When I catch you, Mystra Ch. 3 (Gale of Waterdeep x fem!reader)
Rating: Explicit 18+
Word Count: 4k
Summary: Elminster brings unwelcome news.
Warnings: Smut, TW mentions of suicide
A/N: Alt title: Who's Josh Groban??? Kill yourself!!
Masterlist | Series masterlist
The mountain pass is beautiful. The Rosymorn Monastery trail winds high along the cliffside, where the ground glows gold under the sinking sun. The trees are lush and deep green, the air sharp with pine and cold stone. Everything shimmers warm and unreal in the evening light.
It’s much later than you’d planned to arrive. You hadn’t even left camp until noon today.
Whoops.
Earlier today, you were startled awake by the sound of voices calling out. For a moment, you couldn’t remember where you were - only that you were warm, and had someone’s arm heavy around your waist.
Then you realised it was Gale’s.
He stirred at the same time, blinking at you in the low morning light, both of you half-asleep, confused and perfectly still. The shouts outside grew louder.
“Tav?”
“Where’s Gale?”
Realisation hit.
You exchanged guilty looks that immediately turned into stifled laughter. He hushed you with a kiss, then letting out a soft, wistful exhale, raised his hand and vanished in a shimmer of white light - misty-stepping neatly from your tent into his own, pretending to the others that he was there all along.
Now, you’re keeping a very casual, totally inconspicuous distance. Gale leads the group up front; you, Shadowheart, and Astarion trail behind. The wind whips through the pass, wild enough to keep your voices private.
“Did you sleep well last night?” Shadowheart asks, her smile too innocent to be anything but trouble.
“Wondering if Astarion owes you twenty gold?” you ask dryly.
“Forty, actually,” she replies, pleased. “Double or nothing.”
Astarion pouts. “Our dear wizard was curiously absent this morning, until he appeared out of nowhere, apparently... Well, perhaps that old vagabond knows where he spent the night.”
Who?
You follow his gaze. Sure enough, Gale is up ahead, arms folded as he talks to a wizened old man dressed in royal blue and crimson robes, his silver beard gleaming in the sunset.
“What’s that about?” Shadowheart wonders aloud.
When you reach them, Gale looks flustered - half-impatient, half-defensive. The old man, by contrast, seems perfectly at ease.
“This is Elminster,” Gale says, by way of exasperated explanation. “One of Mystra’s Chosen.”
Your eyebrows lift. “Elminster?” You extend a hand, grinning despite yourself, your lute strap slipping down your shoulder as you practically leap forward. “It’s not every day one meets the hero of countless ballads in the flesh.”
Elminster’s eyes light up. “Ah! A minstrel by trade - I can always tell!”
You beam. “Guilty as charged!”
Gale looks as if he’d like to sink into the ground. Elminster, meanwhile, claps his hands together. “Tell me, my dear - which is your favourite?”
“I’ve always loved The Day the Dragon Woke in Flame.”
“Excellent choice!” Elminster declares. “Old but hearty. And rife with flourishing choices - not unlike myself.”
“Yes, yes, yes,” Gale cuts in, barely containing himself. “This is all very well and good, but you were saying you came all this way on my behalf?”
“She sent me, Gale,” says Elminster, his tone softening. “You know of whom I speak.”
Gale stiffens. “But why? Out with it, Elminster. Please.”
The old man’s eyes twinkle. “Young man, has your sojourn away from Waterdeep washed away your decorum as well as your patience?”
Gale groans quietly, bristling. You can see the protest forming on his lips. Before he can speak, your hand finds his forearm. The touch is meant to steady him, a gentle warning, but the moment your fingers brush his skin and you feel the warmth of him, something coiled beneath him tenses.
It affects you too, the memory of last night surfaces unbidden - the brush of his lips, his voice in the dark, the quiet thrill of the secret between the two of you.
You let go too quickly, pretending to brush something from his sleeve.
“Gale,” you say with forced evenness. “We’re about to make camp. Perhaps you should find Elminster some bread and wine.”
Gale looks at you, taken aback. “Now?”
“Yes,” you say with pointed sweetness. “Now.”
Elminster perks up instantly. “And cheese!”
“And cheese,” you echo, smiling warmly at him before flicking a look back to Gale - the kind that says do it.
Gale exhales through his nose, visibly reining himself in. “Of course. Bread, wine, cheese,” he mutters, and moves to stalk off toward the others, already emptying bags and assembling tents.
You catch his hand before he can go. Just a small tug - enough to stop him, not enough to draw attention. Elminster is setting himself up on a tree stump with the slow ceremony of age, already reaching for his pipe.
Gale turns, businesslike, but it melts away when he sees the expression on your face.
Your fingers tighten around Gale’s, and you tilt your head to kiss him. It’s quick, almost nothing, affection disguised as a whisper. But it’s enough to make his fingers twitch like he might reach for your waist.
By the time Elminster glances your way again, you’ve already stepped back. Gale looks dazed, the corner of his mouth still curved in surprise.
You smile as though nothing happened, turning your attention towards gathering firewood. Out of the corner of your eye, you watch Elminster settle in, his bright, old eyes scanning the camp - assessing, measuring.
Elminster may be all genial smiles and twinkling eyes, but he’s Mystra’s creature. Every word he hears, every glance he observes, will be carried back to her like smoke on the wind.
So you smile, you nod, you make him feel welcome - and pray that whatever news he’s brought won’t be enough to shatter, well… everything.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Most of the camp is gathered around the campfire, perched on logs and stumps, plates empty, goblets full. The night hums with heat and wine and laughter. Everyone is in good spirits.
Everyone except Gale. The firelight paints everyone else in gold, but him in shadow.
He sits apart, posture impeccable, trying not to fidget with the stem of his goblet. There’s a hum in his chest - not from the orb. It’s dread. Or maybe anticipation.
You pick up your lute.
Of course you do.
Gale feels that tiny shift in the air, the way conversations soften, how people instinctively tilt their bodies toward you like flowers turning toward the sun.
You strum an upbeat prelude and the murmuring peters out.
“Now we’ve all been fed and watered…” you begin, voice honey-soft, almost warm enough to melt the tension in his shoulders. Gale watches the way your eyes brighten - alert, alive, wicked - already spinning some new trouble into the world. “I have a song… and it’s not one the wizards amongst us will have heard before…”
And that’s when longing collides with dread.
Your tone is too sweet.
Your smile too knowing.
Your eyes - gods, that glint. Mischief sharpening like a blade.
Gale’s back stiffens.
Elminster inclines his head. “A song,” he repeats, dry amusement threading through the words.
Gale prides himself, after all, on being articulate, persuasive, deft of tongue and mind. But whenever you choose to wield your charisma you outshine him, outmanoeuvre him, outclass him entirely. Gale might read a room but you - you - tilt its axis.
And this version of you is nothing like the one he knows on quiet mornings.
The you who sits cross-legged on a blanket outside your tent, absentmindedly practicing while Scratch naps beside you. Careful and private with your craft, as though music were something intimate, meant for you and the wind.
But when you perform - when you truly perform - you are someone else entirely.
Even now, he can see it happening: Elminster, Chosen of Mystra, leaning in by a fraction, drawn toward you as though caught in your orbit. As though you are a lodestone and he an iron filing, helpless in your pull.
Gale wants to intervene, to stop you before you do something irretrievable.
He opens his mouth - your name poised on his tongue like a plea.
But you are already beginning.
And he is, as ever, powerless to do anything but allow himself to be drawn in too.
“He’s Mystra’s Chosen, favoured pet,
Her archmage unimpeded,
She gave him power vast and deep…”
Gale lifts his goblet to his lips, thinking that perhaps a song flattering Elminster will cast favour upon him.
“But not where it was needed!”
Gale chokes on his wine and coughs into the sleeve of his robe as the camp’s laughter blooms like wildfire. You barely pause, eyes glinting in the firelight.
“She made him clever, made him wise,
She gave him charms aplenty,
But gods above, dear Mystra sighed…
His staff still fired empty!”
Nine hells, thinks Gale.
“He’d brag his hands could wake the dead,
With magic strong and hardy,
He asked her ‘was it good for you?’...
She merely muttered ‘hardly’!"
The final chord trembles into the dark, lingering like a dare.
For one terrible heartbeat, Gale braces for Elminster’s outrage - a verbal flaying, a lecture on reverence and tact - but instead, the old wizard lets out a wheezing bark of laughter so loud it startles Scratch. Karlach nearly chokes on her ale; Shadowheart hides her grin behind her hand; even Lae’zel’s mouth twitches with reluctant amusement.
Gale just wrings his hands together, lost at sea.
“By the gods,” Elminster wheezes, dabbing at his eyes, “in almost three centuries on this plane, no one’s ever had the gall to sing that one in front of me before!”
“I’ve never heard it either,” Gale mutters, somewhere between wonder and despair.
You flash him that knowing grin, slipping your lute strap off your shoulder. “It’s not the kind of song you’d sing in front of most wizards - unless they were very good humoured, like our dear Elminster.” Your winning smile is all flattery. “You wouldn’t catch me singing ‘The Frog Queen’s Webbed Hole’ in front of Lae’zel, would you?”
Lae’zel glares, her voice low and dangerous. “Mind your tongue if you wish to keep it, istik.”
Elminster roars with laughter again, wiping at his eyes.
“See?” you say brightly, winking at Elminster, who lets out another delighted wheeze.
Gale crosses his arms, the motion tight, self-contained. He isn’t entirely sure why the sight of Elminster so thoroughly entertained unsettles him - only that it does.“Elminster,” he says, his tone sharp enough to cut through the laughter. “Perhaps you could finally explain the purpose of your visit.”
“Gale,” you half-sing his name, splitting into two syllables, in that voice he knows you use when you’re trying to persuade or placate. He doesn’t look at you - can’t, really.
You’re playing your part, softening Elminster, disarming him before he can deliver whatever news he’s carrying.
And that’s what undoes Gale most.
Even now, when you could so easily stay quiet, you’re protecting him instead. Wrapping his pride in your charm like mage armour. He can’t decide whether to thank you, tell you off for interfering or beg you to stop before you make him fall in love with you.
Elminster’s eyes glitter across the firelight - sharp, ancient, knowing. “I’ll speak as plainly as I can,” he says, his voice suddenly dry. “I’m here on behalf of Mystra. The message and the charge I bring you are hers.”
You lean forward slightly, tone polite but edged. “Why didn’t she come herself?”
“Oh, Mystra’s delicate feet are ill-suited for the hardships of the road,” Gale says before he can stop himself, voice sharp with disdain.
Your eyes narrow at him - just barely - but he catches it. He makes a quick mental note never to describe the delicate nature of his ex-lovers feet again.
“You’re to be given a chance at redemption,” says Elminster.
“Redemption?” Gale echoes, disbelief curling around the word. “Mystra would consider… forgiveness?”
Elminster exhales, a sound somewhere between a laugh and a sigh. “She would consider what she considers to be forgiveness.”
You lean closer to listen, and Gale feels a pulse of dread before Elminster even begins to speak.
Mystra has been watching him - watching you all - tracking the Cult of the Absolute with growing concern. She sees the threat they pose, and in her divine wisdom, she has chosen him - her exiled favourite - as the only one capable of stopping them.
Elminster’s words are clear: Mystra offers redemption in exchange for Gale’s life.
He explains that the Netherese orb in Gale’s chest can be harnessed, stabilised. Mystra will give him a measure of control - the ability to detonate it at will, at a moment of his choosing, rather than succumb to its hunger.
“Mystra has granted me the power to stop the clock as it were,” says Elminster, gesturing vaguely toward Gale’s chest. “Until you reach the heart of the Absolute - whatever form it may take - and then, you will be the catalyst that burns it from this world.”
There’s a beat of silence. Then you find your voice. “I’m sorry, Elminster, perhaps I’ve misunderstood. Does Mystra mistake Gale for a smokepowder bomb?”
“For this sacrifice,” Elminster says softly, “he will be redeemed.”
“Redeemed?” you say sharply. “What does it matter if he’s redeemed? He’ll be dead. You can’t seriously expect him to -”
“No,” Gale interrupts. “But I think she trusts me to.”
You turn to him, eyes bright, searching. “Are you actually considering this?”
He doesn’t answer.
Elminster inclines his head. “It brings me no pleasure to say this, my friend. But such is Mystra’s will.” His voice softens with a pity Gale can’t stand. “And now, all that’s left is to bestow the charm that was bid.”
He begins to speak in a language older than the air around them, weaving sigils of light that flicker violet and silver. The Weave hums like a tuning string. A purple glow blooms briefly across Gale’s chest - it feels warm, almost tender - before fading back into the skin.
When Elminster turns to you, his expression gentles. “And to you,” he says, “I commit his care. I count on you to shepherd him well on this strangest of journeys.”
“Why me?” you ask.
His eyes soften. “I think we both know.” His tone gentles further - almost fatherly, though there’s sorrow under it.
You don’t answer. You hold his gaze, spine straight, jaw set. Gale knows you well enough to know that you won’t let this go. He can tell your mind is already whirring.
Elminster nods once - a benediction or a farewell - and then he’s gone, his figure swallowed by shadow and starlight.
Silence settles heavy in his wake. The fire pops. You’re still staring at the place he stood.
And Gale… Gale can feel the faint warmth still pulsing under his skin. Stable. Controlled. For the first time in a long time, he feels like his destiny is his to do as he chooses. Even if he knows the right choice is to sacrifice himself for the greater good.
He should be thinking of what Elminster just told him - what Mystra demands.
Instead, his thoughts betray him.
The stabilised orb means control. It means safety. It could mean… you.
He glances at you, the firelight dancing in your wet eyes. If the orb is steady now - if he can truly master it - perhaps he can finally touch you without fear. Kiss you without death between you.
He shouldn’t think it. Not now. Not after what he’s been asked to do.
But gods, he can’t stop.
You turn to him. He expects fear, even anger. But instead, you only nod - calm, certain.
“There’ll be another solution,” you say.
He can’t bring himself to tell you that it’s not possible.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
When you enter the Shadow-Cursed Lands, there’s little time to give any more thought to Mystra’s proposition. The landscape and his inhabitants demand your full attention - every step, every flicker of shadow threatening to kill you. As long as you keep walking, as long as you’re moving toward Moonrise Towers, you can pretend there isn’t a looming conversation waiting for you and Gale.
After days of travel, the Last Light Inn feels almost holy. The air is foggy, the rooms half-collapsed, but there’s laughter and lamplight and living people. Refugees, Harpers, survivors, and - to your surprise - the tiefling, Alfira.
When you see her, you forget the exhaustion. She pulls you into a friendly hug and the warmth of her, her bright voice, makes something ache in your chest for your life before all of this. She’s just like you - a bard, doing her best to make beauty out of ruin. You’ve spent so long amongst warriors, you never realised how much you missed the company of performers.
She insists on sharing her ale, so you follow her out to the back deck and sit on wooden chairs where the air smells of woodsmoke and river water. You listen to her story. You promise to help her friends trapped at Moonrise Tower.
When she plays The Weeping Dawn, you join in without thinking, your lute weaving under her chords and her singing. The two of you fall into the song easily - not for show, just two singers living through their emotions in the only way they know how.
The song finishes and the tiefling smiles sadly. She takes off her lute and picks up her mug of ale.
You both sit quietly for a few moments as you strum idly, looking out onto the dark river.
“I like that melody,” she remarks. “Something new?”
You nod, barely realising what your fingers have been doing. “I’ve been working on something. I just don’t have an ending. Yet.”
“Well,” she offers, “maybe I can help. Like you helped me with my song for Lihala.”
“The reason I can’t finish it,” you say, “is that the story itself doesn’t have an ending yet.”
She shrugs. “Sing it anyway.”
You glance around. The night air is cool, the murmur of voices from inside softened by the closed doors. “Alright. Since none of my travelling companions are here to interrupt…”
You start to play - the first few notes come soft and low, looping like a thought you can’t let go.
“When I catch you, Mystra, I’ll ask what threads you spun,
To bind a boy within the Weave before his life begun.
You filled his head with lilac fire,
You fed his soul to your desire -
And left him cold, and left him thin,
With nothing but your name within.”
Alfira lets out a low hum, nodding along.
“Oh Mystra, Mystra, cold as stone,
You’ll never love what you have owned.
You have his faith, his discipline,
But now you have abandoned him.
“When I caught you, Mystra, I asked what right you claim,
To make men crawl to kiss your feet and tell them it was praying.
You called it teaching, called it faith,
Then he dared to fall from grace,
I pulled a hand from shadowed void,
And found the man you’d left destroyed.”
By the time you reach the second chorus, Alfira’s eyebrows have lifted.
“Oh Mystra, Mystra, cold as stone,
You’ll never love what you have owned.
You had his soul, you pulled him in,
Now who is left to comfort him?”
“Then you came back, Mystra, to test his heart again,
You told him he must die for you, to prove his faith was plain…”
The last note fades off awkwardly - the verse not even half finished. Alfira’s still watching you, one brow raised, her smile soft but knowing.
“That’s it,” you say finally. “What I’ve got. So far.”
She tilts her head. “So, you don’t know whether he should die for Mystra?”
“Oh, I know,” you say. “But he doesn’t.”
The door creaks open behind you. Gale stands in the doorway.
Alfira’s eyes widen as she takes him in - the robes, the way he looks at you, the faint glimmer of Mystra’s earring at his ear. “Oh,” she says softly. “I see.”
“I hope I’m not interrupting,” Gale says - clearly interrupting. “I was hoping I might steal Tav for a moment.”
Alfira smiles faintly as she rises. “I was just heading to bed. It was good to see you again. But if you want my advice, Tav… people could use a song with a happy ending in times such as these.” She squeezes your hand as she passes before looking at Gale. “Goodnight, Wizard of Waterdeep.”
Gale inclines his head, the faintest colour in his cheeks. “Goodnight, Alfira. Sleep well.”
When Alfira leaves, he hesitates, deciding not to take her empty seat. You can’t bring yourself to look up at him so you lay your lute to rest on the wooden deck. The night hums with crickets and the low murmur of the inn beyond.
He doesn’t speak at first, he waits for the sound of her footsteps to fade completely.
“I’ve wanted to talk to you privately ever since Elminster left,” he admits quietly. “But there’s been precious little time for privacy.”
You stare at the floor, knowing that if you look at him you won’t be able to hold your tongue much longer. As if he knows this - he gets on his knees in front of your chair and takes your hand. You lift your head and his eyes meet yours, a flicker of hope lighting there. “The orb won’t detonate on its own anymore - not unless I expressly will it to. It’s… safe.”
Your eyes narrow. “So that’s why you wanted to speak privately? Because now that you can control your orb, we can have one last night together before you go off and blow yourself to bits?”
His brow contracts in confusion, brown eyes wide - hurt. “Tav, that’s not -”
“You’re going to march off to die for your goddess, but at least I’ll have warmed your bed first?”
He goes very still. “You think that's all you mean to me?”
“You said it yourself - Mystra wants you to detonate the orb.” You hear the childish mocking in your voice when you say her name.
Ignoring the childish intonation, he corrects you gently: “I said she trusts me to make the right choice.”
You shake your head, incredulous. “And what choice are you going to make, then?”
“The one that grants forgiveness,” he says softly. “The only one left to me.”
“Then that’s no choice at all.”
“She’s given me the power to stop the Heart of the Absolute,” he says. His voice breaks slightly on the word power.
“The Heart of the Absolute,” you scoff. It feels like your ribs are closing in around you. “And what of your heart?” you ask. Then, louder: “What of mine?”
“Detonating the orb is the best chance we have to end this. The best change I have to make amends, to wipe the slate clean!”
Your throat aches. “How can you expect me to come to terms with this? An accident I could bear -”
“Forgive me,” he cuts in, something bitter in his voice now, “but you seem more comfortable with me dying by mistake than choosing what to do with my own life.”
“What if there’s another way? One that Mysta hasn’t dictated? If you could just put aside your need for approval -”
“My need for approval?” he finishes for you, his voice bitter now. “That’s rich, coming from the woman who seizes every opportunity to perform for an audience.”
The quiet that follows might as well have been caused by a silencing spell. The moon ripples across the river like an unblinking eye.
“That was harsh, Gale.”
“Tav -”
You stand up, heart hammering. “You didn’t complain about my performance when I was trying to sweeten up Elminster for you.”
Your eyes feel hot and blurry. You can’t look at him without risking opening the dam. You turn toward the inn, stop at the door, hand on the handle, not looking back but knowing he’s still standing there, watching.
“And for the record,” you say, your voice steady though it threatens to break, “I like your slate. Just how it is.”
Then you slip inside, closing the door behind you.
The sound rings out - sharp and lonely - and the heavy silence that follows feels like grief.
When I catch you, Mystra Ch. 2 (Gale of Waterdeep x fem!reader)
Rating: Explicit 18+
Word Count: 4.5k
Summary: The orb inside Gale promises devastation should desire be fully realised. You are tempted by the ruin of it.
Warnings: Smut
A/N: Alt title: The one where Gale ‘Dangerkink’ Dekarios gets out-dangerkinked.
Masterlist | Series masterlist
The morning light is brighter and more golden than you deem fair - the kind of morning the gods might conjure just to make waking up beside the one you love feel more divine. The kind of morning that would normally inspire you to write another love song.
How wonderful it would have been to wake up today in different circumstances.
You linger at the back of the group, strumming absently on your lute. The same melody loops over and over - low, circling - weaving itself into the rhythm of the march.
Astarion strolls beside you, one hand shielding his eyes from the sunlight, coat slung carelessly over his shoulder. When you pause momentarily to adjust your strap and resume playing, he sighs, long and theatrical.
“If I have to hear that song one more time, darling, I may start rooting for the other woman.”
You hit a sour note in surprise, strumming off key with a squeak of fingers on polished wood. “The other woman?”
“The same three chords over and over and over? It’s plainly a song of jealousy, heartbreak… rejection?”
He’s fishing.
“I must be much more talented than I thought if you’re getting all that from three simple chords,” you shrug.
“Or perhaps, I’ve been travelling with the subject long enough to read between the sheet music.”
Your gaze drifts toward the front of the group, where Gale is chatting easily with Karlach, looking perfectly at peace. How could he look so calm, so ordinary, when just last night you were inside his mind? Seeing things that, to you at least, had changed the nature of your relationship. You’d seen yourself inside his tent - the connection between you so vivid that you’d practically felt his hands on your hips, his tongue sliding through your most intimate parts. Surely that meant something.
Unless…
“Do you think he still has feelings for Mystra?” you ask quietly.
Astarion tilts his head, eyes glittering. “Oh, I think it’s more complicated than that. Gale still worships her. And I don’t mean figuratively - he never cast his own religion aside when she discarded him. But romantically? No. Even he’s not that self-destructive.”
Self-destructive. You almost snort at the irony.
“How can you be so sure?”
“I asked him,” Astarion says simply, with a little shrug. “And when have you ever known Gale to lie? The man’s constitutionally incapable of it.”
“He hid the truth of the orb from us,” you remind him.
“For all of five minutes. And that was omission, not deceit. There’s a difference.”
“Well, it doesn’t matter anyway.” You pluck idly at the strings. “I kissed him last night and he basically said sorry, but no thanks.”
Astarion raises a sculpted brow. “And that’s all you did? Kiss?”
You glance at him, cheeks warming. “Why?”
“Come now, it’s important.”
You sigh. “Well… our minds connected - through the Weave. And I saw that he was… well, thinking about me.”
“Your minds? That was it?”
Trying not to give anything away, you nod.
“Ugh,” he groans. “I do owe Shadowheart twenty gold.”
Your head snaps toward him. “You bet I’d sleep with Gale?”
He waves a hand airily. “Oh, don’t be cross. There’s precious little entertainment around here after dark. Speaking of which, might I feed on you tonight?”
You narrow your eyes. Without breaking his gaze, you start to strum the same song again.
“I’ll take that as a ‘no’,” huffs Astarion.
The others are way ahead now, moving through the sunlight. Gale glances back once at the sound of your lute, brow furrowing faintly. You immediately change your tune, and begin playing The Queen’s High Seas. Gale turns back around.
Astarion follows your gaze, a knowing little smile tugging at his mouth. “Oh, darling,” he murmurs. “You really are a glutton for punishment.”
You don’t answer. You just keep playing.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Night settles soft over camp - a quilt of smoke and starlight. The dinner Gale made is long done; the bowls have been scraped clean, the smell of roasted vegetables and herbs still hanging faintly in the air.
Gale sits by the fire, a little apart from the others, hoping the heat will help dry the damp curls sticking stubbornly to his neck. The last traces of blood and dust are gone - washed from his hair, from his hands - as though cleanliness might make him feel whole again.
It had been a hard day. A band of raiders ambushed you on the road north, and he’d watched you fight. For all your self-effacing jokes about being ‘just a bard,’ you moved like someone who had trained their whole life for this. What right did a musician have to swing a sword with such precision? You’d fought with a ferocity that startled him.
No, worse. It stirred something else entirely.
He’d read about it once: how the rush of danger could make one crave other kinds of… stimulation. It had certainly intrigued him but he’d dismissed it as a book written to inflame rather than inform. Now, after watching you cut down man after man with your hair wild and your eyes wilder - he understands it all too well.
He smooths a hand over the scar on his chest and exhales slowly. He’s ready. Or as ready as a man can be when about to risk what little peace he’s built from the scraps of him that still exist.
He rehearses the words in his mind - apology first, closely followed by honesty.
He looks toward you, sitting cross-legged at the entrance of your tent, ink smudged on your fingers as you scribble down lyrics. You pause, bring the quill to your mouth, and absent-mindedly suck the tip.
He stops dead.
Of all the things, it drives him to distraction. The academic in him scolds: a one-way ticket to ink poisoning.
And yet.
He watches your lips close around the nib and his carefully crafted apology scatters like startled birds.
Someone who could listen to this damned work in progress. If only you’d asked the tiefling, Alfira, to join your group when you had last met at the Emerald Grove.
You scribble out your latest lyrics. You hear footsteps. Your quill doesn’t stop moving. You don’t even raise your head.
“If you’re over here to complain about my playing again, you can find another neck to suck on tonight.”
There’s an awkward sort of sigh that makes you glance up.
“Oh! I thought you were -”
“Astarion. Yes.” Gale straightens his robes. “I hope you’re not disappointed.”
“It’s not the adjective I was thinking of, no,” you mutter, flipping over the piece of parchment to hide what you’ve written. “What do you need, Gale?”
“Could we talk? Privately?”
You glance up from where you’re sitting by the tent flap, your lute resting loosely in your lap. “Now?” you echo, a little surprised.
He hesitates, then nods. “If you don’t mind.”
You scoot backwards inside the tent and pat the space beside you.
Gale ducks under the flap. The tent feels smaller with him inside. He lingers by the entrance for a heartbeat before you shift on your bedroll to make room.
“Sit,” you murmur.
He does. His knee grazes yours as he settles, and he exhales, lifting one hand to trace a series of slow, deliberate sigils in the air. Threads of the Weave shimmer to life, violet light twining through the seams of the tent like bursts of starlight.
“Private Sanctum,” he says with quiet satisfaction.
The noise outside cuts off all at once. Even the fire’s crackle vanishes, leaving the space wrapped in a strange, heavy silence.
“They can’t hear us?” you ask, your voice sounding too loud in the stillness.
Gale shakes his head. “No. I’d… rather they didn’t.” He takes a steadying breath. “Because what I’m about to say is - well, it’s utterly mortifying. And if it’s all the same to you, I’d prefer to get through it without interruption.”
You cross your arms, feigning nonchalance. “Go on, then.”
He closes his eyes, as though bracing for impact.
“Tav… I owe you an apology. For the way I handled things last night.” His hands twist together in his lap. “You didn’t deserve my abruptness. I meant to explain, but instead I left you to draw conclusions that couldn’t possibly have been kind.”
He looks down, then back at you - his brown eyes so full of warmth that you dismiss any notion of not hearing him out.
“If the orb in my chest detonates, it will annihilate everything in its wake. I don’t truly know how far the destruction might reach. A mile, perhaps more. Possibly fifty.”
You swallow and nod. You know that.
“However, I haven’t told you about the conditions under which it might trigger.” His voice falters. “For over a year, I have had to exert… extreme restraint. I have denied myself a certain kind of -” he clears his throat and you notice his neck is faintly blotchy, “- physical pleasure. Because should I reach the point of… culmination -”
You blink. “Culmination? Do you mean - ”
“Release,” he confirms weakly. “The orb would react. Catastrophically. And you deserve someone who can give you everything you need, without fear of what it might destroy.”
“Gale,” you sigh, “not a day goes by when we’re not in mortal peril. I don’t care about the danger. If anything -”
You stop yourself, feeling warmth creep up your neck. Gale lifts his head up, alert.
“If anything, what?” he asks.
“I mean… I once read a book on the effects a brush with danger can have on one’s desires -”
“- for other forms of stimulation,” says Gale, finishing the sentence at the exact same time.
The atmosphere shifts. A beat passes - silent, suspended - before you both realise what you’ve just said, and how very in sync you were saying it.
“You’ve… read that book too?” Gale asks at last.
“Well, not intentionally,” you admit, worried he’ll quiz you on its contents. “I was just looking for the diagrams.”
Gale pauses - and then laughs. It’s small at first, startled out of him, and the sound is so unlike his usual careful composure that it pulls a laugh from you too. Within moments, you’re both laughing harder than you should, shoulders shaking.
When the laughter finally ebbs, the quiet that follows feels charged in a different way. You’re still smiling when your eyes meet, and for a heartbeat, neither of you looks away.
“Gale… when I saw inside your mind…” Your breath falters. “Before then, I never imagined someone like you wanting someone like me. You think you don’t deserve me because we can’t - because it isn’t safe. But I don’t care about what you can give me.”
You swallow, voice going soft.
“I just… like being around you. That’s enough.”
He looks at you, almost incredulous, then lets out a breath of disbelief.
“When I met you,” he begins, his voice barely above a whisper, “I was drowning in solitude. My only company was Tara and my own mistakes.” A helpless huff of laughter. “And then - you. I fell through darkness and shadowed void only to end up with you under me and the world above us… and for the first time in months, I felt alive.”
You feel warm - you can’t help it - but the way he’s looking at you leaves no room for embarrassment. Only want.
“I told myself,” he murmurs, “that wanting you was reckless. That one kiss too deep, one touch too long…” He breathes out shakily. “And I could lose control. The orb could make sure the whole world knows exactly how deeply I want you.”
Your pulse thrums at the base of your throat.
His gaze flicks from your eyes to your mouth and back again, like he’s trying to make one final judgement call.
“If wanting you is ruin,” he whispers, “then ruin and I are already well acquainted.”
Then carefully - as though the moment itself were breakable - he cups the back of your head and kisses you.
Slow, deliberate, dangerous.
Everything else disappears. Every self-doubting thought you’ve had in the last day - obliterated.
The world narrows to the warmth of his mouth, the scratch of his beard against your chin, the sound of your own heartbeat thundering in your ears.
It’s so loud you almost swear you can hear what it’s saying: He wants you. He wants you. He wants you.
He’s risking everything. His life, your life, the lives of everyone in camp - just for this kiss.
It’s reckless. It’s stupid.
It’s really fucking hot.
The thrill hits you low and sharp, heat twisting tight in your stomach.
He eases you back onto the bedroll, moving over you with reverence and hunger tangled together. His hand finds the laces of your shirt - fingers you’ve watched shape lightning and summon storms are suddenly clumsy, trembling, trying so hard not to be greedy.
He pushes your shirt aside, exposing your chest and his breath hitches - a low sound that makes your pulse jump. You feel his gaze on your skin, and for a moment it’s almost unbearable, the quiet of it.
“Gale,” you whisper. “Are you sure?”
His eyes meet yours - dark, wild, beautifully wrecked
“Please,” he murmurs. “I’m around ninety-nine percent certain I can control myself,” he says, his voice rough at the edges.
“I - I like those odds -” you stammer.
When he flicks his tongue across your nipple it’s careful at first. Then not careful at all.
You almost choke when your breast is enveloped in soft heat as he opens his mouth around your nipple, his tongue sliding over you so devastatingly gently. The tip of his tongue dances around your sensitive skin with no intention of rushing. It’s so wonderful that you let out an impatient little whine, anticipating what his mouth would feel like elsewhere.
“If you keep making sounds like that, our odds will become significantly worse,” says Gale but his expression is playful. “I’m afraid you’ll just have to endure being adored at this rather careful pace.”
Breathing suddenly feels like an impossible task.
He peppers kisses down your jaw, your neck and then your sternum. Each kiss as soft and slow as if you were made of something precious. Your skin prickles, goosebumps rising when his lips meet the new territory of your torso.
When he reaches your lower stomach, he lets out a low hmm that makes your insides clench so violently that your abdominal muscles twitch.
Another kiss, slower, lower. He must sense your impatience because he says; “If I am thorough, it is only because I refuse to miss a single detail.”
Warmth pools between your legs at these words. Gale pauses, hooking his fingers under the waistline of your trousers and pulling them off. He kneels, leaning down to kiss you over your undergarments.
“I know I can’t touch you,” you say quietly, “but… can I at least see you?”
He exhales a laugh, warm and careless, before nodding. He leans back and pulls his purple tunic over his head. Your gaze catches first on the scar, the place where the orb resides - an awe-inspiring reminder of everything he carries. But even that pales beside the sight of his chest.
Gods. Why would a wizard have any reason to look like that? You’ve seen him wield a heavy quarterstaff in battle, yes, but still - you hadn’t expected all that careful muscle beneath the layers of cloth and eloquence.
You forget, for the second time this evening, how to breathe.
Dark hair dusts his chest and traces down over the firm ridges of his stomach, leading down to his waistband. You swallow, unsurprised to find that you’re literally salivating.
He catches your stunned expression. For a moment you expect him to launch into a lecture about the practical benefits of exercise for spellcasters.
Instead, he only gives a small shrug, as though embarrassed to be the focus of your gaze. He knows how he looks, of course - but the faint colour in his cheeks tells you he hasn’t been seen like this - not for a long time.
But Gale doesn’t dawdle on the point. He carefully removes your underthings, pulling them down your knees - you lift your calves so he can take them off. He shifts, adjusting his body to settle between your open legs, catching the backs of your knees and gently pushing them apart.
You suppose you must present quite a pathetic vision - face flushed and an extremely obvious slick between your legs that only seems to feel warmer and wetter, the longer you look at him. You must look completely -
“You really are the most beautiful sight,” he murmurs, running a flat palm across your inner thigh. “I’ve been thinking about seeing you like this every day since we met.”
Oh.
Everything pulses molten hot as he pauses, just taking you in. You look up at the canvas ceiling, feeling your face burning hot - this is deeply personal, the way he gazes at you from between your thighs.
His breath, warm and steady, ghosts over your pussy as his thumbs gently glide over your slick folds, exploratory in their touch. A sound breaks from him, low and fervent, almost a groan of gratitude at being granted this closeness, when the pads of his thumbs part your soaked lips.
“You have no idea how long I’ve dreamt of knowing what you taste like,” he murmurs.
And then your thoughts are cut off by your breath sucking sharply through your teeth, when a soft, wet heat eagerly envelopes your clit. He hums low in his throat as he tastes you for the first time, readjusting his grip to push himself closer.
The sound that escapes you is shameless, the sort of noise you’d occasionally hear while performing in the seedier taverns - the ones with brothels just upstairs.
It almost burns with how fucking good it feels. Gale’s soft mouth burns hotter than the Grymforge - his velvet tongue slipping between your folds, and swiping over your clit.
You back arches to allow you closer. You’re already too eager, doing too much to chase it - tightening, holding, refusing to let go - until you’re certain his exquisite mouth won’t abandon you, won’t leave you shattered and unfinished, a ruin by yourself.
Your journey since the Nautaloid has hardly been conducive to taking care of your own needs lately - responsibility for saving the world dispelled your attempts of self pleasure. And being in such close proximity to Gale has made your pent up frustration even less bearable.
You needed this. You really fucking needed this.
“Gale…? Oh -” Your words come out more urgent than you’d intended but you need him to understand. “Don’t - don’t stop… Please.”
But then, instead of responding verbally - as quick as a cantrip - Gale just slips two of his thick fingers through your folds, curling deep inside you.
You think you might burst into flames. Your teeth sink hard into your lower lip, the only way to stifle the sound rising in your throat.
Your chest burns and your lungs ache as you rock yourself to try and encourage his pace, but his other hand is wrapped around your thigh, holding you against his face and keeping your hips steady.
Your breath comes shallow and uneven, yet he remains steadfast, his fingers and tongue working in purposeful harmony - a steady drum beat coaxing out pleasure from your deepest parts.
He’s maddening in his patience. It makes something in your chest ache so sharply you could almost weep.
You can feel the thrum of your orgasm, rearing its head deep in your core. Your toes flex and your thighs tighten as if someone has cast chain lightning. The air itself seems to crackle in anticipation.
You risk a glance at his face and immediately wish you hadn’t. Gods, he’s devastating. That strong, angular nose only makes his features more striking while his dark hair, pulled back from his face, draws your eyes to the breadth of his shoulders. His chest is close enough that the heat of him washes over you, dizzying.
His eyes are closed in reverent pleasure as his tongue works across your clit in a way that makes your hip jump involuntarily, almost out of his grip. His hold on you tightens and your release takes you by surprise - a firebolt to a barrel of gunpowder - the second Gale’s wrecked groan meets your ears.
White hot bliss stabs through you, launching you headfirst into ecstasy. You whimper as you writhe hard against Gale’s tongue, feeling his fingers hooking into your deepest pleasure, scorching pleasure quickening through your veins.
You cum. Hard.
It surges through you like uncontrolled arcana, a resonance that drowns out every other sense. It arcs down your spine in blinding currents, brighter and more explosive than any lightning conjured by hand.
It’s overwhelming. Unprecedented in its power. But no… that isn’t true, is it? You’ve seen him before, in battle, wielding magic as though it answered only to him. You should have known he’d be just as devastating between your legs. Your clit is pulsing and swollen, and he keeps you firmly in place as you writhe desperately through the aftershocks on your bedroll.
Gale tilts his chin back to look up at you and the slick sound his tongue makes leaving your clit makes you clench and tighten around his fingers, still pressing against that sweet spot inside you.
“Gods… you’re exquisite,” he breathes, his voice roughened by wonder. “If the world would grant me more indulgence… let it be this.”
Your back arches when his mouth finds you again, sucking and swirling on your clit. His fingers press into you, pulling the orgasm from you just as steadily as the first. Your inner muscles contort around him, gripping and squeezing his index and ring fingers. Your thighs go rigid - when another pulsing, debilitating wave of bliss rises high in your chest, pushing all the air out of your lungs.
And then there’s another drop.
You fall apart again. Your fingers rake through his hair and you let out a sob somewhere between his name and a prayer. You’re glad he cast a ward because you’d never be able to show your face around your other companions if they could hear the way you’re crying out for him.
He lifts his head to look at you again, your pussy still spasming uncontrollably as he slowly wrings the last waves of pleasure from you and withdraws his fingers. “So beautiful,” he murmurs, dark brown eyes almost black with his blown out pupils.
He props himself up on one elbow, his fingers tracing gentle lines across your pussy as he drags your arousal across your clit. “I always say that any experiment must be repeated at least thrice to ensure accuracy. So -” his eyes drink you in, dark with reverence, “- shall we test it again?”
“You don’t - “ you swallow, “- you don’t need to keep doing this just to impress me, Gale.”
“Don’t mistake me, Tav. This isn’t performance. It is indulgence. My own. If you imagine otherwise, you do me a grave disservice.”
You swallow. Gods. He’s taking his pleasure in your pleasure. This is art for art’s sake.
He dips his head again - you’re already on the precipice between overstimulation and raw pleasure. Every nerve pulled taut with anticipation. It coils inside you, sharp and electric, as though you’re standing beneath a stormcloud, waiting for lightning to strike. Your whole body trembles. “Gale, I - I don’t think I can take it,” you plead, breath ragged.
His gaze softens, though his command does not falter. “Just one more, darling. Please.”
Darling.
It’s familiar to your senses. Something triggers in your memory.
Then the vision that you saw in the Weave echoes in your mind.
This is his deepest desire - the one he tried to push back into the corners of his mind. And who are you to deny it now that he has the opportunity to live it with you?
But tonight he has reneged on his word again and again. And again. And again.
“Onec more, beautiful girl.”
“Please… I have to see you do that again, so I can commit it to memory.”
“I promise after this one, we can rest.”
He loses track of time. His promises are empty words - he changes his mind every time he looks up at you from between your legs.
All of his self restraint is concentrated on not succumbing to his own release - he doesn’t have any spare to tear himself away from you.
He can’t get enough. Every time he thinks about stopping, every time he pulls his fingers out, he ends up slipping them into his mouth to taste you, before returning them back to your dripping cunt just so he can watch you cum for him again.
There’s just something so deliciously hedonistic about making you fall apart so completely. It’s a privilege to be the one who has made you a trembling mess on your bed roll - thighs glistening, hair disheveled, legs so weak that he has to physically readjust them for you.
He can’t remember the last time he experienced this with another mortal being. Was it always this intoxicating? Or is it that the taste of you is particularly addictive?
The time in his tower was the blink of an eye compared to spending these past few weeks wanting to know how you taste everywhere and having to deny himself the opportunity.
Touch, taste, scent, sound are almost overwhelming in their immediacy. This is different to what he’d known before solitude. With his goddess.
You are different.
You are warmth and heartbeat and music. Every sense of his is alive again, every nerve remembering what it means to feel. The nearness of you is almost unbearable in its clarity.
“Gale… Gale…” you gasp. How he adores the sound of his name on your lips. Your pleading stirs more in him than any ballad ever could.
“Shh, I know, my love. I know,” he soothes. “You’re doing beautifully well.”
“No, Gale -” You reach down to cup his face. “I think I see sunlight.”
The dawn.
With effort, Gale gently withdraws his fingers from inside you, sits back on his knees and follows your gaze to gaps at the bottom of your tent. He looks back at you, lying there with your heavy lidded eyes and legs ready to collapse.
“I really didn’t want this to end,” he whispers solemnly.
“It’s not going to end. Now, c’mere.”
He hesitates for half a heartbeat, as if committing every detail of you to memory, then gathers you into his arms. You settle against him, your head finding the hollow of his shoulder, his chin resting lightly atop your hair. Your weight is solid, nestled perfectly against him.
He stretches out his legs. “Next time, I’ll conjure up a bed. My knees aren’t what they once were,” he says.
You laugh. “I’d welcome that. My back has been better days. Although I do love sleeping under the stars.”
Your hand rests on the scar on his chest.
“I do wish I could return the favour.”
“Your pleasure is more than enough to sate me for a lifetime,” he murmurs, lips against the top of your head. He inhales deeply, taking in the smell of your hair.
The horizon brightens, turning the world a hazy gold. Your breathing slows, evening out against his chest. He doesn’t dare move. The dawn light catches in your hair, turning strands different colours, and for a moment he forgets entirely about the orb, about destiny, about doom.
He finds himself thinking of the chords you were strumming when you were down by the river and then again today. He never caught the words but he can hear those lamenting chords over and over - almost haunting.
He wonders if you’ll play in major key the next time you play your lute.
His arm is numb beneath the weight of you. A tightness blooms in his shoulder from holding so still.
It makes him feel gloriously, painfully human.
Mortal in the best possible way.
No power. No perfection. Just a man bearing a little discomfort to keep joy from slipping away too soon.
He shifts just enough to keep you resting against him. And as the first light spills fully across the countryside, Gale of Waterdeep closes his eyes - not because he’s tired, but because he wants to remember this.
He wants to remember that right now, for the first time, he feels content that he is enough.
When I catch you, Mystra Ch. 1 (Gale of Waterdeep x fem!reader)
Rating: Explicit 18+
Word Count: 5k
Summary: The Weave connects you. The moment feels intimate. But what if you pushed inside Gale's mind instead of opening yours?
Warnings: Smut, a little bit of sex pollen but not really
A/N: New dork on my brain. First time writing bg3 or Gale so please excuse any world-building inaccuracies.
Masterlist | Series masterlist
A dark amber liquid burns inside the familiarly shaped bottle. The label reads Potion of Healing - recognisable, trustworthy… or so it would seem. Yet the warmth of the liquid heats your palms in a way that feels decidedly unusual.
Curiosity pricks at you. You tug the stopper free with a satisfying pop and lift the bottle toward your lips.
The sound is enough to draw the attention of the only travelling companion who lingered behind to help you rummage through a long-abandoned cart at the roadside for supplies. Gale of Waterdeep straightens, brushing dust from the front of his amethyst robes and discarding the burlap sack he was inspecting.
“I sincerely hope you’re not about to drink that,” Gale says at once. There’s a sharpness to his voice beneath his usual joviality. “Respect is hard-won, you know, and I would forfeit a great deal of mine if you insisted on treating an unidentified potion as an evening cordial.”
“Coming from the man who eats magical boots to stop himself exploding?”
It’s a careless joke - the kind you make when you start to become familiar with someone.
You think back to a few nights ago, when he told you the truth about the orb. How he’d knelt before you by the fire and guided your hand to his chest. You’d felt the faint, rhythmic glow of the Netherese orb beneath his skin - warm, fragile, alive. You’d forgotten to breathe.
The only other time you’d felt that breathless was when you’d plunged your hand into a mysterious void and pulled out a very handsome - but slightly blustering - wizard.
Sincerity has never been your strong suit. You write songs about it, sing it for others - but face to face, it slips sideways into humour.
Jokes are safer.
They say I like you without the terrifying part where you admit it out loud.
Still, you’re not entirely sure how a man who’s spent years in a tower talking to a cat might handle your particular brand of affection.
“Well, quite.”
Gale’s eyes crease at the corners, his mouth tugging into a wry smile. Relief hits you like sunlight.
“And if anyone knows the consequences of such decision-making, it’s me,” he continues, dry as parchment. “Now, hand it over, before you join my dubious ranks.”
You hold the bottle out to Gale, pointing at the label with mock offence. “You wound me. It’s clearly identified here - on the label.”
“Then I may lose even more respect for you than I thought possible,” he replies, smoothly plucking the bottle from your hands. He holds it up to the setting sun, the liquid glowing ominously. “If you can’t tell that some scoundrel has decanted gods-know-what into an empty healing phial, then your faith in labels is… well, charming, if a little naive…”
His words begin flowing with quickening energy. He’s in his element, detailing the hazards of repurposed potion bottles - grisly mishaps that could befall the unsuspecting amateur potioneer.
You wonder if he realises how handsome he looks when he’s like this - how his words tumble faster when he’s animated, how the low evening sun catches in his hair, how utterly alive he seems when explaining something he thinks you ought to know.
“Tav?” he asks suddenly. He’s watching you now with a furrowed brow, concern softening his voice. “My company can’t be that unbearable, can it? Do me the courtesy, at least, of not drinking mystery potions as some elaborate excuse to be rid of me.”
Heat rushes to your cheeks. Gods, he thinks you’re bored. That your silence is irritation rather than… this. A lovesick ache sinking low in your stomach.
“No, I’m listening!” you reply hastily. “What is it, then? The potion?”
Gale swirls the liquid inside the bottle as though it were a fine wine, examining the way it clings to the glass. He closes his eyes and lifts it delicately to his nose.
Gods, he has a nice nose.
You briefly think about what it’d be like to sit on it.
But you’re distracted from your own little distraction the moment he inhales. His eyes fly open, a flush creeps up his neck, betraying him before he can school his features.
“Where’s the stopper?” he asks, a little too quickly.
“Why? Is it dangerous?” you counter, though you can’t help noticing the way colour has bloomed from his neck right across his cheeks.
He reaches for the cork in your hands, fingers brushing yours in his haste. “Dangerous? That depends on one’s definition. Let us just say it is… an hindrance.”
Your brows lift as you pull your hand back - keeping the stopper out of his reach. “Well? What is it then?”
His lips press into a thin line. He seems to search for a dignified phrasing, settling on, “A Draught of Reckless Ardour. Alchemical mischief of the lowest order.”
“Reckless Ardour?” you repeat. “Like, enthusiasm? So we could use it in battle?”
“Er, no.” He clears his throat, his eyes flick to the rest of your group who are off in the distance, setting up camp by the river. “Not that sort of ardour. Let’s just say it’s not the sort of thing we should consume in mixed company.” His eyes land on you and he blurts, “Er - any company - I mean. And we definitely shouldn’t - shouldn’t consume it.”
He moves for the stopper again, but you’re quicker. Your swift hands take the potion from him and you hold it out of his reach..
“I want to make sure I know what it smells like,” you tease, “so I can identify it again in future.”
You hold the open bottle under your nose as he did.
“No, wait, Tav! Even the fumes can -”
The words dissolve as you inhale.
Time fractures. Your heart slams against your ribs. Your pupils flare as your eyes lock with Gale’s, the bottle caught between you.
The scent is not bright fire and spice as you’d expected from the physical heat. It’s dark. Heady. Musky. And achingly familiar. It reminds you of the way Gale smells in close quarters after battle, sweat and arcane crackle still clinging to his skin.
Your lips part. For one reckless, impossible moment you crave nothing but more.
The potion beckons you. Just a taste.
A single drop rolls from the rim down the neck of the bottle.
Slowly, defiantly, you drag your tongue along the neck of the bottle. Your lips rest on the rim.
Gale stares. His breath catches - audibly. His eyes widen with astonishment, the flush on his cheeks deepening. For one stolen heartbeat, he is utterly, devastatingly undone.
Then, he pulls himself together..
He wrenches the bottle and cork from your hands, jams the stopper into the neck, and shoves it into his bag with near-violent finality. Time snaps back to its ordinary rhythm. You blink, reeling, still tasting the musk of him on your tongue.
“You licked it,” he manages after a few moments of stunned silence. “That is something that happened.” His voice is stern but low, thick. His shoulders are rigid, his eyes everywhere but on you. “I need some air.”
Before you can point out that you’re already outside, he spins on his heel, striding down the slope toward the camp with long, purposeful steps. His hand clasps the satchel where he buried the bottle, as if keeping it caged will also contain the furious heat still written across his face.
You watch him go, the campfire’s smoke curling into the evening sky ahead of him. Only then does the flush creep into your own cheeks, mortification flooding in where boldness had burned only moments ago.
You hadn’t meant to… Gods, why had you licked it? His expression - shock melting into something else - flares unbidden in your mind.
You force out a breath, shake your head, and follow after him towards camp, heart still thrumming too fast as your lute jostles against your back with each step.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The campfire crackles, throwing sparks into the black sky, and the others are already working their way through bowls of stew.
You’re nowhere to be seen and you haven’t eaten supper. As the camp’s designated cook, this worries Gale far more than he cares to admit. He jokes to himself that he isn’t sure which cuts deeper: the prospect that you had taken a disliking to him, or to his cooking.
But he dreads one of those possibilities significantly more than the other.
He had been harsh with you earlier. Too harsh, perhaps. But what in the Nine Hells were you thinking, putting an obviously mislabelled potion to your lips when he specifically told you not to? Do you not know he always has your best interests at heart?
Well… almost always.
If he were honest with himself, there were selfish reasons to stop you drinking that potion too.
If you started begging for him, professing your love, and all of it only alchemy, it would have been a cruelty he could not bear. To hear those words, to taste that desire, and know it was false… he couldn’t risk putting himself through that.
And then, as if to torment him, you - well - you did that thing with your tongue. A jape, of course. You are laughter and sunlight and music all at once, and he’s ruined by it - undone in ways no spell or goddess ever managed. Did you see it in his eyes? How much it undid him?
Of course you did. You see everything. That’s what makes you such a fine songwriter - the way you notice the tremor in a voice, the glance that lingers too long. You write love as if you’ve studied it all your life, and yet you’ve never sung a verse that sounds like him.
No, with him it’s always laughter. Friendly warmth. The kind you give to a companion, not a lover. Which means, surely, you’ve seen the truth in him - and simply chosen not to return it.
So he stuffed the potion bottle into his bag, and tried to suppress it. And with it tried, foolishly, to suppress his feelings for you.
The bard.
Not the creator of cold, distant chords of the universe, but the composer of harmonies: warm and human and real.
Not a goddess demanding reverence, not a figure who loved him for his power.
Someone who talked to him like he was an ordinary man.
Gale thought he had given his heart once, to divinity itself, and that it had left him hollowed out. He thought he could never love again.
But now he is not so sure.
Because you are the melody he cannot silence.
And yet, he knows he is far less than what you deserve. You deserve someone whole - a man unburdened by catastrophe, not one carrying the end of times in his chest.
The wizard sealed himself away in his tower for nearly a year, because he knew a whole life was a luxury he could no longer afford. He has even trained himself to suppress his own desires, to deny every tremor of want because his surrender - the moment of his release - would detonate the Neterese orb within him, and with it, devastation.
You deserve love in its entirety: touch without fear, closeness without consequence.
And yet, almost every night since he met you, he dreams of yielding.
In his dreams it’s almost worth it.
He dreams of the sound of your sweet voice whispering his name. The press of your breath against his throat. The beat of your heart beneath his lips. The heat of your pulsing clit under his tongue. The squeeze of your cunt around his cock.
The decimation of you and everything in a ten mile radius when he succumbs to his pleasure.
No.
Even if you returned his feelings he would never allow it.
He could not.
“Strange. You usually ask us what we think of your cooking… distracted tonight, Gale?” Shadowheart’s tone is mild, but her eyes are knowing.
Gale looks up from his bowl, blinking as though startled out of a reverie.
Astarion doesn’t even bother to glance up from the tome he’s idly thumbing through. “So,” he drawls, “how is your sad, hopeless pining going?”
“I’m hardly pining,” Gale replies at once, a touch too sharply. “It has been a year or more since Mystra cast me aside.”
Astarion’s lips curl, laughter bright in his voice. “Oh, my dear wizard. I wasn’t talking about Mystra.”
For once, Gale is lost for words. The silence stretches, filled only by the fire’s crackle and the unmistakable exchange of knowing looks among his companions.
“If you’re looking for Tav,” Shadowheart adds gently, “she’s washing her things down by the river.”
“I wasn’t -” Gale begins, flustered.
“Just go, soldier. Tell her how you feel. With words,” beams Karlach, practically bouncing with encouragement.
“I wish it were that simple,” Gale sighs.
They exchange looks.
Gale knows they think him shy - or perhaps still entangled in thoughts of Mystra. But how does one explain the precariousness of his condition without inviting alarm? He could argue, could protest, but what would be the point? The only person who could ever understand is you.
With a quiet huff of resignation, he rises to his feet.
“Twenty gold says they fuck down there,” Astarion says, watching him leave.
“I’ll take that bet,” says Shadowheart.
Gale doesn’t need the Weave to divine the outcome. Shadowheart’s about to make some easy coin.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The cold river is exactly what you needed to wash away your lingering embarrassment. You’d only meant to rinse your armour and underclothes, but the clear, cool water against your skin was too tempting. Before long, you’d stripped bare, leaving your camp clothes folded on a nearby rock while you waded in.
Of course, bathing brings Gale to mind. It always does these days - and not for the reasons you’d hoped. Weeks ago, after a long and punishing march, he’d made some offhand sarcastic remark about how he liked your ‘musk’ and questioned the last time you had bathed. Since then, you’ve made a point of washing at every available opportunity with the soap you’d looted from the bathhouse at Waulkeen’s Rest, if only to deny him the chance to needle you again.
No matter what you do, you feel small beside him. Words are supposed to be your gift - your livelihood. Yet every time Gale opens his mouth, it’s as though he’s speaking from a library you’ve never been allowed to enter. Every phrase elegant, his vocabulary precise. His mind is a maze and you stumble, blindly feeling for the edges just trying to keep up.
You sink lower into the water, as if it could quiet the way you ache for him to look at you.
Mystra’s prodigy. An archmage. A man chosen by the gods themselves.
And you - what are you? A performer. A distraction. Someone who can put on a persuasive act to escape from the occasional tight spot.
How could you, a travelling lute player miles beyond their depth, compete with his ex, the goddess Mystra?
And yet, she left him with the orb in his chest. Left him to lock himself away, afraid of what he could do. Surely a goddess as powerful as Mystra could have simply stabilised the orb? If she ever truly loved him she would not have wanted to see him suffer.
You frown.
“When I catch you, Mystra…” you mutter venomously. The name feels sour on your tongue.
Then it hits you - sudden, furious inspiration.
You surge to your feet, water slapping against your thighs as you wade toward the rock where your clothes lie. Your lute rests on top, and you snatch it up with wet hands, droplets spattering across the wood.
Fingers find the strings before your mind catches up. You strum a few tentative notes, the sound soft and low against the rush of the river. A mournful tune with a heartbeat to it, the kind of song that sounds half prayer, half curse. And under your breath, you begin to sing:
“When I catch you, Mystra, I’ll ask what threads you spun,
To bind a boy within the Weave before his life begun.
You filled his head with lilac fire,
You fed his soul to your desire -
And left him cold, and left him thin,
With nothing but your name within…”
“Oh! Sorry,” says a surprised voice.
Gale’s voice.
You pull your lute instinctively closer to your naked body, and look up - startled to see Gale on the bank. His head whips to turn away, eyes clamped shut as though the very sight of you might strike him dead on the spot.
“Shadowheart said you were washing your clothes, not… er, well…” he blurts, voice higher pitched than usual, still stubbornly looking anywhere but at you.
“Playing the lute naked?” you laugh. “I’m not sure Shadowheart could have predicted that.”
“I’m terribly sorry. I’ll go.”
“You don’t have to -”
“No, my mother raised a gentleman,” he insists, hands raised like a man warding off a spell as he shuffles backwards, eyes squeezed shut.
A gentleman.
You try and stamp down the small voice that’s disappointed he isn’t interested in seeing you naked.
“Gale?”
He stops his blindly walking backwards. “Yes?”
“You didn’t… you didn’t hear any of that, did you?”
“No!” says Gale, a little too quickly, now covering his eyes with his hands. “I was completely lost in my own thoughts. I had actually come to check if you were well. That draught…” He clears his throat. “The after-effects can linger. Once the feelings of passion have worn off, the ingester can experience a heaviness of spirit. Particularly for those without… a certain constitution.”
Your chest tightens. Of course he’d be untouched by the potion. And you - already undone by a single breath of the stuff.
You force a laugh, but it’s brittle. “I’ll survive.”
You put down your lute and pick up your clothes. He shifts, beside the treeline of the clearing, eyes covered, jaw tight. He looks almost comical - facing the wrong direction of your voice.
“Yes, I imagine you will. Still, I thought it best to be certain. And I wanted to apologise for speaking so harshly earlier. It was only out of… well, clumsy concern.”
He came because he cared. And yet somehow, you feel smaller for it.
He clears his throat once more, still refusing to look. “That potion can make one do things that are out of character. I would hate for you to say things you might later wish unsaid.”
Ah. So that’s it. He doesn’t want to hear it.
He knows it would’ve been cruel for him to let you humiliate yourself by spilling your true feelings out for him at the behest of a potion.
You dress in silence, slowly, your fingers fumbling with the fabric. When you steal a glance at him, your mouth twists into a smile - it’s bordering on absurd, the way he’s standing with his back stiff and his eyes covered tightly as though you might blast him to ash if he dared peek.
You don’t hate that it makes you want him more. But you do hate that wanting him more is even possible. That there’s room in your brain to pine for him further.
“I just… always seem to embarrass myself in front of you. I act foolishly. Impulsively,” you say.
“I like it,” Gale replies, smiling warmly in entirely the wrong direction. “Your spontaneity, I mean. It’s - ah - good for the soul.”
You reach out, hesitating for a heartbeat before placing your hands over his and peeling them away from his face - to let him know you’re finally decent.
He opens his eyes. And when they find you, they’re so warm, so sincerely glad just to see you, that your carefully built walls begin to crumble. Your hands feel cold and small in his.
“I feel so stupid sometimes,” you blurt, the words tumbling out before you can stop them. “Next to you, I mean. I don’t even really understand what the Weave is. You’ve explained it, but -”
But what? That you didn’t listen to his explanation because every word out of his mouth sounded like a melody? That you were staring at his strong hands, his full lips, his brown eyes, while composing a love song in your head? You clench your jaw shut. You can’t admit that.
“The Weave?” Gale repeats, his eyes lighting up, slipping into that tone he reserves for lecturing. “It isn’t so easily grasped. There is nothing quite like it. It’s music -”
“Music?” you interrupt, unable to stop your immediate excitement spilling over.
He never mentioned it was like music.
He smiles. “Oh, yes. Music, poetry, physical beauty - all rolled into one and given expression through the senses.” He hesitates, then: “It would be easier if I simply showed you. Would you like me to?”
Your heart skips. He swallows hard, throat working.
You smile, emboldened. “Yes,” you whisper.
“Then follow my lead.”
It’s only when he looks down that you realise your hands are still in his.
You both freeze. His thumb twitches; you pull back like you’ve touched fire.
“Oh,” you blurt.
“Yes, well -” his gaze darts anywhere but you. “The Weave requires… both hands.”
“Right. Obviously.”
He recovers first, lifting his hands in a graceful flourish. You give yourself a little shake and mimic him, summoning every scrap of bardic performance in your bones.
A purple haze hums between you.
“Now - picture, in your mind, the purest harmony you can.”
Harmony comes easily to you. You allow it to wash over your mind. A shimmering current threads through your senses, weaving not just the song but your breath, your heartbeat, your very thoughts into his.
The Weave connects you.
The moment feels intimate.
You realise the Weave is making you one.
You have but imagine your desire, and Gale will know it.
You pause, trembling.
But when you take a steadying breath and focus on the Weave, you feel something more - the sense of a doorway. A threshold that could be crossed in either direction. You can feel him stepping towards it, that he’s expecting you to invite him into your thoughts.
You can’t let him do that. Gods know what he’d see. The extent of your pining. Your most explicit, toe curling fantasies that you regularly visit before you go to sleep.
But what if you were bold enough to step through the other way and glimpse his mind?
Spontaneity is good for the soul after all.
You push through.
The world tilts. For a heartbeat you feel yourself step through a doorway, across the charged air between you, and into him.
Gale’s mind is fire and silk and static all at once. And there, blinding and undeniable, is the image of him - oh.
As if you’re looking down on the scene from above, you’re inside Gale’s tent. There’s a woman in his bedroll, lying on her back and his face is buried between her legs.
At first, you expect it to be Mystra.
But the woman is not made of starlight and river. She is flesh and blood.
She’s… you.
He’s eating you out. Not cautiously nor with trepidation. His hands grip around your thighs, pulling you flush against his face as though he’s starved for the taste of you.
Everything tingles like you’re somehow connected to the vision version of yourself. Your core tightens, heat pulses below your waist.
The you that’s on your back looks down at Gale with a hazy, heavy expression. “I don’t -” she pants and the words echo in your mind, “I don’t know if I can take it.”
Gale pulls back to kiss her thigh, before looking up with a sincere smile.
“Just one more, darling,” he says. “Please.”
He repositions himself and sinks two thick fingers through her folds.
Her back arches.
Your heart lurches.
But then the Weave ripples, shimmering with tension as Gale blocks you out. You feel like you’re being unceremonially tossed out the back door of a tavern by a burly barkeep.
But instead of landing in the back alley behind a pub, you’re suddenly back on the cold riverbank
Gale stumbles backwards into a tree.
You realise you’re breathing hard, chest rising and falling just like the version of you in his mind. You swallow.
“Gale…” you begin.
“I’m sorry -” he stammers, raking a hand through his hair. “I wasn’t expecting… I thought it would be your mind we were entering… I wasn’t - wasn’t prepared.”
You offer him a lifeline. “Perhaps the potion affected you more than you realised.”
His head whips toward you, eyes blazing and you immediately kick yourself for the suggestion.
“Affected me?” His voice rings, all pride and offence. “Do you truly think I could be undone by some home brewed draught? That it could conjure such… vivid imaginings of you?” His words come sharp, indignant. “No. That was me. Entirely me. My own desire laid bare for you… to see...”
The fire drains from his voice the instant the truth of his admission catches up with him. His mouth snaps shut, as if by doing so he could retract the words, but the damage is done. His eyes widen in dawning horror.
“Gods,” he mutters, almost to himself. “I… I should have just blamed the potion.”
“I’m sorry. It was my fault for pushing into your thoughts - ”
“Please, the blame lies with me. I’m supposed to be a skilled wielder of the Weave. I didn’t mean to subject you to such lewd - to such -”
“I had to push into your mind,” you cut in, the words rushing out, “because I was trying to hide my own thoughts. You think what you showed me was indecent? You should have seen mine.”
He makes an effort to close his mouth, hanging agape. He looks like he’s about to say something. Of course he is. He always has something to say.
“That was truly your own desire and not the effects of the potion?” You ask.
He nods, looking - somehow - pained as he does. Before you allow him to get another word in edgeways, you throw your arms around Gale’s neck and your mouth meets his. For a heartbeat he remains frozen, startled - the kiss is fierce, desperate, everything you’ve been holding back. He makes a muffled sound against your lips, half-surprise, half-longing, before the dam breaks.
His hands seize your waist, pulling you hard against him, and suddenly he’s kissing you back with equal ferocity. All the careful restraint, the scholar’s poise - shattered in an instant. He kisses like a man who hasn’t known touch for too long. His lips parting hungrily against yours, breath hot and ragged.
You clutch at him, the world narrows to the heat of his mouth, the press of his body, the hard bulge digging into your hipbone - something greater than the Weave humming between you.
Your hand trails down his chest and pauses over the orb, its gentle thrum echoing against your fingertips. For a moment, it feels as though the world itself has fallen away. You find the waistband of his tunic with your fingertips -
- and something changes.
The pressure of his hands on your waist falters. He pulls back from the kiss and presses his forehead to yours, eyes screwed shut as though in pain.
When he finally speaks, his voice is rough and low.
“I’m sorry.”
The words twist like a knife - so unexpected after his confession, after seeing directly inside his mind. A lump rises in your throat. You move to pull back too, as if distance might dull the sting, but his hands close around your upper arms, holding you there.
“Please,” he says quickly, voice frayed. “Don’t misunderstand me, Tav. It isn’t that I don’t want to. But you know how… precarious my condition is.”
You throw caution to the wind. It’s time to be sincere. For once.
“We’re both living on borrowed time, aren’t we? I’d rather spend what’s left of mine with you,” you say.
He stares at you - silent, eyes shining with something unreadable. Then finally he screws up his face, as if pushing a great heaviness away.
“The risk is too great.”
Your throat tightens, the air catching there like a held note. You blink hard, but it doesn’t stop the sting behind your eyes. You nod - too quickly, too many times - because it’s that or let the silence swallow you whole.
“Well,” you say with forced bravado - and slightly higher pitched than usual, “I should’ve listened to my mother - never pour your heart out to a guy who might set off prematurely. Though I'm not sure she was talking about a Netherese Orb - ha!”
“Tav…” Gale says softly, looking more concerned now than ever.
“And I just realised I haven’t eaten dinner!” You clap your hands together like that settles it and turn on your heel.
“Wait, please let me -”
But you’re already striding back up the muddy path towards camp. You pass your companions without meeting their eyes, heat burning up your neck. By the time you reach your tent, your chest aches from holding everything in place.
You duck inside, let the flap fall closed, and the sound that leaves you isn’t quite a sob - more a gasp cracking under pressure. You sink down, pull your knees to your chest, press your palms against your eyes as if that might stop the tears.
Finders Keepers Epilogue (Cormac McLaggen x fem!reader)
Rating: N/A
Word Count: 1.7k
Warnings: Alcohol
Summary: Quidditch World Cup Final 2014: Brazil v Bulgaria
A/N: Whether you've been here since April 2023 or just found it - thanks for reading.
Masterlist
Epilogue
11th July 2014
The outside of the VIP marquee is draped in Bulgarian red, and the inside is illuminated by softly glowing fairy lights, hovering in the empty space of the high canvas ceiling. The Bulgarian team's victory chants are loud and joyous, and the music is booming. As you walk along the red carpet towards the entrance, you can feel the electrifying atmosphere already.
You’re already feeling slightly harassed that you’re so late to arrive but on the bright side, you’ve missed the red carpet photographers - and you’ve dealt with more than enough time in the spotlight this past month.
It’s been an exhausting tournament. Your voice is hoarse from tonight’s final post-match analysis for the Wizarding Wireless Network - still rough around the edges after hours of dissecting referee decisions and last-minute snitch drama. These days, you’re a fixture in the press box rather than on a broom: retired Holyhead Harpies captain, former international Keeper, and one of the last standing members of Dumbledore’s Army.
Not that you ever volunteer that last bit. It’s not a badge you wear, more a scar that never quite faded. And anyway, certain acid-quilled members of the press are much more concerned with another famous scar.
Your head’s still crammed with stats - possession rates, Bludger patterns, average scoring speed under the blazing Argentinian sun. You’ve spent so long analysing the game, you’ve barely had a moment to feel it. One of your best friends just lifted the World Cup, and all you can think about is whether the Brazilian Keeper’s save percentage dipped below fifty in the second half.
You smile to yourself, a little hollowly. Once upon a time, all these cold, hard facts would’ve been perfect for keeping Eddie Carmichael sane in the cell across from yours in Azkaban.
The faded memory - and the stress of the whole tournament - makes the call of a stiff drink irresistible right now.
The security wizards at the tent door recognise you at once, their expressions shifting to professional courtesy as they hold back the canvas, allowing you to slip discreetly inside and head straight to the bar, keeping your head down.
Perched on a gilded bar stool, you order your usual and begin to scan the room. Your heart sinks when a woman in an acid-green cloak catches your eye.
Rita Skeeter.
And worse - the arm she’s clutching belongs to none other than Cormac McLaggen.
Your back stiffens. You hope that they don’t see you. The last thing you want is to end up in their line of sight and be dragged into conversation.
The bartender slides your drink across the bar and you sip quietly, watching them.
From here, you can really see how Cormac's once cocky arrogance has evolved into a capable demeanour, the experience of his years lending credibility to his previous overconfidence. Silver threads weave through his blonde, curly hair, catching the light and marking the passage of time. Rita looks at him adoringly - a familiar part of their usual banter from years of interviews and encounters at the Ministry. She's not immune to his charisma, even now, as she is undoubtedly trying to pry information from him. You can’t hear what she’s saying, but Cormac's smile looks tired, distracted - like a man who’s doing someone else a favour. Probably himself.
You sip your drink, observing them from a safe distance, eventually Rita spots another quarry - Harry Potter - and releases Cormac to pursue a fresh scoop. Relief washes over Cormac's face, and after she flits away, he glances at his watch and scans the crowd.
And then his eyes land on you.
Uh-oh, you think - you’ve been caught staring.
His face breaks into a teasing grin that, sixteen years after the Battle of Hogwarts, makes your stomach flip. As he walks towards you, you don’t break eye contact. He looks good - it reminds you dimly of that heady night when you were both stupid teenagers at Slughorn’s Christmas Party.
“Long time no see,” he says, sliding onto the barstool next to yours.
“McLaggen,” you say curtly, acknowledging him before taking a sip of your drink and savouring the sharp burn of alcohol.
He signals the barman and orders a Firewhisky. “So,” he continues. “What are you doing alone at the Quidditch World Cup after party?”
“I’m supposed to be meeting my husband,” you say. "But it’s been a busy tournament - we’ve been ships passing in the night recently."
“Oh, yeah? Trouble in paradise?”
"What about you? Does your wife know that Rita Skeeter has been hanging over you all night?” you shoot back.
Accepting his drink, he raises it to his lips and replies before taking a sip, "Just needed a bit of Dutch courage before facing the music."
A smirk curves your lips. “Scared of the old ball and chain’s reaction then?”
His expression turns serious, and he places his glass down with a soft clink. “First of all, don’t ever talk badly about my wife. She doesn’t weigh me down, she lifts me up. And I won’t have anyone - not even you - imply otherwise.” He hesitates for a moment. “But yes, I’m bloody terrified because I explicitly promised I wouldn’t give Rita Skeeter any interviews so I’ll have to beg for forgiveness.”
You purse your lips thoughtfully, considering him. “Well, all that ‘lifting you up’ stuff might be a nice place to start. A bit transparent, though.”
“It’s true, though,” he says sincerely. “You do lift me up.”
You can’t help but laugh this time and he takes the opportunity to lean in and kiss you softly.
“Does that mean I’m forgiven?” he murmurs. “I am sorry. But you know how it is. If I brush her off, she’ll write about how the Department of Magical Games and Sports is a disaster and that we couldn’t keep our fans in line, and make us out to be some sort of international disgrace - you know she will. Not to mention talking about how I’ll never live up to my dad.”
“I know - I know. It’s just that Etta’s starting school next year and I’d rather her classmates didn’t know all the details of her parents’ personal life.”
“I promise Rita didn’t even mention you.”
“But she will,” you sigh, fingers circling the rim of your glass. “She always does. Remember when we got married? She wrote that you'd probably developed Stockholm Syndrome. Never mind the fact that the entire D.A. was cleared after the Ministry fell. She ran with that rumour for weeks - claimed I hexed you into proposing.”
“Yeah,” Cormac says, grimacing. “But it was so obviously nonsense that it was funny. Didn’t your dad ask for a framed copy?”
“And it wasn’t just me. Ginny played absolute rubbish the week before her wedding thanks to Skeeter. We nearly got relegated.”
“I know she’s a horror,” he says, softer now. “But Etta’ll be alright. She’s switched on. And let’s be honest - she’ll be in the same year as James Potter at school. Compared to his parents, we’re practically boring.”
You smile at that, leaning your elbow on the bar and resting your chin in your hand. “Can you believe she’s starting Hogwarts in September?”
He exhales slowly, his eyes suddenly faraway. “Not really. I’m going to miss her trying to steal my wand to turn the lighthouse staircase into a giant slide.”
You groan. “That child is too creative for her own good.”
“She gets that from you,” he says, rubbing a hand over his jaw. “She’s going to run rings round everyone at that school.” He lifts his glass again, but hesitates. “For the record, I wasn’t exactly volunteering to flirt with Skeeter tonight.”
You glance at him sideways. “Oh no?”
“No,” he says with a sigh. “I was trying to get her bloody autograph.”
You blink. “I’m sorry - what?”
“For Etta,” he says, tone resigned. “She begged me before we left. Promised she’d be on her best behaviour Grandad McLaggen if I did.”
You stare at him, baffled for a moment - and then burst out laughing. “Well, that sounds like a thinly veiled threat if I’ve ever heard one.”
“Well, quite,” Cormac mutters.
You snort into your drink. “No interest in her broom, but she’s memorised every scandal Skeeter’s ever written. And she’s only just turned eleven.”
“She’s dangerous,” he says fondly. “I’m slightly terrified that we’re raising a Slytherin.”
“As long as she uses her powers for good.”
He pauses. “She won’t.”
“No,” you chuckle. “She really won’t.”
You both fall quiet for a moment, watching the swirl of dancers - Quidditch stars, Ministry heads and old friends. The fairy lights above shimmer softly, casting a warm haze over the tent. You feel his hand find yours beneath the bar.
You soften under his touch. As usual, you can’t stay annoyed for long. “Well, even if Etta doesn’t care about Quidditch, I think you’ve done a great job. Kept our players and our Ministry in line in Patagonia.”
His face twists slightly, half-sceptical, half-grateful. “Even with Skeeter sniffing around?”
“In spite of her, yes. And you shouldn’t care if she thinks you won’t live up to Gregor. Your dad should be proud.”
“He is, actually.” Cormac rolls his glass between his palms. “Though I think it’s mostly because I took a proper Ministry job. Let’s be honest. I was never going to make it as a professional Keeper. This... was a good middle ground. Kept him happy. Kept me useful.”
“It suits you,” you say honestly. “This whole grown-up, competent, department-head thing. Very sexy.”
He lifts an eyebrow. “Very sexy?”
“Don’t let it go to your head.”
“Too late.”
Then he grins. “You know, I remember you once promised me if you ever won the Quidditch World Cup, we’d meet under the stands to fool around like we used to.”
You raise an eyebrow. “I’m not exactly holding a trophy, am I?”
“We could borrow Krum’s?”
You smirk, draining the last of your drink. “Alright then. But we’d better at least say hello to Viktor and Cho before we sneak off. And I want one dance before Rita comes back and starts writing about our tragic estrangement again.”
Cormac stands and offers you his hand.“It would be my honour, Captain McLaggen.”
You take it, and together you step into the golden light, into the music, into the warm, wild blur of celebration.
And for the first time all tournament, you let yourself feel it.
Summary: You try to ignore your feelings for your best friend, Cormac McLaggen. Reader and Cormac are both 18+.
A/N: A Christmas fic! The Sabrina Carpenter-fication of Gryffindor Common Room. I wrote this for @cinderellasmissingshoes but it's been so long she's deactivated (RIP girl). Also, it turns out, anything can be a one-shot if you just post it all at once!!!! And nobody can stop you!!!!!
Masterlist
Chapter text:
The Gryffindor Common Room is a riot of gold and red, as laughter and music fill the room. Even though Quidditch has never been your thing, a team win is always a good excuse to get swept up in the celebration. You’re dressed the part, of course, with a red bow in your hair and wearing a borrowed, oversized Gryffindor training jumper that by a happy coincidence makes the gloss on your lips pop.
The victory has everyone riding high, but as much as you’re enjoying the party, you can't help feeling a little tug of concern for one person. You’re at Katie Bell’s side, amongst the throng of her teammates happily celebrating as the rest of the party-goers chant Ron Weasley’s name but your eyes search the crowd for a certain someone. You excuse yourself - Katie will be fine without you for a few minutes.
Cormac McLaggen hasn’t been at all himself lately. And while Katie is adamant that she considers this to be an improvement, his newfound reservation is just plain weird. Katie told you to stop worrying about Cormac, that he was probably just sulking over not being chosen as Keeper for the Quidditch team this year and that he should just lighten up. And you’d probably agree if the change hadn’t been so drastic - usually so confident, even arrogant at times, he’s been acting almost shy lately.
Cormac’s tall, broad figure and golden halo of curly hair are easy to spot from the other side of the room. He’s half-heartedly chatting with Dean Thomas, who, like Cormac, is still nursing the sting of not making the team.
“Cheer up, boys!” you call. Dean still looks sullen but Cormac's entire demeanour shifts when he grins at you skillfully weaving through the crowd towards them without spilling the two butterbeers in your hands. “Anyone would think we’d lost to Slytherin if they saw your faces,” you joke, slipping into the tight space next to him.
“Since when did you refer to the team as ‘we’?” teases Cormac, accepting the bottle you thrust into his hands. “Big Quidditch fan now are you?”
You smooth down the jumper you’re wearing, so oversized that the hem of it sits just above your skirt. “Well, if I’d known I’d look this cute in the team merch, I might have taken an interest sooner.”
“I don’t care how cute you look, I want it back.”
He flashes a smile and you can’t ignore the flurry of butterflies you feel.
“Oh, come on. We both know it looks better on me,” you shoot back, enjoying the fun of prying a compliment from him.
Cormac presses his tongue against the inside of his cheek, considering you, before finally concluding, “Debatable.”
You both laugh and you feel a warm sense of satisfaction that your attempt to take his mind off his exclusion from the team is working.
“Oldest trick in the book, mate. Don’t fall for it,” Dean interjects with a knowing smile, snapping Cormac’s attention away from you. You almost forgot Dean was there.
“What’s the oldest trick in the book?” asks Cormac.
“Everyone knows if you give your girlfriend your clothes, they’re hers for good. You’re never getting them back.”
You and Cormac look at each other awkwardly. The flirtatious banter suddenly feels much more complicated by Dean’s assumption.
Because Cormac is not your boyfriend.
In fact, in the run-up to Yule Ball several years ago, he made it crystal clear that he wasn’t into you like that.
Cormac opens his mouth to reply but you spare him the necessity of correcting Dean and hurting your feelings.
“Oh, we’re not going out,” you blurt before he can. “I was cold when we were watching the game and Cormac was just being nice.” Dean’s sceptical eyebrow rises, flicking between you and Cormac. Attributing the sudden flush in your cheeks to the heat of the room, rather than embarrassment, you say, “Actually, I don’t need this anymore now that we’re inside - here hold this.” You hand Cormac your butterbeer and start pulling off the jumper.
“No, look, you don’t have to -” Cormac starts, but you’re already tugging the woollen fabric off over your head. The scent of him - clean, with just a hint of his woody aftershave - floods your senses, making your heart twist painfully in your chest at its sudden absence.
You toss your hair back and hastily fix yourself.
“Here -” you say, taking the butterbeer back and replacing it with his jumper.
“Thanks,” Cormac mutters, but there’s a hint of annoyance as he does. He takes the jumper before throwing a look at Dean.
“Katie’s probably looking for me,” you announce, needing to put some distance between you and this now-too-complicated situation. You turn on your heel, attempting to slip back into the midst of things with your usual grace, but there’s a slight stumble in your step - barely noticeable, but enough to rattle you.
As you make your way over to Katie, you’re distracted by a sudden onslaught of whooping and cheering. Through a gap in the crowd, you see Ron Weasley and Lavender Brown unreservedly snogging.
That’s odd, you think. You could have sworn he was going out with -
The portrait hole opens and you spot a flash of bushy brown hair exiting the Common Room.
A hand grabs your arm. “Sweet!” The familiar nickname that you’ve never quite been able to shake off - not that you mind it - there are certainly worse things to be called. “There you are!” says Katie, her eyes sparkling with post-victory excitement.
“Did you just see -?”
Katie rolls her eyes. “The giant squid impression in the middle of the room? Yup.”
“Do you think we should see if Hermione is alright?” you ask, looking back over to the portrait hole.
“Harry’s already on it,” Katie says, nodding toward the door where Harry disappears after Hermione. “C’mon, I need another butterbeer.”
As you follow her, it’s not long before Katie brings up her favourite subject of late - Professor Slughorn’s Christmas party in a few weeks. Neither of you made Slughorn’s elite list of attendees so the only way you’ll get invited is if someone asks you. As much as you’d love the opportunity to get dressed to the nines, you could do without the drama. If the Yule Ball taught you anything, school dances inevitably lead to heartbreak.
“I don’t even want to go, anyway,” you insist. “See - this is a party. Slughorn’s will be so dry. I mean, there’ll be more teachers and Ministry bigwigs than students.”
“You know, if Cormac weren’t going, I’d suggest throwing our own party on the same night. But we couldn’t do that to him...” A mischievous smile dawns on her face. “Or could we?”
You hesitate but Katie presses on.
“I bet he’d forget all about Slughorn if you told him we were having a party.”
“You really think Cormac would miss a chance to cosy up to old Sluggy?”
When the two of you make it to the drinks table, she leans in conspiratorially close, lowering her voice just enough to be heard over the noise. “What I mean is, maybe he’d ditch Slughorn’s Party if you asked him to.”
“No, he wouldn’t,” you dismiss the idea quickly, not quite meeting her eyes. “If Cormac was interested in going to a party with me, he’d have asked me to Slughorn’s. I shouldn’t have to plan my own just to - ”
To what?
Go out with him?
You cut yourself off, but Katie’s sharp eyes catch yours. The noise of the party swells around you, enough to disguise her prying.
“What’s going on with you two, anyway?”
The question catches you off guard. Truthfully, nothing is going on between you and Cormac McLaggen.
Well, not nothing on your part.
Even if you disregarded the way your eyes sought out Cormac’s reaction whenever you styled your hair differently, or how you sometimes overanalysed his extra-tight friendly hugs that lingered a bit too long, there was no denying you were - at the very least - best friends.
And that was the problem. You were friends. Nothing more. No matter how much you wanted it to be otherwise.
In the run-up to the Yule Ball two years ago, you overheard Cormac firmly assuring Oliver Wood that he did not find you attractive. Like, at all.
You remember you were waiting on Katie finishing Quidditch practice in the courtyard, sitting behind the fountain in your usual meeting spot when you heard Oliver and Cormac at the other side of the fountain talking about the Gryffindor Team. You didn’t even lift your head from doodling on some parchment - the last thing you wanted to do was be dragged into a conversation about Quidditch.
Then the conversation drifted, from tactics to Quidditch team succession planning when Oliver left Hogwarts the following year and then, your ears pricked up when they started talking about the Yule Ball.
“I can put in a good word with Angelina about making you Keeper next year if you do me a solid,” Oliver said before lowering his voice. “Think you could ask if your mate is interested in going to the Yule Ball with me?” Oliver had asked. Your peacock feather quill paused as you sat up straight and held your breath.
There was a pause.
“Yeah, I’m sure Katie would be up for that,” Cormac said eventually, his voice steady in reply.
“Not Katie. Team dynamics would get messy,” he said seriously. “The other one. Sweetie or something.”
The other one. Cormac had two best friends.
That could only mean you.
“Oh,” Another pause, shorter this time, like Cormac was searching for the right words. “Are you sure you want to go with Sweet?”
The way Cormac said your nickname so incredulously made your stomach drop.
“I’m not stepping on your toes, am I?” laughed Oliver.
You leaned forward discreetly, peering around the side of the fountain to see Cormac shifting uncomfortably as he deliberated on his next words.
“No, nothing like that. She’s… alright, I guess. Decent looking. But, not really my type. She’s kind of annoying, y’know? Pretty full of herself. A bit of an airhead, actually.”
You remember feeling a sting of embarrassment, sharp enough to make your eyes water as Cormac listed off all your supposed shortcomings. But you blinked it away, hurriedly gathering your things and forgetting your plans to meet Katie before they could notice you had been there the whole time.
At the time it hurt so badly. Because back then you had such a thing for him. How couldn’t you? Cormac McLaggen was the quintessential golden boy - tall, handsome, athletic - exactly your type on paper. Even if you weren’t his, apparently. And not only did he not want to date you, but he actually found the idea so repulsive that he was trying to put Oliver off you too.
In the end, Cormac’s disapproval didn’t deter Oliver. Even though Cormac reneged on his promise and never mentioned that Oliver was interested in you, Oliver still asked you to the Yule Ball without Cormac’s intervention. And you said yes, relieved that at least Cormac’s poor recommendation hadn’t dissuaded him. In fact, you got on so well at the Yule Ball, that you dated for a few months. Until he dumped you when he left school. But, you supposed, that was boys for you.
And it affected you. Between Cormac McLaggen’s lukewarm feelings towards you and Oliver Wood dumping you, you swore off the idea of dating anyone.
It was easy to forget about Oliver when he left school. You gradually became friendly with Cormac again - you might even call him your best friend, aside from Katie, of course.
But you always kept your guard up around boys, never quite forgetting the sting of either incident.
“So, you wouldn’t go to Slughorn’s Christmas Party if he asked you?” Katie probes, bringing you back to the present.
Even though you trust Katie more than anyone, you’ve never told her about your feelings for Cormac or the utterly humiliating reason that you’ve never pursued them.
He’s just not into you.
“We’re friends. That’s all. And that’s the end of this conversation.”
Katie sighs. “Okay, okay, I get it.” She spins around to the empty drinks table. “How have we gone through six crates of butterbeer already?” She groans. “Do you wanna come to the kitchens and get more?”
“I’ll go, you stay here,” you say and she immediately begins protesting but you ignore her. “Listen, this is a party for your team. You should stay.”
She hesitates before spotting Cormac across the room.
“Why don’t you go to the kitchens with -”
“If you mention Cormac one more time, I’ll lose my mind,” you warn her. “I can handle a trip to the kitchens alone. I won’t be long.”
Katie laughs, holding her hands up in mock surrender.
“Okay, Sweet. I don’t know what’s got you so sour.”
You roll your eyes and ignore her comment. As you walk towards the portrait hole, you glance at Cormac and realise he’s already looking at you. You pretend not to notice like you’re scanning the room for someone else, before disappearing through the door.
Later, as you walk back up towards Gryffindor tower, a few crates of butterbeer (that the house elves were extremely eager to bestow upon you) clink behind as they follow you, levitating in the air.
The cool, empty castle offers little comfort. You left the Common Room to clear your head, but all you’ve found since you left the kitchens are your own thoughts, swirling endlessly as you walk.
If Cormac wanted to ask you to Slughorn’s party, he would have done it by now. You’re not getting your hopes up again. And besides, why would he need to wait for a party to ask you out? If his feelings for you had changed since the Yule Ball, he could have told you at any point.
She’s kind of annoying, y’know? Pretty full of herself. A bit of an airhead, actually.
Harsh criticism. Not entirely untrue. It’s not like you’re clever. And sure, you take pride in your appearance, but until you heard him say that, you didn’t think it bothered anyone. Especially not him. If you had to criticise Cormac, you’d probably say he was full of himself too. And as far as intelligence goes, it’s not like he’s the quickest broom in the shed either.
As you turn it over, replaying scenarios in your head that you haven’t revisited in a long time - most notably, ones where Cormac didn’t talk badly about you behind your back - you walk straight into someone hunched over their knees at the bottom of the spiral staircase.
“Oh, sorry! Wait - Hermione?” you ask. The bushy-haired sixth-year looks up and hastily wipes her eyes. “Are you okay? Where’s Harry?”
Hermione swallows hard and nods, though her red-rimmed eyes betray her. “I told him to go back to the party. There’s no reason for both of us to miss it. I’m fine. Really. It’s silly.”
“You don’t look fine,” you say gently, sitting down beside her on the cold stone steps. After a pause, you add, “I saw Ron and Lavender.”
Hermione’s breath hitches, and she quickly looks away, blinking back tears. “I—I feel so ridiculous. I already asked him to Slughorn’s party, and now he’s… I should have known.”
You scoff, shaking your head. “You’re not the ridiculous one here. Honestly, I think these stupid formal events should be banned.”
Hermione lets out a half-laugh, half-sob - a wet, spluttering sound - but you catch the faintest glimmer of a smile, and you feel a small surge of relief. At least you’ve distracted her for a moment.
“I’m serious,” you insist, leaning back against the wall. “They’re more trouble than they’re worth.”
Hermione sniffles, wiping at her eyes again. “Maybe. But it doesn’t make me feel any less foolish.”
“It’s not foolish,” you say firmly, the butterbeer crates you were levitating now drifting to the ground beside you. “And to tell you the truth, I know exactly how it feels to have your heart broken at one of these things.”
She looks up at you, her eyes wide with surprise. “You do?”
You nod slowly, thinking back to your own past. “Yep. And besides, Hermione, you’ve handled worse than this. You stared down Umbridge, for Merlin’s sake. This? This is nothing compared to her.”
Hermione lets out a dry laugh, shaking her head. “It doesn’t feel like nothing,” she says quietly. “In fact, it feels… it feels worse.”
“I know,” you admit softly. “And I know it probably feels like you’ll never get over it. Like it’ll never stop hurting. But trust me - if I can get through it, you can too.”
She looks at you earnestly, her brow furrowing. “How?” she asks, her voice small but full of curiosity. “How did you get over it?”
The answer isn’t easy, and the truth is harder still. Convincing others - and yourself - that you’re perfectly fine, even when you’re not, is something you unfortunately have experience with.
You push yourself to your feet, brushing off your skirt and forcing a small smile. “By acting completely unbothered,” you say, trying to sound casual, even though the irony stings. After all, here you are, still trying to bury your feelings for Cormac McLaggen.
“We’re gonna go back to the Common Room and make it look like you don’t have a care in the world,” you say as you extend a hand to help her to her feet which she accepts. “And tomorrow we’ll find someone else for you to go to Slughorn’s party with. Someone better than Ron Weasley.”
“Who?”
Perhaps this is your chance to help Hermione and bury your feelings for Cormac in one fell swoop. Maybe, just maybe, if she went to Slughorn’s party with him, it’d help you finally put Cormac - and the lingering ‘what could have been’ - behind you too.
If he was going out with someone else, you could draw a line under all this and move on.
The following Monday, Hogwarts students arrive in the Great Hall to find a winter wonderland. A whirlwind of snowflakes dances over the enchanted ceiling past icicle-adorned rafters. Enormous Christmas trees - decked in baubles the size of bludgers - flank the room. The usual breakfast smells of toast, bacon, and pumpkin juice mix with the scent of pine and cinnamon, giving everything a festive buzz.
But Cormac barely notices any of it.
Sitting at the Gryffindor table, Cormac stabs the fried egg on his plate, watching it ooze onto the rest of his breakfast like it might help him decide how to do what he was about to do next. Oliver Wood used to joke that Cormac had the appetite of a Graphorn, but lately, he hasn’t been feeling hungry. His mind is completely elsewhere.
He’s going to ask you. To Slughorn’s Party. Today.
You and Cormac have History of Magic classes together on Monday afternoons, just the two of you away from the rest of your friends. A rare moment alone. You’re always surrounded by people - constantly laughing, flipping your hair in a way that makes his insides flip, and you seem completely oblivious to how nervous he’s become around you lately.
“Can you stop murdering that egg?” asks Katie, jolting him out of his daze and glancing at his half-destroyed breakfast. “It’s making me queasy. That’s the last thing I need before we feed raw meat to Thestrals.”
“Sorry,” mutters Cormac, setting his fork down, though the uneasy knot in his stomach isn’t going anywhere.
Katie studies him for a second. “What’s up with you? You’ve usually asked me if Ron’s playing worse than you at least three times before the bell rings.” She’s grinning, but Cormac just shrugs.
“It’s not that,” he mumbles.
Katie raises an eyebrow. “Then what?”
Before he can answer, you appear, slipping onto the bench beside him with Hermione Granger in tow. You’re wearing a bright red and gold bow with your hair in that half-up, half-down style that he knows takes you forever to do. It’s probably why you’re late - as usual.
“Morning!” you chirp, grabbing a piece of toast off his plate without asking, your fingers brushing his for a second. The contact sends a jolt through him, but you’re completely unaware. “What’s with you two?” you ask, noticing the odd expressions on their faces. “You look like you’ve seen a Dementor.”
“Not Dementors,” blurts Cormac, the excuse coming easily, thanks to Katie’s reminder. “Thestrals.”
“Ugh,” you say, wrinkling your nose. “Rather you than me. Are you doing the N.E.W.T. in Care of Magical Creatures, Hermione?”
Hermione shakes her head. “I’d have loved to but I had too many other subjects this year.”
“Yeah, right. You’re only saying that because you’re friends with Hagrid.” Hermione smiles sheepishly. “It wouldn’t be too bad if we got to learn about nice creatures -” you start but Katie cuts you off.
“Well, life isn’t all Puffskeins and Unicorns,” she says, pointing forked sausage at you. “The creatures we’re dealing with are much more interesting.”
“That’s just another way of saying ‘ugly’,” you laugh, tossing your hair over your shoulder. In the process, the bow at the crown of your head slips off and drops to the floor. You don’t even notice.
Cormac does.
“And it’s dangerous too,” you continue. “Remember when your poor arm was burned by those Blast-Ended Skrewts, Cormac?”
“Sweet, you dropped this,” he says, quickly leaning down to retrieve the bow before anyone else can.
You reach up, feeling the spot where the bow was. “Oh, thanks.”
“Let me,” Cormac offers, his heart pounding as he tries not to mess this up. He leans in close, and the noise of the Great Hall fades into white noise. It’s just the two of you, and all he can think about is how soft your hair feels between his fingers.
“It’s kind of tricky,” you murmur, glancing up at him.
“I’ve got it.”
“You sure?” you ask, looking up at him in a way that makes his stomach lurch again.
“Easy,” he says, more confidently now as he finishes clipping it into place. “Like putting an angel on top of a Christmas Tree.”
You laugh, and the sound makes his heart race all over again. He quickly turns back to the table, trying to pretend that wasn’t at all nerve-wracking. But Katie’s already watching, her shrewd look making it clear she hasn’t missed a thing.
“So,” Cormac says quickly, desperate to change the subject, “What’s everyone doing for the holidays? Assuming no one’s mad enough to stay here?”
“Nope,” says Hermione brightly. “I’m going home to visit my parents.”
“Yeah, same here,” says Katie. “If you ask me it can’t come soon enough.”
“Tell me about it. I can’t wait to go home. My Uncle’s been invited to Minister’s house for Christmas lunch and -”
“You’re going so you can suck up to Rufus Scrimgeor?” asks Katie.
“Well, it has its perks. But mostly it’s because I haven’t seen my Uncle in ages. Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” says Cormac. And, he thinks, maybe his Uncle won’t tease him for being single again this year if he can convince you to go to Slughorn’s party with him.
“We’re getting ahead of ourselves here. We’ve got more pressing things going on before Christmas, Cormac,” you say. “Or have you forgotten about Slughorn’s party?”
The fork he’s holding clatters onto his plate. “I… er, no, I haven’t forgotten,” he stammers, his face burning as he tries to sound casual.
“So… have you asked anyone yet?”
Your voice is light, casual, but Cormac’s pulse quickens. Is this… actually happening? Well, it certainly makes things easier. He swallows, trying to steady himself.
“Not yet,” he starts, the words feel unfamiliarly shaky. He’s normally so self-assured that he hardly recognises his own voice. But you’re already cutting him off, oblivious to his growing panic.
“Well, I was thinking, if you’re not already going with someone…” You shift slightly, glancing between Hermione and Katie before landing back on him. His heart leaps. Are you about to ask him? But when you finish, your words douse his hopes like ice water. “...maybe you and Hermione could go together?”
“Yeah, I’d - wait - what?” Cormac’s voice cracks, the sound of his own disbelief ringing in his ears. He glances at you, searching for any hint of a joke, any sign that you’re teasing him - but you’re smiling, unaware of the storm you’ve just unleashed in his chest. Didn’t you realise how much nerve he had built up, how many times he had rehearsed this in his mind?
You don’t even realise you’re wrecking him - it’s just another Monday morning to you. Meanwhile, he feels like he’s accidentally tumbled down one of the castle’s trick steps.
“Oh,” Hermione says, clearly flustered. “I don’t - er - I mean, that’s really not necessary,” she adds, casting an awkward glance at Cormac, her cheeks reddening slightly.
“No, listen,” you insist in a low voice, glancing at the end of the table where Ron Weasley and Lavender Brown are engaged in some more intense snogging. “It’s perfect. Neither of you is going with anyone, right?”
The bell rings and everyone in the hall starts moving, getting ready to leave for the first class of the day.
“It’s win-win. This would annoy Ron the most,” you say.
“What’s he got to do with this?” asks Cormac.
“Long story short, Ron’s ditched Hermione for Lavender. And since you were so clearly better than him at Quidditch tryouts, I thought if she went with you it would piss him off.”
Cormac pauses, momentarily stunned. “...You thought I was better than him?”
“Well, yeah. Obviously. The only reason you weren’t picked is because of that last penalty. It was like you were confunded or something”
There’s a thud as Hermione unexpectedly knocks her bag from her seat and it spills open.
“Really?” asks Cormac as you both get off the bench to crouch on the floor and help Hermione pick up her things.
“Yeah, everyone knows that you’re much more talented at - wait, Hermione are you okay?”
The two of you look at Hermione when you notice she’s turned white as a sheet.
“I’m fine,” she squeaks.
“You sure?” you ask and reach out to grab a fallen book. You accidentally touch Cormac’s hand as he reaches for it too and the touch sends another jolt through him. “And it works out for you too, Cormac,” you continue. “Maybe if Ron is distracted by the two of you going out, he’ll play badly enough to get kicked off the team.”
Katie tuts but Cormac has to admit that you’ve got a point. But he can’t put his feelings for you aside because of Quidditch. Not again. Not after the Yule Ball fiasco.
You press the book into Hermione’s hands. “Look, just think about it, alright? I’ve got to go - I’m gonna be late for Muggle Studies.”
“I’m going that way too,” says Hermione quickly, stuffing her book into her bag and not looking at Cormac.
And so, with a swish of red and gold, you and Hermione leave Cormac feeling like he’s just been hit by a bludger,
It wasn’t as if Hermione wasn’t good-looking. Everyone knew she was smart, pretty - she even used to date Viktor Krum. But she wasn’t… well, you.
So why couldn’t he just say it?
He walks beside Katie, silently replaying what he should have said in his head, so clearly as if watching it through omnioculars.
“Cormac, do you have a date for Slughorn’s party?”
“Well, actually, I was thinking about asking you.”
He avoids Katie’s gaze, instead busying himself with pulling on a scarf and hat, bracing himself for the freezing cold of the castle grounds.
Feeding Thestrals feels like a much less daunting endeavour than unpicking this mess he’s gotten himself into.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Later that night, the Gryffindor Common Room is almost deserted. It’s well past midnight, and the only sounds are the crackling of the fire and the soft rustle of turning pages. As Seventh Year N.E.W.T. students, you, Cormac, and Katie have become accustomed to being the last ones awake, studying long after everyone else has gone to bed. When the clock chimes one, even Hermione bids you all goodnight before heading upstairs to her dormitory.
“So… any thoughts about my idea earlier?” you ask, trying to sound suitably impartial, and not at all conscious of the way you and Cormac keep sinking towards each other on the plush sofa and brushing arms. “You know, going to Slughorn’s with Hermione on Saturday?”
Cormac glances at the staircase leading up to the girl’s dormitory. “I dunno…”
Katie says nothing as the grandfather clock ticks ominously. Instead, she and Cormac exchange a look - one that you can’t quite decipher.
“Well, I think you’d be a good match,” you say, just to break the awkward silence.
“Yeah, well, Hermione’s not really who you want to go with, is she Cormac?”
Your eyes fly up, looking between them.
Cormac shifts in his seat, eyes on his copy of A History of Magic. "She’s nice enough."
"That’s not what I asked," Katie presses.
Cormac looks at her seriously. “Stop.”
Katie shrugs, leans back in her armchair and flips through her book.
So, Cormac has someone else in mind for Slughorn’s Party. And he feels comfortable enough to make Katie privy to it. But not you.
Great.
So not only does he not fancy you, he doesn’t even trust you enough to confide in. And you thought you were best friends.
For some reason, that hurts almost as much as when you overheard him telling Oliver Wood that he wasn’t interested in you.
You don’t know what to say anymore, so you look down at your book again.
It doesn’t take long for the words in A History of Magic to blur together on the page, as you read and reread the same passage, trying to remember the names of the loyalists from the 19th-century goblin rebellion. The plush velvet of the sofa feels impossibly soft and warm, and the heat from the fire seeps into your bones, lulling you into a deep, drowsy comfort. Your eyes droop heavily as you sink deeper into the cushions, your body slowly surrendering to exhaustion.
You lazily glance at Cormac’s open textbook, hoping he’s made better progress. He’s supposed to be reading the same chapter, but instead, he and Katie are talking softly about their holiday plans. Katie is debating asking her parents for a new pair of gloves after snagging hers during Care of Magical Creatures. Cormac is once again trying to brag about his Uncle taking him to the Minister for Magic’s house on Christmas Eve without sounding like he’s bragging.
The sounds of your two best friends in quiet earnestness make you feel safe and comfortable - so comfortable that you don’t even realise you’ve dozed off, leaning on Cormac’s shoulder.
That is until Katie closes her book with a loud snap.
“Right, this is useless. I’m heading to bed,” she declares.
Her voice startles you slightly, but you’re too tired to fully wake. You consider opening your eyes and lifting your head but it feels like too much effort.
Five more minutes, you think. Just five more minutes in this comfortable position and you’ll make the long journey up the winding staircase to bed.
“I’ll go to bed soon,” Cormac says, his voice lower now, quieter. “I’m still reading. And I don’t want to wake Sweet”
You’re not entirely asleep, but not fully awake either - just hovering in that cosy in-between. His voice rumbles softly in his chest and the warmth of his shoulder feels solid, familiar. You could stay like this forever.
Your eyes remain closed, and you feel yourself falling asleep again listening to the sound of the merrily cracking fireplace and Katie’s footsteps retreating up the carpeted stairs.
And then you feel a small shift.
Cormac turns his head, pressing his lips against the top of your head and inhaling deeply, somewhere between kissing you gently and breathing you in.
Your eyes flutter open, the haze of sleep fading as you realise what’s just happened.
Did he just… kiss you?
You look up. Cormac freezes as your tired eyes meet his alarmed, green ones. He opens his mouth - maybe to apologise - but whatever he was about to say disapparates when you look from his eyes, to his parted lips then back to his eyes again.
He just stares at you, his breath held, searching your face for some kind of response.
You don’t say anything.
For a second you’re not sure what to do.
But then you just give the tiniest nod as your heart thuds in your chest.
He leans in, his breath is warm on your face. The clean, woody scent of his aftershave tingles your senses - it’s even better than when it lingered on his borrowed jumper. You close your eyes as he moves tentatively towards you.
Then the thundering of footsteps as Katie runs back downstairs makes the two of you break apart hastily.
“Forgot my quill,” she announces. “Oh, are you coming up to bed, then?”
You swallow, your heart hammering. “Yeah,” you say, fixing your skirt and getting to your feet. “Sorry, must’ve dozed off.” You hastily grab your book,
“Yeah, same,” Cormac says, his voice strained. He clears his throat, gathering his things in a flurry of movement. “I think I must have too. For a couple of seconds.”
You glance at him but he doesn’t look at you as he gathers his things, his focus entirely on shoving them into his bag.
You follow Katie up the stairs, your heart still racing as you try to make sense of what just happened. But did it happen? Or were you (like you’ve done more times than you’d ever admit) dreaming about Cormac?
Soon after, you lie in the dark, staring at the hangings of your four-poster bed.
Cormac said he thought he had fallen asleep. You had been so drowsy that now you couldn’t be sure if he had actually kissed the top of your head. Maybe he just rested his head on yours? Or maybe you dreamt it, woke up and immediately tried to kiss him.
It’s a mortifying thought - that one minute Cormac had been asleep and the next he had woken up to find you practically ready to pounce on him.
No wonder he looked like a deer caught in the wandlight.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In the boy’s dormitory, Cormac has similar thoughts.
You were asleep. And you caught him smelling your hair. Kissing the top of your head. Now that he’s removed from the situation, he cringes - hard, realising that it was extremely weird.
Together with Katie’s obnoxious hinting that he really wanted to go to Slughorn’s party with you must have made you uncomfortable. Because you didn’t even look at him. So either your feelings towards him are so platonic that you hadn’t realised he was interested in you or you were choosing to ignore Katie’s comments altogether.
But he swears there had been a moment. A split second downstairs when your eyes met his, and he really thought you wanted him to kiss you. He can still feel your fingers brushing his chest, how you looked at him like you were waiting for him to close the gap between you.
And he almost had.
Almost.
Then Katie had barged in, and you’d jumped away like you couldn’t get far enough, fast enough. Like you’d realised how ridiculous it was - how ridiculous he was.
He clenches his jaw, turning over in bed. You were probably horrified.
He groans, burying his face in his pillow.
There was a moment, wasn’t there?
Maybe he’d imagined how you looked at him. Maybe the exhaustion from studying had gotten to him, and now, his mind was just playing tricks on him.
But then again… maybe it hadn’t.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You spent the majority of the rest of the week avoiding Cormac.
You’ve even been staying in the library with Hermione every night just to avoid Katie after she kept asking pointed questions about what happened after she left the Gryffindor Common Room the other night. Hermione is glad of the company - over the past few days, you’ve been talking a lot. Mostly to keep her mind off of Ron Weasley. And without her realising it, it’s been a great help in stopping your mind wandering to Cormac McLaggen.
Being surrounded by dusty books and writing an essay about plug sockets for Muggle Studies, isn’t exactly conducive to imagining yourself back in the Gryffindor Common Room, cuddled up with Cormac, seeing his face inches from yours, wondering whether or not he was about to kiss you.
But now it’s Saturday morning and tonight is the night you’ve been trying not to think about: Slughorn’s Party.
You’re going to go to Hogsmeade to take your mind off of things. It’s one of your favourite places in the world - especially this time of year. Steamy pub windows, cobblestone streets dusted in white, smugly ordering Firewhisky in front of younger pupils.
It’s just what you need to distract you from Cormac.
At least he’s not coming with you. Studying, he said. Although you think he might just be as keen to avoid you as you are to avoid him
But there’s no avoiding Katie forever, you think, as you and Hermione walk into the Great Hall for breakfast. As if reading your mind, Katie, who is already almost finished breakfast, waves you over and you have no choice but to sit with her and a few of the sixth years.
“Wait - are you sure you want to sit here?” you ask Hermione under your breath, spotting Ron and Lavender enthusiastically entwined just a few spaces away.
“Yeah, don’t worry. I’ve got a plan. Just like you said.”
Well, at least your advice is working for someone.
“Morning!” you say brightly, sitting on Katie’s left-hand side, across from Harry Potter and Parvati Patil. At least in front of a group, you should be safe from her interrogations about Cormac.
"Hi, Parvati!" says Hermione, ignoring Ron and Lavender completely. "Are you going to Slughorn's party tonight?"
You help yourself to some cornflakes and as Parvati passes you the milk, she frowns.
"No invite," says Parvati, gloomily. "I'd love to go, though, it sounds like it's going to be really good... You're going, aren't you?"
"Yes, I'm meeting Cormac at eight, and we're -"
The jug slips from your hand, milk spilling everywhere. It splashes onto the table, drenching your skirt and soaking your tights. There’s a loud, wet sound as Ron, startled, pulls away from Lavender for a moment.
"- we're going up to the party together."
Throughout all your nights studying together this week, Hermione had not shared that detail with you.
You stare down at the mess, your heart pounding as if someone just pulled the rug out from under you.
"Oh, flipping heck,” you mutter, feeling the cold, wet fabric cling to your legs.
Katie quickly vanishes the milk with a flick of her wand and hands you a napkin.
“No need to start throwing f-bombs - it’s only spilled milk” she jokes, taking the heat off of you but her expression is unusually careful as she watches you. You force a tight smile, but your heart is still thudding too fast, a mix of shock and something else twisting in your chest.
"Cormac?" asks Parvati. "Cormac McLaggen, you mean?"
Even though this was your plan all along, you never expected that just hearing his name would sting.
"That's right," says Hermione happily. "The one who almost” - she puts a great deal of emphasis on the word - "became Gryffindor Keeper."
"Are you going out with him, then?" says Parvati, wide-eyed.
Hermione giggles - a sound that cuts right through you. "Oh - yes - didn't you know?"
A lead weight sinks to the pit of your stomach.
"No!" says Parvati, looking positively agog at this piece of gossip. "Wow, you like your Quidditch players, don't you? First Krum, then McLaggen..."
"I like really good Quidditch players," Hermione corrects her, still smiling.
It’s too much. You think of Cormac and his stupid Quidditch jumper. Hermione wearing it at the game instead of you. Then you feel bad for feeling bad about them being together when it was your idea in the first place. Guilt makes the knot in your stomach tighten painfully, and you push your cereal away, the sight of food suddenly nauseating.
“You alright?” asks Katie quietly, leaning towards you.
You nod stiffly, though your throat feels tight. “Yeah, I’m fine. I’d just better change before we go,” you sigh. “I’ll meet you outside.”
“You’re definitely still coming, right?” Katie asks, her eyes narrowing slightly as if she can sense you’re having second thoughts about going to Hogsmeade.
You hesitate. The idea of going upstairs, burying your face in a pillow, and screaming into it for the next several hours suddenly seems more appealing than pretending you’re okay in Hogsmeade. "I don’t know..."
“No, please, you have to come,” implores Hermione, not realising it’s her declaration that has you wanting to retreat upstairs until the end of term.
“Where are you going?” asks Harry, glancing at Ron and Lavender who have once again resumed their public display of affection, as if he’d rather be anywhere else but in their presence.
“We’re going to Hogsmeade. The three of us. Oh, and Cormac, obviously,” says Hermione loudly and for a split second you see the back of Ron’s head pausing.
Harry gets to his feet quickly. “Do you mind if I join you?”
“The more the merrier,” Katie tells him before adding to you in a low voice, “We’ll wait in the courtyard - I think my breakfast might make another appearance if I stay around Ron and Lavender much longer.”
This is good, you tell yourself, getting up from the table and following them a few steps behind. This is what you wanted. You told yourself you had to get over Cormac. And now he’s going out with Hermione. Just like you suggested. Your plan is working. This is good.
But it doesn’t feel good. It feels awful.
As you trudge up the stairs to the common room, you find yourself repeating the same mantra.
This is good. This is what you wanted.
But the more you repeat it, the hollower it sounds.
By the time you come back downstairs to the courtyard, Harry, Hermione and Katie are having a snowball fight. It’s in full swing. And in the midst of it all, Cormac is there. Of course, Cormac is there. Hermione said he would be, didn’t she? And she should know. She’s his girlfriend, now. Apparently.
Harry fires a well-aimed snowball at Cormac but he dodges it.
“I told you, Potter - lightning quick reflexes!” Cormac shouts, his voice brimming with exhilaration. There’s something about the way his laughter fills the air that stirs something inside you that you’ve been trying to bury all week.
Harry launches another snowball, and Cormac, in an obnoxious display of skill, catches it mid-air and flings it back, hitting Harry squarely in the face.
“And the crowd goes wild!” cheers Cormac before chanting his own name. “McLaggen! McLaggen! McLaggen! McLagg - oh. Hi.”
He stops when he sees you. Like he wasn’t expecting to see you here either.
“Don’t stop on my account,” you say, putting on a brave face.
He grins at you “You joining in for once, then? I’ve never seen you throw a snowball in your life.”
“Well, maybe you’re about to,” you say, more threateningly than you intended, thinking that you’d quite like to smack him in the face for not telling you that he was going out with Hermione.
He takes a step toward you, misreading the challenge in your voice. “I’d love to see that,” he teases, scooping up a handful of snow and launching himself at you.
Before you can react, Cormac’s arm is around your waist, lifting you off the ground in one quick motion. The world spins as snow flurries around you, your shriek of protest escaping in the form of a half-laugh.
“Cormac!” you say, breathless. But your laughter dies almost instantly when reality sets in - Hermione is bent down, scooping up snow just a few feet away. His girlfriend is right there.
“Put me down,” you say, seriously this time, the joy draining from the moment. Your voice is firm, but not loud.
He stops immediately, setting you down gently, his brow furrowing in confusion. “What’s up?”
You step back, brushing the snow off your coat, swallowing the tight feeling in your chest. “I think you know.”
“Oh… sorry,” he says, now embarrassed. “I didn’t mean to cross a line or anything the other night -”
“It’s fine,” you say quickly, trying to keep your voice steady. “Don’t worry about it.” You give him a tight smile as laughter rings behind you, the others clearly not noticing or caring about your hushed conversation as their snowball fight continues. You turn away from him and call out to Katie and the others, “Are we going, then?”
The walk to Hogsmeade feels longer than usual. The others chat happily but the conversation is distant, and you keep your eyes on the snow-covered path. By the time you reach the village, the promise of a hot butterbeer should lift your spirits but it doesn’t. You feel disconnected like you’re watching everything through a fog.
“So,” Katie says, as you approach the The Three Broomsticks. “What made you come along, Cormac? I thought you were studying today?”
Cormac shrugs, but there’s a slight defensiveness in his voice. “Just something I had to do before the holidays.”
You wonder if it’s picking up a gift for Hermione.
Katie raises an eyebrow, a teasing smile playing on her lips as her mind defaults to shopping too. “Determined to impress Scrimgeour, then?”
Cormac stiffens. “It’s not for Scrimgeour, Katie,” he says, his voice edged with frustration. “I just needed to pick something up.”
You don’t say anything, keeping your eyes on the ground as they continue their back-and-forth. All you can think about is how wrong everything feels.
When you reach The Three Broomsticks, Hermione opens the door, letting the warmth and chatter from inside spill out into the cold air as you go to file in behind her, Harry and Katie.
“Wait,” says Cormac, catching your arm before you can go in. “Can I have a word with you first?”
You hesitate, glancing down at his hand on your arm, then up at his face. There’s something in his expression - something hesitant, almost apologetic - that makes you pause. You really don’t want to talk but as usual, Katie butts in.
“We’ll meet you inside,” she says firmly, pulling the door closed in your face with a slam.
You have no choice but to follow him away from the door. Snow crunches beneath your boots as you walk, and the cold air stings your cheeks.
When you stop, Cormac turns to face you, running a hand through his hair, looking unsure of himself. “Look, I… I wanted to see if we were okay. You’ve been avoiding me.”
“You’ve been avoiding me too,” you challenge back.
Your breath fogs up in the cold air as you glance down at the snow, trying to collect yourself. It takes a moment for you to find the words, but they come out before you can stop them.
"I'm just... hurt, Cormac," you say, quieter than you'd planned. "You didn't even tell me you were going out with Hermione."
There’s a beat of silence as Cormac stares at you, his brow furrowing in deep confusion. He blinks, clearly caught off guard. “What? I’m not going out with Hermione.”
You meet his eyes, frowning. “I heard her say it. You're going to Slughorn’s party together.”
“I - yeah, I asked her last night because you told me to. But just as friends.” Cormac runs a hand through his hair again, exasperated. “But I’m not going out with Hermione - are you sure she told you that?”
“She told everyone at breakfast, loud and clear that -”
“Everyone? Including Ron Weasley, you mean?” he asks, trying not to smirk.
Oh.
“She was… trying to make him jealous. Like I told her to.” You blink, trying to process what he's saying. “So… you’re not - I mean - she’s not your girlfriend?”
“No.”
You let out a shaky breath and he steps closer, closing the gap between you. His voice drops to barely a whisper, but it carries with it the force of something that’s been buried far too long.
“Do you really not see it? Do you really not know?” he says, his tone almost desperate now. “I’ll go with Hermione to Slughorn’s if you want me to. Hell, I’d go with Filch if it would make you happy. Because that’s all I want. To make you happy.”
“...Really?” You can hardly believe what you’re hearing.
“Yeah.” He smiles sheepishly. “I thought you’d have worked out that’s why I asked her - since it was your idea.”
“Well… maybe you were right when you said I was an airhead,” you challenge. If you’re getting all of your confessions off of your chest, you might as well tell him you overheard this too.
“When did I ever say that?” Cormac asks, taken aback.
You hesitate, the memory is painful but clear. “You told Oliver that I was an airhead. And full of myself. And annoying. It was right before -”
Cormac groans in realisation and finishes the sentence for you. “- Before the Yule Ball.”
“Yep.” You nod, the hurt still lingering after all this time.
“So he told you all that, did he?”
“No… I overheard you. In the courtyard.”
“I -” he groans, looking so painfully guilty that you almost feel bad for calling him out. “I promise I didn’t mean it.”
“Cormac, you don’t have to make excuses -”
“It’s not an excuse.” He shakes his head. “Wood promised that Angelina would make me Captain after he left school if I set the two of you up. And I wanted to make the team more than anything. Well - I thought I wanted to make the team more than anything.” He pauses, his green eyes locking onto yours. “But I was already planning on asking you to the Yule Ball. So I tried to have it both ways. I said that horrible stuff about you to put him off. And I never told you he was interested because… I was afraid you’d be interested back.”
“But none of it worked,” he continues, the regret in his voice cutting through the quiet. “He asked you anyway, and you said yes. And I never made the team in the end, so… it was all for nothing.”
You don’t really know what to say. How much time was wasted.
“I’m sorry,” he says softly, his voice steady but filled with regret. “For saying that about you. You didn’t deserve it. I was so focused on trying to have everything - I didn’t stop to think about what was most important.”
“I didn’t know you felt that way,” you say, your heart pounding. “And, for the record, I would have gone with you. To the Yule Ball. To Slughorn’s… any of it.” You look up at him, your gaze meeting his, and for the first time, it feels like you're both finally on the same page.
Gently falling snow lands across your nose and cheeks as you look up at him. The space between you is almost nothing now. His hand reaches up and cups your face, his touch achingly gentle, almost reverent, as he brushes a wet snowflake from your cheekbone -
But then the door to The Three Broomsticks bangs open behind him, and Katie storms out, her face flushed and her hands gripping a package close to her chest.
“Katie?” you say, taken aback by her sudden appearance. “What’s going on?”
The door of the Three Broomsticks bursts open again. Harry and Hermione spill out looking frantic but Katie is already disappearing along the snow-covered street, the package clutched tightly in her arms.
“All she said was that she needs to deliver a package,” says Hermione, looking worried.
You and Cormac look at each other in alarm before you both sprint to catch up with her. You grab her arm. “Katie, what’s wrong?”
“Leave me alone!” she snaps, twisting to wrench herself free from your grip.
“Katie! What’s going on?” asks Cormac, running to her other side.
“Can you both just fuck off?”
“Woah, woah - what’s with you? And what is that? Who gave you it?”
“None of your business!”
You try to grab it. “Give it to me!”
The two of you struggle, you try to take the package from her and Cormac tries to restrain her.
Then all of a sudden, Katie lets out a scream so loud and so high that it almost pierces your eardrums.
Everything turns black as the snow-covered ground rushes up to meet you.
You open your eyes a split second later in a sterile but comfortable room. Have you… apparated?
You try to sit up, but the world spins violently, your vision blurring as an antiseptic smell floods your senses.
“Woah - hold on, let me get Madam Pomfrey,” comes a familiar voice, soft but urgent.
Madam Pomfrey?
You’re in the Hospital Wing.
You blink hard, trying to focus, and slowly, Cormac’s face swims into view. He’s sitting at the edge of your bed, worry etched into every line of his features. His eyes, which normally gleam with a casual confidence, are shadowed with exhaustion.
Cormac.
He’s looking down the length of the hospital wing, scanning the empty beds for the matron, but when you touch his hand lightly, he turns back to you, his face softening with relief.
“Cormac, what happened?” You panic as you look at the empty bed next to you. “Where’s Katie? Is she here too? And that package? What was that thing?”
His brow furrows as he tries to find the right way to explain it all. "I promised I’d get Madam Pomfrey when you woke up," he says, glancing toward the door. “It was her only condition -”
“She can wait. Just tell me. Please.”
He studies your face for a moment, clearly weighing whether or not to tell you, but eventually, he sighs and moves closer, his voice low. “Katie... that package she was carrying - it was a cursed necklace. McGonagall thinks she was put under the Imperius Curse when she went to the bathroom. She wasn’t herself. You noticed it too.”
You swallow hard, the memory of Katie’s vacant eyes and her erratic behaviour flashing through your mind. “And when I tried to stop her?”
Cormac’s face darkens, his eyes flickering with something that looks dangerously close to fear. “The package split open. The necklace - it should have killed her. The curse was lethal.”
Your eyes widen, bile rising in your throat. “Lethal…”
He nods grimly. “The only reason she’s still alive is that it touched her through a tiny hole in her glove. Barely made contact with her skin, but even that was enough to put her in a bad way.”
Your blood turns cold, the weight of his words pressing down on you like a heavy stone. “Where is she?” you whisper, dreading the answer. “Is she… is she alright?”
Cormac’s jaw clenches, his voice barely above a whisper. “She’s at St. Mungo’s. They don’t know when she’ll wake up. But she’s alive.”
The room spins, this time from the sickening realisation of how close you were to losing her. Your mind races, fear wrapping its cold fingers around your heart.
“That curse was dark magic - whoever planted it knew exactly what they were doing.”
“Katie…” Your voice cracks as you press your palm to your forehead, struggling to process it. “If I hadn’t tried to take the package -”
“Hey - no.” Cormac’s voice is sharp but softens immediately. He moves closer, his hand squeezing yours. “This isn’t your fault. None of it. If anything it’s my fault -”
“Cormac…”
“No, listen. If I hadn’t asked to speak to you outside - I mean, when do you or Katie ever go to the bathroom alone? The person who put her under the Imperius Curse might not have tried if there were two of you there.”
“It’s not your fault either, Cormac. The only person to blame is whoever gave her that necklace.” You don’t even remember seeing the package split open. “But… I didn’t touch the necklace, did I? How come I’m in here?”
“Katie, er… punched you. Knocked you out cold.”
You hadn’t expected that. You find yourself lost for words, not quite able to believe what you’re hearing.
“She was under the Imperius Curse… not in her right state of mind,” continues Cormac, watching you carefully and you give him a small nod.
Silence stretches between you. The hospital wing feels eerily quiet - no bustling, no holiday cheer, just the faint sound of the fire crackling somewhere in the distance. No usual sounds of excitement of the last night of term.
The last night of term.
You glance at the snowflakes drifting down, a sense of dread creeping over you. “Cormac… what time is it? Shouldn’t you be getting ready for Slughorn’s Party?” you ask, knowing that he’d hate to miss the opportunity to network with all the people Slughorn would want to introduce him to.
Cormac shifts a little closer. “Slughorn’s party was two nights ago.”
“Two?!”
“Yeah,” he says, sounding more casual than you’d have expected.
The realisation hits you like a punch to the gut.
“It’s… it’s Christmas Day, then?” you whisper, your voice hollow, the words barely registering as they leave your mouth. “We’ve missed the train.”
Cormac shrugs again, but the weariness in his eyes betrays him. “Yeah.” His tone is light, but you can see the exhaustion etched into his features, the slight slump of his usually easy posture. He’s trying to downplay it like it’s no big deal.
But then it hits you. You stare at him, your thoughts slowly clicking into place. “Did you end up going to -” You stop yourself, feeling like it’d be incredibly selfish to ask if he and Hermione went after all, considering everything that happened.
He rubs the back of his neck, looking away like he’s embarrassed. “Slughorn’s Party? Yeah… I didn’t go. I’ve been here.”
“Oh… I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be… I - I don’t know if you remember what we talked about in Hogsmeade but -”
Butterflies erupt in your stomach as soon as you recall what he said to you. “I remember.”
“Well, I didn’t really want to go without you anyway.”
You open your mouth to respond, but no words come. You don’t know what to say. How do you thank someone for missing something like that because of you? For staying here over the holidays, for caring, for... everything.
Just as you’re about to say something - anything - the doors to the Hospital Wing swing open.
Professor McGonagall strides in, her expression as serious as ever, but there’s a flicker of relief in her eyes when she sees you sitting up.
Behind her, Madam Pomfrey hurries in and starts checking you over, pouring a large bottle of bright golden Invigoration Draught into a cup for you. At her instance, you drink it in one gulp - it’s sharp and spicy, and less gruesome than you’d braced yourself for. As the heat spreads through your chest, you feel a bit less confused.
“Well, it’s good to see you awake,” McGonagall says briskly. “Miss Bell is receiving the best care at St. Mungo’s. The Healers are doing everything they can.”
Everything they can. It doesn’t feel like enough.
“Have we missed dinner, Professor?” asks Cormac, hopefully.
“I'm afraid so, Mr McLaggen,” says McGonagall, less sharply than you're used to her addressing him as she looks from his tired demeanour to his hand holding yours. She waves her wand and a tray of sandwiches is summoned on the table beside you. “I’ll notify your parents that you’re awake and both of you can take the Knight Bus home from Hogsmeade tonight.”
“Not tonight,” says Madam Pomfrey. “Another Invigoration Draught tomorrow morning. Then you can go home.”
Your heart twists painfully, the weight of everything pressing down on you. Katie’s in St. Mungo’s, fighting for her life. Christmas has come and gone, and the world outside feels like it’s moving without you.
“Do I have to stay in the Hospital Wing tonight?” you ask, thinking you’d like nothing more than to sink into your four-poster bed upstairs.
Madam Pomfrey hesitates.
“Oh, please, Madam Pomfrey. It’s Christmas,” you pout. “I’ll come back here after breakfast tomorrow.”
“Before breakfast,” she says sternly. And once you agree, she and Professor McGonagall leave.
Cormac is still here, beside you, his hand lingering on yours, his presence steady and comforting despite everything.
“When was the last time you slept?” you ask.
“I -” He pauses. “Not for a few days.”
You insist that he go back to Gryffindor Tower and he eventually agrees. Cormac grabs a couple of sandwiches, flashing you a tired but grateful smile.
“See you at breakfast,” he says softly, and with a quick wave, he slips out of the Hospital Wing, leaving the room quiet and still.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The dormitory is dark and eerily silent. Too silent. You’re used to the comforting background noise of sharing a room with four other girls - the soft rustle of sheets, the occasional sleepy murmur, the muffled creak of bedsprings. Tonight, without them, the emptiness feels vast and oppressive, as though the walls themselves are holding their breath.
You had expected Cormac to be in the Gryffindor Common Room when you got dressed and came upstairs. But he wasn’t there. He was in bed - no doubt shattered after sitting by your side in the hospital wing for two days straight. Two long, harrowing days where you were unconscious and he was busy worrying about both you and Katie.
Katie. The thought of her pulls at your chest like a lead weight. She’s at St Mungo’s. Alive but unresponsive. The cursed necklace nearly killed her. And while Madam Pomfrey has done her best to reassure you that she’s receiving the finest care, the image of Katie in St Mungo’s is enough to keep you awake.
It doesn't help that the Invigoration Draught has worked too well. You’re frustratingly alert. You’ve never noticed the grandfather clock much before but its ticking serves as a reminder of how much time is passing without you being able to sleep.
You wonder if Cormac is in the same predicament. He was tired but maybe everything that’s happened is keeping him up too. Cormac - of all people - stayed with you through it all. Missed Slughorn’s Party. Didn’t go home for Christmas -
He didn’t go home for Christmas.
You sit bolt-upright in bed.
That means he didn’t go to the Minister for Magic’s Christmas lunch with his Uncle today. He missed it. It’s all he’s been talking about since November and he missed it.
All so he could stay here at Hogwarts.
With you.
Something swells in your chest. A little guilt mixed with, well… overwhelming affection. Did you even thank him properly? You can’t remember - everything after the cursed necklace feels like a blur. You swing your legs out of bed, wincing at the icy chill of the stone floor against your bare feet.
You walk quietly towards the boy’s dormitory. The stone floor is freezing on your bare feet as you tiptoe. Though you’re not sure why you’re being quiet - you didn’t see anyone when you walked through the Common Room earlier. You think that you and Cormac might be the only two people in the whole of Gryffindor house that are here for the holidays.
The door to the Seventh-Year boys’ dormitory creaks faintly as you push it open. “Cormac?” you whisper into the darkness.
There’s a faint stir, followed by a groggy, half-asleep voice. “Hm?”
You cross the empty room, the cold gnawing at your skin, and perch on the edge of his bed. “Are you awake?”
“Wha?” he asks, blearily.
The cold air makes goosebumps rise on your skin. “It’s me,” you say as you sit on the edge of the bed.
Cormac sits up slightly, blinking at you in confusion, his hair sticking up in every direction. “What are you doing? This is the boys’ dormitory.” He pulls the duvet to his chest. You try not to notice that he’s not wearing a t-shirt. “Are - are you okay?”
“I couldn’t sleep.”
Cormac rubs his face, his tired brain catching up. “Katie is going to be fine,” he reassures you. “We’ll visit her as soon as we’re allowed.”
“I know,” you say. She’s getting the best care possible. And it’s not like either of you can do anything about it. “It’s not just Katie. Well, that’s part of it. But it’s that I realised… you missed Christmas lunch with your Uncle - and the Minister.”
“Oh. Yeah. It’s fine. It doesn’t matter.”
“It’s not fine. It’s all you’ve been talking about for weeks,” you insist, making a conscious effort to stop your teeth from chattering. “Missing your Uncle. Seeing Scrimgeour again. The fact you stayed here with me instead… that’s like, the nicest thing anyone has ever done for me.”
Cormac fumbles for his wand on the bedside table, muttering “Lumos.” It lights the nearest lamp. You scoot closer to him on the edge of his bed. The soft glow of the lamp bathes the room in warm light, and he turns to look at you properly, his eyes - greener than you’d ever realised - serious and searching.
“It was nothing. I told you already.”
“Well… I just wanted to say thank you -” you take a steadying breath, moving closer to him again. “- And… do this.”
Without thinking, you lean in, your heart racing. You close the distance between you and press your lips to his before you can second-guess it or get interrupted again.
Cormac pauses, completely caught off guard. You can feel the surprise in his stillness, but it lasts for barely a second before he responds with a surge of enthusiasm that almost takes your breath away.
He shrugs his bedsheets aside, sitting up so he can deepen the kiss, his lips warm and eager against yours. There’s no hesitation now, just the full force of his want, crashing into you like a tidal wave.
It’s everything you wanted it to be. He’s a good kisser. Really good.
You try to put a lot of meaning into the kiss. That you’re grateful for him staying here at Hogwarts with you. That you forgive him for his stupid, blundering mistakes before the Yule Ball.
But mostly, you try to tell him that you’ve been in love with him forever. Ever since you sat beside him on the Hogwarts Express on the first day of school.
You intended to give him a quick goodnight kiss and go back to your dormitory but the thought of leaving quickly leaves your mind when he parts his lips, tender and soft as Honeydukes caramel, as he explores the taste of your tongue. His hands wrap around your back, encouraging you closer, pulling you onto his lap so you’re straddling him.
You were freezing a minute ago but his bare chest and shoulders are warm and he doesn’t seem to mind your cold hands traversing over his body.
You need him. This is new territory. This is… you’ve never felt like this before. Well, maybe alone in your bed, but not with other people. You haven’t done anything more than kissing before.
But this is already more than just kissing, you think, as your tongue meets his again as he licks into your mouth. This is hot and heavy. You’re already starting to feel like you’re not close enough to him.
And so does he.
You feel a firm bulge pressing into your open legs and with a jolt of excitement, you realise he’s only wearing boxers. Everything below your waist throbs hot and sticky as his hips subtly twitch upwards, pressing against your pyjama shorts.
The ache between your legs is too unbearable to ignore. You adjust your hips and the friction against your bundle of nerves is white hot, almost dizzying. He responds to your movements by gripping onto your hips, his cock twitching against your pussy, just two thin pieces of material between you. You’re positively burning up now as he lets out a low groan into your mouth as you kiss him, before pulling back to suck on his bottom lip.
“Fuck…” you murmur, as you wriggle your hips impatiently. But when you say that he pulls back to look at you, his eyebrow raised. “What?” you ask.
You don’t want him to stop - not now.
“I’ve just never heard you swear before,” he grins and your cheeks burn.
You bite your lip. “It just… slipped out.”
“I like it…” he says, eyes glancing over your chest as it rises and falls rapidly in time with your breathing.
His fingers hook around the straps of your tank top, pausing just before they drop over your shoulders. The touch is featherlight like he’s waiting for something. Then his voice, low and careful, breaks through the charged silence.
“Is this okay?” he asks softly, his eyes meeting yours.
You nod and then, realising what he’s just said, you blink. “You’re... asking?”
Cormac tilts his head slightly, frowning just a little like something about your surprise bothers him. “Of course I’m asking,” he says, his voice quieter now, but insistent, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.
You swallow, looking away for a moment, feeling still warmed by the way he’s watching you. Nobody’s bothered to ask you if they could touch you before. It’s…. well, it’s classic him. Considerate. Sure enough of himself that he genuinely would respect whatever answer you gave him.
It makes you want him even more.
“You can - you can touch me. Wherever you want.”
You place your hands on top of his and help him slip your straps down, pulling your top down over your breasts.
“Fuck…” Cormac takes a deep, steadying breath. He tilts his head up and looks at the hangings above the bed.
“...Cormac?” you ask, uncertainly. “Are you -?”
“Yep,” he tells the hangings. “It’s just - I mean, I’ve just - thought about this moment a lot. And in no version did it involve me - y’know - making a mess of myself just from seeing your tits.”
A mischievous smile creeps across your lips. “Are you about to?”
“I’ll be fine - wha - oh, that is not helping.”
You slowly grind your hips against his and place his hands over your breasts. The underside of his cock twitches again against your now soaked pyjama shorts.
“I’ve thought about it a lot too,” you whisper, pressing your lips against his ear. “You can cum like this. If you want.”
“That would be - ah, fuck - completely fucking embarrassing,” he says, his eyebrows knitting together.
“I think it’s hot.”
As soon as you say that, his shoulders relax and he buries his face between your tits with an agonised groan. Your hands tangle in his hair as you rock restlessly against him, moving your hips in search of the gnawing need between your legs.
Cormac swirls his tongue, open-mouthed and panting against your skin. He pushes your tits together, toying with your nipples, pinching the hardened buds between his fingertips in a way that makes you let out an involuntary squeal.
“Too hard?” he asks, concerned, and you shake your head fervently.
“Do it again,” you whimper.
You grind yourself along his rock-hard bulge, feeling exceptionally greedy as Cormac toys with your tits. Pleasure swells in your abdomen. God, this feels good. He drinks up every noise you accidentally release, as you hover on the edge - wasn’t he the one who was supposed to be close?
Suddenly, Cormac grabs your hips, stopping you from moving and you almost cry out in protest. He breathes shakily, adjusting himself.
“Did you just…”
“Not yet,” he says, and before you know it he’s manoeuvring on top of you, flipping you on your back and splaying you out on his bedsheets. “I need to find out just how sweet you taste first.”
This is more like the Cormac you know. He’s been so reserved, so unlike himself around you for the past several weeks that you almost forgot how cocky he could get.
And wow, do you like it.
“Cormac,” you whisper, feeling yourself turn crimson now under his touch.
He plants a trail of kisses along your collarbone, down your torso and pauses just below your navel. Cormac hooks his fingers in the waistband of your pyjama shorts and you arch your back so he can remove them and toss them onto the floor in a pathetic heap.
Cormac drags the pads of his fingertips across your flushed, slick pussy. “Is this… for me?” He gives you the widest, most gleeful grin you’ve ever seen plastered on his face as he laughs once, under his breath. “You’re so wet.”
“Don’t laugh,” you pout - although from the way he’s lighting up, you can tell he likes the effect he’s having on you.
“You’ve got to admit, it is kind of funny. How everyone calls you Sweet because you’ve got this ‘butter wouldn’t melt’ thing going on but here you are… sneaking into my bed in the middle of the night.”
Your hips buck as he slides his fingers through your folds, dragging your arousal across your clit. An uncontrollable whine leaves your mouth as his fingers glide up and down, up and down. He rolls his tongue against the inside of his cheek thoughtfully as he looks you over. “I wonder what other swear words you know…”
“I - ah - I told you it just slipped out -” you stammer. Goosebumps break out along your arms - this time it’s nothing to do with the cold - you’re burning up, hearing him talk to you like this. But the more you blush, the more it spurs him on.
Cormac gives you a lop-sided smirk as he drags gentle, lazy circles around your clit. “So… that kind of talk is just for me, right?” he asks. You wriggle again, opening yourself up wider, silently willing him to put his fingers inside you.
“Yes,” you whimper. He’s got you wrapped around his finger - almost literally. You’ll say anything he wants to hear. Do anything - everything that he wants. Give him anything he asks. As long as he keeps touching you like this.
You make a soft, vulnerable sound in bliss, feeling yourself slowly falling apart at how he’s circling over that little bundle of nerves that makes your eyes fucking roll back. He hisses an inhale through his teeth, watching your reaction.
And then suddenly, he’s pushing in and curling two thick fingers inside your eager, soaking wet pussy and hooking them tight against your g-spot.
“Oh.” Your hand flies blindly down to touch his face - just for something to feel - and his expression changes from a smug smile to stern concentration.
Your thumb brushes along his cheekbone, grazing the rough stubble of his jaw. He tilts his head just enough to kiss your palm, the warmth of his lips lingering against your skin, sending a spark racing up your arm.
Then his eyes find yours - those green eyes, darker now, pupils blown out with a burning intensity that knocks the breath from your lungs. The way he looks at you, unflinching, unrestrained, sends a rush of heat through you, making your heart pound and your pulse quicken.
You almost cry out when Cormac lowers his head and his soft lips envelope your clit. You clench around his fingers and tense your stomach when his tongue swirls even hotter and more dextrous than his fingers.
“Mhmm,” he says, pressing a kiss against your inner thigh before looking up with a wicked grin. His chin is wet. “You are sweet.”
You bite your lip and let your head roll back as he resumes his gentle licking. You can hardly believe this is happening. You’re trembling as you try to suppress another squeal but it’s like he can read your mind -
“It’s okay to make noise. Nobody’s here. You don’t need to hold back,” he says between sloppy sucking. You remind yourself, that you’ve been best friends for so long he can probably read the nuances of your body language.
“Ah - okay, okay. Fuck - Cormac,” is all you can manage.
“That’s my girl.”
Oh, fuck. Why did he have to call you that? Your pussy clenches tight, neediness swelling in waves in your abdomen.
And then you don’t expect the way his whole arm moves as he picks up pace. At first, you feel jostled, almost manhandled when his fingers don’t go in and out but instead curl into you with such intense pressure that you feel like you can’t keep up. It’s too fast. Too much.
Until it suddenly isn’t.
The flat of his tongue rubs against your clit in time with his fingers pressing against your g-spot. Blazing, white-hot heat twists tightly in your pelvic floor muscles. Your hand slides down to the juncture of muscle between his neck and his shoulder as you grip helplessly, feeling the relentless pressure of him stimulating that perfect spot deep inside you.
“Cormac,” you pant, as your walls twitch and tighten around those two fingers. “I’m - ha - that’s - yeah, there.”
“Mhm,” he murmurs, sending vibrations across your clit. His eyes move back to your face. You convulse around your best friend’s fingers as he pulls you closer and closer to the edge. You’ve stopped wriggling, chasing your release - you don’t need to. Your whole body goes limp as you just let him drill inside you.
“Yes,” you say, biting your lip, your eyebrows knitting together, losing yourself in the mindless sensation. “Fuck, yesyesyesyes -”
He looks into your eyes while you plead for him as he pulls the orgasm from you. You clutch on his shoulder, feeling his hand working between your legs, pulling you higher and higher and -
Fuck.
Everything plummets.
White noise rings in your ears as your insides twist and release, sending agonising pleasure rippling through your whole body, more bright and explosive than anything you’ve felt before.
His hand slows down, dragging out the boiling hot aftershock, massaging your pussy until you’re a trembling mess.
At last, he slowly slips his fingers out from inside of you and lies next to you.
Cormac can’t tear his eyes from you, watching the way your head falls back onto the pillow - his pillow - as you catch your breath, looking up at the velvet hangings above and raking your hands through your hair.
You think you must lie there in stunned silence for a full minute before you realise he’s waiting on you to say something.
“What -” you swallow, your mouth feeling dry. “What time is the Knight Bus tomorrow?”
Cormac tilts his head, concerned. “After breakfast, I think. But, I mean… if you need space or something, then that’s fine -”
“No,” you turn your head on the pillow quickly. “No, nothing like that.”
You roll on top of him so that you’re straddling him again and lean down. Your hair tickles his cheek as you lean in close enough to see every detail of his face - the faint freckles across his nose, the shadow of stubble on his jaw, even the flutter of his lashes. Every inch of him feels so present.
“I’m trying to figure out how many times we can do that before McGonagall sends us home,” you smirk and relief crosses his face.
“I thought you were trying to see if there was any way you could leave earlier,” he murmurs, his voice rough with sincerity.
You shake your head. “I want to stay here forever. I want -” You plant a kiss on his cheek and slip your hand between your bodies, your curious fingers lightly dancing over his hard cock through his boxers. “- I want you. So badly. You have no idea.”
“Pretty sure I have some idea how that feels.” Cormac reaches down to catch the waistband of his boxers with his thumbs and lets you pull out his cock. It’s just as gorgeous as the rest of him. You wrap your palm around him, feeling how warm and thick he is, and slowly jerk your wrist. His jaw tightens and he jerks his hips upwards to meet your soft, clenched fist.
“That’s - fuck, that’s good -” he says, closing his eyes, his lips slightly parted. He looks so good like this, you think, as you watch him swallow thickly, neck muscles contracting.
You adjust yourself higher up his body so that you can kiss his exposed neck. As you keep working your wrist between your bodies the tip of his cock rests against your wet folds.
“Cormac,” you whisper, your voice trembling slightly, “do you want to…?”
His eyes open, searching yours with quiet intensity. “Yeah,” he says softly like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.
Your hand pauses stroking him, caught off guard by the steadiness of his answer. “You didn’t even let me finish the question.”
“I don’t need to,” he says, his voice gentle but certain. “If it’s you, the answer’s always yes.”
You can’t help it - the corners of your mouth twitch upward despite the nervous flutter in your chest and the fact that the tip of his leaking cock is pressing against your soaked entrance.
“Does it… do you know if it hurts?” you ask, your voice quieter now - hesitant.
Cormac tilts his head slightly, studying you, his brow furrowing - not in judgment, but in thought. “I don’t know,” he admits, his voice honest but calm. “I’ve never - ” He pauses for a beat, his green eyes flickering with something unreadable. “I haven’t done this before either.”
Your eyes widen. “You haven’t?”
He shakes his head, his expression softening into something almost self-conscious. “Nope.”
“Really?” The word comes out before you can stop it, your voice tinged with disbelief. Somehow, you’d always imagined him as… well, more experienced. The fact that he isn’t, that this is just as new for him, feels oddly grounding.
“Yeah, really,” he says, a small, self-deprecating smile tugging at his lips. His gaze remains fixed on yours, unwavering. “It’s not like I’ve never had the chance or anything… just none of them felt right.”
You swallow hard, your throat tight. “And… this does?”
He doesn’t hesitate. “Yeah.” His lips twitch into a faint smile. “It’s always been you, Sweet. And if you want this too, then -”
“I do. Cormac.” You swallow, the truth spilling out before you can second-guess it. “Of course, I do. I’ve been in love with you since I was eleven years old.”
“So have I,” he says, his voice low but certain. “So there’s nothing to worry about,” he says softly, like a promise. “I’ve got you.”
For once, you don’t think, don’t question. You lift your hips back slightly, just enough for the head of his cock to part your folds. Cormac holds the base of his length, positioning himself so that you can balance your weight, one hand on his chest, the other on the bed.
You sink down, feeling pressure as his cock pushes through your entrance. You shut your eyes tight, expecting pain but you open them again when you feel two large hands caressing your hips.
“Still got you, baby.”
A deep heat blooms within you, sweeping through your body like a tide and leaving your thoughts in a hazy, breathless blur. You slide down further - so slick and hot between your legs that there’s no resistance besides the stretch of him filling you up. As you lower yourself, his reassurance becomes a dark, lustful groan and his thumbs press on your hipbones.
“Fuck,” he grunts. “Fuck - that’s - yeah -”
The back of your thighs meet his hips as you bottom out and the sensation is all-consuming, a wildfire of longing that burns away reason.
His cock presses up against every part of your insides in a way that your body has craved for so long while you tried to ignore it. Every smile he flashed you from across the room, every time you brushed past him as he held a door open - it always made something in your core lurch. And now as you feel those same muscles tighten you realise the extent of your primal want for him.
“It’s… it’s in,” you whisper and it feels almost redundant to say it when it’s so patently obvious but you’re trying to tell him and yourself that you’re okay. It hurts a little - but in a good way - like when your legs ache from climbing a long flight of stairs. Except you never feel fire igniting in your belly like this when you ascend the staircase of the Astronomy Tower.
“Yeah, I’m inside you,” he says breathlessly. Then his expression changes, something flickering in his eyes - an intense, unspoken longing that unfurls in the space between you. “I’m fucking inside you,” he says again, the words low and rough, tumbling from his lips like he’s surrendering to a need he can no longer contain. He thrusts upwards and you gasp breathlessly, it’s as though the world tilts on its axis.
“You good?” he asks, grabbing firm fistfuls of your hips. You nod, your thoughts disapparating around the edges when his cock twitches inside you. “You feel perfect.”
You melt so fiercely under his compliment that you need to look away. But when you look down between your bodies and see him buried to the hilt inside you, you can see why he had to repeat himself.
This is happening - it’s real and it’s actually happening and it’s everything you ever hoped.
You lift your hips in slow, stuttered little jumps, experimenting with the way he feels inside you. Is this right? Are you good at this? Should you move more like this? But Cormac helps, his hands on your tentative hips aid your momentum as he decisively guides you forward and back and - oh.
Now, this is right.
You know for certain now, as his thick cock glides in and out of your sopping wet folds, your arousal dripping all over him, and you can’t tear your eyes away in an almost enchanted haze. You know you must feel right for him too because in almost rhythmic agreement, his cock pushes against that deep sensitive spot you need as you convulse around him.
“Oh, shit -” breathes Cormac. “Look at me, look at me.”
With difficulty, your eyes pull up weakly, looking away from his cock driving into you and meeting his gaze. He’s so present and focused - like he’s searching for something.
Cormac’s hand slides from your hip and his thumb finds your swollen clit. You gasp, realising only now how close you are to the edge. You curse and Cormac grins. This is the answer to the silent question he’d been searching for.
“Fuck -” you whine, your pussy clamping down hard around him. “Fuck, fuck, fuuuuuck -”
“That’s it, baby. Tell me how good it is.”
“Mhm,” you huff as you pick up pace, bouncing against his lap, chasing every bit of friction he has to offer you. It all melds together, the way his cock fills you up, his wet thumb rubbing against your clit, his other hand roughly guiding you up and down on him.
“Fuck - it’s good - s’good -” you try and keep focused on his gorgeous look of concentration as your floor muscles clamp down. “You’re so fucking good.”
He closes his eyes and an agonised groan tumbles from his lips when you say that.
“Yeah? You like that?”
“Yesyesyesyes,” you whimper, every syllable punctuated with you riding him. Your eyes roll back as everything winds tighter and tighter, your nerve endings alight and sparking pleasure through your body.
“Fuck, say it again,” he growls, his hips jutting up to slap against the back of your thighs.
You don’t even know when you say next. All you know is that whatever filthy words spill out, make Cormac laugh triumphantly through gritted teeth as your world shatters.
He murmurs your name - your real name, not that nickname everyone calls you - as he rubs your clit and fucks you exactly where you need him to, throwing you towards raw pleasure.
“Are you cumming again, baby?”
“Ah - uh-huh,” you choke and even that little moan in the affirmative is a struggle.
Every unbridled bounce of your hips sends your mind reeling as your orgasm crashes down over you. Your pussy throbs and twitches around him, squeezing him hard as you ride out the beautiful wave.
Fuck.
It’s messy, it’s aching, it’s blurry, it’s debilitating. You can barely see straight.
You twitch from oversensitivity as Cormac fucks himself up and into you in search of his own high. His hips thrust erratically and his face contorts in pleasure and then suddenly he’s forcing your hips down onto him, and with a guttural moan, he’s cumming deep inside you, holding you in place even as you squirm and shake through the aftershock of your own ecstasy.
Everything goes dark - you see actual stars behind your eyelids. Vaguely, you’re aware of Cormac tenderly manoeuvring you with strong, safe arms so that you’re lying at his side, your head resting on his chest. He pulls his duvet over you - it's cosy and smells like him. It's wonderful.
“You’re shaking - are you warm enough?”
“Mhm,” you murmur, feeling your eyes grow heavy as you try to keep them open. “Just tingly. It’s… it’s nice.”
Cormac tilts your chin up and he leans down to kiss you, slow and lazy. He’s soft and warm. You’re safe and pliant. His fingers tuck a loose strand of hair behind your ear and sweetly brush the curve of your jaw.
“Are you tired?” he asks.
“A little,” you say. It's an understatement. You're barely able to lift your eyelids to look at him. There’s something about being nestled here on his shoulder - like you were in front of the common room fire a few weeks ago - that just signals to your body that it’s secure and that you can relax fully. “You?”
“Yeah… I just don’t wanna fall asleep in case I’m already dreaming. I can’t believe this is real.”
“It’s real,” you sigh pleasantly, feeling his very real heartbeat in his chest as you snuggle in closer. The way he’s looking at you - like he’s seeing something precious - makes your chest ache.
“Good,” he murmurs, his voice low and soothing as he lies back on his pillow. “Because I don’t want this to end.”
You don’t want it to end either.
“I know you probably want to catch the Knight Bus tomorrow and see your family but -” he starts, hesitating slightly.
You cut him off gently. “We could stay here. For the holidays. If you want to.”
He closes his eyes, the softest smile curling his lips as his thumb brushes your shoulder. “Yeah,” he says, his voice steady now. “I want that.”
The Gryffindor Common Room is a blazing display of gold and red. Laughter and cheering fill the room so loudly that you can barely hear yourself think as you weave through the crowd with two butterbeers in hand.
“Cheer up, Cormac,” you say, finding him on a plump armchair in the corner of the room. You hand him a butterbeer and sit on his lap. He pulls you close, his hand resting on the back of your thigh. “We won the cup, didn’t we?”
“I really thought this was going to be my year,” he grumbles. “I might just have to face it - maybe I’m not cut out to play Quidditch.”
“I think you’re brilliant,” you say, although your words are probably meaningless - you don’t know the first thing about Quidditch.
“Oh, come on. You were there - you watched me knock Potter out with a bludger in the last game.”
“Well, Katie was still in St Mungo’s, wasn’t she? You had other things on your mind.”
Cormac tuts, as if he’s annoyed at himself for being distracted by one of his best friends being in mortal peril.
“Besides,” you say, leaning in and pressing your mouth to his ear. “You have plenty of other talents. Ones that are more… useful than Quidditch.”
“Oh, yeah?” he asks, turning to give you a lopsided grin. His tone is low, teasing, but the heat in his eyes makes your pulse quicken. “Care to elaborate?”
You don’t bother answering. Instead, you press your lips to his, letting the butterbeer bottle tilt precariously in your grip as his arms tighten around your waist. His hand slides a little higher up your thigh, the warmth of it sending sparks skittering down your spine. You tilt your head, deepening the kiss, and suddenly it feels like the whole room could catch fire from how hot your skin feels against his.
“Alright, that’s enough of the Devil’s Snare impression” Katie’s voice interrupts, dry and sharp as she drops into the armchair beside yours, looking equal parts amused and exasperated.
You pull back, flustered, trying to regain a sliver of composure. Cormac shifts slightly, but his arm stays around your waist, not bothering to hide the grin on his face.
“Do you have to keep doing that where I can see? I’ve had enough trauma this year without adding that to the list,” she says, rolling her eyes.
“Sorry,” you grin sheepishly.
“Don’t be,” Katie snorts. “Honestly, I prefer this to whatever you were doing before. It was unbearable. I mean, the pining - ” she shudders theatrically “- disgusting.”
You laugh, but Cormac just raises his butterbeer in mock toast. “Thanks for your support. Truly heartwarming.”
Katie waves a hand dismissively, clearly unbothered. “Just get me my next butterbeer so I don’t need to fight through that crowd again, and we’ll call it even.”
Cormac reaches over without missing a beat, handing her his unopened bottle. “Here. You’ve earned it.”
She raises an eyebrow, suspicious. “Why, because I nearly got cursed to death and inadvertently set the two of you up?”
“No,” Cormac says dryly, though his lips twitch. “Because you’ve basically just won us the bloody Quidditch Cup.”
You raise your butterbeer in solidarity. “To Katie.”
“To me,” she says smugly, clinking her bottle with yours before taking a long sip.
The three of you settle into easy conversation, as easy and as natural as it’s always been.
Sitting here in the glow of victory, with Katie healthy and whole, and Cormac’s arm around your waist, you feel like the luckiest person in the world.
Things are pretty sweet.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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Finders Keepers Ch 20. (Cormac McLaggen x fem!reader)
Rating: Explicit 18+ (no smut)
Word Count: 7.5k
Warnings: Minor character deaths, violence
Summary: The final battle of Hogwarts
A/N: The last chapter 😢 an epilogue is on the way. This has been a blast. Thank you for reading. ❤️
Masterlist
Chapter 20: Avada Kedavra
The courtyard is eerily quiet when you and McLaggen skid to an abrupt halt on the rubble. A long streak of blood is painted across the cobblestone. And even though the thought of what caused it turns your stomach, instantly your mind begins playing it out. A faceless Death Eater blasted across the cloister. Or maybe it was a student dragging themselves away from the fighting. Or perhaps it’s the evidence of someone being tenderly carried off to somewhere safer. Assuming there’s anywhere safe left.
“Where is everyone?” The question, more to yourself than McLaggen, hangs in the chilled night air, icy on your skin after the pitch's fiery chaos. He holds one of the now-dilapidated oak front doors open and crumbling mortar silently dusts your heads and shoulders as you pass through the threshold. From a distance, you spot a familiar figure, carrying someone over one shoulder as they walk across the Entrance Hall.
“Wood?” calls McLaggen.
At least one of your group is still alive.
Oliver Wood stops in his tracks and turns, his face solemn. The realisation that the body he carries is dead and not simply injured hits you with sickening force. A young boy, blonde and no older than sixteen, hangs limp in his grasp.
“Colin Creevey,” says Wood sadly, in answer to the unasked question on the tip of your tongue. “He must have snuck back in through the Hog’s Head passageway to fight. He was only a kid.”
“Here, let me help,” says McLaggen.
“It’s alright, mate - he’s -” Wood swallows with difficulty, the sentiment choking in his throat. “He’s only a wee thing.”
“Where - where are the others?” You’re surprised when your voice too is hoarse, barely a whisper. “Did you all get back to the castle alright?”
“We did,” says Wood as you and McLaggen fall into step with him, walking back towards the Great Hall. “But once we got back it was pandemonium. We were split up. I think the girls are in the Great Hall but some of the lads and I have been busy out here - helping carry bodies back and hoping that we don’t see anyone we know.”
The lads. You breathe a sigh of relief because it means Carmichael, Davies and Krum are all right too.
“We’ll be fine,” says McLaggen determinedly. “We’re all good fighters. Not kids like Colin -”
Wood shakes his head. “It’s not just kids like Colin - members of the Order of the Phoenix are dead. You remember Professor Lupin? He’s dead. And Fred Weasley.”
“Fred Weasley?” McLaggen halts. “Back when we were in the D.A. he was one of the best.” He says it matter-of-factly like Wood must be mistaken.
“Gone,” says Wood with a sniff. “There were at least twenty bodies when I last left the Great Hall. And we keep finding more.”
A heavy silence accompanies you into the Great Hall, where the reality of war is laid bare. The sky above the enchanted ceiling is pitch black. There’s not a single star in the sky visible. Dark clouds loom so claustrophobically close it’s a wonder there’s any air in the hall at all. Dozens of the fallen are lined up along the centre of the room. Some with crying families at their side, and some, you realise with a sinking feeling, are completely alone.
Your eyes scour the room searching for your own loved ones. At this side of the row of bodies nearest you, there’s a crowd that can only be Fred Weasley’s family. Relief washes over you as you spot Angelina, at the edge of the group, sobbing on Alicia’s shoulder.
Another two who are still alive.
But your relief is short-lived when you see only Leanne and Katie at the far end of the hall, crowded around someone on the floor.
Panic makes the hair on your arm rise.
You break into a run, heart pounding, as you pass by too many bodies to count, each step fuelled by a mix of hope and dread. Leanne and Katie look up at your arrival, still holding each other, tears streaking down their faces.
Cho is kneeling on the floor, holding the lifeless hand of a girl. She has the same long, wavy, auburn hair as Marietta. But it can’t be Marietta. Eddie isn’t here. And besides, she’s covered in dust, with pieces of rubble strewn in her hair. Marietta was always fussy about her appearance. She wouldn’t be caught dead looking like this.
McLaggen catches up with you and stops dead, momentarily stunned by the scene before him. “Fuck… Marietta.” His whisper hits you like a slowing charm.
“That’s not - it’s not -” Your legs feel like lead as you take a step closer. “I don’t think it’s Marietta - I mean, her face is…” That’s not Marietta’s face. Where are her scars? You sink to your knees across from Cho to get a closer look at the girl’s face. If you look hard enough, maybe it won’t be true. You’ll find some difference. A freckle or a piercing that proves this isn’t Marietta.
“The curse must have died with her,” Cho murmurs, her voice quiet with grief as a tear drips onto Marietta’s serene, unblemished face.
“She’s so beautiful,” sobs Leanne. “I mean - not that she wasn’t before -“
Fuck.
The truth hits hard. Undeniable. Raw.
It is her.
“She was beautiful,” you agree, your voice breaking as a surge of memories overwhelms you, letting the tears flow unguarded. “Before the curse, when she had the curse and - and after.”
After. You never thought there would be a time after Marietta. Ever since your first day at Hogwarts, Marietta Edgecombe was there. After the sorting ceremony, you found yourself sitting across from her at the Ravenclaw table. You still remember the way she covered her mouth with the back of her hand and whispered something that made Cho giggle when Professor Dumbledore stood up to give his beginning-of-term speech. And it was at that point she had first seemed so different to you then. She loved gossip and fashion and makeup and boys - the two of you never really saw eye to eye. Mostly because you insisted you ‘weren’t like other girls’.
But Marietta eventually showed you that you weren’t so different to other girls after all. And that other girls had their own interests just like you. It took longer than you’d like to admit to figure out that liking flying instead of Transfiguration didn’t make you superior. And so, Marietta transfigured your dress for Slughorn’s party. And you taught her how to fly a broom well enough to go on a dangerous mission to Azkaban.
You suppose, if you let yourself think about the sad truth of it, her scars were probably the reason why she was so good at Transfiguration. She had spent a long time when you were still at Hogwarts, in the dormitory mirror with her wand pointed at her face, trying to rid herself of the scars that spelt ‘SNEAK’ across her cheeks and nose.
“How did she…?” The question dies in your throat as you look at Cho, not sure if you're ready to hear the answer. But she shakes her head. She doesn’t know. “I mean, where did you find her? And where’s Carmichael? Wasn’t he with her?” Eddie would know what had happened. “Does he even know she’s…?”
“We don’t have any answers,” says Katie not unkindly but it’s clear that your incessant questioning isn’t helping when they’re just as lost as you.
“Wood said that the guys were helping with the bodies,” McLaggen reminds you. “Maybe they’ll know more. They’ll be back in a… oh, fuck.”
McLaggen’s voice trails off and you look up to see why.
Krum and Davies walk along the length of the hall, carrying a body. Krum holding under the arms and Davies carrying the legs. As they move, Krum clenches his jaw and Davies stares straight ahead solemnly.
“Nonononono…” you whimper, getting to your feet to get out of the way so that they can set the body down next to Marietta. Your hands reach for McLaggen’s and his find you, neither of you daring to take your eyes off of the body being carried towards you as you grasp at each other’s forearms for something - anything - to cling onto.
Krum and Davies set the lifeless figure down and step out of the way. Nobody says anything for a long time as you stare down at them.
The echo of a mischievous smile is still etched on Eddie Carmichael’s face, even in death. You half expect his eyes to fly open. “Only winding you up, mucker,” he’d say, sitting upright and dusting himself off. And you’d roll your eyes and slap his arm for worrying you so. For letting the practical joke play out too long.
It’s not a joke. No matter how much you want it to be.
Carmichael.
Your last shred of hope turns to dust. Even in Azkaban, Carmichael was a vial of Awakening Potion - the jolt of energy you needed to turn the tide in the depths of your despair. He almost made Azkaban feel like a game. Reminded you that being locked up was just a temporary situation - something that would pass. But this? This is permanent.
“Where - where did you find him?” asks McLaggen. His voice is thick, barely recognisable.
Davies clears his throat. “Near the staircase behind the tapestry on the sixth floor. Longbottom said it was where he found Marietta.”
They were together.
McLaggen winces at Davies’ words and shuts his eyes momentarily, unable to bring himself to look at the lifeless figures of Marietta Edgecombe and Eddie Carmichael. You, on the other hand, can’t look away.
The dust coating their faces makes them look almost blue-tinged. The remnants of an explosion, perhaps? The broken bits of rubble are still stuck in Marietta’s hair. Trembling slightly, you crouch down to try to disentangle them with your fingers, careful not to pull at her scalp.
It’s no good.
While you’ve never had an eye for Transfiguration like Marietta, you extract McLaggen’s dad’s wand from your pocket and press it gently at the pieces of rubble and one by one, transfigure them into tiny, blue forget-me-nots.
To an onlooker, she might seem merely asleep, her hair adorned with forget-me-nots as if chosen by her own hand on a sunny day at Seafarer's Beacon. This small touch of beauty, reminiscent of the way her paper snowflakes once danced around the lighthouse stairwell or the summer wreath she hung on the front door just yesterday, captures the essence of Marietta's spirit.
She always had an eye for making this world a little more beautiful.
Cho waves her wand in a complicated figure of eight and a wreath of the same forget-me-nots flourishes into existence. She places it silently at Eddie’s head before the two of you stand up and join the rest in quiet mourning.
“You okay?” you whisper to McLaggen, noticing his ashen face. His brow furrows as if silently debating something internally.
“How long have we got before the fighting starts again?” he asks the group, breaking the silence, his words piercing the heavy air.
“Not long I reckon,” says Davies.
McLaggen’s demeanour shifts, a firm look of determination on his face. “Potter needs to hand himself in… Where is he?” He looks around the room with an intense, measured sort of calm that you’ve only witnessed once before. When he stood up in the Black Dragon and asked Marcus Flint to step outside. “I’ll hand him over myself if I have to.”
“Vot is this?” asks Krum as McLaggen makes to leave.
“Not gonna happen,” Davies tells McLaggen firmly, stepping in front of him.
“If he’d just handed himself over right at the start then Ed and Marietta would still be alive.” McLaggen tries to push past but Davies moves again.
“Handing over Potter isn’t going to bring them back -” says Davies.
For the first time, McLaggen raises his voice, drawing the attention of mourners in the hall. “How many more of us are going to have to die for him?!”
“Cormac -” you start and reach for his hand. “Marietta and Carmichael wouldn’t have wanted us to turn him in.”
“We don’t know what they’d have wanted,” he says bitterly and your own face screws up in anguish, fighting tears and unable to find the words to argue with him.
But before anyone else can argue with him an amplified voice causes the noise in the Great Hall to halt into momentary silence.
“Harry Potter is dead!”
The last word bounces around the stone walls. Dead. Dead. Dead.
There’s murmuring and hushing as You-Know-Who’s disembodied voice calls every survivor to attention. Everyone looks skywards as if it’ll make the words clearer. Make them make sense.
“He was killed as he ran away, trying to save himself while you lay down your lives for him,” the voice continues.
You’d be the first to admit you’re not Potter’s biggest fan but from everything you’ve heard about it, you know he has the same selfless, noble streak that McLaggen and the rest of your Gryffindor friends have - and you can’t imagine any of them running away to save themselves. You furrow your eyebrows together and look at Katie - she knows Potter best. As expected, she mirrors your thoughts with a firm shake of her head.
“He wouldn’t -” Katie starts, but the voice cuts her off.
“We bring you his body as proof that your hero is gone. The battle is won. You have lost half of your fighters. My Death Eaters outnumber you and The Boy Who Lived is finished. There must be no more war. Anyone who continues to resist, man, woman or child, will be slaughtered. As will every member of their family.”
The seven of you gather close as you hold your breath waiting to hear what will happen to you.
“Come out of the castle now. Kneel before me and you shall be spared. Your parents and children, your brother and sisters will live and be forgiven and you will join me in the new world we shall build together.”
McLaggen shakes his head. “It - it can’t all have been for nothing. Breaking them all out of Azkaban - it - it’s just can’t.”
“He’s lying. Harry’s not - he’s not dead,” says Cho with an air of trying to convince herself that it’s the truth.
You look over to where Fred Weasley’s body lies and see that Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger are looking around frantically for the missing member of their trio. The pair stumble into a run, leaving the Great Hall and the rest of the survivors begin following them.
If Harry Potter isn’t dead then why are his two best friends panicking?
You stay rooted to the spot. “Look, we can’t go out there. No matter what You-Know-Who said about sparing us - Cerys told me that Muggleborns and traitors will be killed.”
“Well, we’re not going out there to surrender,” says McLaggen. “We’re going out there to fight.”
Everyone breaks into squabbling.
“They’re going to kill us,” you insist, feeling helpless as you point out the impending death sentence.
“We can’t just stay in here,” says Katie.
“Angelina and Alicia are going,” points out Leanne.
You feel like you’re going mad. Desperation grips you as you beg them to understand. “A Death Eater told me herself that they’re going to execute the Muggleborns and force purebloods into Death Eater families.”
Davies finally chimes in, siding with caution. “I agree with Keeps. They’ll slaughter us all.”
“Not if I kill him first,” says McLaggen, straightening up but his change in demeanour makes your blood run cold.
“Kill who?” asks Cho. “You’re not talking about killing You-Know-Who, are you?”
McLaggen pauses, his gaze fixed on the distant double doors. When he speaks, his voice is clear, and full of resolve. “Not You-Know-Who. Voldemort.”
The use of the taboo name is heavy in the air for a split second as a silent shock ripples through the group. McLaggen begins to march forward, his steps deliberate, pulling the rest of you from your stupor as you scramble to keep pace, murmurs of disbelief echoing behind him.
Wait - what?
He follows the direction of the crowd leaving the Great Hall.
“Cormac - wait - no,” you panic, pulling on his arm but he keeps walking as you practically jog to keep up with his long strides. “Cormac?”
“McLaggen, what are you playing at, mate?” Davies too tries to get Cormac’s attention while you march.
McLaggen’s eyes darken, a flash of the recent pain “No, we end this. I kill Voldemort. If I finish him off, Marietta and Eddie won’t have died for nothing…”
“No, Cormac -”
“I think ve need a plan,” Krum says looking slightly wary.
“There’s no time for a plan. All I need is one shot. One clear shot,” he says, staring ahead defiantly as you join the back of the moving crowd.
“Cormac McLaggen, will you listen to me?!” Your voice is unusually shrill, half-choked with fear and desperation, as you plant yourself firmly in his path, forcing him to confront you. “You can’t just ‘take a shot’ at him. There’ll be protective enchantments. And even if by some miracle you breach those, it’ll be as good as suicide.”
Cormac halts and looks down into your eyes sadly. “You said it yourself - we’re all dead anyway. To them, we’re nothing but a bunch of traitors and Muggleborns.”
“I should be the one to do it, then,” you plead. “You’re from a pureblood family. You might still have a chance.” He shakes his head, dismissing the idea and you flare up. “And why not? I’m just as capable as you.”
“You are capable,” he insists. “But I should be the one to do it.”
“Why?” demands Cho, her voice sharp.
“I’m done for when they find out I killed the Minister for Magic’s daughter.”
“And they’ll let the rest of us walk free?” asks Cho rhetorically. “Umbridge has been looking for us since all this started. If she’s anything to do with the new regime - she’ll make sure that we’re first to go. She’ll probably - she’ll probably frame us for Marietta’s death.” The idea leaves a bitter scowl on her face. Of course, Umbridge would. What a sympathetic story it’d make too. Marietta Edgecombe - Umbridge’s secretary. Kidnapped by the D.A. and killed in battle.
“As much as I don’t like the idea of going out there without a plan, we’re running out of time and there’s nowhere else left to go,” says Davies resignedly as the seven of you look beyond the double doors at the courtyard. “So if any of us get the chance we should take it.”
“Exactly,” says Krum. “Ve train together, ve fight together.”
“I say if anyone gets close enough to You-Know - I mean - Voldemort, we do it. The Killing Curse,” says Katie.
Leanne nods. “I agree.”
You and McLaggen exchange a determined look. One last mission. Together.
“Alright,” McLaggen says, addressing everyone with a confidence reminiscent of the sort you usually have when rousing your Quidditch team. “Alright. Let’s do this. Let’s kill Voldemort.”
The remnants of Dumbledore’s Army huddle together in the devastated courtyard.
Harry Potter is dead.
The grim truth of it is laid bare for everyone to see in the slowly lightening darkness that precedes the dawn as you gaze at his body lying limp in Hagrid’s arms as he sobs.
The lump in your throat isn’t so much for Potter as for what he represented, what his death means for you and your friends. Marietta is dead. Carmichael is dead. You and the rest of the D.A. will probably join them soon. If McLaggen isn’t executed he’ll be married off to some other Death Eater. You hold onto McLaggen’s hand tight, barely listening to Voldemort addressing the crowd as you instead silently count each second your hand is in his before you’re inevitably separated.
You watch as Hagrid is instructed to place Potter on the ground at his feet.
Voldemort paces in front of the crowd, his giant snake wrapped around his shoulders as he points to Potter’s dead body. “He was nothing - ever - but a boy who relied on others to sacrifice themselves for him.”
“He beat you!” yells Ron Wealsey, a few places down to your left. You try to shrink back, away from the attention he’s bringing to your group but McLaggen holds fast - the same look of defiance painted on his face as is on Weasley’s.
To your horror, McLaggen shouts, “Your Death Eaters were losing!” Members of the D.A. and several others in the crowd cry out in dissent too.
“Cormac,” you plead. The idea of any of you breaking through the void between the survivors and Death Eaters to aim a Killing Curse at Voldemort seems like a childish fantasy now that you’re out here, facing him. You just want to slip away. The last thing you want is for any of the D.A. to be made a humiliating example of. You look at the army facing you. They outnumber you by at least five to one. You’re starting to realise that the best you can hope for is a quick death. “Please don’t draw attention to yourself.”
There’s a bang and a flash of light and you flinch when Voldemort silences the crowd.
“He was killed while trying to sneak out of the castle grounds. Killed while trying to save himself -”
But Voldemort’s voice breaks off when you’re jostled to the side as Neville Longbottom breaks through the clutch of D.A. members and charges at him. Clearly, your group weren’t the only ones who planned to take a shot at Voldemort to end this once and for all. There are more bangs and flashes when Neville is disarmed and knocked to the ground and another silencing charm is cast over the crowd.
“And who is this? Who has volunteered to demonstrate what happens to those who continue to fight when the battle is lost?”
Just as you were afraid of. The first dissenter to be made an example of. You clutch onto McLaggen as Bellatrix Lestrange catches Neville’s wand and taunts him. Neville eventually gets to his feet, unarmed and unprotected, standing in the no-man's-land between the Hogwarts survivors and the Death Eaters.
“Neville Longbottom… But you are a pureblood aren’t you, my brave boy?”
“So what if I am?” he spits back.
“You show spirit and bravery. And you come of noble stock. You will make a valuable Death Eater. We need your kind, Neville Longbottom.”
“I’ll join you when hell freezes over!” shouts Neville before turning and raising his fist in the direction of the survivors. “Dumbledore’s Army!”
The silencing charm breaks and your friends jeer at Voldemort in response.
Your own voice is lost in your throat.
“Very well. Are there any more purebloods who, like Neville, will refuse to join my Death Eaters?”
You want to clap your hand over his big fat mouth but before you can other survivors join in the yelling.
“Yeah!” echoes Ron Weasley. “We’d rather die!”
“Ah, but you misunderstand me,” replies You-Know-Who in his snakelike whisper. “Too much magical blood has been spilt already and you are valuable. Pureblood families are dying out. Extinguished by those who choose to mate with Mudbloods and muggles.”
McLaggen lets go of your hand and slips his hand into his pocket, finding his wand.
“Don’t!” You hiss through your teeth, pulling at his arm.
McLaggen ignores you and stares straight ahead, looking at Voldemort defiantly. “And so what if we are? Being pureblooded doesn’t mean anything!”
“Another like Neville Longbottom who refuses to join my Death Eaters?” asks Voldemort, looking directly at McLaggen amongst the collection of D.A. members and the remaining Gryffindor students. “Come forward, unless you are afraid that your Mudblood sympathies have made you weak.”
McLaggen moves his arm so that his wand is hidden behind his back and takes a step forward.
“No! No, stop! Cormac!” You don’t bother hushing your voice this time as you realise he’s actually about to stand beside Neville. You cling onto him frantically with all your might, begging him not to step forward. But you’re not the only one shrieking.
“Ron!” You look over to see Granger, attempting to pull Ron Weasley back too.
“Come now! Come!” laughs Voldemort. “Don’t be shy. Come forward and I’ll show you just how useful those from noble bloodlines will be in the new world.”
“Cormac!” you sob, pulling his arm so tightly that you think you might rip his arm from his socket. He takes another two steps and your feet slide on the uneven rubble underfoot. With a solemn look, he places his hand over yours and eases them off his arm. You look desperately over at Granger and she too has had her grip wrenched free from Weasley. For just a second, the two of you lock eyes in helpless, shared understanding.
You let go of Cormac and almost fall to your knees when he and Weasley join Longbottom but before you collapse, Cho and Krum catch under your arms, stopping you from crumbling as you try to remember how to breathe again.
Voldemort's voice cuts through the tense air. "Those of you who stand before me refuse to acknowledge the way things are now," he declares, his gaze sweeping over the brave three standing in defiance. “You may not become Death Eaters… but your children will.”
A murmur ripples through the crowd, a mix of fear and outrage simmering among the gathered survivors. Voldemort turns to face his supporters. “Now, where is the Minister for Magic? Thicknesse?” Pius Thicknesse steps forward, his long, dark hair danker than you remember it from when you first met him last summer. "Have your daughter bring forth the girls," he commands, his voice echoing ominously across the courtyard. "Let these ancient and noble pureblood families be joined as one."
Thicknesse’s bloodshot eyes dart around edgily. “My Lord - I - I cannot find her.”
“You won’t,” says McLaggen and you exhale a weak groan. The last shred of hope you had that McLaggen might make it through this act of defiance disapparates in an instant. “She’s dead. I made sure of it.”
Thicknesse, fueled by a mix of grief and rage, attempts to barrel through Voldemort’s supporters, his eyes set on McLaggen with a vengeance. But before Thicknesse can reach him, Voldemort, with a flick of his wand, halts Thicknesse's charge.
Voldemort's gaze lands on McLaggen, his curiosity piqued. "And who is this?" he inquires, his voice cold yet amused, as he looks from the distraught Thicknesse to the defiant McLaggen.
"That's the boy she wanted. The one she - my Cerys - asked to be promised to, my lord," Thicknesse says, raising a quivering finger at McLaggen.
Voldemort laughs. A high-pitched, chilling laugh. "I can see why - he's a handsome one," he remarks as he steps towards McLaggen who remains steadfast. Unflinching. "No matter," Voldemort continues, turning away from McLaggen and dismissing the matter with a wave of his hand as if Cerys’s death were nothing more than a trivial inconvenience. "There are plenty of suitable matches from other families willing to produce heirs -"
"I'll kill the next one too,” says McLaggen and Neville and Weasley look at him in agreement. “We all will. If you force any of us into pure-blood marriages against our will, we'll make sure that the bloodlines end with us."
Voldemort pauses and turns around slowly as if hardly daring to believe that McLaggen has spoken out so openly. “Too much magical blood has been wasted already tonight... although perhaps I can make an exception," he muses, his gaze still fixed on McLaggen. "Your bloodline, at least, will end with you."
"And so will yours," says McLaggen. And even though you can’t see his face, you can tell he’s wearing that confident, intense look that so often precedes him doing the impossible.
And just for a second, you think it’s happening. Against the odds, McLaggen, who has saved your skin countless times now, is about to save everyone for good. McLaggen. The Keeper. About to make the save that defines the wizarding world as you know it.
But before McLaggen can even extend his wand, Voldemort, with a flicker of dark amusement in his eyes, utters, "Avada Kedavra!"
McLaggen’s body falls to the ground, lifeless, just as quickly and easily as the falling Quidditch stands on the pitch.
Your stomach lurches. You open your mouth not sure whether you’re about to scream or vomit. The sound that escapes your lips is torn from the depths of your soul, as you witness the love of your life crumple in a heap on the rubble.
Your heart shatters beyond repair.
Each cracked piece is a kiss, a memory, a dream for your future, now lost forever.
“No!” come the shocked cries of Katie and Leanne.
“Cormac…” sobs Cho, still holding you up, though her tight grip falters in shock.
“I’ll kill him myself,” says Krum, letting you go and attempting to push past to get to Voldemort.
But it’s Neville who is closest. The jinx holding him breaks and he charges forward unarmed and wandless toward Voldemort who reacts quicker once more and halts him with a body-bind curse.
As one, the Death Eaters raise their wands, holding the fighters of Hogwarts at bay.
“Gryffindor arrogance!” screams Voldemort. “But no more.” Voldemort points his wand to the sky and everyone except you looks up. Your eyes are still fixed on McLaggen’s body on the stone floor as Voldemort’s snake slithers between McLaggen and Potter menacingly. “There will be no more sorting at Hogwarts school. There will be no more houses. The emblem, shield and colours of my noble ancestor, Salazar Slytherin, will suffice for everyone. Won’t they, Neville Longbottom?”
McLaggen is only metres away but your heart thuds in your chest watching the snake slither along the courtyard. Feeling faint again, you remember how you huddled around the kitchen table in the lighthouse listening to reports on Potterwatch about how the snake carries out Voldemort’s bidding. The rumours that Voldemort feeds people he’s killed to the snake.
The thought is so horrifying, so all-consuming, that you barely notice Voldemort catching the Sorting Hat from mid-air and forcing it onto Neville’s head.
It’s only when Neville’s scream splits the dawn that you look up and watch in horror as Neville rooted in place, writhes on the spot wearing the burning hat on his head.
And then, so many things happen simultaneously that you feel your head spinning.
There’s uproar from the distant boundary of the school as what sounds like hundreds of people swarm over the out-of-sight walls, yelling at the top of their lungs as they charge towards the courtyard. Residents of Hogsmeade. Parents of students. Joining the fray.
Then come hooves and the twangs of bows. And arrows suddenly land amongst the Death Eaters on Voldemort’s side who break rank and scramble, shouting in surprise as the centaurs continue to attack.
Cormac McLaggen’s death has given everyone a second wind. The fact that it’s what he’d have wanted is of no comfort to you.
In one swift, fluid motion Neville breaks free of the body-bind curse upon him, the hat falls off of him and he draws from its depths something long and silver with a glittering rubied hand. The slash of the silver blade is silent amongst the pandemonium of the crowd and stampeding centaurs yet it draws every eye, including your own.
With a single stroke, Neville slices off the head of the great snake’s head which spins high into the air. And Voldemort’s mouth is open in a scream of fury that nobody can hear. The snake’s body thuds to the ground.
You panic, as fighting resumes and people run in all directions. You can’t let them trample McLaggen’s. Or Potter’s if you can help it.
“Harry? Where’s Harry?!” bellows Hagrid, above the almighty chaotic racket.
A jet of light whizzes over your heads and you duck. You keep low as you sprint over to McLaggen’s body, determined to move his body away from the fighting.
McLaggen lies alone. Potter is gone.
You panic some more. This time panicking that Potter’s body has been taken by the Death Eaters to be paraded like some kind of trophy. You won’t let that happen to McLaggen.
You scramble over to him and hook your arms under his, pulling his dead weight towards a corner of the courtyard. Even though a wand is in your pocket, you don’t even think about pulling it out and joining the fight. You don’t even think about casting a shied charm. All you think about is getting McLaggen’s body out of the way.
But you needn’t worry. Perhaps everyone is too busy fighting to pay attention to the girl with the burned clothes and the tear-streaked face heaving a corpse into a corner. From your peripheral senses, you can tell even as you drag him away, that the fighting in the courtyard is thinning out as the fighters run into the caste.
Your resolve hardens. You’ll rejoin them soon, now Cormac’s body is shielded behind what’s left of this wall. You just need a second.
A second to say goodbye.
You collapse in a pile beside him in the empty courtyard and press the heels of your palms into your eyes, stemming the tears. You can’t bring yourself to look at his face, knowing that the green eyes under his closed lids will never see yours again.
“What a stupid plan,” you choke, wondering aloud as you wipe your eyes. “Thinking we could take on Voldemort. And then you actually tried it…”
You try to steady your breathing, feeling your hot breath stick to your grimy palms as you cover your face. The humidity of your own air makes your stomach twist. It brings back memories of laughing under the duvet cover in Seafarer’s Beacon, face to face with McLaggen, intensely close as your eyes roamed over that trademark arrogant smirk on his face,
“You bloody arrogant git,” you sniff, the words a mix of endearment and despair, a tribute to the man who dared to challenge the darkness with his unyielding self-assurance.
Then, the faintest movement - a murmur so soft it might be mistaken for the wind.
“I’m dead and you’re still calling me a git?”
Your eyes snap open, heart caught between hope and disbelief. The world tilts, reality warping at the edges as you stare at McLaggen. Solid, unmistakably alive, his presence defies every certainty that death had claimed him. "McLaggen?" Your voice is a tremble, a prayer whispered against the tide of despair that had nearly consumed you.
“So it’s McLaggen again, is it?” he asks blearily, slowly opening his eyes and looking up at you. “I must have done something to annoy you again.”
He’s alive?
Or… maybe you died too? You pinch yourself to see if you can feel pain. Hard.
You can.
You blink dumbfounded at the cautiously expectant look on McLaggen’s face. He can’t be alive. He just can’t be. You’d never be that lucky. Out of instinct, you pinch him too to check if he’s real.
“Ow!” he winces.
He is alive.
You blink in disbelief as the tiniest smirk crosses his face. “I - how?”
“Lucky charm,” says Cormac as with difficulty he brings his hand up to the chest pocket of his t-shirt and tries to extract something.
“What the-” You're breathless, caught in the sway between joy and the lingering shadow of sorrow.
“Just - look.”
Once you’ve helped him take the Polaroid out of his shirt pocket you recognise it immediately. A selfie of you and Cormac in the Quidditch stands at Hogwarts. The one you used to use as a bookmark. A snapshot from what seems like a lifetime ago. Except there’s a burned scar on it now. Right through the middle.
“I think that this -" he touches the photo in your hand, "- took the brunt of the Killing Curse. And somehow, it spared me.”
“Cormac,” you say gently, given that he’s just woken up after being an inch away from death. “That’s not how the Killing Curse works. You can’t be saved by - by love.”
But even as you say the word love, something prickles on the back of your neck. And to give him credit, he has a point.
“I’m here, aren’t I?” asks McLaggen. His stern look, so assuringly familiar, grounds you, reminding you of the countless times his stubbornness had been a beacon in darker days.
“Maybe it was the picture,” you concede softly, brushing his curly hair, feeling something warm and wet. Blood. “Your head is bleeding -”
Yells of shock and cheers erupt from the Great Hall, interrupting your reasoning.
“Harry?”
“He’s alive!”
The mix of distant exclamations makes you both freeze.
“It sounds like Potter wasn’t killed by Voldemort’s Killing Curse either…” you say, looking in the direction of the castle doors. When you turn back to face McLaggen he’s frowning. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s fine,” he says, touching the back of his head.
“Cormac, are you annoyed because you’re not the only one who survived the Killing Curse tonight?”
“Let’s go back - the others might need our help,” says McLaggen, ignoring the question. You get to your feet and offer him a hand to get up which he accepts, straining with effort as he does.
“It’s alright if you are,” you offer, helping him onto his feet. "Annoyed, I mean."
“Well, nobody’s going to remember I survived it if Potter is alive too.” McLaggen puts an arm around your shoulder and you brace yourself to support him but he doesn’t need it. He just pulls you close as you walk through the courtyard - if it wasn’t for the devastation it would feel exactly like how the two of you used to walk around Hogwarts. McLaggen with his arm around you, your body slotting into the crux of his arm like you were always meant to be there.
“I don’t want anyone else to try to help,” Harry’s voice rings loudly from the hall as you slowly ascend the castle steps. “It’s got to be like this. It’s got to be me.”
Of course, it’s got to be Potter.
“Cormac, when they write the history books nobody’s gonna remember anything we did. It’s Potter’s story. We’re just the background characters,” you say.
“Well, I can think of a few people who’ll remember,” says McLaggen, nodding to the rest of the D.A. just visible through the doors of the Great Hall as the crowd of onlookers watch Potter and Voldemort circling each other.
You and your friends sit at what used to be the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall. Neville Longbottom is talking to Michael Corner and Terry Boot while Terry admires the great, ruby-handled sword lying across the middle of the table.
Harry Potter is moving among the groups of survivors, his presence a quiet pillar of strength as he shakes hands and listens to their stories. The hero of the day.
Harry won. You and McLaggen made it back into the Great Hall just to see the final killing blow. You watched Voldemort hit the floor with your own two eyes. And now, you’re at a loose end. Elation feels distant, almost inappropriate, as the absence of Marietta and Eddie haunts the space around you, their unoccupied places at the table a gaping wound. The cost of victory.
“Explain it again,” says McLaggen, pinching the bridge of his nose in exasperation. “Slower this time.”
“Cormac, keep still,” you chide, wrapping a bandage around his head.
“Harry sacrificed himself which meant he gave everyone in the castle sacrificial protection,” says Cho, with the appropriate air of speaking to someone with a head injury. “So none of the curses that Voldemort or the Death Eaters cast after that stuck properly. Which is why the Killing Curse didn’t kill you.”
“So how come Harry didn’t die?”
Cho pauses and purses her lips. “I don’t actually know.”
“And how do we know it wasn’t my sacrifice that was protecting everyone in the castle?” says McLaggen who then winces as you tie the bandage.
“Because, darling, you didn’t sacrifice yourself. You just tried to attack Voldemort and got knocked out trying,” you say soothingly.
“That makes it sound much less cool than it was,” grumbles McLaggen, half-joking, half-serious. “And I didn’t even get a sword,” he adds, glancing at Terry who is now miming Neville cutting the head off of a snake with the sword of Gryffindor.
A silence falls as you sit down beside McLaggen, resting your head on his shoulder, seeking comfort in the familiar warmth of his presence, your stomach jolts every time you think about Voldemort cutting him down so casually.
“I noticed none of you were at my deathbed when I came round, by the way,” he says, as if he can’t help himself from breaking the silence.
“Ve vere busy covering the two of you with a shield charm,” says Krum. “Then the Death Eaters turned their attention to us and ve had to retreat.”
“It’s a shame Potter didn’t sacrifice himself just a little bit earlier,” you say, sadly, thinking about Marietta and Carmichael.
“You’re always so harsh on him,” says Katie, looking over your shoulder. “Harry’s actually not bad once you get to know him.”
As you turn to respond, Potter approaches the Gryffindor table and greets the D.A. McLaggen stands to meet him.
“Good work out there, Potter,” he says bracingly. “You make putting your life on the line look easy, mate.”
“Er, thanks,” says Potter uncertainly. He looks even more tired than you feel. There are dark circles under his eyes and even though he’s not covered in as much soot, blood and debris as you and McLaggen, he looks pale and drawn. “You too, McLaggen. I saw what you did. It was really decent of you, standing up for Muggleborns like that when you could have kept quiet.”
“Well,” says McLaggen casually, taking your hand and bringing you to your feet. “There was a lot at stake.” You slip your arm around his waist and give him a little squeeze.
“And you - you were the one causing the Ministry so much grief back in October, right? You broke the Muggleborns out of Azkaban?”
You nod and gesture to the area of the table where Cho, Krum, Katie, Leanne, Davies, Wood, Angelina and Alicia are all engrossed in conversation. “We all did. Everyone who was half-decent on a broom.” You pull a tight-lipped smile thinking about what Katie said about you being harsh on Potter. “Except you, of course. Could have used your skills if you weren’t the Ministry’s most wanted.”
Potter smiles weakly. “Thanks, I appreciate that coming from you… Captain.”
McLaggen brings you tighter into a one-armed hug around your shoulders as Potter walks away.
“Do you think he called me ‘Captain’ because he can’t remember my name?” you ask as you both watch Potter continuing the rounds..
“Oh, one hundred per cent,” says McLaggen.
“Unbelievable. I’ve only played Quidditch against him every single year since he started school.”
“Maybe you need a better name.”
“Oh, really?” You roll your eyes and turn to face him, waiting for the punchline. “Go on, then. You got a nickname for me or something?”
McLaggen smirks and his self-satisfied smile meets his green eyes. “I meant a new surname.”
Oh.
“McLaggen, I -“
“You might have to start calling me Cormac all the time now, though. It’s gonna get pretty confusing otherwise.”
You take a deep breath and McLaggen falters slightly when you reach up and hold the sides of his face with both hands. His prickly stubble tickles your palms.
“McLaggen, I really think we need to find Madam Pomfrey.”
“What?”
“Have you or have you not sustained a head injury?”
McLaggen looks at you intently, his green eyes focusing on yours. “I’m serious.”
“I am too,” you say. “You sure you haven’t been confunded again?”
“I’m pretty confident that’s not the case,” he says.
“Ask me again once you’ve had your head checked out,” you murmur before pressing your lips against his. Even under the smoke and sweat, you can still smell the heady amber and jasmine scent of him that so reminds you of your first Potions lesson together.
“Alright, I will,” says Cormac McLaggen when you eventually break apart. “If it’d make you happy.”
Like moonstone being dropped into a cauldron, the idea of it - the sheer hope - glints and sparkles amidst the worst sorrow you've ever experienced.
Tag list: @countlambula, @ratsys, @aweidlich, @navs-bhat, @stainedpomegranatelips, @chiaraanatra, @xxvelvetxxxx, @ohnoitsrosie, @dracosisteer, @daisydark, @intense-sneezing, @lipstickandloveletters, @ichorai, @marmie-noir, @lolitstiana, @evabellasworld, @ivebeentrashsince2001, @xyzstar (let me know if you want removed at any point btw!)
A Royal Misunderstanding (Prince Friedrich x f!Reader)
Rating: Explicit - 18+ only
Word Count: 7k
Warnings / Tags: SMUT, virgin Prince Friedrich and experienced(ish) reader, kinda switchy Prince F, unprotected sex (for the plot).
Summary: He's looking for the future Princess Consort. You're looking for a life out of the spotlight. It'd never work.
A/N: K and an E and a T and a T, E and an R and an ING. T and an O and a W, N. Kettering Town. F.C. Also thank you to my regency queens @stealsteels and @shinytalent for reading this 👑
Masterlist
There’s an unnecessary knock on the open stable door as you move to untack your mare. She needs a thorough brush after the ride you had today.
“You are the stable hand?” inquires a young man’s voice.
You whirl around, ready to deliver a sharp retort, but hesitate when you see his earnest, slightly incredulous expression. You’ve never encountered him before, you’re sure of it. His handsome face, tuft of blonde hair and wide-eyed demeanour would certainly have been memorable.
“I was told I would be meeting the stable hand here,” he continues, still uncertain. “To collect a horse.”
An accent. Foreign. He must be part of Prince Friedrich’s contingent, newly arrived from the Kingdom of Prussia this morning. And he must be exceedingly green to mistake you for a stable hand. Despite your riding breeches being muddied from your ride, any discerning footman would recognise that the fine tailoring is not typical of a servant's attire. Even one in the employ of the Crown. His own attire, however, is old-fashioned and ill-fitting - it bears all the marks of a hand-me-down from another household servant or perhaps an older family member.
You purse your lips to stifle a smile. The opportunity to toy with one of the charmingly naive lackeys from the Prussian delegation sparks your mischievous side. Besides, he’ll need to toughen up if he’s to survive in London. “Don’t they permit women to become stable hands in Prussia?”
He blinks. “No.”
“And this horse is for Prince Friedrich?”
“Yes.” He raises his eyebrows, as though it should be self-evident why he’s here. As if everyone should recognise Prince Friedrich’s footman. The man pulls his shoulder back and there’s a subtle hint of authority in his stance. You’re unsure if it’s the language barrier or his presumption, but his curt answers irk you.
“Very well, then,” you say, gently guiding your horse towards him. “This is Artemis. She’s the finest in the stable.”
“This is your finest horse?” He chuckles heartily and your mouth becomes a thin line and your nostrils flare.
“Perhaps His Royal Highness would prefer a pony?”
He straightens, a haughty glint in his eye. “It’s covered in filth.”
“My lady is a keen rider and has already been out this morning. But if Prince Freidrich can’t handle a little dirt -”
“Of course, I can manage.”
You arch an eyebrow, his tone further irritating you. “If you say so,” you reply, handing him the reins.
As he mounts Artemis, you can’t help but decide to give him a parting gift. You give her a firm slap on her hindquarters. Artemis bolts forward, sending the young man bouncing precariously in the saddle. You watch with satisfaction as he disappears down the path, his shouts of alarm fading into the distance.
Perhaps now he’ll think twice before assuming someone is a servant.
With a contented smile, you leave the stables, already brimming with excitement at the thought of telling your ladies-in-waiting about your encounter.
As far as you’re concerned, there isn’t enough wide open space in London. Far too many locked doors and whispered secrets. Or worse. Written down secrets. Specifically, the sort published by Lady Whistledown. You’d much rather be at home than endure another visit to the capital but when Queen Charlotte invited you to stay at her residence for the duration of the social season, you could hardly refuse. Not when Her Majesty and your late father, the Duke of Kettering, were such dear friends.
You suspect this invitation to spend the season at the palace might be the Queen’s ultimate attempt to honour your father’s memory. It was expected that you’d be desperate to find a husband after he passed. On paper, it should have been simple enough - your inheritance is decent enough to tempt a husband.
But finding a suitor hasn’t been easy. You’re not asking for much. You don’t want titles or wealth. Just a husband who’d be content to let you spend the day out riding rather than attending social engagements. Events like this one are your idea of hell on earth. Although it wasn’t as bad as yesterday when you had to present yourself to the Queen as one of the eligible misses of the season.
As you stepped into the centre of the room, your palms turned cold and you could feel your stomach turning inside out as you waited for the Queen to give her verdict. There’s an old saying: the brighter a lady shines, the faster she may burn. And you’d rather not find yourself turned to ash at the hands of the ton.
You exhaled an audible sigh of relief when Her Majesty remained seated and deigned to give you a small nod of approval. Neither the diamond nor the disgrace of the season and you’re glad of it - it means fewer eyes on you. But even that short burst in the relatively dim limelight made you want to flee from the room and vomit. You put yourself through your paces in the saddle this morning just to shake off the lingering feeling of dread.
You should be grateful that the Queen did not wave you away dismissively. This is your second social season after all and your value is quickly plummeting. You just need a husband who is content to stay out of the spotlight. And is resigned to the fact that you’ll probably prefer your horse’s company to theirs.
If only you really were a stable hand instead of the late Duke of Kettering’s daughter.
As you mingle in Queen Charlotte’s banquet hall amongst other guests, waiting upon the arrival of Prince Freidrich, you feel a twinge of guilt about your encounter with his footman this morning. Perhaps after this welcome dinner, you’ll discreetly invite him to meet you in the stables as a gesture of apology.
The footman was handsome, after all, despite the blonde whiskers he must have grown in an attempt to appear more mature. You wouldn’t mind ruffling his perfectly coiffed hair before letting him bend you over the stable door.
Your companion jolts you from your daydream by squeezing your arm with her silk glove excitedly. You turn and smooth the front of your gown as Queen Charlotte and her nephew Prince Friedrich’s arrival is announced.
The doors open and it takes every ounce of your self-control to maintain a dignified composure as Queen Charlotte walks in, arm-in-arm with Prince Friedrich’s footman.
Or the man who you thought was Prince Friedrich’s footman.
Damn.
Of course, you sent Prince Friedrich himself chasing across the palace grounds on the back of your startled mare.
While your face retains a dignified composure, you can’t do anything about the prickle of embarrassment flushing your chest. It’s only a matter of time before the Queen introduces Prince Freidrich to you and you will need to eat copious amounts of humble pie, slathered with grovelling apologies and dusted off with begging for forgiveness.
There’s no avoiding it. Even though tonight’s dinner isn’t an official event of the season - just a small dinner for the fifty or so palace guests and members of the Royal Family, Prince Friedrich is still introduced to every eligible woman in the room. Including you.
Queen Charlotte, eventually steers him towards you. “Allow me to present my nephew, Prince Friedrich of Prussia.”
You curtsy and allow him to greet your gloved hand with a kiss but your stomach twists in anticipation, waiting for him to admonish you in front of the Queen.
“Lady Kettering, your gown - it is exquisite,” he says, in the usual formality. “And I hope your ride this morning was more pleasant than mine.”
You take a breath to compose your apology but you’re saved from the necessity.
“Yes, the Prince had a simply awful time this morning. First, his footman forgets to pack his riding wear so he has to borrow some from the Viscount of Paisley. And then a common girl posing as a stable hand gave Prince Friedrich your horse and sent him galloping across the plain.”
“I see,” you say cautiously but the corners of Prince Freidrich’s mouth twitch like he’s trying not to laugh. You ask, “And is my horse alright?”
Queen Charlotte laughs at this. “I should have known that you would be more concerned about your mount than the Prince of Prussia.”
You smile. “Forgive me, Your Majesty. It’s only that I’m confident a duplicitous stable girl was no match for His Royal Highness.”
“Your mare was returned safely,” smiles Prince Friedrich, a roguish glint in his eye.
Prince Friedrich bows and Queen Charlotte bustles him away onto the next group of eager girls.
As you watch him greet the next group you wonder: why is the Prince of Prussia making excuses for you?
In the grand dining room, you search for your place setting at the far end of the table beside the other noble families from minor houses to no avail. They’ve missed me, you think in horror as you look around at the filled seats but one of your friends nudges you and nods at the empty seat next to Prince Friedrich.
There must be some mistake.
But when you glance at the Prince, still standing behind his chair expectantly at the middle of the table, he catches your eye and places a hand on the empty seat.
Barely daring to breathe, you wonder if this is his way of getting back at you for the events of this morning. Perhaps he arranged for your table setting to go missing and you’ll be publicly humiliated when you dare to assume the seat next to him would be for you.
You walk for what feels like a very long time to the other side of the table, feeling eyes on you as every step is like your shoes are made of lead. You do your best not to clench your fists as your face grows hot in anticipation of being embarrassed in front of everyone.
Dipping your head, you refuse to look at Prince Friedrich and instead discreetly look at the place cards as you pass. The titles become increasingly grand as you approach the centre of the table until you reach the grandest of them all.
Her Majesty, Queen Charlotte.
His Royal Highness, Prince Friedrich.
Then you see your name. Etched in gold on eggshell paper. At the place setting beside Prince Friedrich’s.
You blink, feeling relief course through you. You’ve never sat this close to the Queen before. The centre of the table was reserved for distinguished guests like, well, Prince Friedrich.
“Lady Kettering, I hope you don’t mind me stealing you away from your usual dinner companions,” says Prince Friedrich, looking at your friends staring wide-eyed at you from the other end of the table.
“It’s my pleasure, Your Highness,” you say, giving them a sharp look. As the servers remove the cloches from the banquet before you, conversation erupts around the table, giving you the chance to swallow your pride. “And I do apologise for this morning,” you add quietly. “I had mistakenly assumed you were Prince Friedrich’s footman.”
“A footman?” He grins, and tilts his head, picturing himself as a footman before adding. “I too would like to apologise. I should never have assumed a beautiful woman such as yourself was a stable hand,” he says.
“When did you come to the realisation that I wasn’t?”
“I knew your horse’s name. When I asked who owned her, I was told it was a lady who was as wild as the horses she keeps.” Your mouth twists into a reluctant smile. “Is that true?” he asks, his green eyes twinkling with interest.
“Oh no,” you smile, sipping your freshly poured wine, aware of his eyes following your every movement. “My horses are very well-behaved.”
He laughs. It’s a pretty laugh. “Can I assume that means you are looking forward to the season beginning?” He gives you a wry smile. His eyes are alight with enthusiasm as he waits for you to share in his excitement for the beginning of the social season. But there’s something else in his gaze, something more intimate.
You must put an end to this before he gets the wrong idea and you’re made a spectacle of. Prince Friedrich will be the most sought-after man of the season and you don’t want the attention that accompanies competing for his affections - to be thrust into the spotlight and have Lady Whistledown write about you would be more attention than you could bear.
You glance around to see if anyone is listening before lowering your voice. “Your Highness - may I speak candidly?”
“Nothing would please me more,” he says sincerely, his tone softening.
“Why did you arrange for me to sit here?”
Prince Friedrich looks taken aback. “Well… after this morning, I knew I had to find out more about you.”
You nod sadly. This is what you were afraid of but you had expected it nonetheless.
“This is my second - and hopefully last - season. You see, I’m not used to being in the public eye and I find the social season to be entirely mortifying.”
“I see…” says Prince Friedrich slowly.
“You Highness, please don’t mistake me. I’m honoured to be in your presence but -”
“Lady Kettering -” Prince Friedrich lowers his voice. “You told me you would speak candidly. Please disperse with the airs and graces.”
You push your food around on your plate. It’s risky to speak so plainly to aristocracy. Their fragile egos normally demand a guarded formality. “I am sorry but the idea of competing with other women to become the Princess Consort of Prussia is more publicity than I can handle. I need to find a husband quickly. A marriage of convenience.”
“Convenience…” He nods thoughtfully. “I understand. A marriage to me would certainly draw attention.”
He’s not offended. Thank god. “Exactly, Your Highness. Being in the public eye. The scrutiny. It would be unbearable.”
“It is a pity,” he says quietly. “Because I’m sure a mutually convenient marriage would have its benefits.”
Mutually convenient? Your own inheritance pales in comparison to the riches that Prince Friedrich is heir to. What would he gain from marrying you?
You look up from your plate to see that he’s brazenly smirking at you.
Oh.
It’s undeniable this time. He’s flirting with you. You feel heat creeping up your neck and you know you must look feverish when his eyes roam across your corseted chest.
“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean, Your Highness,” you say, your whisper barely audible.
“I mean that sharing a marital bed would have its… advantages.” Prince Friedrich takes a sip of his wine, seemingly pleased that he’s made you flustered. Now, you can’t have that.
You glance over his shoulder to make sure Queen Charlotte is occupied. “I don’t need a husband to reap those sorts of advantages.”
When you say that, he slops half of his wine down his front in surprise. “You - you don’t?”
You arch an eyebrow. “You don’t have other companions for that sort of thing?” You pass him your napkin so he can clean himself up, your fingers grazing his knee under the table, making him inhale a sharp intake of breath. “You’re not worried about being unable to please your new wife?”
He stares straight ahead, momentarily stunned. Like he never realised sex was something you could be bad at. After a beat, he shakes his head. “It would not be prudent if people knew I was having - ”
“You mistake me. It is not my intention to get caught.”
Prince Friedrich sighs, a sad smile playing on his lips. “If only it were that simple. I’m surrounded by people. Always.”
The two of you sit quietly, allowing the servants to replace your empty plates with dessert. You can practically hear the cogs in the Prince’s head as his brain works overtime, trying to decide how to respond to this new information. Prince Friedrich takes a polite bite of chocolate cake and sits back.
“Once again, being the Queen’s nephew complicates things,” you say, sitting forward and sliding your fork through a sizable portion. “Don’t you have an appetite after your ride this morning, Your Highness?”
“I think the news that you do not wish me to court you has disappointed me so much that I never want to eat again,” he jokes half-heartedly before returning his focus entirely to you.
“If only we really were a stable hand and a footman - waiting until all the palace guests had gone to bed to meet in the stables after dark,” you say after eating the last bite of cake on your plate.
Prince Friedrich swallows thickly and your eyes move from his Adam's apple to the almost untouched piece of cake on his plate.
“Are you - are you still hungry, my lady?” he asks.
You lean forward and steal a scoop of whipped cream from his plate with your fork. You eat the whipped cream and he watches with bated breath as you take several seconds longer than necessary to drag the polished silver fork from between your lips.
You scratch Artemis’s head in the dark stables, wondering if you’ve made a mistake in being here. Mostly you were interested to see if the sweet, naive Prince Friedrich would turn up. But you know how noblemen are. Their egos are so easy to bruise that an adverturess could scare them off simply by existing.
Which is why you can scarcely believe it when there’s a knock at the closed stable door. You don’t breathe for a second before remembering that only Prince Freidrich would knock before entering a stable of all places.
He opens the door and for a moment is visibly relieved to see you. You stare at each other. The only sound is the soft rustling of the horses, that is until he closes the door behind him and moves to you with an agility that surprises you, considering how unstable he was on your horse earlier.
If he had no appetite earlier, it has certainly returned now. Prince Friedrich has a hungry look in his eyes as he pulls you close by the waist and kisses you. You squeeze your eyes shut, expecting a clash of teeth but his kiss is passionate, even skilled. Your shoulders untense as you relax into it and slide your arms around his neck, allowing him to pull your body against his. Even through the many skirts under your evening gown, you can feel that he’s hard.
His tongue enters your mouth, licking and swirling it against yours - it’s surprisingly good. And he smells good. A beautiful sandalwood cologne that can only be from the finest perfumery.
You pull back breathlessly before you can allow the inebriating scent and feel of him to rid you of your senses. “Prince Friedrich, I -”
“Please, just Freidrich.”
“Friedrich.” Even with his permission the name feels strange in your mouth. “How much romantic experience do you have?”
“I’ve read books,” he says quickly and you press your lips together to stop laughing.
“You mean romance books? Like Miss Butterworth and the Mad Baron?”
“No, I mean… instructional.”
“Instructions on how to fuck?” He nods and flushes a deep shade of pink at the question and this time you can’t help but laugh. “Remind me to spend time in the palace library in Prussia if I ever visit.” You study him. “I meant more… practical experience. It’s not the type of thing you can learn from a book.”
“I have a little experience.”
“Like what? Just kissing?” He hesitates and you move your hand down between your bodies and brush his hard cock through his trousers. “Or has anyone ever touched you like this before?”
Friedrich swallows. “Before now, you mean?” You nod and he hesitates again, guessing that it’s not the answer you want to hear. “No,” he says, truthfully.
You withdraw your hand. “Maybe this is something you should save for your future wife.”
“Marry me, then,” he blurts out, his voice trembling slightly with urgency.
You groan inwardly, shaking your head. “Friedrich, I wasn’t being coy when I told you I don’t want to be wed to a Prince. Besides, the season is starting tomorrow and you’ll be introduced to a hundred wealthy, beautiful women. Each one of them would be a better match than I.”
“Impossible.”
“You don’t know that -”
“I know that nobody has ever spoken to me the way that you did tonight. Or this morning for that matter.”
You smile despite yourself. You can believe it. If you were trying to secure the Prince’s hand in marriage, you would have carried yourself with much more grace and dignity than you have thus far.
“That’s because I have the manners of a common mule and the propriety of a common whore,” your grin falters and you look at him seriously. “And both of those qualities make me thoroughly incompatible with the Prince of Prussia. Marrying you is out of the question.”
“I understand,” he says, clearly worried that you’re reconsidering lying with him. “Let me be one of your companions. Show me how to do it.”
“Will you promise not to ask for my hand in marriage when this is done?”
Your hands undo the lacing on his trousers as he hitches his breath. “Anything. Sh-show me. Please.”
You remove your gloves and toss them on the stable floor. You slide your bare hand into his underwear and feel him shudder when you grip his cock. Christ almighty. It’s bigger than what you had expected from the innocent Prince.
“Since we’re practising so that you can please your future wife,” you tell him as you jerk your hand along his length. “I’ll tell you what feels good and what doesn’t. And you must do the same.”
He exhales shakily. “This - this feels good.”
“That’s a good start,” you smirk. “And you have a nice cock, Your Highness. The Princess Consort of Prussia will be a very lucky woman indeed once I’ve shown you how to use it.”
“Oha,” he breathes.
“So eager,” you tut playfully, your face inches from his.
You pull him close and he moans into your mouth as you kiss him. The sound of his evident pleasure sends heat tearing through you. You make a mental note to tell your future lovers to share their vocal appreciation because the sounds Prince Friedrich is making are driving you wild.
As you kiss him, you lead him over to the loose pile of straw and get to the floor. The straw is scratchy on your bare arms but your legs are thankfully spared by the protection of your skirts.
“When the time comes to do this with your lady wife, you should both undress. But our clothes will remain on - mostly. This is more convenient if there’s an unexpected intruder. Plus, this hay is itchy.”
“Allow me,” says Prince Freidrich, sitting back on his knees and pulling off his jacket. For a second you wonder if he’s misunderstood what you said about undressing but then he flattens his jacket on the straw behind you for you to lie on.
If you were the swooning type, you might just have fainted then and there.
“May I?” he asks, touching the hem of your skirt at your ankle. You nod and he pushes up your skirts. You lift your hips, allowing him to remove your satin underwear. “Verdammt,” he breathes. He moves his head between your legs and you almost sit up in surprise. You don’t mind him having a better look at you if it’s his first time but this feels extremely personal.
“What are you doing?” you ask.
He looks up at you and you pull your skirts close to your stomach. “My book - it said to kiss you here to make sure you are ready.” His face is so close to you that you can feel his hot breath against your pussy.
“Your book said to kiss me… there?” Your eyebrows knit together but you think about how his tongue felt swirling inside your mouth and a stab of ache pierces through your ribs.
“It is not customary?” You shake your head and he frowns in confusion but doesn’t move.
And you realise that you don’t want him to go anywhere. That the idea of him kissing you there in the skilled way he was kissing your mouth inflames you. Out of amused interest, you lift yourself up onto one elbow only to find him looking at you intently, hanging on your every word, waiting to find out what he should do. You realise that you rather like the look of him here, between your legs.
“You -” You swallow. “- You may try. If it pleases you. But I warn you, I - oh -”
Your warning dissipates into the air as Prince Friedrich leans down and glides his hot tongue deep into the seam of your pussy with absolutely no hesitation. You feel yourself relax as you let him get on with this custom he’s learned from his book. You admit, it’s not unpleasant. But you’re not sure what he’s trying to achieve.
It sort of feels like when you touch yourself. Maybe less dextrous but it’s hotter and wetter and - and -
Good lord.
Much to your surprise - and your delight - you feel a soft, delicious warmth spreading from your core as he kisses you where you’ve never been kissed before. You splay your fingers through his blonde hair - your other hand still clutching your dress as his velvet mouth envelops your clutch of nerves and a wave of pleasure cascades through your body.
“Oh - oh fuck,” you curse, not caring that you’re swearing in front of the Prince. He pulls back abruptly and you pant.
“My lady?” he asks. “Are you okay?”
“Yes - god, yes,” you whine, impatient for his mouth to return to you.
He looks at you with that same subtle glint of authority he gave you this morning and says, “In that case, you are not keeping up with your side of the bargain. You promised you’d tell me what feels good.”
Prince Friedrich dips his head and resumes, going from sucking on your clit to lapping up your juices and back again as you squirm and rock against him. This time you remember to hold up your side of the bargain. You pant and tell him how good his mouth feels - how good he feels. Everything is soaked, from your skirts to his chin and nose as he lets you grind yourself against his face.
The flat of his tongue slides across your heat and it’s heavenly. Usually, when you’re with a partner, you’re used to working hard for your release - at the exact right position and tempo to pry yourself apart. But right now you’re just lying back and taking what Prince Friedrich’s tongue offers to you. And it’s offering exactly what you need.
“Don’t stop,” you mewl. “So good. S’good. So good -”
You feel yourself unravelling, your praise and words of affirmation turning into an incoherent babble as your orgasm breaches the surface. You must be making some semblance of sense because he listens - he keeps going and it’s all too much and not enough at once as your walls squeeze around nothing while Prince Friedrich continues his delicious assault on your bundle of nerves.
Damn. You do your very best not to cry out and draw attention to the stables as Prince Friedrich gets closer and closer to making you cum on his tongue. But it’s nigh impossible as you feel the heat rise from your stomach and pull back like the tide.
And then there’s the drop you’d been waiting for.
“Oh - god,” you moan, drawing out the last syllable so that it drips as slowly as treacle. Ecstasy courses through your body as your release washes over you, making your thighs tremble on either side of the Prince’s head. Your chest heaves and you gently tug on his hair, away from your oversensitive cunt. “That’s - that’s good. It’s good. It’s enough,” you gasp before collapsing your head back onto his jacket.
Prince Friedrich gives you a few more slow, gentle licks and murmurs, “So feucht.” before drawing a finger over your twitching, soaking wet entrance, admiring his own handiwork. You don’t know what his words mean and you don’t have the cognizance to ask as you stare up at the wooden beams and try to regain your senses.
After what feels like a lifetime of bliss, you’re happy for your view of the stable roof to be interrupted when Prince Friedrich moves up your body to kiss you and you taste the unfamiliar taste of your arousal on his lips. You kiss him back, slipping your tongue into his mouth and nipping at his bottom lip. God, this was supposed to be you teaching him a few things - not the other way around. When you anonymise this encounter and retell it to your friends later they will certainly be hearing about this.
“Good?” he asks when he pulls back and you nod, before swallowing air.
“I have half a mind to sell my estate and move to Prussia after the social season is over if that is what they do there,” you say breathlessly.
He smirks. “I have told you that it could be arranged. Come home with me and we won’t have to be discreet. We could do this every day.”
You pout playfully and push a loose curl from his forehead. “But I like the stables,” you joke even though your back is aching and a palace bed sounds much more appealing.
“Well, we have stables in Prussia. You could bring Artemis.”
Artemis.
He remembered her name.
Your face softens as you picture her as a royal steed, wearing a white feathered plume like she’s the diamond of the season.
But then the fleeting daydream disappears when you tell yourself that it’s a fantasy you can’t allow either of you to indulge in. As much as Queen Charlotte favours you, you know it would be seen as unacceptable for the Prince to marry someone from such a minor house.
And besides, you remind yourself that you don’t need a royal husband. You have your own home. You have your own horses. You have your own friends. You have everything you’ve ever wanted. But then, why does the thought of him making his social season debut at the ball tomorrow make your heart ache?
“There’s something else I’d like to ride, presently,” you say, in an attempt to rid the thought from your mind as you gently push on his shoulders until he lies on his back.
You straddle the Prince and unfasten his trousers so you can pull his cock out. The sight of him, hard and ready for you and the way he twitches involuntarily in your palm makes your heart pound as hard and steady as horses hooves galloping.
You wriggle forward until you feel the smooth underside of his cock sliding under your messily slick folds, still wet from the orgasm the Prince had bestowed upon you with his mouth. A flicker of dark enjoyment ignites in you when you see a line between his brows as he knits them together and watches as you lift your skirts so he can watch you sliding back and forward along the length of his cock.
“Do you enjoy watching me do this, Your Highness?” you ask as you grind against him.
“I would enjoy watching you do anything,” he says, pushing your gown out of the way to take hold of your hips. “Du bist schön.”
You pause. “Do what?”
“Nothing. Please. Don’t stop.” He presses his thumbs into your hipbones, urging you to create friction against him again.
“You don’t want to fuck me?”
“Isn’t - isn’t that what we’re doing?” stutters Prince Friedrich.
“Oh, my sweet Prince.” You bring your hand to his jaw as you lift yourself so you can position the head of his cock between your soaking folds with your other hand. “We’re only just getting started.”
You lock eyes with him and watch his face contort in pleasure as you slowly sink down, inch by glorious fucking inch. “Oh gott,” he whines. Your German is poor but you’re pretty confident you know what that means.
“Let me know when you’re going to spill - I don’t want to carry your bastard,” you murmur, still cupping his face. “Do you understand?”
“Ja,” he says through gritted teeth. “I understand.”
You’re not sure he really does but that primal part of your brain that wants to fuck him now and worry about the consequences later tells you to shove your hips down against the resistance. You force the rest of his thick cock into you and inhale through your teeth, feeling the delicious way he stretches and fills you. His hands clamp down hard on your hips, his thumbs pressing fresh bruises into your hipbones.
They don’t make them like this in Kettering. Or London for that matter. Equal parts sweet and naive yet firm and decisive. He doesn’t know what he wants yet but he still wants it. Desperately.
As if proving your point, you lean forward to feel the beautiful way he drags out of you and he seizes the opportunity to bury his face into your cleavage, your corseted dress making it exceptionally easy for him.
He moans open-mouthed against your chest, his tongue sloppily trying to find your nipple. You move your hips back and down and wildfire bursts in your lower belly when his cock nudges against that sweet spot you’ve been longing for.
It’s not enough for him - he wants more. He lifts his hips and the tip of his cock drives against your G-spot.
“Oh - fuck. Freidrich. That feels good.”
“So it is okay for me to move too?” he asks.
“Please,” you murmur, closing your eyes and feeling him slide back into you at that perfect angle.
You don’t need to tell him twice.
He rolls his hips upwards to meet yours as you ride him. You can hear how fucking wet you are. Everything is slick and hot and drenched as you roll your hips up and down on top of him and he fucks himself into you.
“So schön,” he grunts and the foreign words sound guttural to your ears.
“I hope that means ‘good’,” you tease, leaning forward to breathe hot air onto his neck.
“Pretty,” he murmurs in your ear. “So pretty.”
“Oh,” is all you can manage as his hips pick up pace. Fuck - you like him being under you like this. Even here, in the stables where someone might come looking if they notice that Prince Friedrich is missing from his chambers.
The sound of your stretched, wet cunt fills the stables so obscenely that it peppers shame into your consciousness. But he hears it too. He jerks up so fiercely that his balls slap against you. You suck air in through your teeth at the sharp sting and he looks concerned but you reassure him. “It’s - oh fuck - keep going. Right there.”
You go from slamming yourself down on him to your whole body stiffening, letting him drive up into you as your hot orgasm approaches, creeping over you in pulsing waves. Your walls grip him, tightening and convulsing as -
“I should - tja - remove myself from inside you -” he stops thrusting up into you and you almost wail with disappointment.
“No - fuck - keep going.” What are you saying? You rock your hips and bounce on him, every nerve inside you applauding your decision to ignore your conscience as you manage to hang onto the precipice. “Don’t stop.”
“I’m going to -”
“Fuck it,” you heave, your walls squeezing impossibly tighter as you fuck yourself on him. “Cum in me. I don’t care.” What the fuck are you saying?!
“Really?”
“Yeah,” you breathe.
It’ll be fine.
You’ve had an accident or two and have been lucky so far.
You may as well have told the Prince that Christmas had come early. The sight of your flushed face, dishevelled hair and the way your tits are threatening to spill out of your dress with every bounce of your hips drives him wild.
Frankly, you’re the most deliciously intoxicating thing he’s ever experienced. He just doesn’t have the necessary vocabulary to tell you this in English.
By this point, “Oh gott,” is the only thing he says that you can understand. You hardly hear the rest as he babbles away in German - you can barely hear anything over the pulse of blood pounding in your ears as Friedrich picks up his pace again. Your body locks down around him so tightly you wonder if you might break him.
“Just like that - fuck, there,” you whimper. He takes the instruction well, driving his cock deep into you - exactly where you need it. The coil of heat in your core tightens impossibly tighter as he chokes words you don’t understand into your ear as he pulls you close to his chest
Maybe one day he’ll teach you what those words mean and you’ll find out that he was telling you what a good girl you are for taking his cock like this.
“Fuck - I’m - that’s it,” you sob, your chest heaving against his fine silk shirt and your fingers entwined in his soft blonde hair. You squeeze around him like a vice. “Friedrich, I -”
“Do it,” he groans. You hadn’t expected him to say that. And certainly not with the commanding tone he chooses. “Let me feel it.”
The coil inside you snaps. A blaze of white-hot fire bursts through you like stitches being ripped. You seize and cry out as your release whips through you with such force that you think you might go cross-eyed. You bury your face into his neck, smelling the rich sandalwood scent splashed on his skin, mixed with his sweat.
Freidrich keeps his tight hold of your hips, fucking into you even as you shake and tremble.
“Ich komme,” breathes the Prince. “Ich komme, ich komme.” It only takes a few more rough, slapping thrusts until you don’t have to guess what that means. You feel him finishing inside you, thick ropes of his spend painting your insides.
You lie here like this for a few moments, collapsed onto his chest and feeling his seed leaking out of you. You feel dizzy as his chest rises and falls underneath you and his fingers tenderly trace lines up and down your back. He closes his eyes, feeling the satin of your gown as his fingertips dance across it.
You could easily fall asleep like this.
Instead, you hoist yourself off him and lie flat on your back as if unattaching yourself from him will place a barrier between you. Put a halt to the immense surge of affection you feel for him in this moment. But he doesn’t let you get far. Prince Friedrich rolls onto his side and cups your face, his thumb tracing your cheekbone and skirting across your lips before he leans down to kiss you. You close your eyes, letting the kiss dissolve into a wet, lazy haze.
He pulls back and looks down into your eyes. “I promised I would not ask for your hand when this was over. So I have nothing else to say.”
“At least now you are prepared for the social season beginning tomorrow.”
“I don’t care about the season. I want to leave. Tonight. To take you with me.”
“I don’t have the wealth or the beauty for that to be allowed to happen,” you say. “The Queen would never find us to be a suitable match. Never mind Lady Whistledown having a field day.”
“You have more than enough of both for me.”
“For you, Friedrich. But not enough for Prince Friedrich. Not enough for The Crown,” you say, your heart breaking as you do. This was a bad idea, after all. You adjust your gown and get to your feet, pretending to ignore Prince Friedrich’s attempts to help you up.
“And what about my - my seed? What if you’re with child?”
You laugh mirthlessly. “We’d have to be exceptionally unlucky for that to happen on our first try. Put it far from your mind. Go and meet with the diamond of the season tomorrow and all of the ladies queuing up to become the Princess Consort of Prussia. They will make you much happier than I ever could.”
You walk towards the stable door but he takes your hand and gives you your discarded gloves. “Please don’t go.”
“I’m sorry, Friedrich.” You can’t. You can hear the gossip already. A thousand people whispering behind your back about how you’re not good enough for the Prince. It would be like that every day for the rest of your life in the spotlight if you did marry him. You tear your eyes away from him and open the stable door.
“Will I ever see you again?” he asks after you.
You pause and turn around. “Perhaps.” You smile at him sadly. “Who knows? If I am with child, maybe you’ll have no choice but to whisk me away back to Prussia and marry me, never to be seen in London ever again. And everyone will wonder why.”
You turn back before he can see your face crumble, leaving the stable door open behind you as Prince Friedrich watches you leave into the night. Your mare whinnies, nudging him gently over her stable door.
Prince Friedrich gives in to her pestering and scratches her neck, much to her enjoyment. Before dawn, he will write a letter. To make sure a stall is prepared for Artemis in the palace stables in Prussia.
Finders Keepers Ch 19. (Cormac McLaggen x fem!reader)
Rating: Explicit 18+ (no smut in this particular chapter)
Word Count: 4.4k
Warnings: Graphic violence (not canon-typical)
Summary: An unwelcome newcomer makes an appearance as you hold off the Death Eaters. McLaggen races against time to work out how to enchant the bludgers.
A/N: omgggg can you believe there's finally a chapter called 'quidditch'?!?! And not a quaffle or a snitch in sight… maybe a few bludgers though. alexa, play holding out for a hero by bonnie tyler
Masterlist
Chapter 19: Quidditch
If this is the way you die. What a way to go.
You laugh. Actually laugh as you speed around the pitch, weaving between the stands and drawing the remaining three Death Eaters away from each other, scattering their attacking formation.
Your friends are nowhere to be seen. They’ve taken heed of your instructions and gone back to the castle. And thank god, because it means all you need to worry about is your own path weaving through the spells being hurled from the pitch.
The Death Eaters’ furious spell casting gets even more erratic as you frustrate them, dodging them on the battered old Cleensweep Seven you borrowed from Madam Hooch’s office. Despite the mortal peril, you feel alive. So much for only being able to buy McLaggen ten minutes of time while he works out how to enchant the bludgers to attack the Death Eaters. Even on this old broom, you could do this all day -
You pivot on your broom and rise high out of spell-casting range to see the voice that ignites a flicker of realisation.
As she pulls back her hood her companion mimics her movement.
Cerys Thicknesse accompanied by Marcus Flint.
As they stride across the scorched earth of the Quidditch pitch below you, Cerys’ eyes are alight with a cold fire. At the same time, you both break eye contact and see yours and McLaggen’s brooms lying abandoned, silent witnesses to the chaos that has unfolded. When she hands her companion McLaggen’s broom and picks yours up from the pitch, indignation ignites inside you that she’d dare to even touch them.
“You might be able to outfly them but you can’t outfly us,” says Cerys.
You laugh derisively, masking the jolt of fear that courses through you. You’re confident you could fly rings around Flint - but Cerys? She was good enough to make it to the Holyhead Harpies. You remember her well from tryouts - even if that day feels like centuries ago now.
When she mounts your broom your eyes narrow. Your companion through countless flights, hundreds of training sessions with McLaggen at Hogwarts and several hundred more at Seafarer’s Beacon with the rest of your friends. Your broom was the thing that first made you feel like you had a place in the magical community. A real connection between your love of muggle sport and the wizarding world. Something your parents were able to understand - they might not have been able to wrap their heads around transfiguring buttons to button mushrooms but they understood saving goals. It was even the common ground between you and McLaggen when you first started talking to each other in Potions.
The anguish you felt when you found out Cerys has convinced her father to send you to Azkaban pales in comparison to how you feel now seeing her on that thin piece of wood that’s been your anchor for the past seven years. Unfortunately for Cerys, you're not the same scared girl you were when you were carted off to Azkaban. Deep down, you’ve always known your prickly assertiveness was a defensive mask for your lack of real courage. But your time at Seafarer’s Beacon has changed you.
You’ve always been a leader but now you’re a fighter.
With something worth fighting for.
“What’s wrong, Cerys? Didn’t your Death Eater pals teach you how to fly without a broom?” you jeer as she and Flint kick off.
“Oh, they’ve taught me more than that,” says Cerys, raising her wand as she flies towards you. “Avada Kedavra!”
Before the words leave her lips, you react - diving on your broom out of the way of the jet of green light. Your heart rate shoots up, shocked that Cerys’ first attack is aiming to kill.
Fuck.
No sooner do you dive than Cerys and Flint surge forward, their brooms cutting a direct path through the air towards you.
A red jet of light whizzes past your ear and you narrowly avoid the stunning spell.
You focus your breathing as you push the battered Cleansweep Seven to its limits. Cerys isn’t the only one who has learned a few things since you last met.
You aim your broom handle towards the three Death Eaters on the burning pitch. Fast. Furious. Direct. Thinking only of Viktor Krum’s signature move.
“Marcus! Stop!” Cerys’s distant voice tells you that she’s pulled back, realising what you’re about to do but you hope that Flint hasn’t.
The hot, burning world below becomes a fiery blur that makes you screw up your face as you fly towards them, Flint hot on your heels. Wind screams in your ears as the figures of the Death Eaters on the ground chaotically try to take aim at your speeding figure. The three of them push each other out of the way of your deadly path and at the very last second, just as it looks like you’re about to crash headfirst into the pitch, you execute the Wronski Feint and pull up with all your might.
Gravity tugs at every muscle in your body. And just as you knew he wouldn’t, Flint doesn’t react in time. With a satisfying, bone-crunching crash and a scream of pain, he slams into the ground, the sound of the impact echoing across the pitch. One of the Death Eaters, caught completely off-guard by Flint's unexpected descent, is taken out in the crash, crumpling onto Flint in a tangled, bloody heap.
You don’t have time to look back before hearing Cerys’ horrified cry followed by more spells narrowly missing you. You need to keep going. This close to the pitch, the hazardous maze of burning debris makes your throat dry and your t-shirt soak with sweat.
You need to get into the open air again but your broom seems to be fighting against you. It’s hot. Swelteringly hot. Come on, you think, urging your broom upwards. But it’s dragging. Why is it dragging? You check over your shoulder and see that the tail of your broom is set alight.
Double fuck.
Whether it’s by Cerys’ hand or from flying too close to the burning stands on the pitch you’re not sure. Either way, you point your wand over your shoulder. “Aguamenti!”. It’s no good. It’s so hot down here that the stream of water from the tip of your wand turns to vapour before it can extinguish the flames.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
There’s nothing else for it - you look for a patch of scorched grass amidst the flame and throw yourself from the broom. As the burning broom leaves a streak of white light in the air before crashing down into a pile of embers, your body slams and rolls onto the firmly solid ground, an entirely new sensation compared with the freedom of the air. Your right arm bears the brunt of your fall. Pain explodes as you roll awkwardly onto your back and your arm feels out of place - either broken, dislocated or both, you’re not sure.
Before you can fully register the vulnerability of your situation or gather your wits, a shadow falls over you. You try to wrench McLaggen’s dad’s wand from your pocket but it’s not there. It must have fallen out as you tumbled from the sky.
Cerys aims her wand directly at you. “Crucio!”
The incantation cuts through the din of burning chaos around you and the curse hits a thousand times worse than a physical blow. The throbbing, useless dead weight of your arm becomes a drop in the ocean as pain like you’ve never experienced before pulls at your every nerve - like every fibre of your being is being torn apart inch by inch. You’re only vaguely aware of the noises you’re making - so raw and so desperate that you don’t even recognise your voice. Even your teeth feel like they’re being pulled from your gums by pliers as you scream. It's only the absence of blood in your mouth that convinces you they’re still intact as you stop screaming to clench your jaw against the unimaginable pain.
She keeps her wand on you as you arch your body in agony and think only of the sweet release of death.
Then it stops suddenly. With immense effort you open your eyes to see Cerys admiring her handiwork, her face twisted in a sadistic grin. She raises her wand once more and you almost hope she ends it rather than putting you through the pain again. But you have to know why she’s getting so much pleasure from targeting you specifically.
“Cerys - wait -” You pant, lifting your head and pushing yourself up on your left elbow as your right pulses in agony. “All this because of what happened last summer? When McLaggen punched Flint?”
“Don’t make me laugh,” she huffs. “This is nothing to do with Marcus.”
“Then what? Cerys I don’t understand what I could have -“
“I told you in the Black Dragon. I left Hogwarts five years before you did. I’ve been trying out for professional Quidditch teams every summer and winter transfer window since. Five years of rejections. Five years playing in the amateur league and working stupid temp jobs in my father’s department at the Ministry. Five years working for that arrogant, blood traitor Gregor McLaggen.”
She walks towards you pointing her wand and you scramble backwards with your good arm. You daren’t take your eyes off her as your fingers search the dry grass for the missing wand.
“But Cerys you - you made it. You got into the Holyhead Harpies… we both did.” The last three words are a plea, trying to appeal to some sense of reason within her, reminding her you were once teammates. For a brief, beautiful few hours after your tryouts together, you thought Cerys might have made a good friend. Until it all went so horribly wrong and she showed you who she really was.
“And do you have any idea how many tryouts I had to endure before I did? Then, when I finally get my shot, who else should swan into their first tryout and get signed? Not even as a Reserve Keeper. And you nearly took it from me. You almost saved every shot but I got two past you -“
“That’s my job! You think I’m not going to save something to make someone else look good at tryouts?”
“There’s an etiquette to these things. Something Mudbloods like you wouldn’t understand. It makes you look arrogant. Like your idiot boyfriend and his traitor father.”
“He’s not an idiot! And they’re not arrogant -“
She slashes her wand downwards and you twist to avoid it but her spell grazes your leg. You wince, feeling it leaving a fresh cut in your calf. You feel something hard sticking into your back.
McLaggen’s dad’s wand.
“Over Quidditch, Cerys? You’d actually kill me over Quidditch?” A minute ago you were ready to die at her hand - to end the pain from the Cruciatus curse. But you’re not dying for this. Quidditch tryouts. Your lifelong dream feels childish as Cerys stands here and declares she’s ready to kill you over it. You slip your hand behind your back and wrap your fingers around your wand.
“This is about more than Quidditch,” Cerys retorts, her voice dropping to a venomous whisper. “Being pure-blooded used to mean something. Connections. Opportunities. Marrying into a pure bloodline. And now you’ve been handed everything that should have been mine and you’re not even grateful for it.”
“Marriage?” Your disdainful laugh is involuntary but you’re pleased to see that it’s wounded her. “This isn’t about McLaggen, is it?”
“McLaggen. Listen to yourself, calling him by his last name. You talk about him like he’s your pal rather than your boyfriend... Where is he, anyway?” Cerys glances over her shoulder, still keeping her wand pointed at you.
“He’s not here,” you make up wildly. “He’s still locked up under the Imperius curse.”
“The Daily Prophet might have bought Gregor McLaggen’s bullshit story but I saw you two in the Black Dragon and he wasn’t Imperiused. So where is he?”
“He’s not here!” you lie again, your heart thudding so frantically you’re sure she must actually see it betraying you, beating against your ribs.
“Liar. Crucio!”
Your whole body jerks again as the brutal curse takes over your senses once more, your wand jabbing uselessly into your back as you lose control of your fingers. With everything you have, you force yourself to think of Cormac. He must not have been able to crack the enchantment for the bludgers. But at least you’ve bought him enough time to get back to the castle.
“Where is he?!” Her question breaks the curse as your mind swims.
“Why - why do you care?” You ask and it’s only the taste of iron in your lips that makes you register that your face is bleeding.
“The Dark Lord has promised he’ll reward those who are loyal to him. With the Mudbloods out of the way, we can return to the rightful order.” Cerys’s gaze is sharp. “I told you last summer, there are no decent men from pure-blood families left. So I’ve decided that when I’ve gotten rid of you, Cormac McLaggen will suffice.”
“He’d rather die,” you spit back, defiance burning through the pain.
Cerys smirks, her wand steady. “Maybe. But would he risk his family?” You blink up at her, trying to make sense of it all. “I can make sure the Dark Lord learns all about Gregor McLaggen's scheming to undermine him. Getting you out of Azkaban? Pretending his son was kidnapped and under the Imperius curse for all these months? Pure-blood or not, the McLaggens will be executed for being traitors. Unless I get what I want.” Cerys moves closer, amidst the chaos of the burning pitch, her silhouette outlined by the leaping flames that consume what remains of the once-pristine field. “So, where is your boyfriend? I’d hate for him to get hurt in the battle - I have plans for him.”
“Cerys?” bellows Flint’s voice from beyond the flames separating you and Cerys from the rest of the pitch. She ignores him - keeping her wand fixed on you.
“What about Flint? Why don’t the two of you go off and have Death Eater babies?” you snarl, grimacing against the dull pain in your shoulder.
She shrugs. “I like them pretty - Crucio,” she says, with an almost lazy flick of her wand.
With every cell of your being screaming under the curse, you force your mind to McLaggen and somehow it lessens to pain. Of the two of you sharing a blanket on a tiny island in the middle of the vast loch, watching blue flames twinkle in a jar. You think of Cho, your fingers braiding her hair as you both sit on the window seat at the top of the lighthouse. Of Marietta, carefully transfiguring the bunch of wildflowers she collected in the garden into a beautiful wreath of sweetpeas, violets and her favourite forget-me-nots. You think about playing Exploding Snap with Carmichael and him leaping onto his chair in an ungracious, goofy victory dance. You think about Leanne transfiguing Carmichael’s chair into a yoga ball, sending him tumbling and making you laugh until your sides hurt. You think about Krum in the kitchen showing you how to make Bulagarian bansita and Davies interrupting to wind him up by insisting that they’re basically pumpkin pasties with cheese. You think about singing Happy Birthday to Katie at a surprise picnic in the garden and her joy when she sees Wood, Angelina and Alicia there too.
You think about all of them. The memories help you endure, drawing out your own torture to keep Cerys occupied, to give them a fighting chance.
When the curse breaks again you squeeze your eyes shut tight, waiting for Cerys to cast the killing curse now she’s finished toying with you. You only dare to open your eyes when a scream is carried to you by the wind.
In the distance somewhere you can hear a man crying out in pain and you hope against hope it’s not any of the others getting themselves hurt in an attempt to rescue you. The thought tightens the vice around your heart, even as you gasp for the air that pain had stolen.
A silhouette rises above the burning sky on a broom and suddenly the atmosphere changes.
Cormac.
Cerys’s focus on you falters when there’s an almighty crunching of something smashing through wood. Her eyes widen as a bludger propels itself through the debris, flying directly towards the two of you. You grab McLaggen’s dad’s wand with your left hand and cast a shield charm around yourself but there’s no need. You’re not the target the bludger is looking for.
With a dull thud of metal meeting a fleshy target, the bludger collides with Cerys directly in the stomach, knocking the wind out of her and sending her off her feet. Another bludger flies downwards and Cerys rolls herself out of the way in just enough time so that it sinks into the ground instead of into her chest.
She gets to her feet and with all your might you push yourself up with your left arm, holding the wand in your practically useless right.
The bludger in the ground shakes and throws itself towards Cerys, sinking into her ribs with a brutal crunch. She doubles over coughing up blood. She looks at you helplessly, blood dripping out of her mouth and down the front of her Death Eater robes, deepening them a darker shade of night.
It’s awful.
You know you should be relieved to see her being bludgeoned to death after she just tortured you. But after spending so much time in Seafarer’s Beacon with McLaggen and those idiotically noble Gryffindors, your heart pleads with you to show her some compassion. To be the bigger person.
Wind rushes as you hear another bludger careering towards her.
“Protego!” you cry, pointing the shield between Cerys and the bludger, grimacing against the effort it’s causing you to even lift your broken arm.
And then a lot of things happen at once.
Cerys levels her wand at you.
You hear McLaggen shouting, “No!”
Your wand trembles under the strain of your pained grip.
She opens her mouth, “Avada Ke-”
McLaggen careers into you on his broom, knocking you aside and onto the ground.
Your broken arm screams as you hit the ground once more.
The shield charm you were casting falters.
The bludger, unyielding and precise, smashes straight into Cerys’s face. The unforgivable curse dies on her lips, unspoken, as silence - a heavy, definitive silence - falls over the scene, punctuated only by the crackling of the flames that have witnessed the turn of fate.
You and McLaggen sit in a heap on the ground. You don’t dare to bring yourself to look at the sickening sight only a few feet away.
You know without looking that Cerys is dead but for some reason - closure perhaps - you need to ask, “Is she…”
And as if for good measure another bludger plummets from the sky towards her as if from nowhere. You yelp and shield your eyes. A thunk of the bludger meeting its target. The sound of liquid on dry grass.
“Dead. Yeah.” McLaggen says in a cold voice but when he tears his gaze away from Cerys his eyes are full of concern for you. “Are you alright? I heard… I heard you screaming.”
You nod but you’re not sure that you are alright. Images of Cerys standing over you, using the Cruciatus Curse on you, streak behind your eyelids every time you blink. Like a camera flash burned onto your retinas. “You did it. You worked out how to enchant the bludgers,” you say, looking out at the burning pitch in front of you, hoping for a change of subject from your own wellbeing.
“I’m sorry - I tried to do it faster. But when I heard you screaming…” He drags a hand down his face, smudging the black soot. “I panicked. And I think I overdid it. I didn’t think the bludgers would - would kill. I thought they’d just rough the Death Eaters up a bit. Cause them enough trouble ‘til I could get you out of there. I mean, Flint, Cerys and those two other Death Eaters, they’re - fuck -” He swallows. “They’re dead. It was grim. And I - I killed them.”
“They would have killed you without a second thought.”
He nods, not able to pull his eyes away from the flaming pitch.
You press on. “Flint tried to kill me. And you saw Cerys trying again. And what’s worse -”
“The Cruciatus curse?”
“Well, yes but -”
McLaggen lets out a hollow sort of groan. “I’m sorry I wasn’t faster -”
“No, listen to me. Worse than the Cruciatus curse. After Cerys had killed me she was going to tell You-Know-Who she wanted to marry you after all of this was over.”
“That’s not worse than you enduring the Cruciatus curse,” says McLaggen. “Not to me.”
“I’d take a thousand Cruciatus curses than an entire lifetime spent in a forced marriage to a Death Eater.”
“Well, when you put it that way…” McLaggen trails off, utter disbelief etching his face.
“At first I thought she was just saying it to try and stick the knife in before she killed me. But then she started going on about pure bloodlines again like she did in the Black Dragon last year.”
McLaggen shakes his head. “She’s deluded... Was deluded.”
“Cormac -” Your left hand searches for his fingers and grips them tight. “I thought you’d be safe even if our side lost, because of your family name. But if what Cerys told me is true and we lose, the Muggleborns will be executed and the pure-bloods who resisted will be forced into Death Eater families.”
“Well, it’s like you said. We need to win or die trying.” McLaggen gets to his feet and extends his hand to lift you to yours. You take his with your left and wince as you get up. “Woah - what happened to your arm? Was that when I flew into you?”
“Well, it didn’t help.” You offer him a small smile despite the pulsing pain and inner turmoil. “But no - it was when I had to jump off my broom earlier.”
“Do you want me to fix it?”
“Can you?”
“I’ve never done it before. But I think if I can handle the bludgers, I can handle this. And I remember the spell from when you fixed my nose.”
You hesitate. Arms are trickier than noses. But if you go back to the castle with a broken wand arm then you’re worse than useless. “Yeah. Go on then.”
McLaggen places the tip of his wand against your upper arm. “Episkey.” You inhale sharply as you feel the bone snapping back into place. “You’ll probably need some Skele-gro after this is over,” he says, taking your arm in his hand to examine it. “Can you try using it?”
You flex your fingers, feeling the sensation returning to them and wave your borrowed wand again. “Thanks.”
You draw your gaze from your hand and up at McLaggen as you stand here, both covered in blood, soot and dirt. Even with his wild hair and his singed t-shirt, he’s a sight for sore eyes. In your darkest moments when Cerys was torturing you, even when you were facing death, all you could think about was him.
But now you need to return to the castle and rejoin the battle. Keep fighting. Face death who knows how many more times.
You both jump with a start when a voice rings through the air, as clearly as if the speaker were directly behind you.
“You have fought,” says the amplified high, cold voice, “valiantly. Lord Voldemort knows how to value bravery. Yet you have sustained heavy losses. If you continue to resist me, you will all die, one by one. I do not wish this to happen. Every drop of magical blood spilled is a loss and a waste. Lord Voldemort is merciful. I command my forces to retreat immediately. You have one hour. Dispose of your dead with dignity. Treat your injured.”
Heavy losses. Dead. There are people in the castle who are dead.
You don’t want to think about who.
“I speak now, Harry Potter, directly to you. You have permitted your friends to die for you rather than face me yourself. I shall wait for one hour in the Forbidden Forest. If, at the end of that hour, you have not come to me, have not given yourself up, then battle recommences. This time, I shall enter the fray myself, Harry Potter, and I shall find you, and I shall punish every last man, woman, and child who has tried to conceal you from me. One hour.”
“We’ve got to move,” says McLaggen, before the ringing has even stopped in your ear, as he marches over to pick up his broom.
“But he said we’ve got an hour?”
“Yeah, and in about five minutes a hundred Death Eaters will be coming past here on their way to the Forbidden Forest.”
“Fuck.”
“Let’s go,” he says, climbing onto his borrowed school broom.
You pick up your broom that Cerys had discarded. As you grip the familiar handle, your body breathes a sigh of relief. Like an extension of you had been temporarily missing. “I don’t know where yours is,” you say before kicking off into the air. “Maybe we could find it?” you suggest hopefully, peering down at the disastrous state of the pitch as the two of you ascend into the air.
“Doesn’t matter. We don’t have time,” says McLaggen. “And besides, it was already pretty burnt anyway,” he adds.
You smile weakly at his effort to bring some humour back to the situation but it’s short-lived.
As the two of you turn West and fly back towards the castle, your stomach churns in anticipation of what awaits you back at Hogwarts.
Tag list: @countlambula, @ratsys, @aweidlich, @navs-bhat, @stainedpomegranatelips, @chiaraanatra, @xxvelvetxxxx, @ohnoitsrosie, @dracosisteer, @daisydark, @intense-sneezing, @lipstickandloveletters, @ichorai, @marmie-noir, @lolitstiana, @evabellasworld, @ivebeentrashsince2001, @xyzstar, (let me know if you want removed at any point btw!)
Finders Keepers Ch 18. (Cormac McLaggen x fem!reader)
Rating: Explicit 18+ (no smut in this particular chapter)
Word Count: 4.7k
Warnings: Canon-typical violence
Summary: Hogwarts has changed.
A/N: This took a hot minute but on the plus side I have the next three chapters written and ready to post! Next chapter coming next Sunday <3
Masterlist
Chapter 18: Calling
Your heart pounds as you make your way through the secret passageway from the Hog’s Head to Hogwarts. This must be how some people feel walking out of the dark tent of the Quidditch changing rooms and onto the roaring pitch. But not you - never you. The feeling of the broom handle slipping from your clutch so often you have to swap hands is an unexpected departure from the norm - something experienced by lesser players.
But this is no game.
Because if your side doesn’t win, you’ll be sent straight back to Azkaban. And you’re not letting that happen. They won’t take you alive. You’d rather die - you’d rather take a killing curse straight to the chest than go back to Azkaban. You can’t do it again. You’re not as brave or resilient as McLaggen.
Though you’ve not yet told him this worry that has been playing on your mind as the two of you, Cho, Marietta, Carmichael, Leanne, Katie, Davies and Krum walk down the winding passageway in silent anticipation, each of you with your brooms in hand.
After what seems like an extremely long time, you hear noise coming from behind a door at the end of the passageway. It’s easy to pretend it’s a crowd of excited Quidditch fans anticipating your walk-out. It steadies you and makes it easier for you to hold onto your slipping broom. As you approach the sounds of chatter and laughter, you can’t imagine what there is to be happy about - the D.A. coins just said that you were supposed to be fighting. Neville Longbottom will be on the receiving end of your fist if you’re here on a fool’s errand.
Cho pushes open the door and you appear to have stepped into some kind of makeshift camp. Around twenty students are milling around underneath a mishmash of hammocks and banners depicting Gryffindor, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff house hangings. A Muggle storybook that your dad used to read to you comes to mind. Peter Pan. You look at the students and realise how young they all look in their school uniforms. This is a hideout for lost children. It makes you notice how much taller and older you are since the last time you were in the castle.
The old stone walls look like the ones in Hogwarts but you certainly don’t remember a room like this. “Are we - is this Hogwarts?” you ask McLaggen when you, Krum and Davies, are the only ones who look puzzled.
“Room of Requirement,” McLaggen says, squeezing your much smaller, slightly damp hand. His touch is reassuring. You’d wipe your hand on your fresh pair of jeans first if it was anyone else reaching for it. But McLaggen would never be disgusted by your nerves. It only makes him hold on tighter and rub the back of your hand with his thumb.
The arrival of your noticeably older group seems to have interrupted something important. There’s a split second of silence when everyone turns to look at you all. “I got the message,” says Cho, holding up her fake galleon sheepishly. And that’s when you clock him.
Harry Potter.
Cho’s ex-boyfriend and Undesirable Number One stares open-mouthed at her. Marietta’s smirk paints a picture of her blatant enjoyment of Potter’s shock even in the face of a battle. Cho smiles diplomatically and links her arm through Krum’s.
You wonder if Potter has been hiding here all this time. In the school itself. If he has, Potterwatch certainly never reported that.
As the rest of you follow her towards a small group of Ravenclaws sitting on a bench near the back of the room, there’s a mixture of exclamations and mutterings. There’s a spotlight on you. To be observed from all sides like this is suffocating. The last time you were around this many people was when you were marched through the Ministry atrium by Mr McLaggen after you’d just been sentenced to another two years in Azkaban.
“Is that - ?”
“Krum! It’s Viktor Krum!”
“They’re the ones that broke all the Muggleborns out of Azkaban, right?”
“Oh my gosh, Marietta!” The Patil twins and Lavender Brown greet Marietta with squeals and air kisses. You try not to frown. They’re acting like you’re at a high school reunion instead of battle preparations.
Just then, the crowd parts and you see two familiar faces from the Ravenclaw Quidditch Team. Although you recognise them, their faces are significantly different from when you last saw them.
“Alright, Captain? Azkaban not exciting enough or something?” asks Terry Boot. You gape at him when he shakes your hand. He looks, frankly, dreadful. His lip is bloody and several of his teeth are missing. There are gouges on his forearms that look as though they’ve been made by a blade. Michael Corner, who shakes your hand next doesn’t look much better. His half-closed, swollen, bruised eye resembles McLaggen’s after his fight with Marcus Flint and Cerys Thicknesse.
“Terry! Michael! Has - has the fighting started then?” you ask.
“This?” asks Terry, examining his own forearms in surprise, like he’s forgotten he’s sporting half-healed wounds. “Nah, this was the Carrows.”
“The Carrows?” you ask, thinking about what you’ve read in the Daily Prophet. “Those Death Eaters who’re teaching here now?”
“Yeah,” replies Terry. “It’s not the same here, Captain. I mean, Muggle Studies turned into Alecto Carrow lecturing us on how Muggleborns are just Muggles who stole magic from unsuspecting wizards.”
“I know a thing or two about that,” you say sourly. “I don’t know how much you heard about why I was sent to Azkaban but -”
“‘Course we know. What, you think we haven’t been keeping up with the player who ‘hoodwinked the Harpies’? That’s how I got this.” Terry rolls up his shirt to reveal a long, healed scar on his torso. “Back in October, Alecto was using you and Carmichael as examples of what happens to Muggles who steal magic. So I asked her who stole her magic since she was so bloody useless.”
“Terry…” You’re too stunned to even finish your sentence.
“Bloody hell, mate. And they did that to you?” asks Carmichael.
“That’s not the worst of it, I mean, Michael got tortured pretty badly for trying to set some first years free from the dungeons.”
Michael shrugs his shoulders and glances at his ex-girlfriend, Cho, expectantly. Perhaps hoping she’ll be impressed.
“The dungeons? They’re locking students up?” Cho asks.
“Yeah! By their ankles and everything. Hogwarts has changed.” Michael pauses before giving you a funny kind of grin. “They’ve even cancelled Quidditch.”
Before you can open your mouth to reply, Harry Potter gets the room’s attention.
“Okay,” Potter calls to the room at large. Everyone shuts up. You feel alert. Not quite the same cheery excitement as everyone else but something is stirring inside you. Maybe your body is relieved that win or lose, this is all about to be over. Potter continues. “We’re back because there’s something we need to find. Something… something that will help us overthrow You-Know-Who. It’s here at Hogwarts but we don’t know where. It might have belonged to Ravenclaw. Has anyone heard of an object like that? Has anyone come across something with her eagle on it, for instance?”
You, Cho, Marietta and the other Ravenclaws exchange significant looks. There’s only one object like that. When you were at Hogwarts, you passed by the statue of Rowena Ravenclaw wearing it every day.
But Luna Lovegood pipes up before any of you can. “Well, there’s her lost diadem,” she says in a dreamy voice. “The Lost Diadem of Ravenclaw. Daddy’s trying to duplicate it.”
“Yeah, but the lost diadem is lost, Luna. That’s sort of the point,” says Michael, rolling his eyes.
“When was it lost?” asks Potter.
Jesus Christ, pick up a history book. You pull a face and look at McLaggen but you rearrange your expression quickly when he’s just as perplexed as Potter.
“Centuries ago, they say,” says Cho, much more kindly than you would have. You can’t fathom how the diadem would help defeat You-Know-Who. You picture Potter wearing the tiara mid-duel, glittering above his scar. “Professor Flitwick says the diadem vanished with Ravenclaw herself. People have looked but -” She looks at you. “They’ve never found a trace of it, have they?” You shake your head.
“Sorry, but what is a diadem?” asks the worst keeper to have ever graced the Quidditch pitch at Hogwarts. It’s not a stupid question but you find yourself rolling your eyes. Even now, almost two years after Ron Weasley was chosen over McLaggen for the Gryffindor team, his presence annoys you.
“It’s kind of a crown,” says Terry. “Ravenclaw’s was supposed to have magical properties. Enhance the wisdom of the wearer.”
“And none of you have ever seen anything that looks like it?” asks Potter.
“If you’d like to see what the diadem is supposed to look like, I could take you up to our common room and show you, Harry?” Cho suggests. “Ravenclaw’s wearing it in her statue.”
Potter, Weasley and Granger huddle together to discuss this. Ugh, Granger. You didn’t even notice her at first but the sight of her makes you realise you’re holding a grudge. The scars from her curse still mark Marietta’s face. It’s been two whole years since the entire Umbridge debacle and you can still make out the word ‘SNEAK’ across her nose and cheeks. You glance at Marietta to see if the same irritation you feel is mirrored on her face too but she doesn’t seem bothered. In spite of everything, she’s quicker to forgive than you are. And you think Carmichael has been a good influence on her.
But even though Carmichael might like Marietta’s scars because they give her an ‘edge’, you decide that after the battle you’ll repay Marietta for her part in getting you out of Azkaban by trying to reason with Granger - you’ll ask her to break the curse. If you win and Marietta is seen to be helping, surely Granger will at least do that for her.
“Listen, I know it’s not much of a lead but I’m going to go and look at this statue. At least find out what the diadem looks like,” announces Potter.
Cho gets to her feet but Ginny Weasley gets to hers too.
“No, Luna will take Harry! Won’t you, Luna?” Ginny says urgently.
“Calm down. Nobody wants your man,” Marietta mutters under her breath and even though you like Ginny, the unexpected jibe makes you snort a laugh.
“Ooh, yes, I’d like to,” says Luna and Cho sits down looking disappointed. You’ve all been trapped inside doing nothing for so long, you know she was desperate for the chance to be useful. Marietta touches her shoulder comfortingly as she sits.
“So what are we meant to do now?” McLaggen asks nobody in particular as the buzz of conversation resumes and Potter and Luna leave the Room of Requirement.
“Wait for the Chosen One, to return with an ancient magic relic that’s been lost for centuries?” you suggest, your voice dripping with sarcasm. “Should only take him ten or so minutes, I suppose.”
“Viktor!” Calls a voice. You all turn around to see Fleur Delacour entering the room through the passageway with more stragglers. “I ‘ave been worrying about you since I saw you in ze Daily Prophet!” Krum goes over to greet her and she throws her arms around him.
“Woah, steady on Cho,” says Carmichael, bracing Cho’s shoulders as if holding her back. You share her perplexed look when she frowns.
“Come on, she’s not jealous of old friends catching up,” says Marietta.
“Yeah, what are you on about, Eddie?” asks Cho, looking perplexed as she turns to look up at Carmichael standing behind her bench.
“I know you’re not jealous,” he grins. “It’s just that Fleur’s the only Triwizard Champion you haven’t gone out with yet. I thought you might need help restraining yourself.”
“Oh, shut up!” laughs Cho, slapping him away. You and McLaggen crack up at this.
“Katie!” Another group emerges from the Hog’s Head passageway. You all spin around again to see Oliver Wood, Angelina Johnston and Alicia Spinnet entering the room.
Everyone exchanges hugs and greetings and you keep an eye on the door - the parade of people coming through the passageway is getting thicker. Some you recognise, like students from the years above you, your old Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Lupin and the Aurors who patrolled Hogsmeade in your seventh year.
“So, McLaggen, is it true that Captain’s been holding you and Marietta hostage?” asks Michael, raising an eyebrow.
You and McLaggen catch up with Terry and Michael. They share more gruesome details of what’s been happening with Hogwarts and you tell them the truth of what happened in Azkaban - from the fight that led to your trial to Carmichael’s breakout as the room continues to fill up with more and more people.
Sometime later, the door at the top of the staircase opens and McLaggen stands up, looking over your shoulder. “Merlin’s beard, he’s done it. Potter’s got the diadem,” says McLaggen.
“What?!” You stand up, letting your broom fall out of your lap.
You look up just in time to see Harry Potter practically tumbling down the top few stairs in shock at the size of the crowd. Noticeably diadem-less.
“‘Course, he hasn’t. I just wanted to see the look on your face,” laughs McLaggen.
“Harry, what’s happening?” asks Professor Lupin, meeting Potter at the stairs as you all gaze up at him.
“Voldemort’s on his way. They’re barricading the school,” says Potter. You inhale sharply and McLaggen puts an arm around your shoulders instinctively. You-Know-Who is coming here. To Hogwarts. “We’re evacuating the younger kids. Everyone’s meeting in the Great Hall. We’re fighting.”
A chill runs through the room, palpable in the sudden stillness that follows Potter's words. You catch Cho's eye, the fear and determination mirrored in her gaze reflecting your own feelings. Marietta fixes the front of her cardigan nervously. McLaggen's grip around you tightens.
The entire castle is alight with anticipation. The weight of the impending battle presses down on the atmosphere, darkening the night sky as you and McLaggen lead your group out of the Great Hall. As the most competent on brooms, you and your friends will be covering the sky, leading the aerial defence which suits you just fine.
Cool night air hits your face as the eleven of you make your way through the organised chaos and out, down the front steps of the castle. But just before you stop in the old stone courtyard and ready your brooms, Marietta and Carmichael jog to meet you and McLaggen at the front.
“Wait!” says Marietta, running to catch up. “Listen, Eddie and I are going to find McGonagall and help with her group. Neither of us is great on a broom.”
“What are you talking about? You’re miles better than you used to be -” You start but Marietta doesn’t let you finish.
“This isn’t like practising at home,” says Marietta seriously. “We need to play to our strengths here or else we’ll die.”
Your mind whirs and you know Marietta’s has already weighed it all up too. Head versus heart. As usual, your head wins. That Ravenclaw logic that you both have in common. Of course, you’d like Marietta and Carmichael by your side as you face certain death but you need to admit she’s right. Everyone needs to do what gives your side the best chance of winning.
“But we’ve been practising for a reason,” urges McLaggen, his heart elbowing its way into the conversation to try and win the argument. “This is the reason! We should stick together.”
“We shouldn’t stick together for the sake of it, mate. Worst case scenario, is that Maz and I hold you back and end up getting one of you killed,” says Carmichael.
All of a sudden, Cho lets out a choked sob and grabs Marietta. You throw your arms around her too and hold on tight. You get a face full of Marietta’s curly auburn hair as the three of you clutch onto each other.
“Eddie and I are better at Transfiguration -” she tells your shoulder.
“Way better than you lot,” calls Carmichael.
Marietta pulls back. “We’re going to help McGonagall with the battlements. She’s already transfigured the suits of armour but we think she’s forgotten about the gargoyle statues on the outside walls.” Her matter-of-fact voice grounds you.
You swallow thickly and try your best to nod. The jerk of your head makes the knot in your throat tighten. There’s no arguing with her reasoning.
“Don’t do anything reckless, alright?” Marietta’s question is directed at McLaggen specifically. He nods.
“We’ll see you when this is all over, innit?” says Carmichael with a cheeky grin that lights up his face. “This time tomorrow, we’ll be back at Seafarer’s having a party to celebrate.”
“Don’t threaten me with a good time, mucker,” you tell him before he and Marietta turn on their heels.
Nerves. Awful, gut-wrenching nerves rear their head again as you drag your eyes from Marietta and Carmichael’s silhouettes sprinting back through the open castle doors. Your hands shake as you grip your broom and get ready to kick off into the air.
At least when you were storming into Azkaban you knew what to expect. You were the ambushers. But tonight you’re sitting ducks. You look at McLaggen - his handsome face lit up by the glowing castle torches is so full of determination. His confidence helps you breathe a little easier.
Eleven brooms lift into the night sky, overlooking the ground from the courtyard below to those familiar old Quidditch stands in the distance. The mild summer night air sweeps through your hair. Your stomach settles immediately. You feel at home - just like your first flying lesson at Hogwarts. You were terrified of being launched into the air on nothing but a flimsy-looking piece of old wood. But as soon as you reached a height where you could see everything looking so small you became a giant on top of the world, ready to conquer anything.
You’ve never seen flames so high or felt them so hot.
Your face burns, sweat drips down your back and your hands slip from your broom handle.
There’s a snapping and cracking of wood. You’ve never really appreciated just how tall the Quidditch stands are until two of them begin to topple over, burning across the width of the grass pitch in long, white-hot streaks.
Smoke floods your lungs - you’ve lost everyone in the opaque blackness. You can hear their shouting. You need to get higher. You could manage being out here yourself but keeping an eye on the others, worrying about them as they send jets of light through the smog, is distracting you.
More creaking and groaning from above you as you’re forced to double back on yourself to avoid the crashing down of another one of the stands.
Why is everything here made of wood?
When the Death Eaters set fire to the first stand, the rest of them caught in flames one after the other like toppling dominoes. It’s only right now that you realise how irresponsible it was of you to set McLaggen’s broomstick on fire last year in a fit of rage.
McGonagall really should have expelled you after all.
You see jets of light down below in the smoke and try not to panic. The smoke is even darker and thicker down where your friends are. They need to get higher too. So high that spells from Death Eaters on foot can’t reach any of you while you regroup.
“Formations!” you yell down into the billowing blackness. “Skyward! Skyward!” It’s useless. Fuck. They can’t hear you above the cracking of the flames and the screaming of curses. You point McLaggem’s dad’s wand at your throat and cast an amplifying charm. “Sonorus… SKYWARD!”
Your voice - magically amplified - booms across the pitch, slicing through the cacophony of flames and battle cries. Your team appears, rising through the smoke one by one: Krum. Wood. Cho. Katie. Alicia. Angelina. Leanne. Davies. Corner. Boot. And finally, McLaggen.
“What now Captain?” asks Cho.
You remove the amplifying charm. “Retreat. Back to the castle. The pitch is done for and we’re fighting one on one down there -”
“But that’s a good thing!” says McLaggen. “We’re keeping them away from the castle -”
“At what cost?” You snap over the roar of the fire. “We’re not sacrificing ourselves!”
“Listen, I know that you -”
But just what McLaggen knows about you is lost in chaos as a black swishing cloak in a stream of charcoal smoke flies through the middle of your group, sending you all scattering. You just about hang onto your broom. But then another one comes. And another one.
The Death Eaters can fly without brooms.
This is more than just apparition - they’re aiming themselves as you scatter, trying to purposefully knock you out of the air. And at this height, it means certain death.
Just as the thought crosses your mind - it happens. The world narrows to a single point of focus as you see a figure plummeting through the smoke-streaked sky, their descent uncontrolled and terrifying. All you know when you tilt your broom downwards and speed after them is that they’re one of your group.
If you make it quickly, you might be able to catch them.
“Arresto momentum!” bellows McLaggen’s voice behind you and the speeding body of Alicia Spinnett comes to a cushioned stop just feet above the ground. You decelerate as quickly as you can, your feet touching the ground precisely before you collide with her.
McLaggen lands with a thud beside her and lowers his wand. Alicia gets to her feet clutching her heart, searching for her wand in her pocket.
“Fuck. Shit. Thanks, McLaggen.” Alicia’s stunned gratitude is genuine.
He nods. “Just stay alive, alright?”
The rhetorical question hangs between them for just a second until it's punctuated by a yell from the flames behind you.
“Aha! Stupe -”
“Protego!” You whip around, hoping you’ve sent it in the right direction. Your invisible barrier flies up separating you, Alicia and McLaggen from the Death Eater just in time to deflect a stunning spell which rebounds and knocks him onto his back, out cold.
"Nice one," says McLaggen.
“Thanks.” Your voice is as steady as your wand arm, still holding up the shield charm as the three of you scan the pitch for further threats.
There’s another roaring creak above you. A flaming stand sways in the air and the three of you gape momentarily in shock as the burning wood begins tumbling down.
You and McLaggen retreat backwards while Alicia stumbles the other way. The colossal stand smashes onto the grass between you, sending tremors across the pitch. For a moment, fear paralyses you, the sight of the divided pitch a stark representation of how quickly fate can turn.
“Alicia?!” your voice cracks as you call out, the fear of loss more suffocating than the smoke as you shield your face from the burning embers, looking for her in the darkness.
“I’m here!” You can’t see her. And you’ve got no idea where your brooms are. “I’m okay!” she calls.
“Alicia? Cormac? Captain?” It’s Katie Bell’s voice from the same side as Alicia.
“Yaxley! There’s more here!” says a man’s voice behind you.
You and McLaggen whirl around to see more Death Eaters on your side of the pitch.
“Get back to the castle! Tell the others!” yells McLaggen to Katie and you both start sprinting towards the entrance to the Quidditch pitch, in the direction of the castle, hearing the Death Eaters shouting spells at you as you run for your lives. With an awful pang of guilt, you realise you lost your broom in all of the confusion. By now it’s probably reduced to nothing but firewood.
You point McLaggen’s dad’s wand over your head at the stands above. “Bombarda!” With an echoing snap, more burning wood begins to crash and fall.
You run as fast as you can, each step a gamble as you weave through the deadly rain of debris. The screams behind you tell you at least some of the Death Eaters aren’t so lucky. A chunk of wood plummets into the sand at the edge of the pitch with such ferocity, it reminds you of a speeding bludger. Then with a start, a memory from a lifetime ago flashes to the surface of your mind. A memory of a game you watched long ago in these very stands, watching Potter being chased by a bludger around the pitch with such targeted ferocity it broke his arm.
An enchanted bludger.
Just as you and McLaggen run through the entrance to the pitch, you grab his hand and drag him sideways.
“This way!”
“Wha - where?!”
“Hooch’s office!”
McLaggen doesn’t ask any more questions as you race towards the office on the outskirts of the pitch.
You barge through the door and lock it behind you.
The room is undisturbed. It looks exactly how you remember with the cabinet full of spare brooms and cases upon cases of spare Quidditch equipment.
“What are we-?”
“Cormac, do you remember that game back in our third year when Potter had that bludger chasing him and only him? And it broke his arm?” you ask urgently, as you start opening crates, frantically looking for the ones with the training bludgers.
“Yeah?”
“We’re going to recreate it.”
“We’re gonna get a bludger to attack the Death Eaters?”
“Not just one…” You find the heavy crate you’re looking for in the corner of the room and open it with a heaving grunt. Twenty bludgers strain against their straps. “And they need to be enchanted so they only attack the Death Eaters. Just like that time with Potter. They’ll be damn near impossible to stop with a wand. They’re too fast to get a good aim at.”
“You - you know how to do it?”
“Not me. You.” You look up from the crate. McLaggen’s face is smeared with soot and there are holes burned by embers on his t-shirt. His hair is wilder than you’ve ever seen it. He runs two hands through it in that stressed-out way he does sometimes.
“I don’t know how either!”
“You worked out how to extend the perimeter of the Fidelius Charm on your own,” you remind him.
“That took almost a week. And Carmichael helped.”
“Now’s not the time for your newfound modesty to make an appearance, McLaggen.” You throw open the broom cabinet and grab one of the spare school brooms. “I can buy you ten minutes.”
“No -” He tries to take the broom from you but you grasp it tight. “No way. You’re not holding them off. I’ll do it. I’m better at duelling -”
Of course, he wants to. But it’s time for you to take a leaf out of McLaggen’s book. It’s time to be brave.
“You’re better at duelling but I’m better at flying,” you say firmly, not quite believing you’re about to go back out there and face the Death Eaters on your own. “I’ll distract them and if I’m quick I might be able to stop them following the others back to the castle.”
“What if it doesn’t work?”
You drop your broom and put both hands on his shoulders to look him in the eyes.
“McLaggen, you’re ten times the wizard any of those Death Eaters are. But if you can’t -” You pause thinking about the last time you gave him a pep talk before Gryffindor played Hufflepuff. “If you can’t do this - that’s okay too. Just get back to the castle. Alive. Please.”
“And you?”
“I’m not going back to Azkaban, Cormac!” you say, a little more hysterically than you’d intended. “I either do this or die trying. I won’t let them take me. I’d rather die than go back.”
“Okay,” he says simply, taking your face in his hands. You don’t even realise you’re crying until McLaggen wipes away a tear from your cheekbone. “Okay.”
Cormac pulls you close and kisses you.
Kisses you like it’s the last time he’ll ever get the chance.
Tag list: @countlambula, @ratsys, @aweidlich, @navs-bhat, @stainedpomegranatelips, @chiaraanatra, @xxvelvetxxxx, @ohnoitsrosie, @dracosisteer, @daisydark, @intense-sneezing, @lipstickandloveletters, @ichorai, @marmie-noir, @lolitstiana, @evabellasworld, @ivebeentrashsince2001, @xyzstar, (let me know if you want removed at any point btw!)
minors, people I know irl - DNI - this is fucked up
Yandere Billionaire Jeffrey Steinberg x fem reader
warnings: non-con, yandere, breeding, kidnapping, DEAD DOVE DO NOT EAT
Deactivated
Rating: Explicit - 18+ only
Word Count: 4k
Warnings: SMUT, the most extreme non-con I have ever written, forced bondage, edging, forced orgasm, kidnapping, forced impregnation
Summary: When the apocalypse hit, you, Jeffrey Steinberg and eight of the world's other greatest minds were trapped in an underground ecosphere. This is an AU where the betas kill Nico and McKenna so Jeffrey hatches a plan to repopulate the world. (Full disclosure: That plan involves strapping you to a table and getting you pregnant.)
A/N: Genuinely might kink-shame myself into deleting this in the morning. Rape and forced pregnancy are incomprehensibly awful in the real world. This fic is intended to be an escapist fantasy. PS This is the only fic my partner has refused to proofread for me so apologies for typos.
Chapter text:
200 days.
200 days was all it took for the men of Evergreen to decide you were nothing more than vessels to be used to repopulate this hellhole of an underground ecosphere.
When they lined you up and began debating who belonged to whom, you and Ida took your chance to execute your hastily pulled-together plan.
Ida slipped a sickle she’d stolen from her agriculture station into a belt loop behind her back. You had pocketed a wrench from your mechanic’s workbench. You weren’t going down without a fight.
When Jeffrey Steinberg looked you over, dictating your height, weight, blood type and other vital stats from Cortex’s electronic display, you took your chance and whacked him on the side of the head with the wrench.
Then - chaos.
Ida grappled with David who caught her wrist as she slashed wildly with her sickle.
You were knocked off your feet and pinned to the ground.
Yelling.
Fighting.
You only remember Cortex being commanded to deactivate you before you were sucked into a black oblivion of nothingness. A door closing. More nothingness. The same door. Nothingness.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You wake up with a gasp - coughing, choking on air.
You’re in a hospital room. A brief glimmer of optimism that this was all just a coma-induced nightmare vanishes in an instant when with a sinking feeling of recognition, you realise you’re not just in any hospital - you’re in Evergreen’s hospital. David’s doctor’s office. This nightmare is real. And it’s only just beginning.
You’re in stirrups. Wearing a hospital gown. With your arms shackled above your head.
Oh, fuck.
You try to move your legs from the stirrups but they’re fastened tight. The handcuffs around your wrists only dig in when you try to slip your hands from them.
There’s an electronic beep and the door slides open.
Instinctively, you try to close your legs together. Preserve your last shred of dignity but your attempt is futile - the stirrups don’t move.
“Nice of you to join us,” says Jeffrey. Anger flares up in you when you see him. To think that you ever had even the tiniest romantic feelings towards such an awful human being.
“Us?!” you ask shrilly, a fresh wave of panic sending a jolt of adrenaline through your veins.
He gives you a tight-lipped smile. “Just an expression.” Jeffrey presses a few buttons on the door panel, locking it behind him. “It’s only me.”
You should have guessed from the start that he’d be a monster.
Nobody becomes a billionaire without stepping on a few toes or, indeed, crushing a few skulls. Everyone else here hated Jeffrey Steinberg from the outset. But you? At the start of all of this, you had actually liked him. The two of you had spent your spare hours flirting with each other. You were like two peas in a pod working to fix Cortex. Mechanic and Programmer. Hardware and Software. Yin and Yang. It only made the betrayal worse when, mere days after Nico and McKenna were both killed by Nico’s experiments on human cloning, Jeffrey had decided that you and the rest of the women were to be reduced to glorified incubators.
“Only you?” you spit. “For now, right? Whose turn is it next?”
He shakes his head and stands adjacent to you at the head of the bed. This small movement to respect what little dignity you have left doesn’t give you much comfort when you know what’s next. “It’s not like that,” says Jeffrey.
You laugh although there’s nothing funny about the situation you find yourself in. “What’s it like, then?”
“It’s just you and me. I chose you and that’s one of our rules - David, Axel and I’s rules, I mean.”
“So you care about rules now?” you ask. “What about laws?”
“I care about the rules I make because there are no laws.”
You scowl at him with all the hate you can muster. “Who undressed me? Who strapped me up like this while I was deactivated?”
“David. It was entirely clinical. He’s your doctor, after all.”
“And you believe that? I could be pregnant already. In fact, come to think of it - I do feel kind of nauseous,” you say looking at him in distaste. “Or maybe that’s just the effect of the present company.”
He smiles. A perfect, arrogant smile that reaches his green eyes. “See? This is why I like you. You always have so much fight.”
“Get me out of these handcuffs and you’ll really like me, you piece of shit,” you hiss, pulling at your restraints.
“I know you think you’re angry but this is humanity’s last chance for survival,” says Jeffrey, picking up the tablet with your vitals on it from your bedside table.
“Look at yourself. Humanity is already dead.”
“After the betas killed Nico and McKenna, this is the only way we can survive.”
“You’re a psychopath if you think living like this is better than dying.”
“It’s about more than just living. It’s about our entire species going extinct.”
You stare at each other in silence for a few moments. You absolutely hate that even under these circumstances, you find yourself blushing when he looks at you for too long.
“Fine. Go ahead with your turkey baster and get this over with,” you say, breaking eye contact with him and staring furiously ahead.
“Now, where’s the fun in that?”
You hold your breath as Jeffrey puts the tablet down and walks to the bottom of the examination bed standing directly between your open legs. Something long and metallic glints in his hand and you attempt to shrink back.
“Safety scissors.” He holds them up so you can see the blunt ends. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
Not with scissors, maybe, but you clearly have different definitions of what hurting another person means.
Jeffrey holds the end of your hospital gown and cuts upwards, careful even with the blunt ends of the scissors, not to touch the cool metal to your skin. Your chest heaves as the scissors split open the fabric over your tits and you close your eyes when they reach your neckline. You keep your eyes tight shut, listening to the snipping of the scissors as he cuts the fabric of your sleeves and pulls the gown away, leaving you entirely naked on David’s examination bed. Your nipples harden when you feel the cool breeze of the air conditioning fanning over them.
Jeffrey lets out a low exhale. “Your fight wasn’t the only reason I chose you.” You open your eyes to find him staring at your body. “You’re beautiful, you know that, right?”
Even though you still have to clench your fists to avoid letting him see that your hands are trembling, you feel your core tighten as butterflies erupt in your stomach. Under normal circumstances, you’d have liked to receive a compliment from Jeffrey - have him admire your naked form like this. But you remind yourself your current circumstances are as far away from normal as you could get.
“Don’t compliment me, you psychopath.”
He steps closer between your open legs and places his hands on your hips. There’s nowhere to cringe away to - but the sensation isn’t unpleasant. His hands are warm on your skin when he draws his thumbs along your hip bones. You feel goosebumps prickle on your skin as he does.
“Are you cold?” he asks gently.
The contrarian in you wants to argue with everything he says. To admit you’re uncomfortable in your vulnerable state would be giving him the upper hand. But the cool air makes the hair on your arms stand up so instead you swallow. “A - a little,” you answer quietly, deciding there’s no point in being even more uncomfortable than you already are.
“Cortex, turn it up to twenty-two degrees Celsius in here.” There’s a wave of warm air - a blessing on your cold, exposed skin. “That’s the temperature you like, right?” You don’t answer but your fists stop clenching and you can feel where your fingernails have been digging into your palms. “I’ll take that as a ‘yes’.”
Jeffrey puts the scissors down on the empty hospital rolling tray table. He notices your eyes following them.
“I told you they’re blunt. But I bet you’d like to stab me with something right now,” he teases. “You’ll come around eventually.”
He smiles, teasing you like you’re friends again and this is just a silly game. Like how he did before everything went to shit. “I’ll never come around. If you go through with this, I’ll throw myself down the stairs. I’ll drown myself in the reservoir. I’d rather die than carry your baby.”
“I won’t let that happen. Cortex will be with you day and night.”
“Cortex can’t keep a watch on all of us. The others -”
“The others. Hannah and Ida both relented. They’re excited, even, at the prospect of giving the human race another chance.”
“They relented after being strapped to a table and forcibly impregnated?”
“They went along willingly with Axel and David, respectively.” You can’t ignore the way his thumbs are so tenderly stroking your hip bones.
“And you’ll be able to live with yourself once you’ve done this? Done this to me?”
He shrugs. “I’ve already made peace with it,” says Jeffrey, drawing his thumbs down and massaging your vulva.
You look away, trying to ignore the surge of heat you feel in your core at his touch. “Stop that,” you snipe. “Can’t you just jerk off until you’re close and finish in me?”
“The chances of conception are higher if you cum too,” he says, pushing your outer lips together, putting the tiniest bit of pressure on your clit. You breathe in sharply, freezing for just a second before trying to move your hips away from him to no avail. “Besides, if I know you’re having a good time it makes it much more enjoyable for me.”
“This - this is not my idea of a good time, Jeffrey.”
“I think - deep down - this is exactly your idea of a good time. I see how you look at me.”
You flush, embarrassed that he’s throwing your earlier flirting from weeks ago back in your face. “You’re deluded.”
He tuts gently. “Now, you can’t lie to me when I can see how wet you are already. ”
This time you feel your embarrassment creeping right down to your chest. “I can’t - I can’t help how my body reacts to you touching me - I mean, being touched.”
But he smirks at your slip-up. “Sure. And when you’re begging for my cock in a few minutes, we can pretend you can’t control that either.”
“Fuck you, Jeffrey.”
“Now that’s the spirit,” he says and your pussy protests when he removes his hands to drag over David’s office chair. You watch as he sits down and wheels closer, his head and shoulders still visible. “God, you have such a pretty little cunt.”
Jeffrey slides two fingers along your slit, dragging your wetness up and over your clit. You turn your head and look away, trying to appear disinterested. You’re determined not to enjoy this. Not to give him anything.
“What’s wrong? Are you worried if you watch that you’ll finish too quickly?” he asks, a mischievous grin lighting up his face as he lightly circles your clit with the rough pads of his fingers.
“I’m just wondering if they have a hospital TV so I have something to do while you get this over with,” you say, blandly - a direct contrast with the heat pulsing from your clit.
“Come on, baby. Don’t be like that. Not when I can see you soaking the bed.” He runs the two fingers between your lips and holds them up so you can see them glistening and wet under the fluorescent clinical lights. “Do you want to taste it? Make sure I’m not lying?”
You stare at him insolently, refusing to answer.
“What am I saying?” He laughs. “You’d bite my fingers clean off if they came anywhere near your mouth, right?” Jeffrey sucks on his two wet fingers, briefly closing his eyes, before slowly withdrawing them. “Mhm. You’re missing out. You taste so fucking good.”
You hate that he’s hot when he does that. You hate that he’s hot full stop.
Why is the psychopath you're stuck here with hot?
Billionaire CEOs are used to controlling everyone around them. You’re not surprised he’s getting off on having you completely at his mercy. What surprises you is that he’s good at it.
When he slowly pushes two fingers inside you and curls them up, it’s like he knows it’s exactly what your body needs. You can’t help but gasp, feeling him gently stroking your G-spot. You bite your lip, trying to stifle any further noise involuntarily leaving you.
You don’t want this to feel as good as it does.
You try and leverage yourself up and away from him using your handcuffs but it’s no use when your legs are strapped down. Your ass barely lifts off the bed. He notices but he doesn’t stop tapping his fingers.
“C’mon, where are you going? We’ve barely even started,” he complains before inching his chair closer and pressing his lips against your inner thigh. “Tell me - how much - you want me - to fuck you.” Each pause is punctuated with a kiss or a suck on the sensitive flesh of your thigh as his fingers continue to curl up inside you.
“You’re crazy if - if - if - ah-” You swallow, watching him smile triumphantly against your soft thigh. Stop, you have to think of something else. You’re a mechanic - not a machine. You can be mentally strong. You don’t have to react automatically when you have these very specific buttons pushed. You exhale steadily. “- If you think I’d ever want you to fuck me.”
But the more you try to appear bored, the more relaxed your body becomes and that only heightens the sensation of Jeffrey toying with your pussy. Feeling your legs untense, he pushes his fingers in deeper and with a jolt of pleasure your back arches. Fuck, fuck, fuck. You curse yourself for making this so easy for him.
He laughs softly at the way your body becomes pliable under his touch and his hot breath fans over your clit. He picks up pace, tapping firmly against your g-spot. Everything pulls up in you like a spring tightening.
Oh, fuck. This is it. You’re gonna -
Suddenly, Jeffrey removes his fingers and frowns. “You know what? Maybe this was a bad idea after all.”
You feel your heartbeat in your ears below your waist screams in protest.
What did he just say? “R - really?” You’re surprised to hear your voice is just a whisper.
You know you should feel relieved. But you were so close.
You try to remind yourself to feel victorious. You resisted cumming long enough for him to come to his senses, after all.
“Although…” He tilts his head. “You’re soaked. What a mess you’ve made… somebody should really clean that up.”
You shudder when he draws his tongue all over your entrance, lapping up your arousal with the tip of his tongue before going back for more. He carefully avoids your clit, making sure not even the tip of his nose touches it. You feel the bundle of nerves throbbing, begging for his attention. You want him to notice, to move up just a couple of centimetres and slip his tongue over the sensitive little nub.
So, you chase it instead. The lower half of your body is in total disregard of your protesting mind. You roll your hips forward hoping to catch his velvet tongue as he mops you up.
“You like this, do you?” smirks Jeffrey and he pulls back to watch your chest heave. You stop your wriggling abruptly, as your brain fights to regain firm control of your actions. “I’m afraid you’re not allowed to cum until my cock is inside you. And the only way that’s going to happen is if you ask for it.”
He looks over you with a smug smile but you’re not going to crack yet.
Are you?
“This is how you’re going to justify it to yourself, then?” you snarl, with renewed pent-up aggression.
“What you’ve got to understand is that I didn’t become a CEO without firstly, having what it takes to make someone break, and secondly, refusing to compromise when it matters most. And you’re going to break long before I decide to compromise.”
He stands up and pinches both of your nipples between his thumbs and forefingers and you suck air in through your teeth. “I wonder if you’d let me suck on your nipples today or if you’d try and bite me…” he thinks aloud, with a discerning look into your eyes as if trying to read your mind. Honestly, you’re not sure how you’d react, you feel so dizzy with need that you’re not really processing what he’s saying.
“I think it’s safe this time,” Jeffrey decides and then, as if for good measure adds, “Remember, I can bite too,” before latching onto your hard nipple. You huff a sigh, the fight burning inside you instantly forgotten as the contrast of his soft tongue running circles around the peak of your nipple makes you want to just melt away.
He firmly rolls your other nipple between his fingers and you arch under him, trying not to moan. Jeffrey takes an agonisingly slow time sucking on your tits, swapping from right to left, trying to fit them in his mouth, burying his face between them as you watch helplessly. The steady pulsing in your clit still throbbing, waiting for him to pay you attention below your waist again.
“God, you’re so hot when you’re being well-behaved,” he says. It’s probably a fair assessment - the last time you saw Jeffrey you hit him over the head with a wrench. You scowl - you don’t want him to think you’re complying just because his mouth on your nipple felt good.
“What’s that little pout for?” coos Jeffrey, straightening up and tracing a finger down your torso. “I know you’re smart but aren’t you tired of thinking all the time? Always thinking about machines and schematics. Solving problems. Wouldn’t you just like to relax for once?”
You purse your lips. This entire time in Evergreen has been so mentally draining.
“If you really thought about it, wouldn’t you like the chance to stop fighting to prove yourself? All you have to do is say the word and you can stop fighting. All you have to be is my little fucktoy.” You screw your face up and he laughs. “You’re not gonna make it easy for me, are you?”
Jeffrey leans down and presses his tongue against your clit. You pant, waiting for him to give you clit the same treatment he was just giving your tits. He looks up at you and raises his eyebrows. “I’m not gonna make it easy for you either. You want to be a worker instead of a fucktoy? Then you can work for this too.”
“Fuck,” you whine, feeling tears prickling the corners of your eyes.
You push your hips up against his face and rock back and forth as much as your constraints allow. Jeffrey follows your needy movements and sucks on your clit, swirls his tongue across the throbbing sensitivity and groans, sending deep vibrations across your skin.
You curse yourself for being so desperate for your orgasm.
Everything pulses and burns. Fuck, it radiates from your centre as you grind yourself against Jeffrey’s face.
“Ah - fuck,” you whimper as everything pulls up fierce and tight once more. Your fingers wrap around the chains of your handcuffs, giving you something to bear your weight against as you roll your pelvis and feel the flutter of his tongue on your clit.
Jeffrey pulls away and you actually cry out this time, arching your back and lifting your hips right off the bed as you helplessly try to follow his mouth.
“Was that a close one, baby?” He clicks his tongue soothingly. “Shhh, you don’t need to cry.” You huff and blink tears from your eyes as he leans over and wipes a fat tear from under your eye with his thumb, smoothing it across your cheek. “All you have to do is ask. Ask for me to fuck you.”
You take a gulp of air and shake your head, using your very last bit of resolve to pull yourself together.
“No?” he asks and with difficulty you shake your head again. With a sigh, he turns away from you and unbuttons his shirt. You blink slowly as he reveals his toned, muscular shoulders and back. “Usually this is reserved for girls who behave. But I can make an exception - given the circumstances.”
The room is silent, save for the hum of the air conditioning and your laboured breathing. Your eyes rake over him. He has no right to make you feel self-conscious. Especially when it’s his fault that you’re in the state you’re in right now. But he does. Just him existing - looking like that - makes you self-conscious of the sweat glistening on your stomach and the puddle of arousal coating the examination bed.
You were attracted to him the first time you saw him. Felt his bicep when you hit him on the arm playfully in the control room. Watched his muscular forearm flex under a rolled-up sleeve when you asked him to lift a piece of machinery while you fixed one of Cortex’s attachments. You already knew that his physical form was more than it seemed under his tailored shirt.
But Jesus fucking Christ.
Like the control freak he is, he folds his shirt neatly before turning back around and standing between your open legs again. Your gaze flicks down, following the dark blonde trail of hair covering his chest and stomach.
Jeffrey undoes his belt and the gentle clinking noise seems deafening in the quiet, clinical room. The atmosphere crackles as you hold your breath.
Waiting.
He hooks his thumbs into the waistband of his overpriced, designer boxers and eases his cock out. And of course, it’s hard already - there’s no way he wasn’t getting off on this. But he’s thick too. Without realising it, your whole body tenses up when he wraps his hand around it.
“No.” You look away adamantly. Though you’re not sure whether you’re protesting about him having his cock out or if you’re resolving not to be persuaded by temptation.
Deciding it’s the former, Jeffrey says, “I already told you, I’m not gonna fuck you until you’re begging me for it.”
Jeffrey cups your pussy and for a second, your body hopes against your own will that he’s going to slip his fingers inside you again. But you feel a pang of longing when instead, he gathers up your arousal on the flats of his fingers before coating himself in your slick.
“I thought you’d break sooner than this,” he says, stepping close enough that the underside of his cock brushes your clit. Your breathing picks up again - his touch sending an electric current through you that kicks your needly little nerve endings into hyperdrive.
He doesn’t fail to notice.
Jeffrey holds onto your hips and fuck, you feel so small in his large, firm hands. He edges closer, dragging his length along your clit. All the gears whir furiously inside your brain - normally your thoughts are so collected. You wish your brain was working properly but all you can focus on is the delicious way he’s rocking his hips, putting the lightest pressure possible on your clit.
You can’t take it.
You can’t fucking take it.
You buck wildly, your body begging for more pressure but he keeps steady, giving you a knowing smirk as you arch your back again, chasing the sensation.
“God dammit,” you sob, wishing you had a hand free just to slap that smile off his face.
Your fingernails dig crescent moon indents into your palms as you exert yourself, shamelessly trying to grind against the underside of Jeffrey’s cock.
“Come on, baby. You can get it if you want it. Almost there.”
He follows your movements this time, pulling your hips into his own.
Holy fuck.
Your heart leaps into your throat as you teeter on a tightrope, willing yourself to fall off. To let yourself plummet.
Yes. Yes. Yes, yes, yes, you think with every little grinding motion.
You squeeze your eyes shut as your orgasm rears its head.
Then Jeffrey steps back and his departure fucking winds you.
“No! Fuck, nonononono!” you wail.
“I told you that all you have to do is -”
“Fuck me. Fuck me. Pleeeeaaassseeee,” you howl, feeling tears hot and wet on your cheeks.
What the fuck are you doing? This is so fucked up.
And what’s worse is that you want it.
You like it.
“Tell me you want me to breed you,” says Jeffrey, placing the tip of his cock against your entrance.
You nod, looking away in shame.
“Tell me. Using words.”
“I - I want you to breed me,” you mumble, feeling your face turn bright red once more.
“Good girl,” he says, slapping you on the side of the thigh like you’re livestock. Jeffrey inches forward and you’re so slick and hot between your legs that you’re able to take him more easily than you’d imagined when you first saw the size of his cock. His grip on your hips tightens as he slowly sheaths himself in you, sucking through his teeth.
“I’m glad you finally saw sense,” he grunts, wrapping his hands around your thighs to better leverage himself so he can sink into you deeper.
Sense? What sense? Your own thoughts have never made less sense than right now. You don’t know how to tell him this so you just whimper, blinking at him slowly while he stretches you out. The head of his cock presses against your G-spot and your eyes roll back in your head, grateful that this most sensitive part of your insides is getting the attention it’s been crying out for.
Holy fucking shit.
Your walls clench around him, clamping down hard as your legs begin to tremble. Jeffrey groans before pulling back out and slamming into you and, fuck, you’d be screaming if you could breathe properly right now. You’re only sure that you haven’t been deactivated again because you can still see.
“You’re all - fucking - mine. Forever,” he says through clenched teeth, drilling into you.
He removes a hand from your hip and starts rubbing circles on your clit as he thrusts. You finally take a gasp of air - so deep that you might be waking up from reactivation - as stars are exploding behind your eyes. “Ah - ah, Jeffrey - fuck,” you whine.
And then you’re writhing. Writhing and grinding as much as you can while he uses your body as a counterweight to thrust himself into you. You’re not losing it this time. He’ll be merciful this time, right?
“You gonna cum for me?” asks Jeffrey. “You gonna cum from being used like a slut?”
“Yes, yes - yes,” you pant, chasing your impending orgasm, everything pulling inside you like a rubber band getting ready to snap.
“Tell me you want my cum -”
“I - I want you to cum - fuck - cum in me,” you say, cutting him off before he can even finish as you take open-mouthed gulps of air. “Breed me. Use me. Do whatever you want.”
“Fuck, I’ve never heard you say that before,” he murmurs to himself, furrowing his brow. With renewed determination, he speeds up his thrusting in time with the circles he’s rubbing around your poor, abused clit. “Come on, baby. You can cum now,” he breathes.
You don’t give him a chance to change his mind. You vault over the edge this time. Your core tightens like a vice then explodes - wet and hot around his cock, squeezing and spasming around him as you tremble and beg for him to let you finish this time.
Jeffrey lets out a low groan, coarse like grit as he fucks you so hard the examination table moves and squeaks on the polished stone floor. You feel his cock pulsing inside you as he growls his way through his release, shooting ropes of his seed inside you.
He pulls out of you quicker than you’d like him to. But it’s with purpose as he pulls up his boxers and says “Cortex - tilt the bed back minus 30 degrees.”
The bed mechanically reclines until your pelvis is higher than your head. It doesn’t help with how dazed you’re feeling.
Your state of mind must be painted all over your face because when Jeffrey walks around to the side of the bed, pulling on his shirt he says, “Just like this for a couple of minutes to give us the best chances of conception.” He brushes a sweat-soaked strand of your hair back from your face.
You look at the ceiling as you regain control of your breathing.
Eventually, Jeffrey puts you upright.
“I’m going to take off your restraints so you can go to V-mem,” he says. “I’m warning you now that Cortex will deactivate you if you try to harm me.”
“V-mem?” you ask.
“I can understand that your current situation could be considered to be… traumatic. V-mem will help you rewrite that trauma.”
You nod and watch silently as Jeffrey presses a button that undoes your restraints. He taps an electronic key fob above your head and it unclips your handcuffs.
“Better?” he asks, watching you rub your wrists. You remain silent. You’ve nothing else to say. Nothing you can say that will change what your future will be down here.
Jeffrey frowns and hands you a fresh hospital gown and you put it on before following down the corridor in your bare feet to the V-mem room.
“You - you know how to use it? Even though McKenna is gone?” you ask, stepping into the chamber.
“We’ve not only used it but we’ve improved it,” he says, pulling the door shut. For some reason, this particular door shutting jogs something in your brain. “V-mem can do more than just help process trauma. It can actually delete memories.”
You stare at him through the glass pane. He might be evil but he has a perfect face.
Too perfect.
You remember hitting him pretty hard with a wrench. Shouldn't there be a bruise?
“Jeffrey... how long was I deactivated for?”
“Which time?” he replies absently pressing buttons on the V-mem pod.
Your stomach sinks.
Deleted memories.
“How many times have we done this?” you ask, your throat feels tight as he continues to press buttons.
Jeffrey pauses. “This is the first time you’ve ever asked that.”
“How many times, Jeffrey?” you plead.
“Nine.”
You feel bile bubbling up in your throat.
“And - and how many more times will we need to do it?” you ask, trying to keep your voice as casual as if you were asking the weather.
“We’ll keep doing it until you’re pregnant. Or until you agree that this is our best shot for humanity. You’ve taken much longer than Hannah and Ida to come around.”
“I agree,” you say quickly. You can’t let your memories be erased. You can’t let this happen again to future you. “I - I see it now. You were right Jeffrey.”
He raises an eyebrow sceptically. “Why the sudden change of heart?”
“I - I’m not sure. I think it just took a while to sink in.” His expression remains still. “And now I - I realise I’m so lucky that you chose me and I’m not stuck with David or Axel.”
Jeffrey’s face softens into a smile. It’s been so long down here that his ego must have been feeling so neglected.
“I’m the lucky one,” he says, opening the door of the V-mem pod and cupping your face. “You are the smartest person down here and I’ve missed you while you’ve been deactivated.”
You paint a simpering smile on your face, choking down the retort on your tongue - that it was he who deactivated you in the first place.
“No - I am. Think about how smart and beautiful our children will be,” you say, fluttering your eyelashes.
He laughs “Come on - let’s get out of here,” says Jeffrey helping you out of the pod and putting an arm around you. “And back to my quarters.”
“Your quarters?”
“Well, if we’re going to be parents together we should probably start sleeping in the same bed, right?”
“Right,” you chuckle weakly, letting him lead you down the corridor to the bed that you’ll be spending the rest of your life sleeping in.
Finders Keepers Ch 17. (Cormac McLaggen x fem!reader)
Rating: Explicit 18+
Word Count: 5.3k
Warnings: SMUT, PIV, a little bit rough but, like, in a romantic way
Summary: At Seafarer's Beacon you feel stuck in limbo. McLaggen is determined to do something to give you purpose again.
A/N: I'm sorry I teased a little subby moment with McLaggen at the end of the last chapter but this chapter took so many rewrites because it turns out I don't have a dominant bone in my body so you'll need to pretend it happened off-screen. Anyway...
Masterlist
Tag list: @countlambula, @ratsys, @aweidlich, @navs-bhat, @stainedpomegranatelips, @chiaraanatra, @xxvelvetxxxx, @ohnoitsrosie, @dracosisteer, @daisydark, @intense-sneezing, @lipstickandloveletters, @ichorai, @marmie-noir, @lolitstiana, @evabellasworld, @ivebeentrashsince2001, @xyzstar, (let me know if you want removed at any point btw!)
Chapter 17: Purpose
You spot a tiny white spatter on the t-shirt you’re wearing as you finish brushing your teeth before bed in the bathroom. It’s clean. Or at least was until your spearmint toothpaste marked it. Freshly laundered so it doesn’t smell like him in the way you’d prefer. The shoulders are too broad. The seams hang loosely around your arms. But the old Gryffindor Qudditch training top fits you like you’re wearing a piece of his soul.
“I’ve got toothpaste on your top,” you remark absently to McLaggen next door in the bedroom.
It’s not like you’ve said something profound but when McLaggen doesn’t reply it sticks out like a splinter. You often bat snippets of unremarkable things to each other, like two beaters at bludger practice. If he finds something useful from a book from his uncle’s collection, he just reads it aloud and says “I should remember that,” instead of writing it down. As if imprinting the words on you means he’ll commit it to memory.
But when he doesn’t fire something back, you open the bathroom door. He’s sitting shirtless in his plaid pyjama bottoms. Even though it’s the coldest Christmas Eve that you ever remember experiencing, your bedroom at the top of the lighthouse is warm. Heat from the hearth in the kitchen on the bottom floor rises the whole way through Seafarers Beacon, making everything feel warm and cosy. You tilt your head, waiting for him to lower the copy of this morning’s Daily Prophet but he doesn’t notice you standing in the doorway - he’s holding it so high that it’s covering his face.
“Are you still reading that?”
“Oh. Yeah.”
You glance at the white, frosty landscape outside the window as you wander over and climb into bed beside him, reading over his shoulder. The development he’s reading about isn’t significant - a short paragraph assuring the wizarding community that repairs to Azkaban are ongoing - but there’s a tiny quote from his dad that he read out to you this morning. And he’s been reading and re-reading all day, ever since his eyes first landed on it on the kitchen table while the rest of you were talking and buttering toast.
“I’m sorry you can’t see your mum and dad tomorrow.”
It’s not that you’ve been having an unpleasant time at Seafarer’s Beacon. But Christmas here has felt like a strained effort to replicate Christmas at home, or even, to some extent, Christmas at Hogwarts. Marietta has spent the past few days decorating the kitchen at the bottom landing of the lighthouse. Paper snowflakes whirl around the empty space in the middle of the empty space between the staircase spiralling around the outer walls and up the seven floors.
“It’s fine,” McLaggen says and clears his throat. “I’m okay.”
“It’s not fine.” You rest your hand on his arm and he lets the Daily Prophet fall to his lap, still staring at the small paragraph with his dad’s words. “I wish I could see my mum and dad too - it’s okay for us to be sad about it.”
He nods. “I know - I miss them. Especially after reading about Dad today. But this time of year makes me… I - I dunno. It’s complicated. I still haven’t really forgiven him for handing you over.”
“Cormac -” you hesitate. “- your dad… he did what he had to do. I forgive him for choosing to save you and your family over me - someone who’s practically a stranger. I mean, if I was in his position…?”
He presses his palms hard into his eyes. Usually so bright and green, tonight they’re bloodshot. “You’d really make a choice like that?”
“All I know is that right now, I’d do whatever it takes to keep us safe.”
“All of us,” he affirms, sitting up properly.
“Well… yes -” You say slowly. “But if it comes to it, what I meant was you and I.”
“Don’t talk like that. We’re all in this together.”
“Cormac, you had to choose between me and Eddie when you had to get one of us out of Azkaban -”
“That was different.”
“Every single time we’re faced with a difficult decision it’s different. It was different for you. Different for your dad. We’re in the middle of a war and that’s how war is.”
McLaggen tosses the newspaper aside. “I just wish we could do something. Something to win the war. I feel useless stuck in here.”
“I don’t think there is.”
Because you’ve already racked your brains. You and McLaggen have had this conversation several times already.
Both breakouts from Azkaban have rendered you almost completely isolated from the outside world. Now that Marietta and McLaggen are both assumed kidnapped, your insider knowledge of the Ministry has been shut off. With Krum and Davies here, you’ve got no idea what’s happening internationally. The only real source of information you have that isn’t Ministry propaganda is Potterwatch, and aside from reporting deaths and other swathes of bad news, they don’t seem to have much more information than you do holed up here.
“What about the snatchers they mentioned on Potterwatch? Couldn’t we go after them?” he asks.
“And what are we supposed to do with them? We can’t hand them in to the aurors. It’s not like they’re doing anything illegally - this is all Ministry sanctioned,” you remind him.
“I was more thinking along the lines of teaching them a lesson.”
“What? Like, kill them?” you raise an eyebrow.
“Nah just scare them - rough them up a little.”
“Cormac, we’re not gonna start dealing out vigilante justice. And especially not when half of us are Undesirables. It could go seriously wrong.” You tilt your head, feeling slightly worried that being so cooped up, being away from his parents and the rest of the outside world is making him want to behave recklessly. “And you’re supposed to be kidnapped, remember? If you’re seen outside again people will get suspicious. All we can do is wait,” you say softly, touching your lips against his bare shoulder. “Wait here and stay safe.”
He shakes his head. “We should be training. Like when Potter was in charge of Dumbledore’s Army. Duelling. Practising defensive spells. If we’re prepared then maybe, just maybe, none of us will have to make a difficult choice about who to save.”
You nod and rest your head on your white down pillow, looking at him as you lie on your side. “Let’s start the day after tomorrow. First thing on Boxing Day.”
“Yeah?” He cocks an eyebrow as if he was worried you’d think it was another bad idea.
“Yeah, it’ll give us something useful to do - I’m kind of sick of doing nothing.” You sigh. “Being here has made me realise how slowly time passes without Quidditch… I wish there was enough room to fly properly.”
Cormac rests his head on the pillow too, lying on his back and looking up at the curved, coral ceiling thoughtfully. His brow is slightly furrowed in concentration.
“I could try to work out how to extend the perimeter of the Fidelius Charm?”
“You can do that?” You blink. Your heart soars at the idea that you might be able to feel the wind in your hair again.
“I mean, it definitely won’t be easy but - yeah, I think so. I’ll get it sorted if it’d make you happy. Who knows how long this war will last? You might as well have someplace to fly.”
God, he’s so sweet.
You don’t say anything else. You don’t need to. Instead you curl into the crook of his arm and you both drift off. You, wrapped in his arms as your dreams take you to the sky once more.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Training breathes new life into Seafarer’s Beacon. Everyone is invigorated by the opportunity to do something that isn’t just lounging around, existing. You’re Dumbledore’s Army, after all. You’re part of the resistance.
McLaggen and Eddie spend days working out how to do an extremely complex piece of magic to extend the perimeter of the Fideleus charm so you have space to fly. You think you could cry when you get onto your broom and fly properly for the first time since your mission to Azkaban.
Marietta gets to work transfiguring a scarecrow into a working duelling dummy and creating so many duplicates you feel like you’re facing a small army when you step into the garden one spring afternoon.
Cho scours the Daily Prophet - her curious intellect and keen eye for detail help her read between the lines to make sense of what’s really happening. She sends coded letters with her theories to Lee Jordan so he can confirm them with his contacts and inform Potterwatch listeners. You all huddle around the radio every other night and you squeeze her hand when Lee’s reporting follows her leads.
Katie and Leanne find that there’s more than just fiction in McLaggen’s uncle’s old bookcase and find an extensive collection of defensive spells and healing potions that can be used in combat. They forage herbs in the lighthouse’s magical garden and order rarer potion ingredients by owl post.
You, Krum and Davies, put everyone through flying drills until even Marietta is confident on a broom. Everyone practises casting curses while flying - it’s much harder to keep balance than it looks. When Krum finds out just how talented a Seeker Cho is, you can practically see little hearts forming in his eyes. When you toss an apple her way one day in the kitchen and she catches it one-handed without even looking, you think Krum might propose to her then and there.
Even as the months slip by, the Ministry is taking your threat about breaking into Azkaban again seriously. There have been no more Muggleborns sent to prison. And you tell yourself that as long as you’re here, and the Ministry knows you’ll retaliate, you’re doing something to help win this war.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“See anything?” asks McLaggen, one late May evening as the two of you finish clearing up the garden after duelling practice. You can hear the others in the kitchen having final cups of tea before bed except for Cho who had to run upstairs to wash her hair after you sent such a powerful disarming spell your way that she’d ended up flat on her back in the rather muddy vegetable patch.
“I think something might have cracked a window pane on the greenhouse?” You suggest as you wave your wand over a heavily battered and burned duelling dummy. “Reparo!”
“On it,” says McLaggen, wandering over to assess the damage. “...I can’t see anything” He calls from behind the greenhouse.
“I definitely heard something smash,” you say, frowning at a slightly squashed courgette in the vegetable patch and making a mental note to cast a protective charm over them next time you’re practising in the garden. “I hope it’s not one of the lighthouse windows.”
You follow the garden path around past the greenhouse to find McLaggen standing at the other side of Seafarer’s Beacon, pointing his wand at a window. Beautiful, warm light cascades across his handsome face. It’s late evening but the sun still hasn’t set.
“Found it. It was a window. Easily fixed though,” he says, lowering his wand and turning to face you. “You’re getting much better at duelling by the way. That last one with Cho was pretty evenly matched.”
“I’m just glad I’m not the worst anymore. I think I’m better than Marietta now. Maybe Eddie too - on a good day.”
“Not everything has to be a competition,” laughs McLaggen before kissing the top of your head and pulling you into his chest.
“That’s easy for you to say when you’re winning. You’re the best at duelling,” you grumble, although you’re not jealous. The thought is a comforting one, you think as you close your eyes and inhale his dark, spicy scent.
“No, I think Krum is probably the best,” says McLaggen thoughtfully.
You look up at him. “Y’know when I first met you, I don’t think you’d ever have admitted someone was better than you at something,” you tease.
He chuckles softly. The garden hums with the sounds of nature as McLaggen holds you to his chest and stares out at the amber sky as the sun sets over the sea, interrupted only by the distant echo of laughter from the kitchen from inside - the unmistakable noises of the others joking together before they retire to bed.
“Thank you for doing all this,” you tell him. Just being on a broom has - ironically - grounded you. It’s made everything feel alright again. And now that you’re spending every day outside in the fresh air and every night insight surrounded by your new found family, the shadows of Azkaban have long left your face.
“It wasn’t just me. Eddie helped with the Fidelius Charm -”
“Not just the Fidelius Charm. For giving us all purpose again. And somewhere safe to stay.”
“It’s my Uncle’s house -”
"You know -" you cut across him, " - when you volunteered to apparate home with Mary Cattermole, I was furious with you because I was scared." Your eyes meet his green ones, finding the warmth and strength that’s become so familiar. "But I should have expected it from you. You always go way beyond what any ordinary person would do in that sort of situation. And I mean, for goodness sake, who else out there can say their boyfriend got them out of Azkaban?"
McLaggen exhales in an embarrassed sort of way and turns his head back from the window. “It’s not - I mean when you say it like that it sounds much more impressive than it is. I’m just doing what anyone else would do. ”
"Most people would save their own skin.” You put your hand directly above his heart, feeling it beating through his chest. "That fact we’re all still alive isn’t because of this lighthouse. It's because of who you are,” you tell him fiercely.
You look up at him, bathed in the warm light from the sun against the backdrop of the whitewashed lighthouse. He looks down at you with an oddly reminiscent look on his face.
“You’re more like yourself again.”
You nod. The past few months have made you feel like you’re the Ravenclaw Quidditch Captain again. You love getting to fly with Cho and Davies again. It’s just like old times. But you never dreamed you’d be flying with Viktor Krum, never mind have him actually take direction from you when you yell mid-air about flying formations for combat.
Cormac curls a finger under your chin and kisses you. You link your arms around his neck, pulling yourself close to him. Everything slots together perfectly. Well, almost perfectly - you need to stand on your tiptoes but to you, that just makes him more perfect. Like he’s your missing piece of a puzzle.
He parts his lips and your tongue finds his. Your fingers become entwined in Cormac’s messy curls as you press your hips into his. The world outside the Fidelius Charm might be chaotic, fraught with fear and devastation and death but in this pretty, seaside garden where the evening light warms your back as you kiss Cormac, you have the sanctuary of each other.
Cormac’s large hands roam the curve of your waist under your t-shirt and you feel callouses on his palms and fingertips from so much flying and duelling. And you know he believes if you all train enough none of you will ever fall in the war. He trains so hard because he thinks that if he does when the time comes, he can protect everyone. Save everyone.
And you hope beyond hope that you’ll never need to put your training to use. But you’ve been listening to Potterwatch every night. The tone has been subtly shifting since your giggled huddling and listening back before Christmas. You know things are getting worse out there. Something in the air tells you that you’re going to have to act - and soon.
But not right now.
Right now all you want to think about is each other.
“You know, you don’t have to be so selfless all the time,” you say, unfastening Cormac’s belt and getting to your knees on the grass in front of him. Fuck, he looks even taller like this.
He wastes no time helping you and pulls his cock out from his boxers. You blink up at him, taking a shuddering breath when you see him - already thick and hard and ready for you. Even after all this time together, your stomach flips when you’re reminded that his cock is just as beautiful as he is. You take him in your hands and place tiny kisses along the underside of his length.
“You can let me do things too,” you whisper, his tip just brushing your lips as you breathe the words. Cormac leans his head back against the curved exterior wall.
You can’t take your eyes off him as you slowly wrap your lips around his head and circle it with your warm, hot tongue. The light makes every hair visible on the small strip of skin on his lower abdomen, shining and golden. The tiny freckles on his arms are getting darker now the early summer sun has been cascading down on you while you’ve been training in the garden.
“Fuck, you’re so pretty,” he tells you, threading his hands through your hair. He’s messing it up but the ache between your legs is pulsing too pleasantly for you to care. It would almost be distracting if you weren’t so preoccupied with sucking and swirling your tongue around him. “My pretty girl.”
You stare up at him with wide eyes as he swallows thickly and leans his head back. His adam’s apple is visible as he swallows back a steadying breath. Just seeing him enjoying the feel of your hot, wet mouth makes you moan around him. The vibrations make his eyes snap back towards you just in time for him to watch you swallow his entire length down your throat. His grip tightens in your hair when he bottoms out and lets out a groan.
You don’t hold back. You press your head down as much as you can, blocking your own airways and feeling saliva dripping down your chin as his cock fills your mouth up. Cormac gently pulls back, letting you briefly take a gulp of air but the way you eagerly take him again makes him pant harder, his shoulders rising and falling with his breathing as you work your mouth.
“Fuck, let me fuck you.” You detach from him with a gasp and shake your head, blinking back tears. His grip tightens. “I don’t want to cum. Not yet.”
“Be selfish for once. Finish here. Please,” you say through laboured pants as you jerk him off in your hand and present your tongue. You go to take him in your mouth again but he grabs your upper arm.
“I am being selfish.” Cormac hoists you to your feet. Before you know it, you’re being spun around and pressed up against the wall. You feel the bumpy whitewash paint under your palms when he whispers in your ear from behind. “You think I want to fuck you as a favour to you or something?”
His hands unbutton your jeans and he pulls them and your underwear down over your ass. You’re able to turn your head just enough to see him casting his eyes over your body with that appraising smirk that makes you fold every fucking time you see it. It’s been over a year and a half since that stupidly gorgeous dimpled smile made you feel butterflies in a way you hadn’t expected. Just that look is still enough to make you feel like you’ve been knocked off your broom.
And to him, the way you look right this second - dishevelled and pouting because you’re not getting your own way - is equally captivating. Everyone thinks you’re the loud, domineering one in the relationship and that it’s him who goes along with whatever you say. But Cormac doesn’t care what they think because he knows the truth of it. Even when you take the reins, climbing on top of him or setting the pace, all it takes is a single whispered word from him, or his hand gently guiding you at your lower back that keeps your dynamic exactly how he likes it.
And here you are once again, as malleable as if he’s used a softening charm on you.
Before you realise what’s happening Cormac’s tongue sucks your earlobe as he presses your body between his and the wall. You open your mouth to argue but instead take a sharp inhale when he slaps your ass, followed quickly by his hands groping and massaging all over your body - going from squeezing your backside to groping your tits and back again like he doesn’t have enough hands to touch you everywhere he wants to at once.
“I - I wanted to make you cum with my mouth,” you complain as he pushes your bra up to pinch your nipple between two fingers but you don’t protest any further - you’re too turned on to care. From how flush he’s pressed against you, you can feel his hard cock pressed up against your backside, wet with your saliva and his precum.
You’d think after a hard day of training, Cormac would be exhausted - that he’d have no testosterone left in his body. But you know from experience over the past few months that this isn’t the case. You’re not sure whether it’s seeing you fight that turns him on or if his ego is slightly bruised from having Krum as fierce duelling competition - either way, he comes to bed most evenings murmuring sweet things in your ear and slipping his Gryffindor training tshirt off our your body before you’ve barely had a chance to wear it.
This evening is only different because he can’t wait until you’re back in your bedroom to have you. He kisses your neck and draws the tips of his fingers along your slit, dragging your wetness over your clit.
“I couldn’t let that happen. Not when all I can think about is how wet this cunt is for me,”
You let out a low, shaky breath. Fuck, you love it when he gets in this mood. He’s so filthy. Talking to you like how you sort of expected he would when you first met him. Before you found out how sweet and soft he is.
Usually.
Fuck.
Your legs twitch involuntarily when Cormac drags the pad of his middle finger across your clit and dips it through your sopping-wet folds. You can’t move much but you can’t stop your hips from grinding with his fingers, chasing the feeling of him toying with you.
“Yes. Ah fuck - yes,” you squeal as he draws the words from you with his touch.
“Shh, shh, shh…” He soothes, tutting gently. He pulls his wet fingers back over your clit, swirling in circles around the throbbing clutch of nerves. “The others are through the wall. You need to be quiet.”
As if testing you, his wet strokes over your clit pick up pace - his calloused fingers feel so deliciously wet and rough all at once. You whine pathetically.
“Can’t you - oh, god, can’t you cast a sound-dampening charm?” you whimper, your fingers searching for something to grip. Your palms just claw helplessly against the surface of the exterior wall as his chest presses into your back.
“I don’t think so. I think you need to show me you can be good.”
You squirm but there’s nowhere you can move while you’re pressed between him and the wall. “I will. I’ll do whatever you say,” you pant. The pads of Cormac’s fingers continue pressing circles the pressure building inside you as your walls clamp around nothing. You need him - you need his fingers, his cock - fuck, anything inside you. “Just fuck me. Please, Cormac.”
You know the drill. You know he loves hearing his name. Having you beg for his cock. And you’re running out of time - your twitching and convulsing is picking up pace. “Q-q-quick, please, I want to cum on your cock.”
Cormac’s hands leave your body so he can take his cock and tease you between your folds. You feel the tip of his cock at your entrance and whine. Fuck, you need to cum. You bring your hand between your legs to start rubbing yourself in his absence but he moves your hand out of the way.
“Keep your hands where they were.”
You place your palms flat against the wall, splaying your fingers, and feel your knees buckle when Cormac sheathes himself into you with one forceful roll of his hips.
He curls one arm around your chest and the other slips down your body to play with your clit as he jerks his hips up, each thrust sends his hips smacking against your skin.
The burning ache in your pelvis crackles and fizzes inside you while Cormac fucks you. Your hands scrabble against the wall and you feel chalky, white paint crumbling under your fingernails as the walls of your cunt spasm, grateful for Cormac’s long, thick cock to grip onto.
“Fuckfuckfuck-” The curse tumbles from your lips. You’re so boxed in that your cheek presses against the rough surface of the wall. All you can do is close your eyes and fucking take the way that Cormac is brutally slamming himself into your tight heat while his hand dances perfect, rhythmic circles over your clit.
You seize up and cry out and the arm that Cormac had wrapped around your chest claps over your mouth, pulling your head back and dampening your wailing. “Let it all out for me - quietly,” he growls in your ear.
There’s a drop like when you descend in the air on your broom too quickly - your body reacting after your brain. Your core plummets and everything implodes as you sob against his palm, melting into his touch.
“Good - that’s it, baby,” he says, more softly this time as your orgasm, blinding hot, makes your cunt convulse and clamp around him.
You cum so hard that you think your legs give way - you can’t tell because his strong body pushing yours against the wall keeps you upright. Tingles spasm from your core right down the backs of your thighs.
Cormac groans too. He moves his hand from your mouth so he can push his hips against your ass and shove his twitching cock as far as it can go inside you. When you whisper his name shakily and tell him you love him, he’s done for. Warmth floods your insides as he cums, filling you up as he grunts into the column of your throat against your racing pulse.
Even as you’re pressed up against the wall with his cum leaking out of you, you feel like he belongs here with you. Not in the lighthouse - or against the lighthouse - necessarily. Just here. Inside you. With nothing but the sounds of your heaving breathing and waves crashing against the cliffs in the distance to interrupt you.
Eventually, his mouth breaks into a smile against your skin and his laugh tickles your neck.
“What’s so funny?” you ask.
“We’ve got a perfectly good bed upstairs and we’re still sneaking around like we used to do under the Quidditch stands at school.”
He pulls out of you carefully and offers you his t-shirt to clean up the mess. You decide it’d be less conspicuous to wash your jeans and underwear in the laundry tomorrow morning than for McLaggen to return back inside suddenly missing a t-shirt.
“We never did that under the Quidditch stands,” you say, turning around and leaning your back against the wall so you can button up your jeans. “We’d have been expelled if we were caught.”
“Oh, yeah, I’m sure Madam Hooch would have been totally fine if she caught us just doing hand stuff,” he grins.
“Well, we were stupid back then,” you laugh.
“It was fun though. I kind of miss those Quidditch stands.”
“Even when we’re old and married and I’m winning the Quidditch World Cup. I’ll want to meet you under the stands afterwards to celebrate.”
“Yeah, right. If I wait for Scotland to win the Quidditch World Cup for our next fumble under the stands, I’ll die without ever doing it again.”
“You really think I won’t go out of my way to win the Quidditch World Cup just to prove you wrong?”
“Anyone else? No. But you? I’m counting on it.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
When you quietly come back inside the back door to the empty kitchen, you insist on making a cup of tea for yourself and a cup of coffee for McLaggen while he goes upstairs - you insisted that he needs to let you do something for him for once. That beautiful post-sex warmth nestles into your chest and makes between your legs ache pleasantly. Nothing can go wrong when you feel like this. You boil the kettle and set to finding yours and McLaggen’s favourite mugs in the cupboard when a yell from upstairs makes you nearly jump out of your skin.
“Cho?!” It’s McLaggen’s voice. The urgency in his voice makes the hair stand up on the back of your arms.
You run to the bottom of the spiral staircase and skid to a halt, looking up at all the seven floors winding above you. You crane your neck upwards to see McLaggen on the topmost floor looking over the bannister - a small, gold something glints in his hand. A galleon?
“Cormac? Did you see?” Katie’s head appears diagonally across from McLaggen on the floor below. She looks down at you standing in the middle of the kitchen and then up to McLaggen at the top of the lighthouse.
“Whazgoin’on?” yawns Davies, coming out of his bedroom opposite Katie’s. “Are the others back from Puddlemere?”
“Not yet. But they’re about to be.” Leanne pads out onto the landing directly above you in her pyjamas, closely examining a galleon in the palm of her hand. “Merlin’s pants…”
“Mine just came through too!” Marietta too appears outside her bedroom door, followed by a bleary-eyed Carmichael. She looks up at Katie, Davies and McLaggen.
“Guys, this is it,” says Cho leaning over the bannister across from McLaggen. Krum curiously joins her, looking equally as puzzled as you are.
“Can someone please explain what is going on!?” you bellow from the bottom of the staircase as if calling everyone to attention in Quidditch practice.
“It’s our coins from when we were in the D.A. The old D.A., I mean,” says Marietta. “It’s what we used to find out when the next meetings were.”
“And? What do they say?”
“It’s Neville Longbottom. He says they’re getting ready to fight at Hogwarts and that we’ve to join them,” says Cho.
“Fight?” Your stomach drops. “Fight who? Why?”
“Only one way to find out,” McLaggen replies as you look up at him in disbelief.
He nods at you reassuringly and you take a deep breath. This is what you’ve been preparing for after all, right? It’s not just pretend. You’re simultaneously more and less prepared than when you broke into Azkaban. You’re much better in combat now but god, you need a plan. More details. Something you can control.
You nod. “Alright. Well, we’ll get some rest and meet up first thing tomorrow with Wood and the others so we can come up with -”
“No,” says McLaggen. “Now. They’re fighting now. We need to leave. Right now.”
You look up at him. Absurdly, all you can think now is that you really need to change your jeans.
Warnings / Tags: Smut, infidelity, size difference, references to previous underage romance (when they were both teens).
Summary: You're the bridesmaid at your brothers wedding and his best man, John MacTavish is back in town. You just hope he doesn't remember when you last saw him, when you tried with all your might to stop him from joining the army.
A/N: I've not played COD since like 2012 but I keep seeing clips of Soap on TikTok and my wee Scottish heart just fancies the pants off him. This is inspired by a Scottish folk song called 'Bonnie Wee Jeannie McCall'. The dialogue is written in Scots - I hope you can follow along.
ALSO I just found out about @glitterypirateduck’s challenge by a happy accident the day after I wrote this and this fits nicely into:
Prompt 28: They don't need to know
Masterlist (there’s no other COD stuff here sorry)
Chapter 1: The first night I met her she was awfy, awfy shy
You pull your shawl around you as you stand outside the old castle. Rain lashes down across the sprawling Falkirk countryside while revellers laugh from the wedding inside. The music hasn’t started yet - you think that you’re safe to have a breather before you need to go inside for the first dance.
You stand as close to the wall as you can, taking cover from the rain. Your pink satin shoes are getting soaked. Not that it matters. The shoes your brother’s new wife chose for her bridesmaids are so ugly it’s unlikely you’d have worn them again anyway. But she’ll be fuming when she sees the state of them.
The door to the castle opens behind you and you move over, dodging a puddle to let the newcomer seek the shelter of the castle wall too.
“Awryt, darlin?” asks a voice and you look up from the puddle at your feet to see John MacTavish, your brother’s best man, pulling out a packet of cigarettes from his jacket pocket. “I didnae think you smoked.”
“I don’t,” you say, putting your vape to your lips and raising your eyebrows once.
He pulls a sour face. “Them? They’re fulla chemicals and like, mercury, and that.”
“Oh aye? What’s in these? Vitamins?” you ask, flicking the pack of cigarettes in his hand with a forefinger. “You didnae smoke afore joinin’ the army.”
“Aye, well, I was sixteen when you last saw me. And you were, whit, twelve?”
“Fifteen, John.”
There’s only a year between you and your big brother, Tam. But the way he and John treated you, you’d have thought there was a decade between you. Acting like you were an annoying wee tag-along. You just wanted to be included from time to time.
But that was ten years ago. Last time you saw John, he was just a boy, and you, just a lass. But now he’s older, with a scar on his chin that’s only highlighted by his coarse, dark stubble. The scar cuts across the hair there like white lightning. He’s taller, and broader than when you last saw him and his hair is shaved much shorter and neater than the teenage John you remember.
“Aw, aye. I mind now. You and your pals had wangled your way intae the sixth-year leavers’ gaff. As usual.”
“Did I? Any excuse for a drink back then, I s’pose.”
“Aye, but I remember ‘cause I wis leavin’ in a few days for the army. And you were -” He cuts himself off suddenly.
“I was whit?” a smile cracks across your face, waiting to hear his description of how you looked that night. Beautiful? Stunning? Mesmerising? You see yourself as you had been - your hair perfectly straightened, your Oh Polly bandage dress hugging your form in all the right places. In your memory, you were the embodiment of a siren. You had dolled up that night to impress the older boys. Or, if you were honest, one particular older boy.
“Well, I mean,” he says putting a cigarette between his lips and flicking his lighter. The orange glow briefly illuminates his face, casting shadows that seem to momentarily harden his features, making you remember he’s no longer a boy of sixteen but a man of twenty-six. “You were absolutely gantin’ for it.”
Your mouth falls open and you hit his arm.
Mortifying.
“Whit? Fae you? Aye, right !” you say, sarcastically but your face flushes bright red, immediately giving you away. You might have been drunk but John MacTavish rejecting your drunken advances as a teenager was probably the defining moment of your formative years.
As your words, brushing off his teasing, hang in the air, the jolt of embarrassment reminds you of a different party.
On that fateful night, ten years ago, the music was much louder. The floor was littered with empty cans and bottles and you’d ‘accidentally on purpose’ bumped into John in the hallway before pulling him into someone’s parents’ bedroom. You’d recklessly thrown your arms around him.
“Woah, woah, woah. What you daen?” he’d whispered in a panic.
“Please, Johnny,” you’d slurred drunkenly. “I dunno when I’ll see you again. Somethin’ tae remember me by.”
You had leaned in to kiss him but he turned his head. You were so drunk you didn’t care. You sucked on his neck, feeling that dark stubble under your sloppy tongue as your hand found his cock in his jeans.
But he’d stopped you in your tracks. Pinned your arms to the side. He was stronger than you, even as a teenager.
“Naw, look, I cannae,” he had said. And even though your eyes could barely focus on his, you could tell he was annoyed at you. But you didn’t care. You just wanted him so badly.
“Aw, come on, John. Please? I’ll show you my tits,” you had said. “I’ll - I’ll go the full way. I’ll do anythin’. Just - just don’t leave, awryt?”
The sound of cheers from the reception hall cuts through your memory and snaps you back to your current, rainy surroundings.
“Aye, well, I was probably just dreamin’,” says present-day John. “It probably never happened.”
It’s considerate of him, to pretend that it never happened.
But no matter how hard you try to pretend, there’s no denying that you made a fool of yourself, plain and simple.
Sometimes late at night when you can’t sleep, the memory makes you cringe as you replay that embarrassing moment. You try and cut yourself some slack, remind yourself that you were just a desperate, heartbroken teenager who’d drunk half a bottle of vodka working up the courage to make the move she’d always thought about. Begging John not to join the army. Begging John to fuck her.
He had declined both requests.
But that doesn’t matter because you’re a fully grown woman now. One that hasn’t spent more than a second thinking about John MacTavish coming home for her brother’s wedding. No, sir. Not one second. Definitely not.
You exhale a laugh like it’s a funny memory. “Maybe it did happen. I cannae really remember, I must have been steamin’ drunk,” you say. But you know what happened. He knows what happened. And he knows you know.
John's response comes with a delay, his chuckle soft and tinged with a hint of meaningful self-deprecation, to try and frame some of the embarrassment back onto himself. “You must’ve been steamin' to have tried it on wae the likes of me. You were always far too good for me,” he laughs, but this time his smile doesn’t quite reach those dark eyes.
There’s a long silence as you say nothing. With a deliberate motion, you bring the vape to your lips, inhaling deeply, the action grounding you back to the here and now as the artificial kiwi-passionfruit-guava fills your lungs with something that you know must be bad for them. As you exhale, your gaze drifts down to your soaked shoes, the pink satin darkened by the rain. They’ve changed beyond recognition.
“Woah,” he coughs his own puff of smoke. “Now just whit is that ?” asks John, his eyes clocking your left hand.
You tilt your hand subtly, letting the diamond catch the cloudy daylight. “Did Tam no mention it?” The words linger between you, almost casual. “I’m engaged, John.”
For a moment, John just stares at your hand, his face unreadable. Then, a low whistle escapes him, a mix of surprise and something unspoken. He glances up at you, his eyes searching yours for the answer to a question that he doesn’t voice. “Engaged, eh? Tam never said a word.” His gaze shifts away, a frown creasing his forehead. “Where’s the lucky man the night?”
“He’s offshore the now - he works on the rigs.”
“Christ, I’ll say,” says John, taking your hand and examining your ring. “He’d need tae be workin’ in oil for a big rock like this wan.”
Your hand feels small in his. His thick brows soften from a frown when he pulls his gaze up from your engagement ring to meet your eyes. His eyes are dark and full of a warmth that you wouldn’t expect from someone who, from Tam’s account, is a hardened soldier.
Your heart thuds in your chest when you realise that he’s been holding your hand for too long. But you don’t retract it.
“Aww the best tae the happy couple, then,” he says softly. “I suppose Tam never telt me ‘cause he had a lot to be dealing wae his own wedding and that.” John lets go of your hand. “Dae you no miss your fella, wae him being offshore?”
“Four weeks on, two weeks off. I see him plenty… More than your missus sees you, I expect. How often d’you come home? Once or twice a year?”
“I’ve no got a missus so I don’t need tae worry about that.”
The raucous laughter from inside the wedding venue dies down suddenly. And you hear the master of ceremonies announcing the entrance of the bride and groom.
“Gads,” says John, stubbing out his half-finished cigarette.
“If we miss the first dance, we’re fucked,” you say. “I’ll never hear the fuckin’ end of it.”
You try to carefully step over the puddle - John takes your arm and holds on to you so you don’t fall. He opens the oak door for you but as you’re about to pass, he grips you tighter, stopping your movement.
“Listen, darlin’, there are some things that are just off-limits,” he says, his voice a low, gravelly whisper in your ear as he leans close. He smells like cigarettes - normally that smell would turn your stomach but there’s something sweet in his aftershave, like vanilla, that makes the tobacco smell musky and warm.
“Meanin’?” You look up at him, confused.
“The last time I saw you,” he murmurs. “You were mad wae it. I couldnae, in good conscience, take you up on that offer when you were that drunk. And you’re my best pal’s wee sister tae boot. I couldnae dae that tae Tam.”
“John, that was - that was a long time ago. It was nothin’.”
“And now,” he continues. “Now you’re engaged. Which means you’re even more off-limits.”
Off-limits?
He’s talking like you’re in that bedroom again, begging for his attention. Except you’re not. You’re not begging for John again. He’s just assuming that you’re about to.
That presumptuous bastard.
“You’ve got some fuckin’ nerve, John MacTavish. Who are you tae try and let me down gently? It’s been ten years and I’m no even slightly interested in you anymore.”
“Naw, I know,” he says, refusing to match your volume or tone of indignation. “I’m just tellin’ you out loud why I won’t be trying it on with the most beautiful lassie in the room. And why I said no back then, as well.”
“Haul! You two!” You and John spring apart to see your tiny, furious wee auntie storming down the hallway. “You’re missing your brother’s first dance with his new wife and you’re both supposed to be on the dancefloor.”
“We - we are?” you stammer.
“Aye, did you no hear the emcee telling the wedding party to join the bride and groom? That means bridesmaids and groomsmen, ya pair of glaikit idiots. Your maw’s fuckin’ ragin’”
And with that, John lets the door behind you swing shut and you both leg it past your auntie to the reception room, with you leaving wet footprints in your wake as you go. The music from the room swells into clarity as you burst through the doors and skid inelegantly onto the dancefloor.
Your brother and his wife are too absorbed in their own happiness to have noticed your late entry and you breathe a sigh of relief. But it’s short-lived. You immediately stiffen again when John takes your waist and you realise that he’s your dance partner.
As the two of you begin swaying to the music, your mind races. You’re no longer that sad, rejected teenager, yet here, in John's reassuring grasp, you feel the ghost of her stirring. His gaze is careful, and guarded, but there's still that question in his eyes that he’s forbidden to ask.
And behind your own eyes, you can’t help the stream of curses going off inside your head.
You curse your nerves for being the reason you got so drunk at that party.
You curse John for being Tam’s best man.
But most of all, you curse yourself as you watch your left hand rest on John’s shoulder as you dance, the giant diamond ring glittering like a heavy disco ball.
A Nest of Vipers Ch6. (Cormac McLaggen x Original Female Character - Slytherin)
Rating: Explicit 18+
Word Count: 4.8K
Warnings / Tags: A little bit of smut, pure blood supremacy, tragic romance
Summary: Slughorn's party is tonight and it's time for Una to choose between the Vipers and Cormac McLaggen.
A/N: Una gets worse every chapter I swear to GOD.
Masterlist
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Chapter 6: Slughorn's Party
Una entered the dimly lit common room arm in arm with Meredith and Sabine, their entrance causing a sudden silence among the four Slytherin boys in dress robes.
“Wow, Sabine, you look… wow,” said the usually aloof Theodore Nott, causing Blaise to give him a haughty look.
“Put your eyes back in, Nott,” said Blaise, rolling his eyes.
“Now you know how I feel,” grumbled Graham. “Having one of your friends go out with your sister.”
It was the night of Professor Slughorn’s Christmas party, and both Una and Blaise had their own agendas for the evening. They were attending as friends, united by separate pursuits of the heart.
“Una and I are going as friends,” Blaise reminded him. “Better that than fraternising with the enemy.”
“The enemy,” snorted Graham but Una knew Blaise was overcompensating, that he’d slink away and find Ginny Weasley as quickly as he could.
“Well, I think you make a lovely couple,” smiled Sabine, showing off her perfect row of white teeth as she greeted Blaise with a kiss on each cheek before taking Theodore’s extended arm.
“I dunno, it’s all a bit incest-y for me,” said Graham with a sour look on his face. “You’re going with my sister, your sister’s going with Nott. We’re a hop, skip and a jump away from getting married off to our cousins.”
“Well, I’m glad you’re not my cousin,” said Albie Selwyn, taking Meredith’s hand and kissing it. Una wrinkled her nose. It wasn’t even eight o’clock yet and in her opinion, that was much too early for public displays of affection.
“Just Sabine’s ex,” muttered Graham to Una who covered a laugh by opening her bag and checking her lip gloss in her little black mirror.
This was exactly how Sabine liked it. Having power over Meredith and Una by persuading them to go to Slughorn’s party with people she thought she had influence over. Albie Selwyn was a perfect match for Meredith - he wasn’t good enough for Sabine so of course Meredith was permitted to have her sloppy seconds.
And Blaise, well, Sabine didn’t know her brother as well as she thought she did. Una had found an unlikely friend in Blaise after her confrontation with Myrtle in the girl’s bathroom. He was alone in the common room when she had returned and she’d confided in him. He was the only person who could understand how she was feeling. Although by Blaise’s account, his and Ginny’s secret was progressing much more discreetly, and successfully, than her’s and Cormac’s. But Blaise didn’t have the same jealous streak as Una and Cormac. In fact, he didn’t even seem to care that Ginny would be there with her boyfriend, Dean Thomas.
Una took Blaise’s arm and the seven of them ascended the stairs, the salty seaweed-tinged air of the Slytherin common room turning to Christmas pine and firewood as they entered the Entrance Hall.
Cormac McLaggen and Hermione Granger were standing beside Ginny Weasley, Dean Tomas and Katie Bell as the latter awaited the arrival of her date. When Graham saw Katie he practically bounded over, taking her hand and making her do a little spin to show off her dress. It was so sickeningly cute that the other Slytherins rolled their eyes at each other but it made Una’s throat knot in jealousy. Why must her own pursuits be so complicated when Graham could so openly and unashamedly go with Katie?
When Katie stopped her spinning she looked giddy. Graham took her arm and led her towards the direction of the corridor where Slughorn’s office was. Just as Katie and Graham passed between Una and Cormac’s line of sight, they locked eyes.
It was irritating how handsome he looked tonight. Una supposed he must come from money like her, with his perfectly tailored black dress robes. Of course, she knew he was well-connected - he had to have been to receive an invite to Slug Club, but his robes made the other revellers milling around the Entrance Hall look scruffy in comparison.
Cormac’s curly hair, usually messed up from running his hands through it or playing Quidditch, was elegantly textured. There was a single curl over his forehead that could have been a paid actor. She finally understood what Cormac meant when he said he ‘wanted to make a mess of her’. Una wanted to twist her fingers through those curls and make fun of him for trying so hard, to push that stupid curl out of his face while he was on his knees with his mouth between her legs.
Una snapped out of it when Hermione slinked her arm through Cormac’s and he broke his eye contact. Hermione’s usually frizzy hair was also slicked back, except hers was twisted into an elegant bun. She supposed Cormac and Hermione were well-suited. And as things weren’t working out well between Una and Cormac, maybe he and Hermione would have a flock of wild-haired children one day. She watched as they followed Katie and Graham in the direction of the party.
“You know, you look beautiful,” murmured Blaise as the group of Slytherins followed suit, Una and Blaise lagging behind the others. “Speaking platonically, of course. McLaggen is an idiot.”
“Thanks, Blaise,” she smiled.
She almost felt guilty about confiding her woes with Cormac McLaggen to him. Especially when even though he didn’t know it, Blaise’s blossoming relationship with Ginny Weasley would be playing right into her plans to get back at the people who had hurt her brother.
Try as he might, Cormac McLaggen was having a difficult time getting rid of Hermione Granger. He should have expected this, of course. He knew how he looked when he made an effort and the effect it could have on girls. It just wasn’t having the desired effect on the right girl. And it really wasn’t fair to poor Hermione to lead her on like this.
What was worse was that he thought he might be able to get to the bar by himself. Be seen there alone - then maybe Una would come over and they could discuss tactics. Arrange to meet later, or better yet, sneak away before either Hermione or Blaise noticed they were gone. But Hermione just wanted to accompany him to the bar. Wherever he went she followed. It was like she wanted to be seen with him in every corner of the room.
“And then, I suppose, my eighteenth best save was when I was playing for the Wimbourne Wasps under-14s,” he said and he was actually starting to bore himself now. “Their seeker was Cassius Burke. Or maybe it was Gideon Blackwood. No, wait - it was Cassius Burke. And it was a kick away from the left hoop.”
“You know, this is really fascinating, Cormac,” said Hermione loudly as a few other Gryffindors passed by.
“It - it is?” he asked. Una would have told him to shut his fat mouth and stop talking about himself long ago. Then he’d have wiped the beautiful sneer from her face by letting her know his preferred way of being shut up.
The thought made him miss her.
He looked over to where she was still standing with Blaise, Sabine and her date. Blaise rested a hand on the exposed skin of Una’s backless emerald green dress just below where her straight, shiny hair danced across her spine and he said something that made her throw her head back and laugh. Una’s other friend, the red-headed one, Meredith, was some way away looking uncomfortable as her drunk date pressed his mouth to her ear, half kissing her, half whispering something and accidentally spilling some of his drink down the front of her dress.
It inspired Cormac to try a different tack. He remembered how Hermione recoiled at Slughorn’s dinner party back in October when he’d suggestively sucked on his fingers while looking at her from across the table.
“What do you say we get out of here?” he asked, leaning down to whisper to Hermione and purposefully slurring his words. It was perfect, seeing as he couldn’t think of a tactful way to ask her to leave him alone without offending her.
“I - excuse me?”
“Come on, you just said I was fascinating. Let me show you something really impressive,” he said, putting a hand on her waist.
“I don’t think so, Cormac,” she blustered. “Excuse me, I need to go to the ladies.”
Cormac watched as she turned on her heels and ran off. In the opposite direction of the bathroom and towards the tent-like furnishings where Harry Potter was standing with Luna Lovegood from the D.A. in her spangled silver dress robes.
Well, that was easy, thought Cormac before spotting Katie Bell and Graham Montague over at a secluded table. He didn’t want to be a third-wheel on their date but he didn’t really know anyone else here except Una.
“Remember the time Potter practically swallowed the snitch?” laughed Katie as Graham almost choked on his drink.
“Mind if I join you?” asked Cormac and Katie nodded enthusiastically to the chair opposite them.
“Graham, this is Cormac McLaggen,” said Katie. “I’m not sure if Una has told you about him.”
Cormac stuck out his hand and Graham put down his drink to shake it before Cormac took his seat. “Er, no, she hasn’t,” said Graham with uncertainty. “Are you friends with her then?”
It wasn’t a surprise that Una hadn’t mentioned him to her brother, after all, they were keeping things between them a secret. Although he had sort of hoped that maybe she’d have confided in Graham, especially since he himself was here with a Gryffindor.
Cormac chose his next words carefully, mindful of Katie’s suspicious look. “Hardly. Well, I mean, we sit next to each other in Transfiguration,” he said casually. “But she talks about you.”
“All complaints, I assume?”
Cormac laughed. Una had told him all about how Graham was their parents' golden child. According to Una, the fact she was Head Girl paled in comparison to their darling, Quidditch Captain son.
“Well, she’s so sick of me meddling in her love life, I’m not surprised.”
Cormac covered his momentary pause by taking a sip of his drink. Maybe Graham knew more than he was letting on.
“I asked her not to come here tonight with Blaise because he’s my best mate,” explained Graham.
“Oh?” So that explained Una’s sudden change of heart.
“Yeah, well, she wasn’t having it so I’ve backed off now. Especially after the last time my parents tried to force her to go out with someone and she blew -” Graham stopped himself abruptly and shook his head. “I mean she wasn’t happy.” He laughed unconvincingly.
“What happened?” asked Cormac, his curiosity piqued by Graham’s sudden change in tone.
“Where is she anyway?” asked Graham, ignoring Cormac’s question and looking over his shoulder. “I haven’t seen her and that slimy git Blaise in a while.”
Cormac turned around in his chair. None of the Vipers or their dates were anywhere to be seen.
“Slimy git? I thought you said he was your best mate?” laughed Katie.
“Yeah, well, it’s different when he’s got his hands all over my sister,” Graham grumbled.
Cormac turned back around to see Katie observing him. He shook his head warningly. Katie had been suspicious of his relationship with Una for a few weeks now but the last thing he was going to do was confess his feelings in front of her brother. Katie just smirked as if his head shake had confirmed everything.
Graham turned the subject back to Quidditch and while Cormac had more questions than ever, he was relieved to not have to word his answers so carefully now they were no longer talking about Una.
“And remember when your mates got detention for dressing up as dementors during one of our games?” chuckled Katie.
“Oh god, yeah. That was Draco’s idea. He… hang on. Speak of the devil,” said Graham, his brows furrowed in confusion as he looked past Cormac into the middle of the room.
Cormac turned in his seat and watched the Hogwarts caretaker, Argus Filch, dragging in a pale boy with a pointed face into the middle of the room by his ear.
“Alright, I wasn’t invited!” Draco spat angrily. “I was trying to gatecrash. Happy?” And Cormac was surprised when he looked furiously over in the direction of the table that he was currently sitting at.
“That’s alright Argus, that’s alright,” boomed Slughorn. “It’s not a crime to want to come to a party. Just this once we’ll forget any punishment. You may stay, Draco.”
“Oh no,” groaned Graham.
“What’s wrong?” asked Katie. “I thought he was your friend too?”
“He was trying to convince me not to come tonight so I could help him with a job - I mean, a project. I think that’s why he was trying to sneak in.”
Cormac remained fixed on the commotion as Draco thanked Slughorn for his generosity and couldn’t help but notice that Draco looked a little ill.
“A project? The day before we go home for the holidays?” asked Katie. Cormac wondered if that was why Draco looked so worse for wear. Maybe he had a deadline he was going to miss?
“Well, I’ve not had much time to work on it. I’ve been preoccupied with something else,” said Graham and Cormac turned back around in his chair just in time to see him wiggling his eyebrows at Katie. “Doesn’t matter anyway - look, Snape’s not having it.”
Sure enough, Draco was being dragged back out of the room at the exact same moment Una was coming back in. Alone.
Cormac raised a hand in acknowledgement and Una halted on the spot, pursing her lips when she saw he was sitting with Graham and Katie.
“Una!” called Graham and her eyes darted everywhere except their table as if looking for an escape route before reluctantly continuing towards them, her high-heeled stilettos clicking on the dance floor ominously as she did.
Cormac stood up and pulled out the seat next to him and she sat down wordlessly, dumping her clutch bag on the table. “Well, I’ve just had to rescue Meredith from Selwyn. Blaise and I had to put them to bed. Separately. And now I’ve got no idea where anyone else is.”
“You’ll just have to put up with our much worse company then,” said Cormac.
Una huffed a derisive laugh and looked directly at Cormac. “I’ll say.”
Her icy glare was full of annoyance and Cormac was sure he’d soon find out that he was somehow responsible for her mood. But even though she looked irritated at him, he couldn’t take his eyes off her.
She always looked beautiful. He still got a little flustered now that he was actually allowing himself to look at her in her school uniform but he was unprepared for seeing her dressed to the nines like this. He was glad of the commotion caused by Katie and Graham fawning over each other in the Entrance Hall earlier this evening - it meant that nobody noticed that he had stopped mid-sentence when Una had appeared, arm in arm with Blaise wearing that satin green dress that pooled on the floor like it was molten.
“Ouch, harsh, Una,” chuckled Graham. “Cormac was just telling us you’re in Transfiguration together.”
“And come to think of it, that’s just about as much time in Cormac McLaggen’s presence as I can stand sober. Excuse me.” Una tossed her hair over her shoulder before getting up and walking over to the bar.
Cormac hesitated as he looked from Una’s abandoned bag to her figure cutting through the crown, a backless silhouette of grace and indignation.
“Just go,” said Katie in exasperation.
Cormac didn’t bother explaining himself. He grabbed Una’s bag and followed her towards the bar.
“So much for hardly knowing each other,” said Graham, raising an eyebrow.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Una, what’s up?” asked Cormac, leaning on the edge of the bar at the back of Slughorn’s office as Una caught the barman’s eye with practised ease.
“What’ll it be?” asked the young barman absently, dressed in a white tailcoat and cleaning the bar with a towel. He had a pimply face - he couldn’t have been much older than Una or Cormac, she thought.
“A shot of firewhiskey please,” said Una.
“Make that two,” added Cormac.
“No can do,” said the barman. “Boss said no shots.”
“Oh.” Una pouted and twisted the end of her hair. “Not even just one tiny shot?” she asked, her voice dripping in saccharine sweetness that was anything but innocent.
The barman shook his head as if strengthening his own resolve by denying her request.
Una giggled. “I suppose that makes sense. Who knows what would happen if the students all lost our inhibitions.” She moved her shoulder discreetly so that her strap fell down her arm.
The barman blinked a few times as his cheeks turned pink. “Well… maybe one. Just don’t tell anyone, alright?”
He poured a shot and Una downed it before placing the glass back on the bar. “Gosh, that’s gone right to my head.” She batted her eyelashes at him. “Could I trouble you for a glass of champagne, please?”
“Two!” Cormac called after him, a hint of irritation in his voice after being plainly ignored by the barman. “And you can stop trying to make me jealous because it isn’t working,” he added to Una.
“I’m doing no such thing,” said Una. “And besides, you’re one to talk. The way you had your hands all over Granger.”
“I was just trying to get rid of her.”
Una snorted derisively. “By doing your best impression of the giant squid?”
“I didn’t think anyone noticed.”
“Cormac, it’s time you learned that I see everything and I hear everything,” hissed Una, her voice filled with venom. “So don’t expect me to be grateful when you tell Hermione to doll herself up for you so you can spend the evening getting handsy with her.”
“Fuck, Una. It wasn’t like that -”
“Oh yeah? That’s not what Moaning Myrtle overheard in the bathroom. She told me all about how you asked Hermione to wear something sexy tonight. I mean, what the fuck, Cormac? You think I wouldn’t find out? Oh - thank you.” Her expression softened momentarily as she thanked the barman for the drinks with a forced smile.
She tried to walk away from the bar but Cormac caught her wrist discreetly.
“Let go of me. You can’t just manhandle me any time an argument isn’t going your way,” she snapped.
“And you can’t just storm off every time you’re about to show the tiniest bit of vulnerability,” said Cormac sternly, his tight grip encircling her wrist bones and pulling her close.
“That’s not what this is, I -”
“I know what you’re like, Una, I can tell you’ve been stewing over this all day. And I’ll be damned if I let you leave for the Christmas holidays without us sorting this out.”
“It’s not for you to let me do anything.”
“It is when it involves me so shut up for a second and listen.”
Una’s nostrils flared as she stared up at him furiously. That stupid, pretty little curl on his head. It tempted her fingers with a desire to yank it out. “Go on then, try and talk your way out of it.”
“Not here,” said Cormac, increasingly aware of the fact that their whispered conversation was likely to be overheard. “Behind that curtain,” he suggested, nodding to the heavy tent-like draping covering the stone walls of Slughorn’s magically expanded office.
“Are you going to let go of me or should I expect an escort?”
Cormac loosened his grip and handed Una her purse. She snatched it from him and followed him to the secluded edge of the room. Cormac checked the coast was clear of onlookers and held open the hanging to let Una walk through.
“I did ask Hermione to dress up,” said Cormac, his voice tinged with embarrassment and regret. “But that was before I knew you and Blaise were going tonight as friends. I was jealous. And I was trying to make you jealous too.”
“Well, it worked. Are you happy?” Una’s words were sharp but her voice wavered - a tiny chink of vulnerability in her armour that she so wished she could hide.
“Obviously not, Unes. I told you before that I’m terrible at playing games. And this attempt has backfired. Spectacularly.”
Una paused, taken aback by his candour. She was adept at weaving intricate plans. It was like playing wizard’s chess to her, while Cormac... he was more like a player of exploding snap - unguarded and impulsive. And maybe, she thought, what he deserved was someone who wasn’t a game player. Someone honest. Someone who didn’t care about being strategic.
He might not have her cunning, but there was a simplicity, a sweetness in his earnestness. A typical Gryffindor, wearing his heart on his sleeve.
“Maybe you should find Hermione again -” started Una softly but Cormac interrupted her with an exasperated groan.
“Una, come on. We’ve just been over this -”
“No, I’m serious, Cormac. I’m not just saying it to start another argument. Aren’t relationships supposed to be fun? Easy? The two of you looked good together.”
Una was starting to think she should have just let her parents betroth her to someone as planned rather than putting up such a fight. It would have avoided this current mess with Cormac if she had. It would have meant that she’d never have made a mess back then either, a mess that strained her relationship with her parents beyond repair.
“I am having fun. And it could be easy if you just stopped caring about what the Vipers think.” Cormac cupped her face with both hands and she could feel her worries melting away, even if only for a moment.
She sighed heavily. “Cormac, please don’t make me choose between you and them.”
Cormac leaned in closer, his green eyes locking onto hers with a sincerity that made her heart flutter. “I’m not asking you to choose, Una. They are. But if you’re really thinking of ending this...” He leaned in, his warm breath fanning against her skin. “I can’t let you go without one last kiss.”
And then he kissed her. Kissed her as if she were the only thing in the world he ever wanted. And Una kissed him back, the sweet champagne on his lips tainted by the smoky, briny firewhiskey on hers.
This was all it took. A kiss was enough to turn her to putty in his hands.
She succumbed to her intrusive thoughts.
“Fuck what they think. I’ll have my parents buy me new friends if it means you’ll fuck me again,” panted Una in Cormac’s ear as he kissed her neck.
He groaned. “You’re so fucked up for that.”
“And you’re fucked up for wanting me.”
She grabbed the front of his dress robes and pulled him urgently so he pressed her between him and the stone wall. Fuck, she loved feeling his body between her legs. It seemed to block out all the external problems complicating things. It was just she and him.
Cormac’s hands pulled up her floor-length satin dress.
“Fuck, not here, Cormac,” she said as his hand cupped her lacy underwear. But her cunt was throbbing underneath his touch. She couldn’t deny that she wanted him to touch her.
“But you’re so wet for me,” he whispered, slipping his hand into her underwear and tracing two fingers along her slit. “I can’t let you back out there all worked up. What if that barman gets ideas?”
“You said that wasn’t working - flirting with the guy behind the bar to - to make you jealous,” she whimpered.
“I’m not jealous. I’m furious. And I’m about to teach you a lesson,” he told her with an arrogant sort of appraising look.
Suddenly, the curtains behind them rustled and Una and Cormac broke apart. Panic jolted through her as Una yanked down the front of her dress and hastily wrenched the fallen strap back up her shoulder.
“Mister McLaggen,” said a low voice from behind them.
Shit. Cormac spun around and when Una laid eyes on the person who’d interrupted them, they widened in horror.
“Miss… Montague?” Professor Snape’s voice had a tone of surprise as eyes darted between them.
Fuck. Una’s stomach dropped as her Head of House eyed them suspiciously.
“I trust, Miss Montague, that you are of sound mind and have not been confunded?”
“Yea, sir,” said Una sheepishly. “I mean, I haven’t been confunded.” Although for a split second, she briefly considered lying and saying she was confunded. Let Cormac take the fall.
“Detention. Both of you. After the holidays.”
“Sir, please, I can’t be seen in detention,” said Una. It was a risk arguing with Snape, even though he was her favourite teacher and Head of House. But she had to at least plead her case. She knew it would look bad for him too if the student he’d put forward for Head Girl was in detention.
Snape paused, looking at their dishevelled, embarrassed appearances, his expression unreadable.
“I’ll do both detentions,” said Cormac. “It was my fault -”
“Your chivalry is very touching, Mister McLaggen, however…” said Snape, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “I am the one who will decide a suitable punishment.” Una held her breath waiting for the verdict. “You will both receive detention. Separately. Miss Montague, you are permitted to use the excuse that you are doing remedial Defence Against the Dark Arts.”
“Remedial Defence…” whispered Una, horror-struck. She felt like the wind had been knocked out of her lungs. She couldn’t think of anything more mortifying. That is until Snape held open the curtain.
“Now, I expect you to return to your dormitories. Immediately.”
Una was temporarily rendered speechless. If she and Cormac were to emerge from behind a curtain and frogmarched through the party by Snape… “Sir, I can’t -”
“Miss Montague, I have been exceptionally lenient with you - do not test my patience.”
Resigned, Una muttered a quiet “Yes, sir,” and reluctantly followed Snape and Cormac. The party was thinning out, which only made their conspicuous exit feel like a spotlight. She fought the urge to hide her face, instead lifting her chin with feigned confidence.
“Nice one, McLaggen,” congratulated Marcus Belby, sticking out his fist as they passed. Cormac at least had the decency to ignore him. Or perhaps he knew reciprocating would land him another few weeks of detention.
Una saw Ginny Weasley and Hermione Granger huddled together near the doorway as she continued to follow Snape and Cormac.
“I told you he was vile,” said Hermione quietly.
“Yeah, well I didn’t think he’d sink that low,” said Ginny.
Una slowed her pace, just enough to let Snape and Cormac exit the room ahead of her. This was her chance. Her chance to set off her plan for revenge and provoke Ginny Weasley into attacking her.
“Sorry about your boyfriend…” Una lowered her voice to a barely audible whisper so that only Ginny and Hermione could hear. Then she said a word that she’d never said before. “...Mudblood.”
Hermione’s jaw dropped in shock but Ginny’s eyes narrowed furiously.
“How dare you!” exclaimed Ginny, drawing her wand. A jet of purple light flew towards Una - she made to duck but twisted her ankle in her high stilettos and fell as the bat bogey hex flew over her head and hit Marcus Belby directly in the face, causing pandemonium as everyone dodged the effects of the spell.
“Goodness gracious” exclaimed Slughorn, flapping his arms in panic.
Snape whirled back into the room, quickly followed by Cormac to find Una on the floor, Ginny standing over her with her wand raised and Hermione tugging on Ginny’s arm trying to pull her back. With a lazy flick of his wand, Snape disarmed Ginny and caught her wand in the air with his other hand.
“Sir, I tried to warn you,” said Una, tears welling in her eyes as Cormac helped her to her feet. “She’s jealous, Cormac, and she got her friend to attack me.”
“That is not what happened!” protested Ginny. “She called Hermione a -”
“Oh, spare me the thrilling details of your personal lives,” said Snape, rolling his eyes and handing Ginny her wand back. “Weasley, detention. Granger, ten points from Gryffindor. You two - follow me.”
“Yes, sir,” sniffed Una as she looked down and rubbed her elbow where she had fallen and grazed it. As Cormac and Snape left the room she turned back and looked at Ginny and Hermione, giving them the tiniest smirk as she left.
Warnings / Tags: SMUT, Sex pollen, Established friendship, Friends to lovers, Mutual pining.
Summary: Most people in Evergreen think Jeffrey is an asshole. But you’re the only one who knows him from before - he was your favourite customer at your restaurant. And even if he's an egotist, deep down you know he's sweet. He even has a special surprise for you to take your mind off of the apocalypse.
A/N: Call me a men's rights activist because Jeffrey Steinberg did nothing wrong. (I'm joking - please never call me that)
Masterlist
Chapter text
You sit at the edge of the lake with an almost empty pack of cigarettes in your hand. The artificial sun sets in the distance as you feel the last cigarette in existence rolling around inside the confines of its battered cardboard prison.
Footsteps approach you on the grassy verge. You don’t need to look around to see who it is. You only have one friend in Evergreen who’d bother to come and find you. And as far as you can tell, he only has you. Unless he considers Cortex to be a friend.
“Do you think he put the lake here just to fuck with me?” you ask when Jeffrey Steinberg's footsteps come to a halt beside you but you still don’t take your eyes off the still body of water.
“Well, I think he put a lot of things in here to fuck with us,” says Jeffrey with a deep sigh as he lowers himself on the ground to sit next to you. “What makes you think the lake was one of them?”
“No fish.”
It catches you off-guard when Jeffrey laughs at this. You look at him seriously and it only makes his handsome but tired face break into an even wider smile as he laughs hard at your expense. You try to pout but it’s infectious. Your lips twist reluctantly into a smile as he rests on his elbows and leans back to observe the lake.
“No fish…” he chuckles, pushing his wire-rimmed glasses up the bridge of his nose. “Well, yeah, it would be pretty fucked up to trap a world-famous seafood chef in an ecosphere with an empty lake.” Jeffrey looks out at the water. “But it’s just a reservoir. For recycling and filtering the water supply.”
“You really get this place, Jeffrey. No wonder Fin wanted you here.”
“You’re clever too. I mean, your business acumen? You own an empire of restaurants -”
“Stop. We both know why he really wanted me here.”
Jeffrey takes a deep breath, carefully choosing his next words. “He was a real piece of shit. Or is, I suppose. If he ever wakes up.”
“You know how many times Fin tried to hire me to be his personal chef? I mean, he offered me a lot of money. I’m talking about generational wealth. It would make your eyes water.” Jeffrey raises an eyebrow. “Okay, maybe not your eyes. But most people’s. And I told him ‘No’.”
“See? Clever. Like I said.”
“So what does he do?” You press on, feeling like there’s steam coming out of your ears as Jeffrey lets you rant. “Let me die in peace with everyone I know? ‘Course not.” You make a disgusted noise. “I mean you guys… you guys are all essential to making Evergreen a success. And I’m not saying it’s right -” you add hastily when he opens his mouth to argue. “ - but you can see the logic. Me though? Cortex can synthesise food so he didn’t need a cook… No, he just wanted me here. Trapped for the rest of my life as a fucking servant.” You meet Jeffrey’s eyes behind the reflection of the sunset on his glasses. “I loved saying ‘No’ to him, y’know? I was like the one thing he couldn’t have. The thing that he couldn’t get by throwing money at.”
Jeffrey hesitates for a few moments. You suppose that before the asteroid hit Earth he used to be the kind of guy who got whatever he wanted by throwing money at it. “Is that why you haven’t cooked anything since you came down here?” he asks.
“It’s not much. But I suppose I still have my own free will.”
“Are those cigarettes?” asks Jeffrey, noticing you spinning the almost empty carton in your hands.
“Goes hand in hand with the industry.” You’d kill for a smoke break in the dirty alley behind a greasy kitchen right now. “But I’ve actually decided to quit.”
“You mean you had to quit. Unless Fin has a tobacconist down here that I don’t know about.”
“As long as there’s one cigarette left, I’ve chosen to quit. Free will.” You give him a small smile. “Is that stupid?”
“I suppose that all depends on your understanding of the concept of free will -” He stops himself when he sees your eyebrows raise. “I mean - sorry, I’ll shut up and stop ruining your attempt to have some autonomy.”
“Don’t be sorry. It must be hard being so smart - I guess you can’t turn it off.”
“Smart people know when to shut up and stop trying to prove themselves. I was just being a dickhead know-it-all.”
“I don’t think you’re a dickhead.”
“Hah, don’t say that in front of the others if you want to make friends,” Jeffrey says sourly.
“What do they know? They know you in here but I knew you out there. And out of all the rich assholes who came to my restaurants, you were my favourite.”
He chuckles and rests back on his palms. “I find that hard to believe.”
“You’d always get your assistants to book way in advance. Make sure you had a big plate of oysters waiting to impress woman after woman you’d bring in,” you smirk.
“God, I miss that,” says Jeffrey tilting his head back and looking at the sky. “Mostly the oysters but - ”
“- And you always left a huge tip for my staff.” You continue, preferring not to be reminded of Jeffrey Steinberg’s never-ending stream of previous conquests. “They liked you too. But Fin? Do you know the number of times I had Hannah calling my personal phone in tears because Fin wanted a table the same night or he’d fire her?” You roll your eyes. “As if I didn’t have a restaurant already packed with other billionaires and Saudi Princes that I could just bump.”
“And did you?”
“Did I what?”
“Get Fin a table?”
“Well, yeah. But only because Hannah’s neck was on the line. It wasn’t so many years ago that I was in her position. Working for asshole Head Chefs who demanded the impossible.”
You put the pack of cigarettes back in your pocket and rest your head in your hands.
“It’s so gross to most people,” you say into your palms. “But I miss the fishy smell, even though I hated it at the time. And now I won’t get to smell it ever again.” You inhale deeply. Your hands smell clinically clean. Like hospital disinfectant.
“You still worked in the kitchen? I thought you’d have chefs to do that for you?”
“Of course I did. You think I put that jacket on for show when I came to your table to see you?” He shrugs. “I loved it. I loved being in the restaurant kitchen, preparing food. More than anything.”
“Well…” You look up and see him smiling at you, dimples appearing at the corners of his mouth. “It’s funny you should mention it. Because I have something to show you.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Oysters.
Nico was growing fucking oysters in her lab.
Jeffrey said she had needed them to harvest their large amounts of zinc and other nutrients for her experiments - scientific jargon that went over your head.
All you know is that you practically feel giddy as you and Jeffrey turn out the lights of Nico’s DNA bank and sneak along the corridor to the speakeasy.
You’re not sure why exactly you’re sneaking - Jeffrey basically runs this place. But you like that this is something for just the two of you. Something that the others can’t ruin with their chaos.
“Get some champagne and two glasses,” you say as the door to the speakeasy slides open.
“Yes, chef,” says Jeffrey when you run the cold tap behind the bar to clean the oysters. “Need anything else?”
“See if you can find a big plate and fill it up with ice.”
“What kind of ice?” asks Jeffrey looking at the fancy ice machine. “Crushed? Cubed? Ooh, spheres?”
“How many times have you eaten oysters on spherical ice in one of my restaurants?”
“Crushed. Got it.”
He puts the plate of ice on the bar and watches you from the other side as you shuck them.
“You know what they say about oysters though, right?”
“What’s that?” you ask absently, concentrating on sliding the knife between the shells.
“That they’re an aphrodisiac.”
Your knife almost slips when you look up at the stupid smirk on his face. You quickly avert your eyes back down at the task at hand. There’s no way you’d even consider starting any kind of romantic relationship down here. All of your previous relationships have ended badly - you can’t even begin to imagine how messy it would be if you were trapped in an Ecosphere with an ex-lover for the rest of your life.
“As if, Jeffrey. Even if you are the last fuckable man left on Earth.”
“Oh yeah? What about Axel and David?”
You shrug. Axel and David are good-looking in the way that most wealthy, successful men are but there’s something about Jeffrey with his rolled-up shirt sleeves, slutty little glasses and permanently messy hair that he’s always running his hands through, that makes you seriously reconsider your determination not to have a messy fling while you’re stuck here.
“This is a very dangerous conversation to be having while I’m holding a knife,” you tut, pointing it at him before resuming what you were doing. “Besides, I thought you were a man of science? You should know there’s no concrete evidence to say oysters really are an aphrodisiac.”
“That’s not what your Maitre D’ told me on Valentine’s night.”
“That,” you say, placing the two oysters onto the ice. “Is because if they say that we sell more. And the markup on these things is enormous.”
You slide the plate across the bar towards Jeffrey.
“Shall we?” he asks.
“No, let’s sit down over there.” You nod to the plush leather sofa behind him. “I want to pretend I’m in a nice restaurant, having a good time.”
“Like on a date?” He tilts his head.
You laugh. “Like two friends who have just finished a hard week at work. An exceptionally hard week. Grab the champagne, will you?”
You set everything down on the small table and sit down on the sofa. Jeffrey sits beside you and starts pouring champagne into two glasses.
“Give it here,” you say, gesturing for the bottle. “I wish we had fresh lemons or something acidic -”
“There’s Tabasco for Bloody Marys?” He nods at the bar cart.
“That’s more spicy than acidic…”
“Tabasco has a pH level of 4. It’s acidic.”
“Alright then, we can use Tabasco since it’s scientifically proven.”
“I sound like a dickhead know-it-all again, don’t I?” Jeffrey asks, getting up to find the bottle of hot sauce from the cart.
“It is kind of funny how you just can’t help yourself…” He sits down and passes you the Tobasco. “A few drops of something acidic and a tiny, tiny dash of champagne -” You spill a small drop of champagne onto each oyster. “Pairs excellently with Morecambe Bay rock oysters. So we can pretend that’s what we’re having instead of whatever lab-grown monstrosities these are... Ready?”
You pick up your oyster and Jeffrey does the same. You both tilt your heads back and swallow. As soon as the oyster hits the back of your throat, you feel warmth flooding through your veins. Every nerve ending sings. You suppose your body is just grateful that you’re finally feeding it with real, unsynthesised food. Even if it was grown by Nico in a lab.
“Even if these do turn out to be poisonous… what a way to go,” says Jeffrey. From the look on his face, you can see he’s almost as elated as you.
“Cheers to that,” you say, picking up your champagne glass and clinking it against his before taking a sip. “What champagne is this? No wait - let me guess!” You determinedly look away from the bottle. “Dom Perignon 2004?”
“Would you look at that? I’m not the only one who’s a know-it-all.”
The impressed note in his voice makes you beam. You look from the champagne label back at Jeffrey staring intently at you. And God, maybe it’s the dim light in here or the way he’s sitting with his arm relaxed on the back of the sofa but he looks… good. Maybe you’ve been under so much stress here in Evergreen that you’ve never really been tempted by how jaw-droppingly fuckable he looks.
It makes you wholeheartedly reconsider his suggestion.
“So if this was a date…” You begin and Jeffrey blinks at you as if snapping out of something. “What would your opening move be?”
He scoffs at you playfully. “I don’t need moves.”
“Oh, yeah? Women throwing themselves at you so often that you’ve forgotten the art of seduction?”
“Sort of,” he takes another sip of champagne. “I don’t know, I’d probably ask you what you did for a living. Are you a model slash actress? Or an actress slash model?”
“Ah, so in short, I’m not your type?”
“How many other chefs have been in Vogue?”
You feel flushed that he knows about your magazine features. But the heat creeping up your neck doesn’t stop at your face. It’s fucking boiling in here. Like a kitchen in the middle of a dinner rush on the busiest night of the year.
“And that works? Just asking them where they work?” You take another sip of champagne, hoping it will cool you down but the chilled liquid fizzes and practically sizzles on your tongue. Why is your mouth so warm?
“One hundred per cent success rate so far.”
“Go on then, let’s see if we can fudge those numbers.”
“You want me to try and pick you up?” He adjusts his navy shirt collar slightly and you can’t tear your eyes away from his Adam’s apple moving as he does. The heat you’re feeling spreads across your chest - you’re so warm that you want to rip your sweater off and toss it on the floor.
“Just for fun,” you say but you feel your heart beating so quickly in your ribcage that you’re sure it’s going to betray you. That he’ll notice.
“Alright.”
He moves in closer and you’re sure he must be able to actually hear the pounding in your chest. You can smell his aftershave from here. It’s sweeter than you’d expected it to be. Spicy vanilla with notes of tangerine. You could easily eat him for dessert.
“So what do you do, then?” he says, jolting you out of your daydream.
“I, um, I own a couple of seafood restaurants.”
“A couple? Yeah, right.”
“Well, a few.”
“I bet they’re extremely upscale. Not tacky like this place.”
“Some people would say that.” You smile. “What about you? What do you do?”
“I’m a racecar driver.”
“A racecar driver who wears glasses?”
“Alright, you’ve got me. I’m actually a masked vigilante.”
“Jeffrey…”
“I manage a college radio station?”
“So you lie about what you do on dates?”
“No. But I probably should. Because I’m a billionaire CEO.” He rolls his eyes as he says the last two words like it’s an inconvenience.
“Now why does that sound like the least believable one on that list?”
He runs his hand through his tousled, dark hair and you notice a bead of sweat clinging to his brow.
“Are you warm too?” You ask and bring the chilled champagne glass to rest against your neck.
“It’s like a million degrees in here.” He looks up at the ceiling. “Cortex? What’s the temperature reading in this room?”
“It is twenty-two degrees Celsius,” says Cortex’s disembodied electronic voice.
That doesn’t sound right. It feels more like forty.
“Cortex, can you turn up the air conditioning?”
You feel a blast of cold air sweeping over your skin. As the surface of your skin cools slightly, you notice that the heat from your body seems to permeate from your core, like the heat is coming from deep in your pelvis. No external breeze is going to help whatever this is.
“It is now seventeen degrees Celsius,” says Cortex after a few moments of silence where you and Jeffrey both determinedly look at anything but each other. Your eyes dart around the room as if expecting to see the heat.
“Do you think it’s broken?” you ask, not feeling any less warm.
“Cortex is never wrong… You don’t think it’s food poisoning, do you?”
“If it were food poisoning, it would take longer than a few minutes to kick in. And you’d be feeling more than just warm.”
He doesn’t say anything. You wonder if he too is feeling more than just warm - and not in a food poisoning sort of way. You wonder if he also has a deep, throbbing sensation in his underwear that’s getting harder and harder to ignore.
He pushes up his glasses to wipe sweat from the bridge of his nose. Those glasses. They’re so, devastatingly cute. You have a sudden, aching urge to see those glasses steamed up.
“Why do you still wear those?” You ask, trying to distract yourself from the way your body is screaming for attention. “Surely a guy like you would get laser eye surgery.”
“Here.” He takes his glasses off with one hand and passes them to you. “Put them on.”
You do. And you can see perfectly.
“They’re… just glass?”
“Yep. I am the type of guy that gets laser eye surgery. I just like how they look.”
“You slut.”
He almost spits out his drink. “What?!”
“These are like the sluttiest thing a man can wear!”
Now that his glasses are off, you notice just how green his eyes are. You can’t imagine having eyes that beautiful and hiding them behind glasses all the time.
You push his glasses up your nose but they slip again.
Fucking hell, you’re on fire.
You feel a drop of sweat roll from the nape of your neck down between your shoulder blades, sending a shiver down your spine. You need to take off this sweater before you turn into a soaking mess. Although your torso isn’t the only thing that’s sopping wet right now - you shift uncomfortably, feeling the way your underwear is saturated.
“Are you okay?” he asks.
“I’m just - just too fucking warm. Here, hold this a sec,” you say and pass him your champagne flute so you can pull your sweater off over your head, taking care not to catch it on the glasses still on your face. When you disentangle yourself you find him staring, unashamedly open-mouthed at your chest.
You look down. Your tank top is almost entirely translucent with sweat and your hard nipples poke through the fabric. Why are your nipples hard? It’s the opposite of cold.
“Sorry,” you say and cover your tits with your hands. Oh fuck. Why does the way you touch your own body feel so fucking good right now? “I didn’t realise…”
“It’s okay. We’re all friends here.”
“I… I don’t think I can let go,” you say, feeling your chest rising and falling under your palms. “I think I need something cold.”
Jeffrey looks at the ice-filled plate next to you. “What -” He swallows thickly. “What did you say again about the science? About oysters not being an aphrodisiac?”
“I…” Your mind feels blank. Like a rosy mist is clouding your brain. “I can’t remember.”
“I just wonder if Nico maybe didn’t get the chemical composition of those oysters quite right.”
His eyes meet yours. They don’t look as bright green anymore. They’re impossibly dark. Like his pupils are trying to find light in a pitch-black room.
“Do you feel… turned on?” he asks.
You take a gulp of air and your hands jolt from the fresh intake of oxygen. “No,” you lie, feeling your hand nipples under your palms. “Just hot.”
“Yeah… yeah, me too.” He puts down the champagne flutes, grabs and handful of ice and holds it to his neck. You watch breathlessly as it melts against his skin, trickling down his shirt. You grip your chest helplessly, not daring to remove your hands and do the same.
He notices the way your eyes linger on him. “Do you want me to…?” He thinks the longing look is for something cold when in actual fact, you’re jealous that the ice gets to roll down his delicious neck. You nod and he takes another handful of ice. He gets on his knees and leans over you, pressing it against your neck.
“Oh, fuck,” you whine and sink back into the corner of the sofa, feeling the crushed ice melting against your throat.
You can’t do anything except grab your own tits and try to steady your breathing as he holds it against you. But even as you breathe, the smell of his expensive cologne breaches your lungs.
“Your - your cologne is nice,” you say in an attempt to make conversation that isn’t about how good he’s making you feel right now. “What kind is it?”
“It’s bespoke. There’s a - a place in Paris that…” He trails off and you realise the ice has melted completely and he’s just holding your neck. Jeffrey’s hand is furnace-like. But it doesn’t make you feel any worse, on the contrary, it sends a pleasant tingling sensation through your body. Like his touch is answering the unasked question that you’re screaming internally. “Did that help?”
“The ice didn’t… But this is.”
You hope he won’t force you to elaborate that his skin touching yours is the only thing that’s making you feel better right now.
“Me too,” he says but before you get the chance to respond, his knee slips on the leather and his hips fall between your open legs. You feel his hard cock pressing against the seam of your jeans, right onto your clit. “Oh, fuck,” he groans. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” But despite his babbled stream of apology, he doesn’t pull back.
Doesn’t stop.
His hand moves from your throat to lace the hair at the nape of your neck as he grinds himself against you. And you realise now, he’s getting the same relief from physical contact that you’re feeling. The only difference is that you’re restraining yourself much better than he is right now. And while Jeffrey might be kind of a nerd, he’s bigger and stronger than you. You’re not sure you could fight him off. Even if you wanted to.
“Jeffrey?” you say uncertainly - not because it doesn’t feel good but because you feel like you should for his sake. The irony isn’t lost on you that after all your complaints about Fin respecting your free will, you want Jeffrey to ignore it.
That you want him to pin you down and get off however he likes.
It seems to jolt something in him. “Shit.” He jerks his hips back slightly and your whole body screams in protest. “I don’t know what - I don’t know why I did that.”
Your pussy throbs. “Do it again,” you whisper.
“Wha - really?”
Jeffrey looks down from your face to your body and back again. You breathe deeply, trying to calm yourself.
“Unless - unless you don’t want to?” you breathe.
Jeffrey swoops down and shuts you up, kissing you like he’s been wanting to do it for fucking years. You can’t thread your hands through his curly hair the way you want to because his chest is trapping your hands firmly against your tits. Instead, you pant as his tongue licks inside your mouth. His teeth pull on your sensitive bottom lip, harder than you expected, but you like it. More than like it.
Jeffrey’s tongue slides down your neck, tasting the combination of sweat and melted ice on your skin. His hands push up the bottom of your soaked tank top and with reluctance, you release the comforting grip on your chest. Your discomfort is quickly replaced with pleasure when he pushes your breasts together with his own warm hands and sucks urgently on your nipples like he can’t decide which one he wants to pay attention to first.
You squirm underneath him. You need these jeans off. You need his everything off.
“Fuck - let me - let me see you,” you whimper.
“Mhm,” he murmurs and detaches himself from your nipple. “In a minute.”
He resumes his frantic sucking and slobbering all over your tits. The pulsing in your clit can’t be fucking ignored now. Every flick of his tongue against your chest makes your core clench and tighten.
“Please, Jeffrey.” You barely recognise the pathetic plea that leaves your lips. What he’s doing feels good, sure, but you need him to fuck you. It’s not just a want. You think you might spontaneously combust if he doesn’t start paying attention to your pussy.
He lifts himself off you and starts taking off his shirt. You watch his fingers undo every button as you carelessly yank off your jeans and underwear in one fell swoop and toss them into a pile with your shoes and sweater onto the luxuriously carpeted floor.
“Oh, god,” you say, in annoyance as he removes his shirt and you can see his muscular chest and toned stomach. “Of course you have abs.”
“And you’re mad about that?” he smirks.
“Because you have everything. You’re fucking… ugh, you’re fucking perfect.”
“Well,” he says, undoing his belt. “If that’s the case, you’re going to be really pissed off when you see this.”
That arrogant piece of -
Your train of thought is cut off when he takes his cock in his hand.
He’s right.
You’re furious.
Furious that not only does Jeffrey have a perfect face and perfect body has a fucking perfect cock too. Suddenly your mouth feels dry. You know a thing or two about dating men on Forbes’ Richest List - and all previous experience has shown you that the Venn Diagram of billionaires, tiny dicks and premature ejaculators is practically a circle.
But Jeffrey? It looks like Jeffrey is a fucking outlier. Well, at least on the first two.
“I hate you right now,” you complain, and lie back down, watching him stroke himself between your legs.
“I can change your mind,” he grins and lowers his head to kiss your stomach.
As soon as his lips graze your soft skin, your thigh muscles twitch. “Ah, fuck. No - wait. Just fuck me. Please,” you whine.
You don’t really understand why you’re saying it. If there’s something you love it’s having a powerful man with his face buried between your legs. God knows you’ve been through enough of them.
But something - something chemical - at the back of your mind is yelling at you that you need fucked. Hard. Now.
“You don’t want me to -?”
“Later,” you plead.
You don’t need to tell him twice. From the sight of his leaking cock, you know why. The same ache is pulsing through his veins.
“Fuck, c’mere,” he grunts, pulling you closer by the hips. Jeffrey runs the head of his cock along your dripping slit and you almost cry out with need.
“Just put it in - oh, fuck -“
The instruction on your lips is cut off when he pushes forcefully through your folds. As soon as he fully sheathes himself, he slides his hands under your shoulders, pressing his full body weight into yours as he starts thrusting into you.
Normally, you’re a perfectionist. Your profession demands it, of course, but your demands don’t stop in the kitchen. In the bedroom, you have a particular way of liking things to be done and you’re not shy about expressing them. But right now, for the first time ever, your body doesn’t care about the finer details. Your pleasure doesn’t need to be carefully constructed in the exact way and order you’ve previously always needed.
All your pussy craves is exactly what Jeffrey is doing to it - which is fucking pounding you with seemingly zero regard for your own pleasure. As soon as he feels your pussy squeezing around him, some kind of basic instinct takes over and he’s merely using you as a tight hole to fuck himself into.
“Jesus, fuck, Jeffrey…”
You wrap your legs around his little waist, opening your hips up further so he can drill right into your G-spot. Your walls clamp and convulse around him as every sloppy, wet thrust draws your orgasm closer and closer.
“Fuckfuckfuck - yesssss,” you sob through gritted teeth right in his ear. You can tell by the way his fist in your hair tightens at the noises you’re making that he loves hearing you moan so unashamedly.
And you’re right. Because Jeffrey never thought you’d be like this. Always keeping him at arm’s length as a professional acquaintance. Never anything more. A fleeting flirtation maybe once or twice in all the years you’d known him. But never any indication that made him think you actually liked him. Never anything that would have him guessing that one day you’d end up wriggling underneath him, practically fucking yourself up into him and whimpering in his ear.
You can feel your pussy leaking all over Finn’s leather sofa when he moans something raggedly into the juncture of your neck. Your name.
Oh - fuck.
You were sort of lost in the fuzzy, clouded haze of how good he felt you almost forgot it was Jeffrey Steinberg who was fucking you until you heard your name on his lips. Jeffrey Steinberg and his slutty, dorky little glasses and his perfect fucking body that you can’t even see right now because you’re staring at the wood-panelled ceiling.
“Let me - let me see you,” you pant and gently push on his shoulders.
Jeffrey lifts himself off of you and without pulling out, keeps fucking you on his knees with one of your legs over his shoulder. Fuck - this angle. He’s so deep. And, Christ, so beautiful. His toned body is sticky with sweat, right down to the smattering of hair covering his lower abdomen. You look down to see his thick cock sliding in and out of you.
“Fuck, you’re so wet. So fucking sloppy,” he groans, his brow furrowed in deep concentration as he too looks over your body, watching your tits bounce with every slapping thrust into you.
His concentration face is cute. Devastatingly so. But something’s missing…
“Where’s your glasses?”
Jeffrey’s hand caresses your face and the heel of his palm moves the wire frames, making you realise you’re still wearing them.
“Do you want them back?” you ask.
He shakes his head.
“You look slutty in them too,” he says and cups your face. He drags his thumb across your lip and you open your mouth so you can suck it.
“Mm-mm-mm…” Your hum around his thumb, stuttered by every pounding of his hips against yours gives you something to concentrate on. God, you’re so close. So fucking close. And you try to stop bucking your hips because you really, don’t want to cum just yet.
But it’s like Jeffrey is reading your mind.
“You gonna cum for me?”
You bite your lip and shake your head. Because instinct tells you that as soon as you both cum, whatever hormones Nico has pumped into these oysters will probably leave your system. And that this will all be over. That you’ll go back to being friends.
“Not - fuck - not yet.” Is all you can manage to stammer as Jeffrey’s hips continue their relentless pursuit into yours.
“C’mon, I can tell you’re close,” he says, right as your pussy clenches around his length. “We’ve been down here for so long. Aren’t you tired of waiting?”
“I don’t - oh, god… I don’t want this to be over.” Jeffrey looks at you so intently that you need to shut your eyes. It’s like staring at the sun - if you don’t look away you’ll get burned. “Not yet. Not yet. Not yet. Not yet…” The words keep spilling out like a mantra. If you keep repeating it, it’ll be true - right?
Wrong.
Everything pulls up in your core and tightens like a spring coiling. Oh, shit.
“This isn’t going to be over after you cum. It’s never going to be over. You’re trapped down here with me, remember?”
Fuck.
“Eyes on me,” he continues. “Look at me when you cum.” You look up at Jeffrey helplessly through his own askew, slightly steamed-up glasses still on your face. “I’ve wanted to see you like this for - for so long.”
Like this? With your flushed cheeks and messy hair and sweat practically pooling on your stomach from the heat? The corners of his mouth turn upwards in a gentle smile, showing off his dimples before he turns his head to kiss your calf leaning against his shoulder.
It’s so sweet. You’re done for.
There’s no stopping your orgasm now as you feel a surge of heat and the contracting of muscles in your abdomen.
“So - fuck - so fucking pretty,” he says through gritted teeth as he watches you squirm. The pleasant way you wriggle against him and force yourself to maintain eye contact spurs him on. He grabs your hips and fucks himself as fast and as deep as he can into you, pounding into your G-spot as you speed past the point of no return. “That’s it, baby, you can cum for me.”
Christ.
“Fuck, Jeffrey, I’m - fuck - I’m -”
But just what you are is cut off when your climax takes hold of you and shuts down your loquaciousness. Everything goes black and you barely realise what’s happening - all you can focus on is your pussy camping down and spasming around him. It’s only when you feel the sensation of his glasses pressed into your face do you realise Jeffrey is kissing you.
He grinds his hips deep into yours, cumming deep inside you as your own ecstasy sends fireworks ricocheting from your core right to your extremities.
.Jeffrey sits back on his knees again, his hips still rocking gently into you, forcing the combined mess of his cum and your wetness to spill down between your legs and all over Fin’s couch.
“Jeffrey, that was - ”
“We’re not done yet,” says Jeffrey smearing a wet thumb across your clit. “I told you - you’re trapped here with me.”
Your eyes roll back in your head.
You think you might need to revisit your Venn diagram.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You and Jeffrey both lie, sprawled out and naked on the carpeted floor of the speakeasy. Both wet. Both sticky. Both trying to catch your breath. You have no idea where his glasses are.
Your mind feels clearer now and you wonder if his does too. You turn your head to look at him, frowning up at the ceiling.
“Jeffrey, are you alright…?”
“I’m worse than Fin,” he groans.
Worse than Fin? This is serious. In your eyes, nobody is worse than Fin. You prop yourself up on your elbow. “What do you mean?”
“Always trying to get what I can’t have.”
Your frown. “I don’t understand. What can’t you have?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” He runs his hand through his hair in that stressed-out way he always does. “The fact you thought I was a good customer? When all I was doing was parading my dates in front of you in a stupid attempt to make you jealous.”
“You - you were?” The thought that Jeffrey didn’t just want you because he’s ingested god-knows-what chemicals Nico has pumped into those oysters sends a pleasant tingle down your spine.
He laughs at himself scornfully. “I never wanted to be there with them. I just wanted an excuse to see you.”
“Are you kidding me?”
He’s startled by your tone. “What?”
“It took a fucking asteroid hitting Earth for you to admit you like me?”
“You never seemed interested!”
“What was I gonna say? ‘Hey, Jeffrey. I know you’re busy being a literal genius but I’m just about finished braising some fish if you’d like a meeting of the minds after this?’”
“Yeah? Well, what was I going to say to you? ‘Hey, I know you’re the most talented, in-demand chef in the world but can I take you to someone else’s restaurant?’”
“Uh? Yeah!”
“Oh.” You both look at each other and bust out laughing at the absurdity of this conversation. “I’m really not as smart as they say,” he says, closing his eyes in amusement.
You let the back of your hand fall on his bare chest, hitting him playfully.
“Well, I’m not exactly ‘in-demand’ anymore.”
“I wouldn’t say that just yet,” says Jeffrey with a smirk. Without warning he climbs on top of you. “I can be pretty demanding.”
A Nest of Vipers Ch5. (Cormac McLaggen x Original Female Character - Slytherin)
Rating: Explicit 18+
Word Count: 4.6K
Warnings / Tags: ANGST, Tragic romance
Summary: If her brother is brave enough to ask one of the Gryffindors to Slughorn's Christmas party, surely Una can work up the courage to do the same? Or has Sabine been right all along?
A/N: No smut in this chapter just some angst and everyone being cagey with their feelings lol. Also this diverges from the canon timeline just a little - Katie Bell isn’t cursed by the necklace until after Christmas.
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Chapter 5: Suffocate
A winter chill was in the air as Una and Graham Montague walked up the steps to the owlery, their shoes crunching on frosty fallen leaves on the stone staircase. Una wrinkled her nose when Graham opened the door at the top of the tower and they were greeted with the stench of owl droppings and hay.
“I’ve been laying the groundwork and dropping some serious hints that I need a new broom for Christmas,” said Graham as he tied their letters to one of the school tawny owls who was sticking its leg out in a serious, professional sort of way.
“I can’t believe this is the first time you’ve written to them all term,” said Una. This was typical of Graham. He was their golden boy - what did it matter to their parents if he didn’t write for months? Their beloved Quidditch Captain son who could do no wrong. Una, on the other hand, had to constantly fight for their approval.
She knew she should probably resent him for it, and yet…
“What am I going to write about? I’m not brilliant like you. I’ve not done anything worth writing about.”
There it was. Even if her parents didn’t give a damn, her little brother was always so proud of her. And he let her know it. She loved him more than anything. Although Sabine and Meredith were a close second. And, if she was being honest, third respectively.
“They’d love to hear from you, Graham. They’d want to know that your panic attacks have gotten much better lately.” Graham frowned and pretended to busy himself with the fastenings on the letters. “And Father would be really pleased that Slughorn invited you to his Christmas party after doing so well in Potions.”
“Oh, so you just send them a list of achievements every other week? Sure - that’s nothing to do with trying to get a good Christmas present.”
“Well,” smirked Una leaning against the window sill. “I’m not saying it doesn’t help.”
“Right, off you go then,” Graham told the owl who ruffled its feathers against the icy breeze, spread its wings and took flight across the Hogwarts grounds, carrying the siblings’ letters. They stood for a moment watching the silhouette of the owl disappearing into the sky across the lake.
“So, who are you going to the party with?” asked Una, looking up at him and thinking of his fellow Slytherin sixth years. As much as she didn’t like to think about her brother’s dating life, she would rather he wasn’t going out with someone who was a simpering pushover like Pansy Parkinson or a knucklehead like Millicent Bullstrode.
“Eh, I dunno…” He said, pushing a gloved hand back through his auburn hair. “I was thinking maybe Katie Bell?”
“What?” She knew that name from her lessons.
“She’s in the year above me.” He cleared his throat.
Una blinked a few times as his hazel eyes, so similar to her own, refused to meet hers.
“Yeah, I know she is because that’s my year, you dolt. But she’s in Gryffindor.”
“Oh, don’t you start too. It’s a different house, not another planet.”
“Your friends giving you a hard time then?”
He snorted. “Like you wouldn’t believe.”
“And it doesn’t… bother you?”
“What? That she’s a Gryffindor?”
“No, that Draco and the others are giving you a hard time.”
“Yeah, well, what are they gonna do about it?” He drew himself up to his full height. He was tall - even taller than his friends Crabbe and Goyle - she supposed they were probably too intimidated by him to try and put a stop to it.
“Well… good for you,” said Una.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I like that you don’t care what they think.”
“What about you?” he asked, pulling his scarf tighter against the cold air coming through the giant open windows.
“It’s fine by me, I don’t care who you go out with.” That wasn’t strictly true but it was better than him dating one of the Slytherin sixth years who were always sucking up to her, Sabine and Meredith.
“I meant who are you going with?”
“Oh.” Una and Blaise had already arranged to go with each other as friends. That way she could sneak off with McLaggen and he could attempt to get to know Ginny Weasley better, despite Una’s contempt for the latter. “Blaise.”
“What?!” His exclamation startled her slightly. “Una, you can’t go with Blaise.”
“Who are you to tell me who I can’t -”
“Not like that. Una, please. I’m begging you. Don’t go with Blaise.”
She was taken aback by this. Blaise was in Slytherin. By all accounts, he was a perfectly suitable match for her. “Why not?”
“Because he’s my mate. I mean, I can put up with them slagging me off for who I go out with but I don’t want to hear about Blaise with his hands all over my -” He pretended to retch. “I can’t have my sister going out with -” He retched again. “one of my friends.”
She frowned.
“Don’t give me that look. I mean…” He looked out the window again with a pained expression. “I suppose if you really like him, I could make peace with it. As long as y’know, you don’t start snogging each other in front of me.”
“It’s not that we like each other. It’s just that neither of us had anyone else to go with,” said Una carefully.
“Come off it.” Graham rolled his eyes and walked over to the owlery door. “I mean - they reign it in in front of me because they know I’d kill them - but I know from my mates that you’re not that ugly. I’m sure you’d have your choice of poor, unwitting souls. Like a dementor.”
“Oh ha-ha. It’s more of a quality problem than a quantity one - have you seen the trolls in our common room?”
“Well, maybe you should broaden your horizons. I’m not saying you have to go out with a Gryffindor but people in other houses exist, you know.”
Una sighed heavily as the owlery door shut behind her. She couldn’t believe she was taking dating advice from her brother - and what’s more, he was right.
“What’s that sigh for?”
“I wish I could be like you. Sabine and Meredith would kill me if I went with someone from Gryffindor. The three of us have a reputation to protect.”
“What does a reputation mean, really? What other people think of you? Maybe they’re not good friends if they care more about what other people think than being happy.” They paused at the bottom of the stairs. “I’m serious, Una. Fuck them. Go out with who you like… As long as it’s not Blaise or Draco.” He paused for a moment and (as if to make sure he was covering all his bases) added. “Or Crabbe, Goyle or Theo.”
Una laughed but as they walked back to the castle she couldn’t help but think about how complicated this was becoming. Why couldn’t things just be simple? Surely she could just be honest with her friends and go with who she really liked.
Una, Sabine and Meredith sat in front of the fire in the Slytherin common room. The atmosphere was stiff like they were the only three mourners at a very poorly attended funeral. Una had to remind herself that they weren’t actually grieving, that she had simply broken the news she was going to Slughorn’s party with Cormac McLaggen.
“I can’t believe you’d do this to my brother either,” Sabine sniped, breaking the silence. “Who’s he supposed to go with now?”
“The party is almost two weeks away. Blaise has plenty of time to find another date. Besides, Graham doesn’t want me to go with one of his friends.”
“I think,” Sabine said coolly. “I think you should find somewhere else to sit.”
Una snorted in disbelief. “Sab, come on-”
“Don’t ‘Sab’ me. I’m not having you cosying up with the Gryffindors all day and then coming crawling back to us. We stick together. The three of us. And only us.”
“You can’t be serious.” Sabine only raised a perfectly manicured eyebrow in response and continued to look into the fire, the light bouncing off her high, dark cheekbones as she stared stonily. “Doesn’t Meredith get a say?” Una scoffed and looked at Meredith who was attempting to make herself as small as she could in her leather armchair. “Well?”
“I agree with Sabine,” Meredith said quietly.
“Unbelievable.” Una stood up and her temper rose with it. “Are you really going to be that spineless, Meredith?” Meredith simply looked at her shoes. “And you,” she turned her glare to Sabine. “You only want me to go out with someone you can keep a close eye on.”
“I know what’s good for you.”
“What’s good for you, you mean. You’d rather the three of us were single than Meredith or I had a boyfriend before you.”
“You bitch,” hissed Sabine and Una knew she had touched a nerve. Sabine might have experience but Una knew her inside out. Sabine had never had a boyfriend for more than a few weeks.
Cormac’s earlier teasing of Una swam to the forefront of her mind: ‘It was easy to pretend you didn’t exist since you have such a terrible personality’
If Una had a terrible personality, Sabine’s was diabolical.
Sabine pressed on. “It’s nothing to do with who I am or aren’t dating. You know for a fact that you going out with a Gryffindor ruins the whole dynamic.”
“The dynamic?” Una laughed so shrilly that Pansy Parkinson and her friends looked over from their seats at the window alcove. “What dynamic is that? The one where you’re in charge and Meredith and I go along with whatever you say?”
“No, the dynamic where we don’t have the same kind of power when one of us splits off from the group to chum up with those blundering idiots in Gryffindor.”
“Then don’t split us up. It’s you who’s making a big deal about me asking Cormac to some party!”
It was Sabine’s turn to laugh. “Wait, hold on a second. He hasn’t even asked you yet?”
“So? What does it matter if he hasn’t?”
“I saw him scowling at you in Snape’s lesson the other day when you asked about the Cruciatus Curse. He doesn’t even like you. Sure, maybe he’s trying to fuck you but there’s no way he actually wants to date you.”
It was a knife in Una’s stomach. Sabine knew Una just as well as Una knew her. She had an intimate knowledge of Una’s deepest insecurities and her attempt to wound her was working.
“Well, maybe I don’t care if that’s what he wants.”
Sabine laughed again and it stung like venom in the wound. “As if. You’re going to catch feelings.”
“You really think I’m that easily manipulated?”
“Actually I do, Una. Because without us, what are you? A goody-two-shoes virgin and a loser.”
Una knew arguing back was only giving Sabine more ammunition but she couldn’t help it. The smug smirk on Sabine’s face told her that Sabine knew just how deeply she’d cut her. “He doesn’t care who my friends are. He likes me.”
“He likes the idea of fucking you. Wait until he finds out you’ve got as much experience as a twelve-year-old.”
Una could feel tears welling in her eyes and she was furious with her own emotions for betraying her. She wanted to tell them that actually, she did have experience. And that Cormac didn’t even mind when she didn’t. “He’s not like that.”
“They’re all like that,” Sabine said seriously. She held out her pinky finger. Their special signal. “Last chance, Una.” When she looked at Una her expression softened. “I just worry about you.”
Una looked at the pinky finger extended in front of her but didn’t link it. “You’re wrong.”
“I don’t want you to prove me right. Don’t ask him.”
“Why not?”
Una gave Meredith one last pleading look but Meredith just shook her head.
“If you make a fool of yourself it looks bad for all of us.”
Sabine pressed her pinky right into Una’s breastbone.
“I’m not a fool. And you’re a bad friend if you don’t want me to be happy.”
“You’d be happier without getting involved with him,” said Sabine. “I swear, Una. You’re setting yourself up to get hurt.”
Una thought hard. Thought about when Cormac told her he wanted to bend her over and fuck her like the mean little bully she was. Thought about the way he was as keen as she was to keep it a secret.
She barely knew him. He barely knew her. And maybe Sabine was right - what he did know he didn’t seem to like. Even if he did want to fuck her.
And asking him to Slughorn’s Christmas party would probably end in rejection and hurt.
She looked down at the pinky pressed into her sternum and locked her own around it. Sabine squeezed it with satisfaction.
“You’re right. I - I don’t know what I was thinking.”
As the Gryffindor Quidditch Team made their way back to the common room, Cormac McLaggen and Katie Bell lingered at the back of the group with their brooms slung over their shoulders.
“What a waste of time,” he groaned.
“Cheer up. You’re still technically on the team,” said Katie.
“Technically, yes. But in actuality that means spending a perfectly good Saturday afternoon sitting on the sidelines watching Weasley make an arse of himself.” Cormac grumbled as he adjusted his broom. He was in a bad mood and what was worse was that he still hadn’t found a date for Slughorn’s Party.
He knew why he was putting it off and resented himself for it. He had sort of hoped that after spending the evening in the Prefects’ bathroom with Una a few weeks ago that maybe - just maybe - she’d have a change of heart about not wanting to be seen with him anywhere.
But that wasn’t looking likely.
For the past couple of weeks, their only contact had consisted of sitting too closely in Transfiguration when they could get away with it and discreet brushes of their fingers when they passed in the corridor. Just last week he had dared to squeeze a handful of her backside as he walked by her in the Great Hall which she had met with a scathing look and the tiniest jerk of her head towards Sabine and Meredith.
Then, he hadn’t expected his heart to sink the way it did when she’d told him casually in Transfiguration that she was going to Slughorn’s with Blaise Zabini. Cormac thought they were well suited - both Slytherins, slight and statuesque. He felt like a lumbering giant when he walked past Blaise the next day.
He needed a date. And fast.
“Katie, you don’t fancy going to Slughorn’s Party with me, do you?”
Katie stopped in her tracks. “What?”
“Just as friends, I mean.”
“Thank God,” she laughed and they resumed their ascent of the moving staircase.
“Alright, don’t sound too relieved or anything.”
“You know what I mean.”
“No, I do. I just thought that since you’re not going you might -“
“I am too going,” said Katie defensively.
“What? You’re going to Slughorn’s?” asked Cormac. “You never told me that.”
“I don’t tell you everything,” Katie said. “But yeah, I’m going with the Slytherin Quidditch Captain. Graham.”
Cormac furrowed his brow. “Wait -”
“Una Montague’s brother,” she reminded him.
“What? Why’d you say it like that? I barely know her.”
It was easy to forget Graham and Una were siblings. They were different, that was for sure. Graham was taller, broader and with much hairier arms than Una - not that Cormac was complaining that they didn’t share those traits.
Katie looked at him blankly. “Because you mentioned you sit next to her Transfiguration?”
“Oh. Yeah. Right.”
“He’s kind of sweet, actually,” said Katie quickly. “Not as bad as the rest.”
His memory was jogged by this. “Hold on, didn’t he grab your head instead of the quaffle during a match once?”
To Cormac’s surprise, Katie gave him a girlish smile that he’d never seen before. “That’s what he said when he asked me to Slughorn’s Party. He said he wanted to make it up to me. ‘Baubles’,” she added, pushing through the portrait of the Fat Lady and stepping over the threshold of the common room.
“I dunno, Katie. Carmichael warned me about him,” he said.
“What’s going on?” said Katie. “First you’re getting defensive when I mentioned Una and now you’re telling me Carmichael is warning you about her brother. Why?”
“Nothing’s going on,” Cormac insisted, thinking about Una’s scalding look when he tried to touch her when she was near the other Vipers. She’d be furious if he told anyone about them. So furious, she probably wouldn’t want to have sex with him - and he was determined to at least do that again, even if they weren’t going to the party together.
“Are you into her?”
“No, Katie. I just sit next to her in one class.” He did trust Katie but he was becoming extremely conscious of the fact they were having this conversation in the busy common room where anyone could overhear.
“Is this why you haven’t asked anyone to Slughorn’s? Are you trying to work up the courage to ask her or something?”
“No. And she’s going with Zabini anyway.”
“Sabine?”
“Blaise.”
“Hmm… you seem to know an awful lot about who she’s going with for someone who isn’t interested.”
“It just came up in Transfiguration.”
“How did it come up?”
He dragged his hand down his face in exasperation. Katie could be so infuriatingly tenacious. “It just did. Let it go.”
“So you’re not going alone in the hopes she ditches Blaise for you?”
“No! I just asked you didn’t I?”
“As a friend.”
“Yeah, because Slughorn’s Christmas party is only two days away and I still don’t have anyone to go with.”
“Cormac?” said a voice from behind them. Katie and Cormac whipped around to see Hermione Granger standing with a book under her arm. “Sorry, I couldn’t help overhearing. Did you say you were looking for a date for Slughorn’s party?”
Now, this was interesting. Hermione was pretty, he supposed, even if she did look slightly stressed out and frazzled right now. But she had never shown the slightest interest in him before, in fact, it was quite the opposite when he had made eyes at her during Slug Club.
“Yes,” said Cormac with relief. He was proving Katie wrong before her eyes. “Are you? Do you want to go together?”
Hermione nodded. He wondered if this would make Una jealous. Hermione was, after all, a shoo-in to be Una’s successor as Head Girl. And she had gone to the Yule Ball with Viktor Krum - that had to mean something, right?
“You mean like, as a date though, right? Not as friends?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Oh, I would love to go with you as a date, Cormac,” she replied very loudly, looking over his shoulder at the rest of the Quidditch team heading to their dormitories and tucking her bushy hair behind her ear.
“Excellent,” said Cormac, clapping Hermione on the shoulder and walking backwards towards the boys’ dormitory. “You’ll wear something hot though, right?”
“Cormac!” said Katie, aghast.
“What?” asked Cormac. He was thinking about how Una would mock him if he turned up with a date who clearly didn’t look like she’d made any effort to be there with him. But judging from Katie’s horrified expression, he’d said the wrong thing. “I just meant, y’know, at the Yule Ball - you looked great. I’m looking forward to seeing you dressed up again.”
“Ignore him,” said Katie, rolling her eyes as Hermione looked offended. Cormac shrugged and turned to go upstairs.
In the last Transfiguration lesson before the end of term, Professor McGonagall seemed to have let her hair down slightly and had allowed the seventh-years to spend their lesson practising whatever they wanted. And so, Cormac continued his attempts to silently master the Avis spell while Una sat in front of a mirror, transfiguring her eyebrows into different colours.
“You know, I might keep them like this for Slughorn’s party tomorrow night,” said Una, admiring her emerald green eyebrows in the mirror. “They match my dress.”
Cormac turned in his seat to face her as she smirked at him expectantly.
“Blaise would love that, I’m sure.”
“He won’t care.”
“Nice to know he’s not superficial. That’s a good quality to have in a boyfriend.”
Una snorted. “What are you on about?”
“Well… you’ve barely spoken to me since you told me you were going to Slughorn’s with Blaise.”
“That’s not -” Una hesitated before continuing. “That’s not why I haven’t been speaking to you. Sabine and Meredith are sort of… on my case.”
“They’ve always been on your case.”
“More than usual.” Una held up her mirror to her face and pointed her wand at her eyebrows. Cormac had a feeling she was hiding her face so she wouldn’t need to look at him. “I told them I was thinking about asking you.”
“You - you did? What did they say?”
“Oh they were really supportive,” said Una sarcastically, as they both watched her eyebrows resume their usual colour. “Asked if you had any friends for them too - do you think Carmichael would be interested?”
Cormac put down his wand. “What did they really say?”
“It didn’t go down well. But -” Una pursed her lips thoughtfully. “- does it matter what they think?”
“To me? No.”
“Should we, then? Go together, I mean? I know it’s only tomorrow but Blaise won’t care. We’re just going as friends.”
Friends? Shit.
“Una, I can’t. I’ve said I’d go with someone else - I can’t ditch her the day before.”
“Who?”
“Hermione Granger,” he said and Una scoffed. “What’s wrong with that?”
“Well, you were trying to hit on her at the dinner party a couple of weeks ago, so, what, you’re dating her?”
“How was I supposed to know you were going with Blaise as friends?”
She looked at him incredulously. “I thought that was the plan? We’d find someone else to go with and we’d sneak off somewhere together later?”
“We can still do that,” he said, feeling a little desperate now his plan was backfiring.
“Cormac, I’m not…” She sighed. “I’m not gonna be some bit on the side for you while you’re actively dating. You can’t have it both ways.”
That was exceptionally unfair. “Me? Una, I’m doing this at your request. You want to keep it a secret. You want to go to the party with someone else. It’s you who can’t have it both ways.”
He was expecting a venomous argument but she just looked disappointed. Which was worse.
“You’re right. I’m sorry.”
He certainly hadn’t expected her to apologise. He felt his defences drop.
“Come on, Unes. I’m not dating her. I was scrambling for a last-second date and she overheard. That’s all it is.”
“And what’s this?” asked Una. “Like… between us?”
“What do you want it to be?” He tilted his head. “Una, I like you a lot but if you’re that worried about Sabine and Meredith, we can keep it a secret. I don’t care.”
“You like me? You never told me that.”
“Didn’t I?”
“No. You said you didn’t dislike me.”
“That’s the same thing.”
“Even though Carmichael says I’m evil?”
Cormac grinned. “Well, you are evil. I’m just into it.” He didn't really think Una was evil. A little mean with a twisted sense of humour, sure, but she had a soft side that most people didn't realise existed. He couldn't ever imagine her purposefully harming someone.
She laughed at this for a second then her expression shifted slightly. “And you don’t care that I’ve got about as much experience as a twelve-year-old?”
“Well, that’s not true anymore, is it?” He shrugged his shoulders. “And it’s great, actually. It’s the one thing I’m better at than you.”
“Shut up,” she said, although she looked relieved. It was oddly adorable. Usually so quick-witted and sneering, it was nice when she let him peer behind the curtain and see that she had real, human emotions.
“You’re gonna need a lot of practice to catch up,” he said with a cocky grin, and he was glad when she hit his shoulder because he knew it meant she wasn’t upset with him anymore.
The bell rang and Cormac and Una filed out of the class behind the others.
“I’ll see you tomorrow then?” he asked and she nodded. Then Una did something she’d never done before. She stood on her tiptoes in the busy corridor and kissed his cheek.
“See you later,” Una said and off she went, giving him a quick smile over her shoulder before disappearing through a hidden passageway behind a tapestry.
After Arithmancy, Una went along the second-floor corridor to the nearest bathroom. It was cold and dank in here - she knew why Filch avoided cleaning this one. She looked at her reflection in the streaky mirror as she dried her hands. She too usually steered clear of this bathroom if she could because -
“I know something you don’t know,” sang Moaning Myrtle, rising from the air above the stall behind her. Una glanced her out of the corner of her eye in the mirror as she pulled out her lipgloss.
“Oh, I’m sure there are plenty of things I don’t know, Myrtle. How to scare away every boy in school, for instance?”
“Funny you should say that… Did you know that boy you’re seeing is taking someone else to the Christmas party?”
“Oh, no,” said Una mockingly applying her lipgloss. “What a terrible shock.”
“I heard Hermione Granger and Ginny Weasley talking all about it in here.”
“Did you now?” said Una, feigning disinterest as she pouted at herself and fixed her hair.
“Yes, although she’s not looking forward to it. He sounds awful. I can see why you’re both interested in each other.”
Una smirked at her own reflection. Good. She was glad Hermione wasn’t particularly keen on their date.
Myrtle continued. “I overheard them talking about what a chauvinist he is. Apparently, he told her to wear something sexy to the party. Can you believe it?”
Una’s smirk faltered as the pit of her stomach dropped. She tried to recover quickly by pressing her lips together but from the gleeful expression on Myrtle’s face, she’d seen it. Myrtle floated over to sit on the sink next to her but Una kept her eyes firmly on her own reflection.
“Said he was really looking forward to seeing her all dressed up. Gosh, he must really like her.”
Una carefully put her lipgloss back in her bag. So much for ‘only asking Hermione because she overheard’. So Cormac McLaggen was a liar - plain and simple. And Sabine was right. By putting herself out there and telling him how she felt, she had only set herself up to get hurt.
“Is that why you told me not to tell anyone? Are you sleeping with someone else’s boyfriend?” asked Myrtle in a would-be innocent voice.
Una pulled out her wand and pointed it at Myrtle’s throat. “Langlock!” she spat and watched Myrle’s eyes bulge as her tongue rolled back down her throat. “Engorgio!”
Myrtle clutched her throat as her tongue swelled up.
“Now, if you were alive, you’d suffocate,” whispered Una, watching Myrtle’s ghostly face turn less and less opaque. Her neck bulged as her tongue continued to grow. “But what happens if a dead person chokes on their own tongue, I wonder?”
Una didn’t bother to find out. She turned around and strode out of the bathroom, her heels clicking across the wet stone floor as Myrle gagged behind her.
Summary: Your Halloween plans are cancelled last minute. You’re ready for a night alone eating Halloween candy until Vigilante comes to your door needing stitched up.
A/N: Based on this ask by @impossibleheartflower - thank you! No pronouns are used but the reader is wearing a slutty nurse outfit. It’s pretty nondescript (e.g. no specific mention of skirt or pants) so the slutty nurse outfit can be whatever you want it to be. Maybe the real slutty nurse outfit is the friends we made along the way.
Masterlist
Chapter text
You dip your hand in your bubble bath to test the temperature - it’s not exactly going to make up for the fact that your Halloween date flaked at the last second but you know you’ll feel better when you take off this ridiculous costume and sink into the bubbles.
You hear a distant knock from your front door and turn off the tap.
It’s sort of late for trick-or-treaters. Right? Maybe your apartment is the last stop for the kids who live in your building. You don’t want to end up on a register somewhere so you pull on a robe over your sexy nurse costume.
“Coming!” You rush out of the bathroom to unchain your front door.
You let out a gasp of shock when you open it. Thud. A man’s body falls backwards into your apartment.
“What the fuck?!”
Is he… dead?
Dread fills you as your eyes ping over every part of his figure, looking for signs of life. But it’s hard to tell when he’s dressed in a black and teal Halloween costume with his face completely concealed by a mask.
Almost completely.
His eyes are just visible behind the red visor on his mask. He blinks up at you. He blinks. He’s alive.
The man dressed up as the masked Vigilante of Evergreen groans. “It’s me... Sorry.”
That voice is familiar. “Who- ?”
Vigilante stares up at you standing over him. He knows he’s got more pressing matters to worry about than being offended that you don’t recognise his voice but he can’t help it. He’d know your voice anywhere. Hell, he even recognises the way your keys jingle in the hallway when you get home from work.
“I’m your neighbour… from across the hall.” He clutches his side with one hand so he can rip off his mask with the other.
Oh.
‘Hot guy’ is the stupid thought that pops into your head when you stare at his upside-down face lying across your doorway. You realise who he is now after all, under his Halloween costume, with his dark, curly hair and sharp jaw - all that’s missing is his glasses. You’re not even sure of his name - you’ve been so used to referring to him as ‘Hot Guy Across The Hall’ in your friends’ group chat for months that you’re more accustomed to calling him that in your head.
‘Hot Guy Across The Hall took a package in for me today.’
‘I bet you’d like to take a package from Hot Guy Across The Hall.’
You snap out of it when you see a trickle of blood drip onto your floor. You look at the gloved hand clutching his side - he’s holding a wound on his abdomen. A dark puddle of blood leaks through the fabric, staining the white parts of his gloves crimson. A new terror sets in as you realise he’s been attacked.
“Please, I need a nurse.”
“This…” You look down at your red and white polyester outfit and the plastic stethoscope around your neck that’s visible underneath your open robe. “This is a Halloween costume.”
“I know that. I’ve seen you in scrubs.”
“I’m a vet.”
“Uh, thank you for your service?”
“A veterinarian.” You stick your head out the door and look up and down the hallway, worried about anyone stumbling upon the bloody scene. “Get in here.” You slip off your robe so you can move freely, then bend down and drag Hot Guy Across The Hall by his underarms into your apartment, sliding him across your wooden floor and shutting the door behind him. Fuck, he's heavier than he looks.
Shit, what was his name?
“Aidan, right?”
“Close enough.” He groans, staring up at your ceiling.
“Can you get up if I help you?”
“Mhm,” he winces in affirmation and you bend down to put his arm around his shoulder. He inhales sharply, holding onto his side as you help him across your small apartment into your bedroom. You’re glad your apartment is clean. Not that you’d admit out loud that you’d tidied it specifically just in case your date had gone well tonight.
You help him onto your fresh bedspread. The blood is definitely going to stain your new sheets. Perfect.
“Okay, let’s see what we’re dealing with,” you say, tossing the plastic stethoscope aside and sitting beside him on the edge of the bed so you can assess the wound. “Wait, is your costume a onesie?”
“No,” he groans. “I just need to take off the belt-” He swears when he removes his hand from his side to unfasten his gunbelt. A jolt of adrenaline courses through you when you realise that attached to him are real guns.
“Okay, let me do that. You just keep applying pressure.” You firmly move his hands from his belt to his wound. The sound of metal on metal clicks in your silent bedroom when you gently unthread the belt from the loops. “There we go, you’re doing great,” you soothe as you place the belt and his gun on the floor and roll up the top half of his suit. Your fingers tremble slightly when you realise the fabric under them isn’t cheap polyester. It’s thick. Lined with what you expect is Kevlar. This is no bargain bin Halloween costume.
Oh shit.
There’s a long but shallow knife wound running down his ribs. It doesn’t look like there’s any damage to his vital organs. But it’s gruesome. “I’ll get my car keys - I’m taking you to a hospital.”
“Wait!” He tries to sit up but yelps in pain and lies back again.
“Please, I can’t go there… Too many questions.”
It confirms your suspicions.
“You’re not dressed up for Halloween.” It’s not a question but you look up to see his response all the same. You’ve been so focused on his injury that you haven’t noticed the way his green eyes have been searching your face. He slowly shakes his head and looks at you beseechingly. Ugh. You can’t say no to those pretty eyes. It’s why you ended up becoming a vet - you just can’t resist the stupid, puppy-dog eyes.
“I don’t have any anaesthetic. This is gonna hurt like a bitch.”
“Thanks.”
“Keep that sentiment in mind when you’re screaming in a second.”
You leave him and boil some water while you busy yourself finding your medical supplies and a bottle of vodka. You set up your things on the bedside table while you sit on a throw pillow on the floor next to the bed.
“God, this is always the worst bit.” He says, squinting at you dipping the gauze in the boiled water, getting ready to clean out the wound.
“Don’t you normally wear glasses?”
“They’re in my pocket.”
You reach into his pocket and carefully place them on his face. “Better?” He nods. “Or maybe you don’t wanna see this?”
“Aren’t you gonna clean it out with vodka first?” He asks as your hand hovers over his wound, holding the gauze.
“Hell no - that’s only in the movies. Alcohol can damage your tissue. This is for us.” You open the bottle with one hand, take a quick swig and shudder before handing him the bottle.
“Shouldn’t you be sober for this?”
“Hey, the dogs never complain when I turn up to work drunk.”
“They don’t?”
Your face cracks into a smile as you take in the sincerity of his look. “A joke. I’m joking.”
“Oh, right. Yeah.” He takes a long gulp of vodka, screws up his face and passes it back to you.
You clean his wound and he clenches his fists, breathing heavily.
“So, you said you’ve done this before?” You ask, trying to distract him.
“Yeah,” he says through gritted teeth.
You scan his toned lower abdomen and spot a gruesome-looking scar just under his navel. “Oof, I can tell. That looks like shit.”
“Hey-” He cuts himself off with a sharp inhale when you give the wound one last wipe.
You thread the sterilised needle. “You ready?”
“Wait.” He extends his arm towards the vodka and you pass it to him so he can take another drink. He shakes his head. “Ready.”
“I’ll be quick. I promise.”
He groans when the needle breaks his skin. “So, what’s your name? If it’s not Aidan.” If you keep him talking, you can take his mind off the pain. Keep him conscious.
“It’s Adrian.”
“How about that? I was close.”
“I know yours. I get your packages sometimes.” He says your full name and address as if reciting a poem.
“Well remembered,” you say, furrowing your brow in concentration as you make the next stitch. He grabs your shoulder instinctively.
“Sorry,” he whimpers.
“It’s okay. You’re doing so good.”
His grip tightens at that.
“Anyway, how come you’re home more than me? You always get my packages. Doesn’t doing all this keep you busy?”
“I work nights. Mostly. Evenings too at my other job.”
“You’re a waiter, right? I’ve seen your uniform.”
“Busboy.”
“That’s cool,” you jabber on, focusing on keeping him distracted. “Must be a pretty convincing secret identity.”
“Right?!” He perks up at your compliment, extremely pleased that you think his secret identity is a good one.
“Bussing tables in the evenings then committing murder at night?”
“It’s not murder.” He grimaces again. The grip on your shoulder is now vice-like. “It’s holding people accountable.”
“Sure, sure…” you say. You feel strangely calm. It’s as if the shy, awkward dude on your couch is just cosplaying as Vigilante. Even though you’re currently stitching up his fresh wound from whatever the fuck it is he’s been up to tonight.
“...You’re not gonna, like, tell anyone, right?” You feel his eyes studying your face as you continue stitching him up.
“That depends. What are you gonna do for me?”
For some reason, his cheeks turn crimson and he blinks rapidly behind his glasses.
“Uh, like what?” he blusters.
“Does your job have any perks?
“Uh… Do you need me to kill someone?”
“No!” And despite the absurdity of the question, you laugh. “I meant like free pink lemonade for life in exchange for stitching you up.”
“Ohhhh, right. I dunno. I might get asked a lot of questions if I give you free drinks.”
“More questions than you’d get at the hospital if I took you there instead?”
“Uh, no, probably not.” He chews his lower lip seriously and it makes you feel bad for teasing him in his sorry state.
“I’m kidding, dude. My lips are sealed.”
The fact he’s Vigilante doesn’t scare you in the way you know it should. You know you should absolutely phone the police. But you kind of enjoy sharing this. A dirty little secret between the two of you.
“Pink lemonade is overhyped,” he says after a few beats.
“Is is not! It’s like the best kind of lemonade.”
“It is - ow! Sorry! Okay, sorry for saying it’s overhyped! Pink lemonade is great. Jesus.”
“That wasn’t on purpose - sorry. It’s just the last stitch… Keep holding onto my shoulder if you want?” Before you even finish the suggestion, his blood-stained gloved grips onto your white nurse outfit. “You’re being so brave.”
“Oh, fuck,” he whimpers.
His whimper makes you feel flustered in a way you hadn’t expected. And you’re pretty sure it’s nothing to do with the task at hand.
You can’t think of a response to comfort him. Your bedside manner leaves a lot to be desired - usually, your patients are much fluffier. You stop short of calling him a good boy and patting his head
Finally, you tie off your last stitch and squeeze some antibacterial ointment onto the neat row of stitches.
“Done. Now take a look at this.” With difficulty, he hoists himself into his elbows to look at his stomach. “Evenly spaced stitches, not too tight, yeah? Now look at these.” You point at the scar on his lower abdomen. “Tiny stitches. They’re too tight. And you shouldn’t make X’s when you sew yourself up. Not bad for a second try, though.”
“That was like the fifth time I’ve done it,” he pouts. “I didn’t think it was that bad.”
“Look, you can feel how it’s gone all bumpy.” You trace your fingers along the scar, feeling the way the skin has healed unevenly under the trail of hair on his stomach.
He flushes again as he looks down at you, your fingers brushing his abdomen.
“What?”
“Sorry.” He lies back again, determinedly looking at the ceiling.
“For what? Oh.” Your forearm brushes against something hard in his pants as you remove your hand from his stomach. “My bad.”
“It’s not - ” he winces, trying to sit up further but changes his mind mid-way through. “Fuck.”
“Does it hurt?”
“My… my boner?”
“No!” You crack up laughing again and he joins in uncertainly as if not sure why. “Your very recent knife wound?”
“Oh. Yeah. I mean - no.” His eyes linger on your body and you suddenly feel very aware of the fact that you’re kneeling at his side wearing not very much clothing. He swallows and looks away quickly. “Y’know, I should go. I don’t wanna ruin your night.”
You laugh like it’s nothing. That this whole situation is totally in your comfort zone.
“Don’t worry about it. I was supposed to be going to a Halloween party with a date but they bailed.”
“They bailed on you?”
“Eh, it happens.” You shrug. “They mighta had a better offer.”
“Than you?” He looks at you seriously and pushes his glasses higher up his nose. “No way. Not possible. You’re, like, a ten.”
You tilt your head and look at him carefully. He takes a sharp inhale of breath when you get up from the floor, sit on the bed next to him and place the back of your hand on his forehead.
“Wha - what are you doing?”
“You don’t seem to have a fever…” His eyebrows scrunch together as he gazes up at you through his wire-rimmed frames. “I just thought you might be hallucinating.”
“Don’t pretend like you’re not hot.”
“You don’t have to compliment me just because I stitched you up.”
“Am not!” he protests like you’re teasing him. “I’d compliment you all the time if you didn’t run off every time I saw you.”
It’s your turn to protest. “I do not ‘run off’.”
Although it’s not strictly true. You sort of do. You just thought he hadn’t noticed.
“Uh, yeah!” he says. “When you picked up that package last week? It was kinda impressive how fast you sprinted across the hall.”
You feel heat rising in your neck as you remember it. He had answered the door wearing just a pair of grey sweatpants, grinning as you read the indiscreet label plastered on the front.
‘HOSPITAL HOTTIE - ADULT FANTASY LINGERIE’
You had stammered a quick thanks before fleeing back to your apartment where you shut the door behind you and leaned against it, eyes closed, not sure whether to text your friends immediately with this news or to strip off and take a cold shower.
You look down at your almost bare legs and smooth out the front of your outfit, now wishing you hadn’t so hastily thrown off your bathrobe. It must look ridiculous.
“Y’know when I saw the label, I thought a lot about what was in that package.”
Your eyes dart up instinctively to see if he’s making fun of you. He’s smiling. But sincerely. It’s a cute smile. With dimples.
“You did?”
“Tch - Hell yeah I did. I sort of… I dunno. Fantasised about this, I guess.”
Your throat feels dry. “About this?”
“Yeah, I mean I thought I might have been dreaming when you actually opened the door like that.”
You look at him suspiciously. “Adrian… did you - did you get stabbed on purpose so I’d take care of you?”
“What? No! I never get stabbed.”
“Never?”
You touch the scar on his lower abdomen again and this time - intentionally - your forearm rests on his crotch.
“Well, hardly ever.”
“You should let me stitch you up from now on,” you say, as your fingers dance down his stomach. “The next rare occasion you get stabbed.”
The heel of your hand barely grazes the tip of his hard cock through his pants. When his eyes lock onto yours, you know you’re not being slick. He swallows. You freeze. You’re worried you’ve overstepped.
You both stare at each other for a few seconds.
You realise you’ve been holding your breath. “What else was in your fantasy?” you whisper in an exhale.
“Fuck.” He closes his eyes like he’s throwing caution to the wind. “This.” His gloved hand clamps on top of yours faster than you’d have expected in his injured state and he firmly moves your hand over his cock.
Fuck it.
Your hands work urgently, unzipping the suit hugging his waistline and suddenly his warm cock is under your palm.
He suppresses a groan of pain and you look up in alarm, worried that you’ve hurt him somehow but you can see he’s trying to sit up.
“Lie back - you’re gonna hurt yourself.”
“It’s - ow, fuck - it’s worth it if I can kiss you.”
You push his chest back gently so he’s lying on your pillows and kneel on the bed to kiss him. As soon as your lips meet his, he tries to lift himself up again, lurching himself deeper into your mouth. Your tongue slips into his mouth as you push, more firmly this time, onto his chest so he can’t sit up.
You lean your forehead against his and his glasses push into your brow. “Keep still. Nurse’s orders.”
“I thought you were a vet,” he says breathlessly.
“I’ll be whatever you want me to be.”
You lick your palm, wrap your hand around his cock and slide it along his shaft.
“Oh fuck... Fuck - you’re so hot. Where - where have you been all my life?”
His eyebrows knit together in a beautiful, pathetic sort of way that makes your lower tummy burn dangerously.
“Across the hall in this slutty little outfit. Waiting to take care of you.”
“Holy fucking shit.” He tenses his thighs and jerks his hips up into your slick fist with a laboured groan.
“Don’t. Stay still,” you tell him sternly. For some reason your reprimand makes him clench his jaw.
“God, I wanna fuck you so bad,” he says through gritted teeth.
“Yeah? I bet you do. I bet you’ve been jerking off thinking about it.”
“Y- yeah,” he gasps. His cheeks are flushed pink. You don’t think it’s from embarrassment - you have a feeling he doesn’t embarrass easily so you press on.
“Tell me.”
“I’ve been - shit - I’ve been jerking off thinking about you.”
“Doing what?” Your hand picks up pace and he squirms underneath your touch.
“I told you. This.”
“Just this?”
“Fuck. No.”
“Tell me then,” you repeat.
“I wanted to - oh god - when you ran across the hall, I wanted to grab you.” His voice strains. “Pull down your scrubs and fuck you so hard you wouldn’t forget my name again.”
You feel yourself dissolving then and there. “Shit. I would have let you.”
“Ah - fuck,” he whispers as he throbs under your hand. “Let me. Please.”
“No.” You stay in your kneeling position on the bed - one hand bracing against his chest to prevent him from sitting up and the other pumping up and down his cock. “You’re hurt. Lemme take care of you.”
He whimpers and pushes his head back into your pillows. The muscles in his pale neck tighten as he swallows hard. You can’t resist leaning down and pressing soft, open-mouthed kisses on the exposed sensitive flesh of his throat.
“Relax, Adrian,” you murmur, your mouth pressed against his skin.
When his name leaves your lips, his groan vibrates in his throat against your mouth in response.
“Fuck - fuck - you feel so good.”
“You know where’d feel better, right?”
Adrian’s hips jerk up into your hand again. You don’t scold him this time - you let him squirm and work his hips in sync with your fist. He can handle it.
You kiss along his jawline and meet his lips again.
“Cum for me and you can fuck me when you’re healed,” you whisper.
And quicker than you’d expected - he does.
A shaky gasp leaves his lips and without really realising you’re doing it, you pant with him, breathing each other’s air as spurts of warmth coat your fingers. Your hand flexes along his length as you milk every last rope of cum from him and he collapses back onto your fluffy, white pillows.
Grabbing tissues from your bedside table, he lets you clean him up without complaint as he breathes heavily, staring at your ceiling.
“Better?” You give him a wry smile and he brings his gaze back to you.
“Yeah…” He looks down at his new stitches apprasingly. “I just wish I hadn’t been stabbed.”
“Yeah, well I’m kind of glad you were.”
He laughs so hard that he winces in pain and holds his side again. “Fuck. You’re kind of a freak, you know that, right?”
“Maybe I just like helping injured little things that give me puppy dog eyes.”
Adrian exhales a gentle laugh and fixes his glasses.
“Did you mean what you said about stitching me up again?”
You meet his green eyes. “Did you mean what you said about fucking me so hard I’d never forget your name again?”
“Uh, yeah? Obviously.”
“Then sure.” You toss the used tissue into the trash can and kiss him again. “Fucking sounds good. Pink lemonade is overhyped, anyway.”
Finders Keepers Ch 16. (Cormac McLaggen x fem!reader)
Rating: Explicit 18+
Word Count: 6.2k
Warnings: SMUT, PIV, Sex pollen / Love Potion so copious dub-con
Summary: You want to celebrate Carmichael's return but you have anxiety. Thankfully McLaggen can always help you let some steam off.
A/N: We're really just killing time with the power of friendship (and smut) until the Battle of Hogwarts here.
Masterlist
Tag list: @countlambula, @ratsys, @aweidlich, @navs-bhat, @stainedpomegranatelips, @chiaraanatra, @xxvelvetxxxx, @ohnoitsrosie, @dracosisteer, @daisydark, @intense-sneezing, @lipstickandloveletters, @ichorai, @marmie-noir, @lolitstiana(let me know if you want removed at any point btw!)
Chapter 16: Relax
The party is in full swing as you sit anxiously on the couch, absently toying with the label from an unopened bottle of Madam Rosmerta’s mead in your hands. From here you can keep an eye on the front door and watch the others milling around in the kitchen.
You’re supposed to be joining in with the others, celebrating Eddie Carmichael’s release from Azkaban but when you look at the discarded Daily Prophet on the coffee table, a knot twists in your stomach.
Three photos dominate the front page under the headline “Mass Breakout from Azkaban: Quidditch Conspiracy?” Two professional headshots of Krum and Davies respectively, looking intimidatingly composed in their Lyon Quidditch robes and a picture of you in your Azkaban ones, looking quite the opposite.
You reread the caption underneath, although at this point it’s committed to your memory - permanently.
‘Undesirables. Contact the Ministry of Magic immediately if you have any information concerning the whereabouts of the organisation known Dumbledore’s Army or the disappearance of Cormac McLaggen and Marietta Edgecombe. Reward five thousand galleons.’
“You alright, Keeps?”
You look up when Alicia drops herself onto the sofa next to you. You nod and stop fidgeting with the bottle, trying to appear nonchalant.
“You’re not. I can still tell when something’s on your mind,” she says.
“I’m just keeping an eye out. I’m not sure it’s a good idea for us all to let our guard down.” You look edgily at the door.
She chuckles. “You haven’t changed a bit. Always so serious - too serious. Relax. Enjoy the party.”
You purse your lips, holding back the rebuttal on the tip of your tongue. Her statement is half true but you can’t help feeling her assessment is an unfair one. You have changed. But to give yourself credit - this is serious. There’s a war going on and you’re all in here, partying as if it’s the end of term and you’ve just finished your exams. Nobody’s behaving like you’re wanted by the Ministry.
“I just think at least one of us should keep their wits about them. Just in case something happens.” Your eyes find the door again.
“What are you gonna do? Fight off the Death Eaters single-handed while we watch?”
“What are you gonna do? Get so wasted you can’t point your wand straight?”
“We’ll be fine.”
You look up at Carmichael and McLaggen, laughing together at the other side of the kitchen.
Carmichael, even more so than you, bears the gaunt look of someone who’s spent time in Azkaban but his smile lights up his face so brightly that it’s almost easy to forget how recently he escaped. Your brow softens when you see him slap McLaggen on the back in reaction to some joke you can’t hear.
“Well, maybe something about you has changed,” says Alicia, watching you observe the two of them across the room.
“Oh, yeah?”
“I kind of had a feeling you’d settle down with a guy when your experimental phase was over.”
You snap back around to look at her. “It’s not like that.”
“What’s it like, then?”
You feel adrenaline rising in your chest, your body instinctively reverting to a state of readiness for one of your and Alicia’s notorious screaming matches.
“You know what, Alicia? You broke up with me so I don’t have to justify who I end up with or why.”
“Well, it might have been different if I’d known you’d resort to dating an idiot like McLaggen when there were no other lesbians left at Hogwarts. I could have at least warned you.”
“He’s not an idiot.” You hear scuffling at the other side of the kitchen and look up to see Carmichael and McLaggen play fighting, trying to put each other in a headlock. You close your eyes and let out an exasperated breath.
Alicia laughs. “Come on, he’s everything you hate. Arrogant. Entitled. I heard he even got into an argument with Harry Potter when he wasn’t picked for the Quidditch team.”
“He was confunded!”
She pulls a face. “He was? He was reminiscing about the whole sorry tale with Wood and Angelina about it yesterday morning and never mentioned that bit. Just seemed to think Potter had just missed a trick, not recruiting the amazing Cormac McLaggen.”
Your stomach drops. He still doesn’t know. He doesn’t know that you knew Hermione Granger confunded him and never said anything.
“I’m not listening to you talking shit about my boyfriend - yes, boyfriend - when you’re staying here at his place,” you say and get to your feet. “You know, you haven’t changed either, Alicia.”
“I’m sure you’ll tell me why.”
“You’re still a dickhead.”
You hear her scoff behind you as you go to the kitchen and interrupt McLaggen and Carmichael’s boisterous laughter.
“Hey,” McLaggen says in a cautiously optimistic sort of way when you come over. “Do you need a bottle opener?”
“No. Do you have a minute?” you ask him and his expression becomes serious.
McLaggen puts down his drink and opens the kitchen door into the garden. When you follow him outside he shuts the door behind you and leans on the edge of a planter filled with lavender and sage.
“Everything alright? I saw you talking to Alicia. Didn’t want to interrupt.”
“Cormac, I need to tell you something.”
He straightens up with the demeanour of someone bracing themselves, pulling his shoulders back. “Cormac? Something must be up if you’re calling me that.”
You take a deep breath. “Do you remember your Quidditch tryouts? How you missed the last penalty?”
“...Yes? Sort of?” he says uncertainly.
“Well -” You swallow nervously. “- Hermione Granger confunded you. And I found out and didn't tell you.”
“Okay?” His eyebrows knit together worriedly. “Then what?”
“That’s it.”
“That’s what you came out here to tell me?” He laughs and runs his hands through his hair. “I thought you were about to break up with me or something.”
“What? No!” His palpable relief is confusing you. “You’re not annoyed with me?”
“C’mere,” he says, pulling you close to him. You stand between his legs and rest your forehead against his chest. His arms are like a warm, weighted blanket around your shoulders. “I’m not annoyed with you about school Quidditch tryouts. You’re acting like you confunded me - not Granger.”
“I should have told you or Madam Hooch or, well, anyone,” you tell his chest. “But I didn’t because I thought Ravenclaw’s chances would be better if Weasley was Keeper.”
He snorts a laugh. “Well, you were wrong. I was awful when I played in that one match, remember?”
“You’re really not mad at me?”
“You’re forgetting I already know how ruthless you are when it comes to Quidditch. I just can’t believe you’ve been feeling guilty all this time.”
“I sort of forgot about it until I was speaking to Alicia.”
“What else were you guys talking about? I looked over and, well, it looked deep.”
“Definitely not deep. She was just saying I’m too serious and that you’re arrogant and entitled.”
“Lots of opinions for someone who broke up with you and barely knows me.” McLaggen rolls his eyes.
“Do you think I’m too serious?”
He looks down at you, considering you for a moment. “I think you worry a lot and that it’s probably exhausting to live in your head. And don’t get me wrong, there’s a lot to worry about right now, but sometimes I think you think you need to be responsible for it all. And you don’t.”
You nod. “I don’t feel great about having a party when people like me are in hiding.”
“We’re still hiding. Or have you also forgotten you’re a fugitive responsible for my kidnapping?” He raises an eyebrow.
“And you’ll never escape,” you say, allowing yourself a small smile.
“I hope not.” He smirks. “What about me? Think she’s right”
“Entitled? No. Arrogant? Yes. But in fairness, you don’t have a lot to be modest about.”
“Lucky you,” he says, with that cocky look you love so much, waiting for your usual sharp retort. But you just bring your hand up to touch his handsome face.
“I am.”
“You’re supposed to argue and say I’m the lucky one. Now I do sound like an entitled dick.”
“I can’t believe you thought I might be coming out here to break up with you.” You’re not sure where you’d be without McLaggen right now. Probably holed up somewhere alone, or worse, still in Azkaban.
“To be honest, that still sounds more plausible than you apologising for keeping a secret about Quidditch tryouts last year when there’s a war going on.”
“Yeah…” You frown when you hear raucous laughter coming from inside the lighthouse.
He kisses the top of your head. “How about you and I sit this one out? The Fidelious Charm is impenetrable. Everyone who knows about headquarters is in there right now. But if it makes you feel better, we can.”
And his words of comfort make you believe it in a way that Alicia simply dismissing your concerns and telling you to relax didn’t. Really believe it. That you’re safe.
And that you’re not overreacting. That he gets it.
Gets you.
You shake your head. “You’re right. I need to stop worrying. At least for tonight. Let’s go back inside and enjoy ourselves. Angelina, Wood and Alicia are going home tomorrow - when are we all going to get to do this again?”
You weave your way through the party, chatting and occasionally accepting drinks thrust into your hands as music plays from McLaggen’s Uncle’s radio. You pass Davies as he leaves Krum on the sofa to get more drinks. You replace his empty seat next to Krum.
“I like this,” Krum says, looking appraisingly around the room.
“It’s all Carmichael’s doing. If there’s one thing he’s mad for, it’s a party. He was probably planning the whole thing in Azkaban.”
“Not the party. It is like having friends. Not just fans.”
You look at him a little sadly. He’s not expecting sympathy but the matter-of-fact way he said it makes your heart sink. You know what it feels like to not have many friends. It was only this year, after all, that you made your own.
“You can’t take part in a prison breakout without becoming friends at the end of it,” you smile.
He takes a sip of beer thoughtfully, looking at McLaggen. “At first, I am not so sure when he says you are his girlfriend. You are very bossy. But now I am thinking you are a good match. He is a good leader too. He fought vell in Azkaban.”
His unsolicited, backhanded compliment out of nowhere makes you laugh.
“Thank you. I think?”
Krum nods at Cho talking to Davies. She laughs hard at something he says and her long, shiny hair swishes in the dim light of the kitchen. “I also think your friend is very pretty. But I knew Diggory. They were together at the Yule Ball.”
“They were. But she can’t be expected to be alone forever. She’s had boyfriends since Cedric if that’s what you’re getting at.”
“This is good to know.” He stands up. “I’ll see you later,” he adds bluntly, standing up and making a beeline for Cho as if worried that any time she spends talking to Davies instead of him is an opportunity wasted.
Before you have time to be offended by Krum’s abrupt departure, Carmichael launches himself next to you, followed closely by McLaggen who slaps Carmichael’s head and squeezes between you.
“Keep your bloody hair on. You could have just asked me to shift over,” says Carmichael, slapping him back. “You alright, mucker?”
You nod. “You’ve done it again, Carmichael. Some party.”
“It’s all I’ve been thinking about in Azkaban for the past month,” he says and you feel warm satisfaction - somehow knew that’s exactly what he’d have been doing without you there. “Needed something to think about when you done a bunk.”
“I’m sorry, Eddie -“ you start but absurdly he just laughs.
“Only winding you up.”
“I didn’t want to leave you there alone. I swear.” Even though Carmichael is just teasing, you still feel like you need to explain.
“It’s true - it’s the first thing she said when she saw me,” confirms McLaggen with a slightly awkward look. “I wanted to get you out at the same time, it’s just that -“
“Don’t get your knickers in a twist, alright? Maz got me up to speed, didn’t she? You broke into Azkaban for me. Can’t ask for much more than that.”
You nod. It still barely feels real. You did it. You got him out. And he’s doing… surprisingly well. “I can’t believe you’re so upbeat. I was a mess.”
“The Patronus every night kept me going. And I kept our old routine up.”
“What routine?” asks McLaggen, looking confused.
“You never told him about our very exciting schedule?” asks Carmichael.
“I’ve not told anyone anything about Azkaban, to be honest. Except the layout so we could draw up a plan.”
“Well, we’d recite facts all day and do burpees all night to keep sane. I think I’ve nearly remembered every plant from ‘One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi’,” reminisces Carmichael.
“That was basically all we did until the Patronus came. We couldn’t chat or anything or else the Dementors would sense us having fun. But when your Patronus showed up we could actually talk about things that mattered,” you add and squeeze McLaggen’s hand.
“You really did us a solid, mate.”
McLaggen nods at Carmichael and returns the squeeze of your hand gently.
As the night goes on, you, McLaggen and Carmichael are soon joined by Marietta as you catch up sitting on the fat leather couches. Leanne and Rodger Davies appear too and McLaggen pulls you onto his knee so Leanne can sit down, while Davies plants himself on a cushion on the floor. You look at the old grandfather clock - Krum and Cho have been conspicuously missing for almost an hour.
“You think they’re… they’re alright though?” you ask, looking at the kitchen window. You’re worried they’ve accidentally stepped outside the perimeter of the Fidelius Charm.
“They’re fine,” insists McLaggen. “Trust me, you don’t want to stumble across something you can’t unsee.”
Just then, Cho and Krum burst through the back door in a more giggly fashion than you’d have expected from the internationally famous player.
“Oi, oi,” grins Carmichael. “Where you been?” They glance at each other and there’s an obvious silence as they hesitate. The only the sound is of The Weird Sisters coming through the radio.
“I remember this,” says Krum, changing the subject. “This vos the music at the Yule Ball.”
“Isn’t it funny that we were all at the Yule Ball?” asks Leanne. “Who would have thought three years later, we’d all be here together?”
Not you, anyway. For most of your time at Hogwarts, your only close friend was Cho and briefly, Alicia. Now you’re quite literally surrounded by friends.
A thought strikes you. “Who did you go to the Yule Ball with?” you ask McLaggen. You didn’t really know him back then.
He clears his throat. “Er, one of the girls from Beauxbatons.” You don’t fail to notice the sympathetic look Leanne gives him. Neither does McLaggen. “It’s alright,” he laughs. “I’m over it now. Really.”
“Wait, what happened?” you ask.
“Took his V-card and fled the country,” says Carmichael.
“Oi, it wasn’t like that.” Carmichael raises his eyebrows at him. “Alright, maybe that was the jist of it.”
“I hear that, mate,” says Davies and you give him a tight-lipped smile in commisseration, remembering how he was devastated when Fleur Delacour went home to France and never wrote back to him.
“What about you?” asks McLaggen. “Who did you go with?”
You shrug. “I didn’t have a date. I just went alone.”
“Yeah, but you never finished the night alone,” says Alicia, coming over with Wood, Katie and Angelina. “Remember?”
At the Yule Ball, Alicia noticed that you didn’t have a date either. And you hadn’t wasted time in finding out why she too had spurned invitations from the boys at Hogwarts. But you’d rather she didn’t flaunt it in front of your current boyfriend, who you notice, holds onto your waist a little firmer than before as you sit in his lap.
“I am thinking that I am not the only one who vos heartbroken after the Trivizard Tournament,” says Krum, and you’re grateful that the normally stoic Seeker has warmed up enough to change the subject again. He looks intently a Cho. “I vos sorry about vot had happened to Diggory.”
Cho smiles, a little sadly but she doesn’t look upset. “He would have been here too. At headquarters with us. He’d have loved being part of the D.A.”
As the night draws into the small hours of the morning, the group begins to retire to bed. Alicia, Angelina and Wood make their excuses since they’re getting up early to leave tomorrow. Soon after Katie and Leanne yawn and declare they’re tired and go upstairs too, shortly followed by Davies.
“Right then. Party favours anyone?” asks Carmichael, wiggling his eyebrows at the five of you remaining.
Without waiting for a reply, he leaps off the sofa and runs up the stairs.
“Where’s he going?” you ask Marietta.
“Probably to get something from his bag.”
This perplexes you. “Where’d he get his bag?”
“I stole it from the Department of Magical Confiscated Items before I left the Ministry.”
“You did?!”
“Marietta Edgecombe.” McLaggen whistles, impressed. “It should be your mug shot in there.” He points to the front page of the Prophet, still open on the table. But Marietta just flips her hair over her shoulder with a proud smile as she hears Eddie trundling back downstairs with something clutched in his hand.
“Right, here we go,” says Eddie putting three heart-shaped vials on the table.
“Nope, no way,” you say. You recognise them immediately as love potion.
“Look, it’s different. You drank a whole bottle last time, didn’t ya? If you have half each it’s a better experience.”
You and McLaggen exchange glances. You don’t want to make a fool of yourself again.
“What was it like last time?” Cho asks you. “I’ve never had a love potion before.”
“What do you mean ‘what was it like?’ - you saw me.”
“No, I remember that. Vividly,” grins Cho, and you expect she too is remembering you trying to kiss her like a possessed maniac. “What did it feel like?”
“I dunno, I was in a weird state of mind.” You and McLaggen were broken up and you remember begging him to fuck you in the cubicle as he resisted your pleas. “But it still felt… good, I guess. Circumstances aside.”
That’s an understatement. It felt really good. You wonder what it’d be like if McLaggen wanted you in the same insane, feral way you wanted him that night. It’s not as if he’s shy when he’s feeling amorous but still, the idea makes your cheeks flush.
“Should we?” you ask him.
“You want to?” He reaches across your legs to pick up the small bottle. “I’m not doing it right here though.”
“Good, I don’t even remotely want to know what your turned-on face looks like, mate,” laughs Carmichael before swerving a cushion that McLaggen tosses at his head.
“Are you guys…?” You look between Marietta and Cho. Marietta nods but Cho looks at Krum waiting for his answer. He shakes his head and Cho looks slightly disappointed.
“Not tonight,” says Krum. “I vant to be lucid when I’m with you.”
She looks taken aback by his forwardness but it cheers her up significantly. McLaggen hesitates looking at the bottle but you press his hand closed and look at him meaningfully. Maybe, just maybe, using it with him could repair your so-far tainted relationship with the potion.
McLaggen tears his eyes from your hungry look and helps you to your feet. “Right, we’re turning in to get some rest. See you guys later.”
You squeal when he grabs your hand, dragging you towards the stairs.
You close the bedroom door behind you and lock it with a wave of your borrowed wand. You pause thoughtfully. “I’m gonna move the chest of drawers in front of the door - just in case.”
“A bit overkill, isn’t it?” asks McLaggen.
“I wanted to fuck anything and everything last time. It’s just an extra precaution.”
“Hmm,” he murmurs, turning the small vial in his hands and sitting down on the bed. “You sure it’s not going to be too intense for you? We don’t have to.”
“I mean, based on what happened to me last time, you know you lose most of your autonomy, right? All you’ll want to do is fuck me.”
“That’s all I want to do most of the time as it is,” he grins.
“I’m serious. It’s like losing yourself and only listening to the horny part of your brain.”
He doesn’t look too concerned with this revelation. “Sure you want to do it again? You hate love potions.”
“I just hate bad experiences with them. Are you sure you want to?”
“I’m always sure when I’m with you,” he says as you sit down on the edge of the bed beside him. He opens the stopper decisively and takes a drink. You both stare at the bottle.
“That’s almost all of it…” you say, your pulse rate quickening, remembering how you felt when you drank an entire bottle.
“It felt like barely a sip!” He holds it up to the light. “I think there’s about a quarter left.”
“That’s a generous estimate.”
McLaggen is much bigger than you after all - maybe it’s fine if he has more. You take the tiny bottle, drink the last few drops and when the liquid spills down your throat you immediately feel it warming in your chest. The burning sensation sinks lower and lower into your pelvis.
You look at Cormac. God, he’s beautiful with his messy curls and his eyes focusing intently on your face. But his usually bright green eyes almost look black right now.
“Your eyes…” you say, blinking up at him.
“My eyes?” He blinks a few times. “What about your eyes? They’re so pretty.” He cups your face with both hands. “So, so pretty.”
With difficulty, you tear your eyes off him and look at the door.
“Let me just move the drawers,” you say, turning on the bed to face the door so you can grab the wand lying on the other side of the mattress. “Wingardium Leviosa - oh fuck -”
Your careful movement of the drawers is interrupted when Cormac crawls behind you on all fours and clambers over you, squeezing your tits from behind and knocking your wand arm so they crash into the door with a thud.
“Wait - Cormac -“ The feeling of his hot breath against your ear as he nuzzles into your neck makes your cunt throb. You extend your wand arm towards the door again. “Muffliato.”
White noise buzzes around the bedroom door as you place your wand down and try to turn around to kiss him but his body cages you in, preventing you from changing position.
Cormac roughly pushes your T-shirt and bra up over your head so he can grope the bare flesh of your chest from behind.
“Fuck. You smell so good,” he says, breathing in the scent of your hair.
You feel his cock pressing against your backside. You want his touch more than anything right now but there’s a niggling feeling at the back of your mind. The sensible, ‘too serious’ part of your brain is yelling at you. Calling you an idiot for locking yourself in. But the love potion flowing through your veins is shouting louder. Telling you to do whatever will ease the throbbing sensation in your underwear.
Your core burns when he removes a hand from your chest and you hear the gentle clinking of his belt unbuckling. He’s never asked to fuck you like this before - you don’t mean under the effect of love potion - but from behind. And without any preamble, insistence on eating your pussy first or sweet murmured words of how much he loves you.
Silently he reaches around and unbuttons your jeans and when his hand brushes over your pussy you let out a whimper. It’s only the lightest graze but your skin tingles in response. Cormac pulls your jeans and underwear down to your knees, not even bothering to remove them completely as you remain on all fours.
“Fuck,” comes his low, ragged breath when he sees your pussy - blushed pink, sopping wet and ready for him to do whatever the fuck he wants with you.
Suddenly his chest is pressed up against your back and the length of his cock rubs underneath you, along your lips and brushing your clit. Every sensation is heightened. From the way his hands find your hard nipples to how his stubble scratches your shoulder as he kisses and bites your skin.
You feel yourself getting stickier and wetter from the way he’s dragging his length along your cunt. Until you realise he’s barely moving at all - that it’s you who’s pushing back against him chasing the gentle friction while he sucks a fresh bruise on your shoulder blade.
Cormac’s hands cease their rough groping of your body and you feel him position himself at your slick entrance. The head of his cock slowly glides between your folds but you can’t wait for him to slowly sink into you. Full of longing, you urge your hips backwards, feeling a shiver go up your spine as he penetrates you.
“So fucking tight…” he groans as he grips the soft curve of your hips and you rock on your knees until he’s pressed flush up against you. You unsteadily bring your hand to your clit but he reaches round and pushes your own hand aside so he can toy with the pulsing bundle of nerves, begging for attention. The rough pads of his fingers, coated in your juices, dance against you in time with your rocking.
Bright, white light - brighter than any Patronus - flickers behind your eyelids as you chase the sensation. You pant and whine under his touch, feeling like a wild animal in heat as you get yourself off on his cock. But why isn’t he moving? You had expected from the way he crawled on top of you that he’d be desperate to fuck you too.
“Cormac, fuck - fuck me… please,” you babble, knowing how much he likes it when you beg for him. The steady rhythm of his fingers picks up, rubbing in circles all over your clit.
“I can’t - can’t -” He swallows.
You push your hips back harder, gyrating into him as far as you can, feeling the stinging stretch of his cock opening you up as your body cries out for him. You bounce back wildly against his still body and your pussy clamps and convulses around him. Cormac frantically works your clit under his hand, guiding you to the blinding light just out of your own reach.
“Why?” You sob, in a pathetic, drawn-out wail. You were sure he’d want you the way you wanted him in the Prefect Bathroom. The way you want him right now. But here you are, making an idiot of yourself again, the love potion making you act in a way that you know is embarrassingly unbecoming but your body doesn’t seem to care.
He grits his teeth. “If I start - I won’t - I can’t be gentle.”
Oh shit.
“Don’t be gentle, then. Fuck me - fuck, fuck…”
Pleasure floods through your entire body, the love potion setting every nerve ending ablaze as your orgasm takes hold of you. You don’t even realise how loudly you’re cumming until he grunts your name and you can barely hear it over your own mewling.
Your arms give way and your face presses against the sheets as you collapse in a dishevelled heap, catching your breath and feeling your cunt twitch helplessly in the wake of your orgasm. The feeling you’ve only experienced once before, of love potion evaporating from your consciousness and your thoughts becoming instantly coherent, washes over you as your chest heaves and intense clarity sets back in.
He pulls out of you and your hips slump down to meet the bed too. But the anticipated sensation of his cum leaking out of you doesn’t happen.
“Did you…?” You look over your shoulder and watch him silently remove his T-shirt over his head. He clenches his jaw as he takes off his jeans. Cormac straddles your lying figure from behind and his hands massage the flesh of your ass, roaming over your curves until his thumbs spread your pussy - still flushed and swollen for him.
“Are you okay?” you ask. He doesn’t reply - he simply adjusts himself, taking hold of his warm, wet cock. You suck sharply through your teeth when he forces himself down into your sensitive cunt.
Oh, fuck.
You can barely move. You try to tilt your hips up, to find a better angle but his weight on your thighs presses down on you - hard. Maybe if you had a pillow to lie on…
“Let me just grab -”
His hand comes down with lighting quick reflexes and pins your outstretched arm.
“No.”
He grinds down on you, using his forearm to push on your back so you’re flat against the mattress as his cock rams undiscerningly against your G-spot. And you realise, as he ramps up pace, that he was fighting against the love potion, letting you cum first so he could finally give in to the urge to fuck you mercilessly.
Cormac’s hand laces through your hair and wrenches your head back. He kisses you desperately but you wince and attempt to pull back. He makes a shushing noise, his lips pressing against the side of your face.
“Shh, just take it… take it… take it…” Every hushed insistence is punctuated with a thrust.
Jesus fucking Christ.
Cormac is taking your permission not to be gentle seriously. Your pussy leaks as you forget to protest and your body willingly accepts the uncomfortable hold he has on you. His fingers remain firmly entwined in your hair as he fucks himself into you. You wonder if he can even register that you’re his girlfriend and not just a warm, wet fucktoy for him to do whatever he pleases.
You know he’s being too rough with you. He knows he’s being too rough with you. But right now he doesn’t care. You wonder if he’s always wanted to fuck you like this and it’s just that the love potion has made him lose all sense of how he should behave.
The thought makes your pussy clench - that he’s always been so loving and gentle with you because he knows he ought to be. That he makes himself hold back because knows he’s so much bigger and stronger than you.
And now…
You let out an involuntary whine and quickly feel yourself blush right down to your chest when he laughs in response. A triumphant laugh, with his teeth bared against your cheek as he continues to thrust down into your pussy, his hips slapping your backside so hard it stings.
Fuck, you’re going to cum again. Going to cum from being used as nothing but a hole for Cormac to empty himself into. His free hand slides under your chest and squeezes your breast roughly. It’s definitely going to leave a mark.
Your thighs twitch as your G-spot is fucking pounded into submission. You can’t tense and squeeze the way you normally do so you just have to accept your fate and pray that his cock keeps hammering into that same exact spot that you’re so desperate for. You wonder if he’d listen if you told him to keep going.
“Please, Cormac - there. Keep - fuck - right there.”
“Yeah? Fuck. You’re such a slut. Such a pretty, fucking, slut,” he slurs his words right against your ear.
Oh shit.
He’s never called you that before. Probably because he knows under normal circumstances you’d curse him. But you’re in no position to do so right now. And what’s worse - for some reason, it turns you on in a way that you never imagined it would.
“Yes,” you breathe.
“That’s right,” he says, gritting his teeth. “You gonna cum for me like this?”
You try to reply in the affirmative but instead, a broken yelp is ripped from your throat. The bedsheets bundle up tight under your fists as another wave of ecstasy takes hold of you, dragging you by your hair under the surface.
And then you feel the drop approaching without any indication of slowing down.
An empty dark space filled only by Cormac fucking you so hard that his hips drive you right down into the mattress. So deep and so tight that the air is forced from your lungs under the sheer weight of him. Every part of your walls constricts around his cock, gratefully squeezing him, thanking him for making you cum like this.
He lets go of your hair and anchors himself to your body by holding onto your tits. He gasps and groans wildly, and with a few more deep, grinding thrusts he pushes as deep as he can, cumming deep into your cunt. You twitch involuntarily around his cock, the aftershock milking every last drop he empties into you.
Cormac’s dead weight collapses on top of you and he pants breathlessly for a few moments. Even though you’re crushed, you’re comforted by his warm body. But it doesn’t last long. He pulls out of you and lies on his side, quickly brushing loose strands of hair out of your face.
“Baby… baby, are you okay?”
You remain lying on your front and turn your head to look at him. His eyes are full of deep concern.
“Yeah, I’m - I’m more than okay… are you?”
“I dunno, I - I tried to hold back but… fuck -” He brings his hand to his head. “I - called you a slut,” he whispers.
You laugh and pull yourself close to him, lying on your side and feeling his cum leaking out of you onto your thigh.
“Are you sure you’re alright? The love potion’s not -”
“Yes,” you stress.
He looks at your breasts, covered in blotches. “Oh, god.” Cormac moves downward and places soft kisses on your chest, so gentle it makes you giggle.
“I’m sorry.”
“I told you - it’s okay. Are you feeling alright?”
“Just - fuck - I never let myself lose control like that.”
Your suspicions are confirmed.
“You know… you’re allowed to lose control when you’re with me. I’m not that fragile.”
“But -”
“No, listen, I know you’re a gentleman and I love that you make me feel loved, even adored when we have sex. I do. But if I’d known you had wanted to just pin me down and fuck me hard before, I would have let you. Wanted you to.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” You shuffle down to meet him and smirk. “I’m not saying all the time. You know how much I like being adored.”
He smiles and kisses the top of your head, before pulling you close.
“I don’t want to break you.”
“Psht, I can handle it.” you smile.
You lie quietly, breathing in the warm amber and jasmine scent lingering on his chest. It smells like home to you.
“I can’t imagine what it was like for you that time in the Prefect’s Bathroom. I mean, after that, I almost feel bad for not fucking you back then,” he murmurs into your hair and inhales deeply. You wonder if you smell like home to him too.
You laugh. “It was rough. But you made the right decision.”
“I mean, fuck, I had you. And I still felt like… I dunno. Like I was going crazy. You were right in Slughorn’s class.”
“In Potions class? What?” Your eyebrows pull together in confusion, trying to recall.
“Way back in our first lesson together, when you said they should be banned -” He frowns. “- I feel sick thinking what would have happened if it was me instead of you who drank it at the seventh-year party. I was able to hold you but if it was the other way around you wouldn’t have stood a chance.”
You shrug. “I’d have done alright if I had my wand.”
“Unlikely. I’ve seen you duelling, remember?”
“Nah, I wouldn’t have duelled you - I’d just have done a binding spell.” You mimic waving your wand. “‘Incarcerous’ - then you’d be tied up so I could just wank you off. Sorted.”
You said it as a casual joke but Cormac’s breath catches in his throat as he holds you.
“What?” You look up and see his face has turned pink.
“I think…” He clears his throat and laughs. “I think that’s just awoken something in me.”
You gasp in mock scandalisation. “Cormac McLaggen tied up and forced to cum by someone who ‘wouldn’t have stood a chance’ otherwise.”
“It was you who suggested it!” He protests as he laughs and rolls on top of you, lying between your open hips. He presses his forehead against yours and you look in his eyes. They’re normal again. Devastatingly green.
“Imagine the Daily Prophet found out that’s what I’d been doing to you the whole time you were here, kidnapped.”
“Stop, I can only get so hard,” he smirks.
Cormac kisses you and runs his hand down the back of your thigh. You suck on his bottom lip before grinning up at him wickedly. “Who’s a slut now?”
Lana's Fics @training4theapocalypse-backup - Tumblr Blog | Tumgag
