Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/8284004.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Soul_Eater, Harry_Potter_-_J._K._Rowling
  Relationship:
      Giriko/Justin_Law
  Character:
      Giriko_(Soul_Eater), Justin_Law, Arachne_(Soul_Eater), Shinigami-sama_|
      Lord_Death
  Additional Tags:
      Crossovers_&_Fandom_Fusions, Age_Difference, Developing_Relationship,
      Teacher-Student_Relationship, Unhealthy_Relationships, Pining,
      Graduation, Power_Dynamics, Alcohol, Swimming, Anal_Sex, Hand_Jobs
  Series:
      Part 2 of Every_Little_Thing
  Stats:
      Published: 2016-10-25 Completed: 2016-12-06 Chapters: 7/7 Words: 18297
****** The Sorcery Within ******
by tastewithouttalent
Summary
     "Giriko isn’t cut out for teaching." Giriko's been chasing students
     out of his Care of Magical Creatures class within the years since he
     started his tenure as a professor. Unfortunately his usual tactics
     don't work on the newest Ravenclaw student.
***** Blank *****
Giriko isn’t cut out for teaching.
He knows this. He’s known it his whole life, could have told Lord Death as much
a handful of decades ago when he was a sullen seventh-year attending classes as
much out of dug-in habit as out of any real interest. He had wanted to be a
dragon tamer, to go wandering the wilderness without anyone hovering over his
shoulder or insisting on a particular way to do things, where the only thing
anyone really cared about was whether he brought wild dragons in for training
and, to a lesser extent, that he didn’t get himself killed while out on a
mission. But he lacked the connections for that pursuit, in the end, and a
brief stint working with the curse testing branch of the Ministry had left him
with a rough-edged scar across his stomach, a laundry list of crimes to his
name, and the threat of a sentence to Azkaban long enough to undo whatever
sanity he had left to him and leave him useless for any kind of civilized
society.
He should be grateful, he supposes. Lord Death had offered both himself and his
erstwhile Ministry supervisor refuge at the school, claiming to the Ministry
that he was taking full responsibility for their rehabilitation and
reintroduction to society and that allowing Arachne and Giriko to graduate
without ‘considering their underlying psychological struggles’ was a failing of
the school rather than of their own psyches. Giriko had thought for a few weeks
that the academy was going to be closed entirely during the uproar; but this is
hardly the first time Lord Death has used his sway to take in those wizards and
witches deemed too unsafe for general society and turn them into members of his
faculty. It’s a matter of loyalty, Giriko supposes -- when you’re offered a
reasonably ordinary life in exchange for work, you’re unlikely to turn on your
employer -- but he suspects it has more to do with a faith in their ability to
reform that Giriko, at least, doesn’t share. But Arachne settles into the
library with far more grace than Giriko expected, seeming as at home there as
she did on those few occasions he ran into her while they were students
together, and if Giriko is relegated to handling the magical creatures at the
periphery of the school grounds, well, he doesn’t much like the rest of the
staff anyway. With a whole host of dangerous creatures to look after and one of
the less popular elective courses to teach, he manages to slide through the
first two years without any more inconvenience than scowling at the few third-
years who make the mistake of signing up for his class. None of them stick
around past the first year of what lackluster education Giriko provides, and
that’s just the way Giriko likes it; the sooner he can be left alone with the
animals he finds far easier to deal with than humans, the better.
Unfortunately he always has to chase off the new students at the start of each
school year. Giriko avoids the entrance ceremony and indeed the Great Hall
entirely as much as possible; he’d prefer to visit the kitchens directly if he
needs something, and by now the house elves know to bring meals directly to his
home without being told. The farther Giriko can get from the responsibilities
of the school to which he owes his loyalty the happier he is; but today is the
first day of teaching class, and much though he’d like to growl and frighten
off the half-dozen third-years in front of him, he’s been told politely but
firmly that he must make at least an attempt at teaching, at least until all
the students have requested permission to transfer to another elective course
for next year.
“Hey,” he says to this group, fixing the lot of them with the most intimidating
scowl he can muster. “Care of Magical Creatures?”
There’s silence. There’s always silence, if he manages to growl the name of the
class with sufficient force; in this case all six of his temporary students are
staring wide-eyed at him, the majority looking like they’re considering bolting
for the relative security of the castle behind them. Giriko fixes his attention
on one of the shakiest, a boy nearly a foot shorter than those around him, and
demands, “That what you’re here for?” The boy cringes, taking a half-step back
and looking away from Giriko’s gaze; his motion takes him halfway behind the
cover of one of the two girls in the class, a Slytherin who looks like she’s
considering retreating just as fast as her classmate is attempting to.
“Hey,” Giriko says again, without easing his fixed glare on the cowering boy.
“First rule of my class is you answer when I--”
“Yes.” The answer comes from the back of the class, a high voice with
surprising calm under the tone; it’s not the terrified boy trying to melt into
the ground but one of the slightly taller ones, if still not of a height with
the Slytherin girl. He doesn’t look nervous at all, when Giriko lifts his head
to consider him; in truth he doesn’t look like much of anything, at first
glance. His pale hair is almost the color of his skin, the combination
stripping him down to completely bland normalcy; except that his eyes are fixed
on Giriko without wavering at all, his gaze so blue and blank he looks more
like a doll than a living human. Giriko blinks, some part of his awareness
murmuring Imperius?; but of course it’s not, no one would bothering Imperius-
ing a thirteen-year-old boy even if they could get away with it on academy
grounds, and when he looks for it there’s still attention behind that stare,
some whisper of human emotion that comes out in the weighty pause before the
boy appends “Sir” to his statement in that same flat tone.
Giriko frowns. It’s not a comfortable experience to be stared at so directly
and without any trace of the fear he’s trying to elicit; it feels like a
challenge, even if he knows it’s absurd to feel so about a student when he
clearly holds the position of authority. “Who the hell are you?”
“Justin Law, sir.” Again there’s that title of authority, delivered with such a
complete lack of emotion it feels more mocking than laughter would. “I’m one of
your students for Care of Magical Creatures.”
“I’m no sir,” Giriko snaps. He’s glaring at the other now; the boy is
unremarkable, bearing all the unpleasant traits of the half-growth children
Giriko finds so distasteful, except for that complete lack of fear behind the
strange uncanny flat of his eyes. His robes are absolutely black, the standard-
issue cut perfectly within the letter of the school rules, without any of the
adornments to tell his House affiliation or personal character the other
students so regularly affect. Giriko’s scowl deepens. “What the fuck are you, a
Gryffindor?”
Justin shakes his head, a short, sharp arc of motion to give a precise response
to Giriko’s question. “I was Sorted into Ravenclaw.” His tone gives the verb
the capital letter it technically deserves; hearing him feels like listening to
a textbook given voice and an ostensibly human form. “I believe your language
is inappropriate for a school setting, Professor.”
“Shut the fuck up,” Giriko growls, and takes a step forward towards the cluster
of students. They scatter before him like leaves in a wind, ready to abandon
their classmate at the first sign of trouble; but that doesn’t seem to ruffle
Justin’s composure any more than anything else does. He keeps watching Giriko
with those strange eyes, with that self-assurance so uncomfortably wrong in
that child’s face, and even when Giriko is looming over him with all the
implied threat his greater height and breadth can bring to bear Justin barely
blinks, doesn’t give away the least sense of danger in any part of his
expression.
“This is my class,” Giriko tells him, grating the words in his throat like he’s
revving an engine deep down inside the span of his chest. “I’m gonna talk
however I damn well please so long as I’m the one teaching it. If you’ve got a
problem with it, you can take your propriety and take yourself right the fuck
back out of my class and find yourself another elective.”
Justin stares back at Giriko for a long minute. Giriko wonders if he won’t just
turn and leave; knowing Ravenclaws he’ll do the proper thing and go to the
Headmaster’s office to complain to Lord Death directly. It’s a relatively minor
infraction compared to the things Giriko did in his first few months at the
school; there’s no chance of any measurable fallout, other than having to
suffer through one of Lord Death’s long-winded chats over cups of the tea
Giriko hates. He’s ready for it, ready to grin victory as soon as Justin turns
to go; and then Justin blinks, and ducks his head, and Giriko is left
speechless as he says, with that same perfect calm, “You are correct. I
apologize, Professor.”
Giriko feels like he missed a step while climbing stairs. There was no sign of
intimidation behind those blank doll eyes, nothing like uncertainty in the
boy’s expression; he had surrendered all at once, without giving any warning
that he was about to do so, and Giriko is left feeling more unsettled than if
Justin had indeed turned on his heel to retreat to the relative safety of the
castle. He gapes for a few seconds, his thoughts too scattered to allow him to
regain coherency for the span of several heartbeats; and then he drags his
mouth into the weight of a scowl, and turns away to stride away at once.
“Anyone else got a problem with me?” he asks, turning on his heel to glare at
the remainder of the class. They cringe back in a panic so instinctive it
undoes some of the uncomfortable distaste in Giriko’s chest, and when he
continues it’s with his scowl twisting into a vicious grin at this evidence
that the rest of his class, at least, is normal. “Good. Let’s get this over
with, then.”
The rest of the class goes smoothly, or at least as smoothly as anything
involving Giriko trying to babysit six thirteen-year-olds ever does. Justin’s
questions are thankfully limited and focused on the subject with a laser
precision that Giriko might appreciate in someone else; but his focused stare
doesn’t get any less unsettling over the course of the class, and by the time
Giriko dismisses the students by the simple expedience of telling them to “Fuck
off” with an evocative hand wave, he’s already looking forward to the relief of
the beer waiting for him inside his house.
He sincerely hopes that Justin Law is among those who decides to transfer to
another elective.
***** Persist *****
Objectively, Giriko has great luck with that year’s batch of third-years. He
gets two to drop in the first week -- the terrified boy and the tall Slytherin
girl -- and manages to chase off another just before the first round of
midterms by offering the threat of a test involving Ashwinder eggs and a timed
test period. By the end of term, Giriko is confident the trio of students left
will be requesting to switch electives for the next school year and leave him
free to reestablish his reign of terror over a new handful of third years.
Justin Law, unfortunately, is not one of the dropouts. Giriko had hoped the boy
might cave eventually, or even just get bored of the travesty of teaching
Giriko offers by way of curriculum; but after their brief conflict the first
day Justin offers no complaints at all, almost no words at all, just arrives to
class on time and listens without any trace of emotional reaction to anything
Giriko does. Giriko keeps a closer eye on him than usual for the first few days
-- where there was once rebellion there might be again -- but then he stops,
because the steady focus in Justin’s expression is too uncanny to watch for
very long without starting to feel discomfort like dread rising low in the pit
of his stomach. Justin doesn’t look at things -- he seems to see through them
instead, until Giriko begins to feel like it’s his own innermost thoughts on
display with every class period rather than details on the proper caring and
raising of Phoenix chicks.
The only comfort Giriko has is that Justin isn’t particularly good at Care of
Magical Creatures. He studies, at least, or has a memory for spoken directions
as uncanny as the color of his eyes; Giriko can’t get him to make even the
slightest error on any kind of written test. But the animals don’t seem to care
for him any more than Giriko does, they shy away from his touch regardless of
how slow the boy moves or how much patience he demonstrates. Eventually he
manages to make contact with some of the slower and less skittish creatures,
the ones that warm up to anyone given enough exposure; but Giriko is gratified
by the difficulties Justin is having, even if they’re beyond his ability to
control personally. It might be fine for the first year of classes, but the
higher-level creatures only get more finicky and harder to handle. Surely the
same intelligence that earned Justin his House sorting will let him see that
any further pursuit of Giriko’s class is doomed before it begins, and he will
quietly remove himself from the elective with the coming of the new school
year. This happy thought soothes Giriko through the interminable process of
final exams, and the parties and celebration that come with the end of every
school year, and finally classes are over, and the students are gone, and
Giriko is left to peaceful pursuit of his own interests for the ever-too-short
duration of the summer months. By the time September returns, as it inevitably
does, Giriko is very nearly optimistic for his newest batch of third-years.
After all, there’s no way they can be worse than the prior year’s.
They are.
Giriko should have checked his class roster. He never bothers -- he doesn’t
care about the names of students he doesn’t yet know and hopefully will soon
never see again -- so when the sheet of parchment arrives in Lord Death’s
curving handwriting he cast it aside to be forgotten as it is every year. When
his first day of classes arrives, he goes out wholly unprepared to meet the
handful of third-years, wide-eyed with nerves and uncertainty...and a single
fourth-year with pale blond hair and blank blue eyes.
Giriko stops dead. “You,” he grates, ignoring the cluster of new students -
- eight, this time, the most he’s ever had at once -- in favor of fixing the
one recognizable face with his most vicious scowl. “What the fuck are you doing
here.”
“I enrolled in the second course you offer in Care of Magical Creatures,”
Justin says, with that same untouchable calm that seems so deeply at odds with
his apparent age. “I passed the first and wished to continue my studies.”
“You barely passed the first,” Giriko tells him. He had thought about failing
Justin outright, considered abusing his prerogative as a professor to force the
other out of his class on the basis of his dreadful practical exam grades in
spite of his perfect written performance; but it had felt too much like
cheating, somehow, in whatever silent war they have going on, so in the end he
had given the boy a mediocre grade and assumed common sense and an interest in
perfect academic performance would do the work for him. It seems like a foolish
hope, now, with Justin staring calmly back at him from the crowd of his new
students as the first fourth-year to ever continue in Giriko’s Care of Magical
Creatures course. “You have zero talent for working with animals, you know.”
Justin nods without looking so much as self-conscious. “I know.”
Giriko scowls hard at him. “So why are you here? Shouldn’t you be burying
yourself in Arithmancy or some other bullshit Ravenclaw class instead of
forcing yourself to continue with what you’re terrible at?”
“I’ll never improve if I only ever run away away from my failings,” Justin
says, sounding so level and steady Giriko feels a little like he’s being quoted
at, or as if Justin has somehow stolen the position of professor from him to
lecture in his place. “I chose to pursue this course from the electives
available to me last year and I intend to see it through to its conclusion.”
“No,” Giriko says. “Get out of my class.”
Justin tips his head to the side, very slightly, like a bird trying to get a
read on something it’s looking at.  “I passed the prerequisite course,
correct?”
Giriko growls. “Barely.”
“I did pass,” Justin reiterates. “This course only requires completion of the
previous class to join. As I meet the minimum requirements, you cannot refuse
to offer the curriculum to me.”
“You little brat,” Giriko hisses. “I should have failed you in the first
place.”
Justin meets his glare without so much as blinking. “You didn’t. I’m taking
this course.”
“Damn it,” Giriko spits. “I’m not passing you this time, I don’t care how
perfect your exams are. If you can’t work with the animals there’s no point in
you pursuing this, this is a waste of time.”
Justin blinks at him. “Do you intend to begin class today, Professor?”
“Fuckyou,” Giriko growls, and looks away from Justin to the remaining third-
year students. They’re staring at him or at Justin, eyes wide and mouths agape
like a single choreographed unit. Giriko hates them all instantly. “Maybe I’ll
just fail all of you right now and save myself the effort.” That brings their
attention back to him at once, widens their eyes on panic and brings about a
few half-formed protests from the more studious ones; Giriko silences them with
the most vicious growl he can muster and a “Anyone who complains can leave
right now and save us all some time.” That brings about quiet, at least, to go
with the fearful gazes of overprotected children who have never faced anything
worse than the possibility of failing a course, and Giriko fixes his attention
firmly on the newest batch of students as a better use of his energy than
trying to figure out how to gain the upper hand with his old one.
It’s going to be a very, very long year.
***** Change *****
Giriko doesn’t fail Justin out of his class. He thinks about it. He thinks
about it a lot, with every written test that he skims over and every practical
exam he glares through. It’s a pain to teach two levels at once, the worse
because with Justin the only fourth-year representative Giriko has to deal with
him directly far more than the never ever he would prefer. He looks forward to
the first practical exam, is ready for Justin to fail so miserably Giriko has a
justification to drop him on the spot; but Justin’s been practicing on his own,
or sheer persistence pays off for him in a way Giriko has never seen it work
for anyone else ever before, and he does a passable job of completing the task.
Justin’s spellwork with the bowtruckle Giriko has brought in for the purposes
of testing the only fourth-year student he’s ever had is mechanical, like
something studied too long alone without someone to critique it, but it’s
unfortunately perfectly effective for the purposes of the exam. Giriko glares
Justin off at the end of that class, but Justin is as unaffected as ever, and
he handles all future exams with the same tolerable efficacy, if without any of
the natural grace Giriko might find more admirable. At the end of the year
Giriko doesn’t even bother speaking to Lord Death about the possibility of
assigning a failing grade; he knows without asking that he has no grounds for
it, and that even his most persuasive argument of he’s the most annoying
student in the entire school is unlikely to carry any weight with the far too
tolerant Headmaster. So he gives Justin his pass, and locks up all his teaching
material, and takes the summer months to take a long research trip across
central Europe and avoid the subject of next year’s classes entirely.
He does check his class roster this time. There’s a pair of third-years who
chose to continue from his latest batch -- he’s sure that’s Justin’s fault, for
putting the idea in their heads by example and by distracting Giriko from his
usual efficiency in chasing new students out -- and Justin, of course,
requesting to join the fifth-year course that will again have no one in it but
himself. Giriko glares at the roster, downs a shot of the vodka he brought back
with him from his trip, and scrawls down several ideas for sufficiently
dangerous creatures for fifth-year students to work with before he goes to bed
still as irritated as when he first opened the note. He’s still out-of-sorts on
the first day of class, but there’s nothing terribly unusual in that, and at
least this time he’s expecting the silent rebellion of Justin’s flat stare from
the lineup of students. He goes out before they arrive, glaring at the castle
as if to summon the students with the force of his frustration, and so he sees
the cluster of them as soon as they emerge from the front gates, a larger group
even than last year and chatty in a way that grits his teeth. There’s
apparently enough of them to require the escort of one of the prefects; Giriko
can see the height of an older student ushering the others forward, like a
pilot attempting to steer a particularly recalcitrant craft into some semblance
of order. He doesn’t envy the student the job; but then again, at least the
prefect can leave as soon as they’ve handed off the new students to Giriko.
He’s stuck with them for the rest of the class session.
“Shut up,” Giriko offers as greeting as the students come close enough for him
to see. The third years are easy to pick out; they’re the unfamiliar faces, and
the expressions that go wide with confusion at his unorthodox greeting. The
fourth years are less confused, and also the ones who were quiet already as
they came up; they just look resigned, like they’re bracing themselves for the
year to come. Giriko passes over the array of faces, already readying himself
to growl irritation at the blue stare he knows will be waiting for him; but
there’s no blank expression, no washed-out hair, no sign of the student who’s
become frustratingly familiar over the past two years. He frowns, looks over
them again; but there’s no mistake, and there’s no Justin anywhere amidst the
cluster of students in front of him.
“Damn,” Giriko mutters, more for his own benefit than for the hearing of the
children in front of him. He can feel himself starting to grin, can feel the
vicious tug of tension at the corner of his mouth as he looks up to glance at
the escorting prefect. “All that trouble to send you out here, and you--”
Forgot one, he’s going to say, going to grin delight all out-of-line with his
words; but his vision comes into focus on the escort, and his words die on his
lips, because it’s not an escort at all, and if there is a prefect badge pinned
to the front of those robes it’s totally secondary to the actual identity of
the student watching him with all-too-familiar eyes.
Giriko hadn’t even recognized him. It’s not unreasonable, he thinks; Justin has
gained more than a foot of height over the summer, has lost all traces of
softness at his shoulders and hands in exchange for the skinny angles and harsh
lines of puberty forcing his body to a height his weight hasn’t yet caught up
to. Even his face is different, if still holding to some of the baby-soft
roundness he’s carried for the last two years; there’s the suggestion of
cheekbones, now, the very beginnings of a jawline underneath the pale of his
skin, and then there’s the simple fact that his eyes are on a level with
Giriko’s now if not a little bit above. Giriko thinks he might not recognize
Justin at all, even with the odd pale of his hair, if it weren’t for the fact
that his eyes are exactly the same as always, his gaze still as unreadable and
flat as ever.
“What the fuck,” Giriko blurts, entirely forgetting the rest of the class in
front of him. “Justin?”
Justin doesn’t blink. “Yes.” His voice is different too, if still in a far
higher range than Giriko’s; it’s settled a bit, dropped down by an octave from
the childish heights it once scaled and into something a little more resonant,
a little lower in his chest.
“The hell happened to you?” Giriko asks, too off-balance to think through the
rhetorical stupidity of his question.
“I was made a Ravenclaw prefect,” Justin says, and that’s not at all what
Giriko was asking but it’s enough to bring him back to the moment, to shut his
mouth on any additional absurd questions and scowl past the burn of sudden
embarrassment that he can feel surge under his skin. Justin doesn’t look away
now any more than he did in his first two years; his stare seems to carry more
weight, now, with his extra height to support his focus. Giriko feels more off-
balance than he has since Lord Death offered him a reprieve from Azkaban.
“That’s obvious,” he finally musters, and looks away from Justin’s gaze to
consider the remainder of the students in front of him. They’re all watching
him with varied expressions of curiosity, boredom, and mild fear; it’s not the
best start he’s ever made, but it’s still preferable to continuing to meet
Justin’s stare. “I hope you all realize what you signed up for,” he growls, and
watches the eyes meeting his go wider with the beginnings of concern. That’s
better. “There’s a reason this is the smallest elective course at the school,
and I’ll make sure you all realize it before the week is over.”
He tries not to look at Justin again. It’s easier to talk to the newer
students, or even those with enough backbone or enough masochism to make a
return after taking his course last year. The fifth-year he ignores entirely,
avoiding so much as eye contact for the whole of his introductory warning; but
by the time class is over Giriko’s glanced at Justin a handful of times, on
accident rather than intent, and every time Justin is staring right back at him
as if he hasn’t so much as blinked in the intervening minutes.
Giriko wishes he didn’t feel so much like that might actually be the case.
***** Bind *****
Giriko lifts his gaze from the scroll of parchment slowly. Part of this is
because he is trying to make a point of the action. Part of it is that he’s in
no real hurry to meet the flat stare of the student standing in front of him.
And part of it is that he thinks reading over the request in front of him has
given him an instant headache, and he can’t see anything in the conversation to
come but what will make it worse.
“An apprenticeship,” he says, grating the words into as much vicious edge as he
can possibly give them. “What the fuck do you want with an apprenticeship.”
Justin’s focus doesn’t so much as flicker. Giriko didn’t really expect it to -
- it hasn’t in the last four years he’s had the boy as a student -- but he
holds out desperate hope as the last refuge he has against the endless
attention in those blank blue eyes. “I’m interested in pursuing a career in
Care of Magical Creatures,” he says, delivering this statement as if it’s
something reasonable, as if it’s something a perfectly ordinary top student
would select from the infinite options Giriko knows full well exist for Justin
at the present moment. “I’ve been excelling in your course for the last four
years. My Head of House informed me that an apprenticeship is the next step.”
“You haven’t been excelling,” Giriko spits across the table at him, shoving his
chair back from the support so he can get to his feet and turn his back on
Justin completely. The few rooms of his house that have always been more than
sufficient for his purposes feel too small with Justin in the middle of the
space, as if the ceiling is bearing down on them both to crush Giriko out of
existence before he can work himself free of this conversation. “You’ve only
barely been passing because you haven’t managed to light yourself on fire yet
or kill anything on accident.” He pulls a bottle from the back of the cabinet:
Firewhiskey, far stronger than the beer he usually drinks, but a necessity at
the moment if only to ease the painful pressure throbbing at his temples. “You
must be doing better in every one of your own courses, why this one?”
“I enjoy the challenge,” Justin says, without any trace of enjoyment in his
voice or on his face.
Giriko coughs a laugh and cuts his glare sideways at Justin. “Don’t fucking try
that,” he growls, and downs a swallow of the Firewhiskey. It’s too much, it
burns all down his throat and knots poisonous heat in his stomach, but he
doesn’t give in to the urge to cough, just lets the heat ache into his blood
while he swings his arm out to gesture at Justin with the open bottle. “I’ve
known you for years, don’t think I can’t tell when you’re lying through your
teeth.”
Justin’s expression flickers. It’s a tiny tell, just a half-motion of pale
lashes and a fractional shift of his lips, but Giriko was watching for it, and
the burn of victory that it brings with it is infinitely more warming than the
alcohol burning down his throat. He takes another swallow, slower this time,
and by the time he emerges he doesn’t have to reach for the dragging grin at
the corner of his mouth, the one that makes Lord Death tsk about professional
appearances and that makes grown men flinch back in fear when Giriko approaches
them.
“What the fuck is your problem,” Giriko says rather than asks, punctuating by
setting the Firewhiskey down hard against the edge of his table and taking a
step forward to glare at Justin from a closer range. “You’re terrible with
animals, you know you are. Why are you so goddamn stubborn that you won’t admit
when you can’t do something?” He takes another step forward. Justin is still
watching him, his feet planted and shoulders steady; he doesn’t look at all
frightened by Giriko’s approach. He doesn’t look like much of anything, other
than ostensibly alive and possibly focused on the conversation. Giriko is
reminded vividly of that first day of classes again, of facing down a stare so
blank he thought of the Unforgivables as an explanation instead of logic; for a
brief, insane moment he wishes for the shape of the curse on his lips, wishes
for the flicker of light from his wand to let him crack open the polished shell
of Justin’s composure, to let him see what kind of insanity might lurk, must
lurk, behind that unchanging expression.
“You could do anything,” Giriko tells him, and when he takes a step forward it
brings him close against Justin’s unwavering stance, brings his eyes perfectly
on level with the other’s. They really are of a height, Giriko is surprised to
see; Justin looks taller at a glance, but face-to-face like this Giriko doubts
there’s more than a half-inch of gap between them. “You’re a model student in
every one of your other classes. You’re the star Ravenclaw Seeker, for fuck’s
sake. You could be an Auror, a teacher, a goddamn Quidditch idol.” Giriko
hisses the words like they’re blows, like the rough edge of his voice will tear
blood from Justin’s untouched skin, but Justin barely blinks, barely breathes;
he’s still staring at Giriko like he’s waiting for something, like maybe he’d
stand there staring at the other forever if Giriko didn’t do something to force
him off-balance. It makes Giriko’s skin crawl, makes his teeth grate against
each other as he glares into those unresponsive eyes; when he reaches out it’s
to slam his palm down against the parchment still on the table, to pin Justin’s
request to the wood as he can’t manage to pin down the other’s motivations.
“Why the fuck are you so determined to ruin my life?”
Justin shakes his head. It’s a tiny, precise motion, so abbreviated it barely
shifts the pale hair curling across his forehead. “I’m not.”
Giriko throws his hands up. “Then why the goddamn fuck are you insisting on
this? You have no talent. You don’t even like this class. Why didn’t you drop
your first year with everyone else?”
Justin blinks. The movement is strange to see; Giriko wonders vaguely how
rarely he’s seen it before, to feel so unsettled now. Or maybe it’s just that
he’s so much closer, that he can see the shadows clinging to Justin’s lashes to
cast the weight of them into a darker shade than the pale of his hair, to
spread odd illumination over his eyes until the blue looks nearly black for a
brief moment.
“I don’t like the class,” he says, his tone flat with sincerity but his voice
lower than Giriko remembers it, dipping down like he’s thinking about hitting a
lower range even than the summer of his fifth year granted to the childish
height of his voice. “I don’t care about Care of Magical Creatures at all.”
Giriko takes a breath, ready to push back with the obvious conclusion to this
sentence; and Justin’s chin tips up, the light catches his eyes to the
brilliance of a summer sky. For a moment Giriko loses his voice, loses his
coherence to grasp to words; and it’s in that moment that Justin speaks, still
with that same absolute calm on his voice. “I like you.”
Giriko is certain for a moment that Justin is joking. There’s no indication of
laughter in the other’s expression or tone; but it’s the first answer his
skidding thoughts light upon, the only thing with any trace of plausibility
under it of the dozens of ideas Giriko’s mind seizes upon and discards as
quickly. Certainly it makes more sense than taking the other’s words at face
value, than taking the implication of interest, of affection from the lips of
someone two decades Giriko’s junior, from a boy only barely clear of the edge
between childhood and adolescence, from a student who Giriko--
“Shit,” Giriko blurts, and stumbles backwards to collapse into his chair again,
his movements made suddenly clumsy in a way he’d prefer to attribute to the
Firewhiskey than to the panic currently running all through him. In fact while
he’s at it he’d like to attribute the whole of this conversation to the
Firewhiskey. Maybe Justin has only ever been an extended hallucination of his,
maybe he should go and visit the Infirmary for treatment for an imagined
addition to his reality that has proven remarkably consistent over the past
four years’ worth of classes. Giriko more than half-wishes he could make
himself believe that’s the case; but Justin is staring at him still, is
watching him without a flicker of uncertainty behind his eyes, and this time
Giriko’s the one who looks away.
“No you don’t,” he says, because that seems like the most reasonable point to
start from. “You don’t like me, what the fuck, you’re a kid.”
He can see Justin’s shoulders stiffen even in his periphery as he reaches for
the Firewhiskey again. “I’m sixteen.”
Giriko cuts a glare sideways up at Justin still standing on the far side of the
table. “Kid,” he repeats, harder this time, determined to hold to his claim
even with Justin’s fixed gaze trying to undermine him. “Do you have any idea
how much older I am than you?”
“Significantly,” Justin says, looking and sounding completely unperturbed. “I’m
old enough to legally consent.”
“I don’t give a damn,” Giriko grates out, and swallows back a long draw from
the bottle in his hand. “You’re my student. I can’t fuck my student.” Justin’s
lashes dip, just for a moment, the weight of them going suddenly heavy like he
can’t hold them up; his mouth goes soft, his cheeks shade into the faintest
hint of color, and Giriko would swear up and down that he’s never so much as
considered Justin that way before but for a heartbeat of time his imagination
dips into shadow, for the span of a single breath he can color Justin’s skin to
a darker flush, can imagine the part of those lips on something more than
momentary surprise. He’s the one who blushes, this time, his skin rising to a
burn of self-consciousness dark enough to show up even under his usual tan, and
when he retreats to the bottle it’s as much to give himself another reason for
his flush as to chase away the sharp awareness of his own too-vivid
imagination.
Justin clears his throat as Giriko sets the bottle down. Giriko doesn’t look up
at the other’s expression -- he keeps his gaze fixed firmly on the label on the
Firewhiskey -- but the burn of the alcohol in his throat does nothing at all to
push aside the clear care with which Justin frames his words, as deliberately
as if he’s laying down a verdict in some court of law. “I won’t be your student
forever.”
“No,” Giriko growls at the bottle. “You’ll graduate, and you’ll leave, and
you’ll be glad you stopped wasting your time on a bullshit elective with an
unqualified teacher.”
“I won’t.” Justin’s voice is lower than Giriko has ever heard it, so tense it’s
verging on actual chill; Giriko glances up through his hair, just for a moment,
just long enough to catch a glimpse of the look in Justin’s eyes. The summer
sky is gone; there’s winter there, now, an ice that Giriko didn’t know the
other had in him, cold like snow, like the water of the Great Lake in the hard
freeze that comes with December, like the stare of some domesticated animal
gone feral and vicious overnight. It’s not Imperius behind Justin’s eyes, now;
it’s Crucio, delivered in the icy tone of certainty, or maybe the Killing Curse
itself, pressing against the other’s set lips like he’s ready to fling a hand
out and offer wandless murder across the span of Giriko’s house. Giriko’s
breath freezes in his lungs, his whole body goes tense with instinctive,
reflexive fear, and Justin keeps staring at him, his gaze locked onto Giriko’s
without so much as a flicker of dark lashes to break his focus. “If you won’t
accept me as an apprentice then I’ll take it up with Professor Stein, or
Albarn, and I’ll work with them until I graduate.” He reaches out to touch the
curling edge of the paper between them, to pin the weight of it down against
the table as if it’s in any danger of being knocked askew, as if Giriko isn’t
keenly aware of the curving sweeps of ink across the parchment in a handwriting
as precisely, perfectly beautiful as Justin is himself, as Giriko never has
been and will never match.
“But I don’t want to work with them,” Justin says, and slides the parchment an
inch forward, until the curling end is sliding over the edge of the table to
fall into Giriko’s lap. Giriko doesn’t look away from Justin’s stare. “I want
to work with you.”
Giriko glares up at Justin. He’s willing the other to blink, to flinch, to turn
away or flush into embarrassment or react in some ordinary, human way to the
conversation they’re having. But Justin just watches him, his expression wiped
clean of that brief, momentary heat, even the frigid fury behind his eyes
vanishing behind the inscrutable wall he so often shows. Giriko wonders what
kind of heat there might be to find, if he could pull that mask off, wonders
how much anger Justin has fitting inside those narrow shoulders and those
skinny wrists, wonders which of them would win, if he pushed it to the point of
a fight. Wonders if there even is a fight still to be had between them, or if
the decisive battle has already been fought and lost.
“Why?” Giriko asks, finally, setting the bottle in his hand down hard against
the top edge of the parchment, just alongside Justin’s bracing fingers. “What
in Merlin’s name is there for you to like about me? Fuck, I don’t even like
you.”
“I know,” Justin says, calm and controlled once again; and then his lips
twitch, his mouth curves, and he’s smiling, so suddenly and so brightly that
Giriko feels like he’s been blindsided, like Justin’s just slammed a punch into
the side of his head and left him dizzy and reeling from the impact. He doesn’t
know what expression he offers in response, but whatever it is, it’s apparently
entertaining enough to pull Justin’s smile wider still, to crinkle the corners
of those brilliant eyes and huff his breathing into the outline of what is
almost a laugh, something approaching the childish delight Giriko has never
seen the least trace of anywhere in Justin’s behavior. “That’s why I like you.”
Giriko stares at Justin, his mouth open and his thoughts spinning; Justin
catches a breath, and closes his mouth on the soft of that smile, but it still
clings to his lashes, still tugs hard at the corner of his lips. Giriko never
wants to see Justin look so human again. Giriko already craves another glimpse
of that smile.
“Fuck,” he says succinctly, and ducks his head over the parchment as he roughly
shoves the edge back over the support of the table and reaches to fumble for a
quill. His is dry, the ink in the pot long since evaporated without his notice;
but Justin has one, of course Justin has one, is offering a perfect owl quill
across the table even as Giriko is hissing frustration at the dried ink on his
own. Giriko looks back up at the other, his scowl digging grooves into the
corners of his mouth; but Justin just gazes blandly back at him, his mask
perfectly in place and not so much as slipping even when Giriko snatches the
offered quill from him with a growl too vicious to allow space for coherent
words. His scrawled signature is as vague as the sound he made; but it glows
bright against the parchment as he draws the quill away, the haze of light
standing as binding proof for the apprentice he has just taken on.
“Here,” Giriko says, shoving roughly at the quill and parchment together with
one hand while he reaches for his bottle with the other. “You got what you
wanted, right? Now get the fuck out of my home, I don’t want to see you again
until finals.”
“Of course,” Justin says, as perfectly calm in his agreement as he is in
collecting the scroll of parchment and rolling it back into a neat curl. His
pen he tucks away somewhere in the uninterrupted black of his robes while
Giriko swallows another mouthful of Firewhiskey, and by the time he’s lowering
the bottle from his lips and dragging the back of his hand over his mouth
Justin is ducking his head into a nod that completely fails to carry any
indication of submission with it.
“Thank you,” he says, his voice back to his usual absolute politeness to match
the steady focus behind his eyes as he lifts his head to meet Giriko’s glare.
“I look forward to working with you this summer.”
“I don’t,” Giriko says, his fingers still tight against the neck of his bottle.
“I told you to get the fuck out.”
“Your wish is my command,” Justin says with perfect equanimity, and he’s going,
leaving Giriko’s home with the same deliberate attention he shows in all his
movements. Giriko glares after him, watching the motion of the other’s actions
flutter the edge of his robes; they’re almost mechanical, show an attention
that keeps them from achieving real fluidity, but there’s something strangely
intriguing about them in spite of that that Giriko can’t look away from, as if
Justin’s starting to grow into the clumsy length of his new height and is
finding some kind of uncanny elegance to his actions with it. He’s still
staring when the door swings shut behind Justin, the rattle of the weight
landing against the frame enough to startle Giriko back into himself; and then
the only thing left to him to do is to scowl at the shut door, and hiss
something incoherent and furious at the wood, and dedicate himself to getting
well and truly drunk in an effort to stave off the power of an overactive
imagination awoken from a years-long slumber by the hint of color under
Justin’s pale skin.
He falls asleep over the table instead of making it to the comfort of bed, but
at least the discomfort keeps him from remembering the details of the
overheated dreams that linger well through the morning.
***** Self-Preservation *****
“That’s really all you needed?” Justin asks from the edge of the Great Lake,
where the ripples caused by his motion are lapping against the rocks that line
the perimeter. “I could have collected that in ten minutes.”
“Yeah,” Giriko says, reaching out to adjust the leaves Justin returned with
where they’re drying along the rock neck to him before bringing the beer in his
other hand to his lips and taking a deliberately long swallow from it. “I
coulda done it in five.” He shrugs one-shouldered without looking away from the
bright glow of the summer sky overhead. “Don’t worry about it though, for your
first time you were quick.”
“I thought it would be a longer project,” Justin says, shifting so he can rest
an arm against the rock in front of him to hold himself steady. “Isn’t using
gillyweed for this a bit wasteful?”
“Oh wow,” Giriko says to the sky with mock surprise. “I guess you’re right. I
coulda just cast a charm on you and let you go down that way, huh?”
Justin huffs from the surface of the water. “I could have done it myself if you
had told me.”
“You shoulda asked.” Giriko swallows another mouthful of beer, savouring the
bitter tang of it on the back of his tongue as the cold liquid slides down his
throat. “‘Stead of just doing what I told you to without questioning anything.”
“Yes,” Justin deadpans from the lake. “I trusted the professor in charge of my
apprenticeship, how could I have made such an amateur mistake.”
“I should fail you just for that,” Giriko declares. “Then I’d have my summer to
myself again instead of giving up my entire vacation to tutor a Ravenclaw
brat.”
“You could go right now,” Justin points out. “You’d at least have forty minutes
of peace before I can go anywhere but here.”
Giriko glances down. Justin’s not looking at him; he has his chin braced
against the support of his arm over the rock, his head just free of the water
so the gills brought about by his unwary consumption of the gillyweed Giriko
offered him can stay below the surface of the lake. His hand shows the signs of
it too, with the thin span of webbing that has spread up to connect the elegant
lines of individual fingers one to the next, but his face is unaffected, his
eyes still their usual summer blue and the pale of his hair only made slightly
darker by the weight of the water that’s soaked into it. Even that’s drying
rapidly in the heat of the afternoon; Giriko can see the very edges of the
strands curling to softness against Justin’s forehead even as the other gazes
out across the hill in front of him.
“Nah,” Giriko says, and kicks a leg out in front of him to hang over the edge
of the rock he’s sitting on while he braces himself with his free hand. “I
kinda like watching you suffer.”
Justin’s mouth quirks at the very corner, just for a moment. “I’m hardly
suffering.”
Giriko grins. “Nice and cool for you down there?”
“It is.” Justin turns his head to consider Giriko alongside him instead of the
grass of the lakeside. “Isn’t it quite warm for you?”
“Shut up,” Giriko tells him. “I ain’t swimming for you or anyone.”
Justin blinks. “Don’t you know how?”
“I can goddamn swim,” Giriko scowls. “There’s just no point when I can send
idiot apprentices down to deal with the merfolk and save me the trouble.”
Justin hums. “It really is comfortable,” he says, his gaze sliding down from
Giriko’s face to catch at the hem of the other’s jeans, rolled up around his
knees in allowance for the wading he was doing a few minutes before. Justin
shifts to rest his head against the support of his arm against the rock, the
blue of his gaze sliding half-focused as he moves, and when he reaches out with
his other hand it’s to touch the very tips of his fingers to Giriko’s bare
ankle, like he’s feeling for the shape of the bone underneath. “You might as
well join me, if you’re already planning to spend the next half hour gloating.”
Justin’s skin is cool to the touch, chilled from the water and the effect of
the gillyweed together; Giriko can feel the cool run up his leg from the
ghosting contact, as if the weight of Justin’s fingers is draining the human
warmth from his veins to pull him down towards the water’s surface, to draw him
into the cool unfamiliarity of the world below. He takes a breath and feels air
catching uncertain in his lungs, like his body is already craving the weight of
water dragging through gills, as if the contact of Justin’s skin is enough to
make the effort of breathing with human lungs a burden rather than an instinct.
“The lake’s going to your head,” Giriko says, and he doesn’t pull his foot away
from Justin’s touch. “You think you’re some kind of siren, now? Planning to
drown me and have your revenge on me that way?”
Justin’s gaze skips up from the weight of his fingers at Giriko’s skin, his
ever-unreadable eyes fixing to hold Giriko’s stare steady against his. His hair
is half-dry, now, his face turned up to catch the glow of the sunlight against
his skin. There’s the faintest dapple of shadow across the high arch of his
cheekbones, the beginnings of freckles brought out in exchange for the flushed
sunburn that clung there for the first two weeks of Justin’s apprenticeship.
Giriko wants to press his mouth against the pattern, wants to drag his tongue
over the summertime shadows and catch his teeth at the delicate skin just at
the corner of Justin’s lashes to press in the dark of a bruise of his own
claiming, a mark to stand alongside those the sun has already left against the
inhuman porcelain of the other’s skin.
“Yes,” Justin says, his thumb sliding to curl around Giriko’s ankle and make a
delicate cage of his hold. “Be careful or I’ll pull you under.”
“I should be careful?” Giriko asks. His fingers brace against the cool
condensation at the side of the Ever-Chilled glass against his palm. “You’re
underestimating me, kid.” He takes a long, slow swallow; when he looks back
Justin’s gaze has slid from his eyes down to his neck, washed-out blue
lingering against the motion clinging to Giriko’s throat. “Might turn out you
have a shark on your hands instead of the easy prey you expected, and your
gills won’t last forever.”
“No,” Justin says. His fingers tighten, his thumb digs in hard against Giriko’s
skin to score a thin line of pain over the other’s ankle; Giriko hisses,
jerking sideways in a reflexive attempt to pull free, but Justin lets himself
be pulled with the motion, the surface of the lake rippling into fractured
patterns as he shifts through the water. He catches at the edge of the rock
Giriko’s on with his free hand, webbed fingers spreading wide for traction; the
wave of his wake catches over his shoulders to splash wet into his half-dried
hair. When he looks back up it’s from almost directly below Giriko’s position;
Giriko imagines he can see the midday sun catching to glow white-hot behind
Justin’s lashes, imagines he can see the shimmer of endless depths to the blue
of Justin’s eyes. “It’s only a matter of time.”
Giriko stares down at Justin gazing up at him, feels the double meaning of the
other’s words slide down his spine as if Justin had pulled those uncanny-cool
fingers all down the curve of his back. He swings his foot sideways to pull his
ankle free of Justin’s hold, uncaring when the other’s fingernails catch to
scrape aching pressure over his skin, and then kicks out against Justin’s
shoulder, shoving down to force the other under the surface of the water in a
rush of movement. Justin goes down while he’s still shutting his eyes to the
press of the water, the pale of his hair splashing under the dark surface of
the lake in immediate surrender to the force of Giriko’s movement, and for a
moment there’s just sunshine sparkling bright off the splash of the water, even
the outline of Justin’s pale limbs gone vague and distorted by the angle of
illumination travelling through the liquid. Giriko draws his foot up onto the
rock in front of him, watches the surface of the water smooth and clear into
the placid calm of a mirror; and it’s only then that Justin reemerges,
smoothly, without the gasping lungful of air that would ordinarily follow such
a forced submersion.
“You’ve got no sense of self-preservation,” Giriko tells him while Justin is
still blinking to shed the weight of water from the dark of his lashes. “You
keep on like this and something’s going to eat you alive someday.”
Justin’s gaze skips up to land at Giriko’s face, his eyes as focused and steady
as ever. There’s no trace of fear in his expression, not even the tension of a
laugh or the weight of a frown at his lips; just attention, flat and focused
and pristine, and maybe the faintest suggestion of shadow tangled in his lashes
and fitting against the curve of his mouth.
“Yes,” Justin says, and pushes away from the shore of the lake to tread water a
foot away, just out of reach of Giriko’s position at the rocky edge. “I suppose
something will.”
The ripples across the lake smooth and flatten to glassy clarity, the air goes
quiet but for the summertime heat; but neither Giriko nor Justin look away from
each other for a long, long time.
***** Tempt *****
It’s nearly sunset by the time Justin arrives. The nights are still long in the
early months of the year, the shadows descending early and lingering late, and
Giriko rarely finishes dinner before the fading light of the day is spreading
to oranges and reds across the sky. He hurries through his meal today, his
thoughts racing and his motions mechanical and the quicker for the lack of
distraction, but if he’s impatient Justin must be even more so, because Giriko
has barely Vanished his clean-scraped dishes when there’s a knock against his
door, the separate raps careful metered to such a precise accuracy that that
alone would tell who it is visiting even if Giriko wasn’t expecting company.
Giriko can feel his skin prickle to heat, can feel a shiver as of electricity
run down the whole length of his spine, and when he speaks to growl “It’s
unlocked” it’s with roughness on his voice as much to counter that almost-
nervousness as to bid Justin entry.
Justin is slow to respond. The delay goes so long Giriko wonders if his voice
didn’t carry, if Justin somehow didn’t hear the rough edges of permission the
other granted him; but then, just as Giriko is scowling at the door and opening
his mouth for another shout, the handle turns, the door swings open, and Justin
is stepping into the main room, his stride as carefully measured as the rhythm
of his knock. He’s wearing his usual robes, the black unadorned of anything to
tell who he is or even to what house he belongs; but they’re open, this time,
undone all down the front to show the pale blue of Muggle-style jeans and the
fall of a t-shirt bearing the logo of what Giriko assumes is some band printed
in rough-edged lettering across a white background. Justin steps past the
doorway, pauses with his feet just inside the entrance, and when he speaks it’s
with a hand still at the edge of the door, his fingers still bracing the weight
of it open. “Good evening.”
“Yeah,” Giriko says, acknowledgment without any attempt to return the greeting.
His heart is beating harder than it should, harder than it has any right to;
it’s just Justin, after all, by this point Giriko knows the other as well as he
has ever known anyone, including himself. But those blue eyes are watching him,
clear and untouched by any trace of judgment, and Giriko can feel the self-
consciousness that stare always brings unfolding into his veins like a chill,
like ice to make his movements jerky and uncertain.
He nods towards the door, the action rough and forced. “Let that shut. You’ll
be here for a while.”
Justin doesn’t blink. There’s not so much as a flicker across his expression to
show his reaction to Giriko’s words; but his fingers tighten against the door,
just for a moment, for the span of a heartbeat before he draws them back and
lets the weight of it swing shut against the frame. The rattle of the impact
shakes the house and resonates in the back of Giriko’s teeth; it feels like
punctuation, like a dare to action Justin is forming from his very surroundings
rather than aloud.
Giriko turns away. Justin is still standing in the entrance, still staring at
him like he’s awaiting a sign of what to do, and if Giriko keeps looking at the
way that t-shirt clings to the curve of the other’s waist he’s not going to be
able to stick to his plan for the night. So he turns, and reaches for his wand,
and hisses an “Accio” in the vague direction of the kitchen without bothering
to turn around.
“It’s your birthday today,” he says as he waits for the bottles he Summoned to
make their way out of the case and to his waiting hand. “Isn’t it?”
Justin takes a breath behind him. “It is,” he says, careful with the agreement,
like he’s signing a contract by acknowledging the truth of the statement.
“Yeah,” Giriko says, and slides his wand back into his pocket as a pair of
bottles emerge from the kitchen to steer themselves towards his waiting hands.
He catches the chill of the glass against his palms, one in each, and brings
one to his mouth to set his teeth against the metal of the lid. It pops off
easily, the attachment giving way to the practiced force of sharp teeth, and
Giriko lets the lid clatter to the floor as he turns to offer the beer to
Justin. “Happy birthday.”
Justin blinks. There’s a flicker of uncertainty behind his eyes, or maybe
confusion at some part of this situation going counter to his expectations.
“Thank you,” he says, polite even in his confusion, and reaches out to catch
the bottle against his palm.
“You’re welcome.” Giriko leaves Justin to hold the bottle, popping his own open
as he turns fully around and strides in to drop to sit at the table; when he
gestures it’s with the angle of the bottle in his fingers, indicating the chair
across from him without looking at it. “Have a seat.”
Justin hesitates. Giriko can see the other in his periphery, can see his
stillness speaking to his uncertainty, but he doesn’t look up, even when Justin
clears his throat and says, “Should I take my robes off?”
“If you want,” Giriko says. He keeps his gaze on the side of his bottle rather
than meeting the steady attention behind Justin’s eyes. “Make yourself
comfortable. No point in a celebratory beer if you’re all stiff and formal
about it.”
“Ah,” Justin says. “Right.” Giriko keeps his gaze on the bottle, on the table,
on his fingers holding to the curve under his palm; anything is better than
looking up to meet Justin’s stare, or to see what the rustle of sound indicates
the other is doing. It’s not until he hears the click of glass against the
other side of the table, not until he’s sure Justin’s sitting down and out of
reach, that he lets himself look up from under the shadow of his hair. Justin
has taken off his uniform robes, draping them over the back of his chair in a
dark spill of fabric; his shoulders look narrower than usual with just the
white of his t-shirt to span them, his skin winter-pale until it’s almost a
match for the fabric. Giriko’s attention clings to Justin’s face, his focus
seeking out the promise of the summer in freckles he knows to be long-since
absent, and Justin looks up from the table to meet the other’s gaze, his eyes
wide and clear with their usual uncanny focus.
“I don’t drink,” he tells Giriko, his fingers still steady against the neck of
his beer.
Giriko huffs a laugh. “Of course you don’t,” he says. “You’re too much of a
goody-two-shoes to indulge illegally.” He lifts his own bottle, angling it out
over the table in an overt suggestion. “Congratulations. You get to try it
now.”
Justin considers Giriko’s bottle for a long moment, his fingers working over
the glass under his touch. Giriko wonders if he isn’t going to refuse, if he
might not reject this indulgence as contrary to the one Giriko knows he really
wants; but then Justin sighs an exhale, and lifts his own bottle to tap the
weight of it gently against Giriko’s.
“Happy birthday,” Giriko says gruffly, and lifts his bottle to his lips to down
a long swallow of it. The cold of the liquid is soothing, the bitter of the
taste familiar over his tongue; Justin takes a far smaller sip, and coughs hard
at the taste. He has a hand pressed to his mouth when Giriko lowers his beer to
consider him, his cheeks flushed to pink with the effort of his coughing; he’s
looking at the bottle and not at Giriko, his forehead creased into
consideration.
“It’s an acquired taste,” Giriko tells him, the warning too belated to even
approach its intended purpose. “Might as well drink up or you’ll never learn to
like it.”
“Of course,” Justin says, glancing up from his bottle to stare flatly at
Giriko. “That is clearly the logical course of action.”
Giriko gestures with his bottle. “Don’t get all Ravenclaw on me,” he orders.
“Drink.”
Justin doesn’t look like he’s at all willing to comply with this order; but he
lifts the bottle to his lips anyway, tipping his head back to down a larger
swallow than he did the first time. Giriko watches his throat work over the
action, watches Justin’s fingers tense against the neck of the bottle in the
instant before he pulls it away to set back against the table.
“Better?” Giriko asks.
Justin shakes his head. “No,” he says, but his mouth is set on determination,
and he takes another swallow as soon as he’s set his shoulders for it again.
This one is a little smoother, at least; when Justin sets his bottle down this
time he leaves it against the table, lifting a hand to his lips to drag across
the damp clinging to his skin.
“Much though I appreciate the gesture,” he starts, his gaze skipping up from
the bottle to Giriko’s stare at him, “this isn’t precisely what I thought you
intended in inviting me over tonight.”
Giriko raises his eyebrows. “What, you were betting on me bending you over the
table instead?” He lifts his beer to his lips and downs a long swallow of it
without looking away from Justin’s gaze. “I told you, not while I’m your
teacher.”
“I could drop your class,” Justin says. His foot bumps against Giriko’s ankle,
his knee presses close against the other’s leg. There’s color rising across his
cheeks, the faintest indication of embarrassment staining the porcelain pale of
his skin, but he’s not looking away, and there’s no trace of hesitation behind
the focus of his eyes. “You wouldn’t be my teacher then.”
“And you wouldn’t be able to graduate with a full class load.” Giriko kicks
Justin’s leg aside, roughly knocking away the other’s balance before lifting
his booted foot to press hard against the inside of the other’s leg, just above
the open angle of his knee. “If you don’t pass my class I can’t make you my
full-time assistant when you graduate.”
“You could anyway,” Justin says. “Lord Death would let you do whatever you
wanted.”
“You sure about that?” Giriko asks. “What if I don’t want to?” His boot slides
sideways, the tread against the sole catching and dragging at the inside seam
of Justin’s jeans; Justin blinks, the dip of his lashes his only visible
concession to the friction, but his knee tips wider, the open angle of his
thigh making an unstated invitation of his position. Giriko can feel his heart
pounding faster on adrenaline, can feel his breathing catching harder in his
chest. He tightens his grip on his beer and lifts it to his mouth for another
swallow. “You that ready to give up the future for a quick fix tonight?” His
foot slides higher by an inch; he flexes his leg, lets the force grind his toe
hard against the inside of Justin’s thigh. Across the table Justin’s lashes
dip, his expression flickering to shadow for a heartbeat of time. Giriko can
feel the other’s body tense against the pressure of his foot.
“You could,” he says, without taking another drink from his beer and without
looking away from Justin’s stare. The other’s mouth is tense, set into a fixed
line while the blue of his gaze holds steady and unreadable, but his cheeks are
going darker, his skin showing the proof of rising heat that the blank of his
eyes and the set of his mouth are still managing to resist. Giriko’s heart is
pounding, his blood rushing to fire in his veins; his voice is dropping lower,
gaining depth and force as his words turn over to grind to seduction in his
throat. “It’s your call.” He flexes his leg again, sliding his foot up so it’s
his heel against Justin’s thigh and not his toe; the movement draws the contact
a half-inch higher, the incidental action bringing Giriko’s foot closer towards
the inside line of Justin’s jeans.
“Say the word,” Giriko suggests, punctuating with an ungentle shove of his foot
against Justin’s leg, hard enough to rock the other sideways on his chair.
Justin abandons his hold on his beer bottle to grab at the edge of the table,
his hold desperate enough that Giriko can see the tendons flexing to visibility
all along the inside line of his arm; but he’s still staring at Giriko, his
eyes still focused on the other’s face, and Giriko can feel his heart racing
with anticipation, with adrenaline, with something between hope and terror
crystalline and electric in his veins. “Drop my class, if that’s what you want.
You won’t be my student anymore, then; we’d just be two consenting adults, we
can do whatever the hell we want to tonight.” Giriko slides his boot higher,
braces his heel hard against the inside line of Justin’s jeans; if it weren’t
for the weight of his shoe, he’s sure he’d be able to feel Justin hot right
through the barrier of the denim, is sure he’d be able to press the arch of his
foot against the resistance of the other’s cock and grind against the heat of
it. Justin would melt into the pressure, Giriko is certain of it; he’s barely
holding back as it is, with only the clumsy weight of Giriko’s boot shoving
rough against him.
“I’d fuck you right now,” Giriko suggests, feeling his spine prickle with the
thought of it, feeling his voice rumble to shadow in the depth of his chest.
“Tonight. Right here. Happy birthday to you and all that.”
Justin’s lashes dip, his blink slow enough that it’s teetering at the edge of
surrender, and when he opens his eyes again the wall of blue in his eyes is
melted, has given over to shadows so dark Giriko can barely recognize the
other’s expression anymore. His lips part, his chin dips down; but when he
speaks it’s a sentence, it’s a question, coherency still clinging to his throat
beyond the gasping affirmative Giriko was half-expecting. “And tomorrow?”
Giriko stares back unblinkingly. “What about tomorrow?”
He can see Justin’s throat work on a swallow, can see the motion against the
collar of the other’s shirt. “What would we be tomorrow?”
Giriko braces his grip against the curve of his beer bottle and lifts it
towards his mouth without quite completing the motion. “Dunno.” He swallows a
mouthful, lets the bitter of the alcohol saturate his tongue while the cool
liquid slides down his throat. “We’d probably keep fucking around for a month
or two.” He sets the bottle down against the table, hard, so the liquid inside
splashes against the glass. “Then you’ll graduate, and go find some fancy
Ministry job, and I’ll never see you again.”
Justin blinks. “And if I don’t get a Ministry job?”
“Doesn’t matter,” Giriko tells him. “You sure as fuck won’t be working with
me.” He doesn’t look away from Justin’s face, doesn’t break eye contact. “If
you drop my class we’re done when you graduate.”
Justin’s jaw flexes, just barely, a hardly perceptible shift under his skin.
“And you won’t consent to a relationship while you’re my teacher.”
It’s a statement, mostly; Giriko can barely make out the upswing at the end to
turn it to a question. “That’s right. ‘S against school policy.”
“You’re stretching the intent of that policy quite far already,” Justin informs
him. “Isn’t the goal to avoid any possibility of favoritism? Or do you
regularly invite students over for a celebratory drink on their birthdays?”
“Don’t argue the point,” Giriko growls at him. “If I were that worried about it
in the first place I’d have sent you home for the summer instead of signing
your apprenticeship request.”
“So you’re being argumentative,” Justin concludes. “Just because you have the
advantage of power at the moment.”
“Yep.” Giriko tips his bottle up to drain the last of his beer without looking
away from Justin’s face; as he sets it back on the table he pushes his foot in
against the other’s thigh in forceful reminder. “So what’ll it be?”
Justin stares at him for a long moment. The blank wall behind his eyes is gone,
but Giriko can’t make any more sense out of the darkness clinging to his stare
now than he could of the polished-glass blue that’s usually there. Finally he
lets his hold on the table go and drops his hand to catch at Giriko’s boot.
“I’ll wait,” he says, and shoves hard enough to force the other’s leg back and
away. Giriko’s foot falls to the floor with a bang, the motion too sudden for
him to stall, and Justin looks away from his face at the same time, reaching up
to grab for his beer with a shaky hand. “It’s not worth the price.”
Giriko’s eyebrows jump up. “Damn,” he says, surprise taut in his throat. “I
didn’t think you had it in you to refuse.”
“You underestimate me,” Justin says, a statement rather than an insult, and he
tips his bottle up to take a long swallow of the beer inside. “I’ve already
waited this long, I can wait another few months.”
Giriko can feel his mouth twitch on unwilling amusement. “Fine,” he says.
“Guess I can content myself with my hand for a bit longer.” He braces his foot
flat on the floor and leans forward to weight his elbow at the table as he
jerks his chin towards the beer in Justin’s hand. “How’s it taste now?”
Justin glances sideways at him. “The same as it did,” he says. “Bitter.”
That, at least, Giriko can’t argue with.
***** Domesticate *****
Giriko doesn’t attend the graduation ceremony.
He never does. He doesn’t see any purpose to going to a celebration for
students he barely knows, and the seventh-years are always more than excited
enough in themselves that they won’t notice the absence of one irritable
professor from among the congratulatory ranks. He stays at home instead,
listening to the sound of the fireworks breaking over the Great Lake and the
distant shouts of delight from students freed of their responsibilities to
homework and to the school, and he drags his fingertips across the texture of
his table, and he waits.
The knock at the door comes with the cessation of sound from around the Lake,
like a tell for the end of the festivities or at least enough of a gap in them
to allow one recently graduated student to slip away unnoticed. Giriko left the
door unlocked again, could just call an invitation from his position at the
table; but he straightens instead, pushing to his feet with deliberate care
before turning to the entrance to the house. His heart is beating steady in his
chest, marking out an even pace for his footsteps to match; he wonders if
Justin can hear his heavy tread approaching from the other side of the door,
wonders if Justin’s imagination is flaring as bright as Giriko’s own has been
over the long hours of the day between them. But imagination isn’t needed any
more, fantasy is unimportant under the circumstances, because Giriko is
reaching for the handle, and pulling the weight of the door open, and Justin is
standing in front of him.
He looks almost ordinary. His robes are as pristine as ever, smooth and
untouched by any trace of the celebration he must have just come from; his hair
shows no more disarray than it usually does, his mouth is set and his lips are
steady. The only indication that there is anything remarkable about this moment
is his eyes, where the usual flat of his gaze is vanished like it was never
there at all, subsumed by a shadowy weight so great even the pale color looks
nearly black for the intensity of his stare. It’s enough to make him look
dangerous, to make the slim lines of his shoulders carry the power of a latent
threat; for a moment Giriko thinks Justin might curse him, if he were to try to
shut the door on him now.
Luckily, Giriko has no intention of doing so.
“Come on,” he says, taking a half-step to the side to make an invitation of the
doorway into his house, and Justin moves at once, without any indication of
hesitation in entering. Giriko’s position leaves him close enough for Justin’s
robes to brush his sleeve, near enough that he could turn his head and press
his nose against the soft tangle of the other’s hair; he reaches out as Justin
steps past him, catching and closing his fingers hard around the inside of the
other’s elbow. Justin stops dead, his whole body turning in surrender to
Giriko’s hold, and Giriko can feel his heart pounding harder against his
ribcage, as if gaining force from adrenaline more than speed.
“Right here,” Giriko says, and pushes at the weight of the door without turning
to meet the gaze he can feel burning against him. The door swings shut,
rattling into place against its frame, and Giriko is pulling at Justin’s arm,
forcing the other to stumble backwards and towards the entrance again. It would
be enough to shove the other back out the door, if it were still open; but it’s
not, and with the latched door behind him when Justin trips he falls hard
against the support at his shoulders, the impact enough to knock all the breath
loose from his body in a rush. He blinks hard, visibly struggling for clarity;
but Giriko doesn’t wait, doesn’t give him time to catch his breath. He’s
stepping in instead, moving into space that doesn’t exist to shove Justin up
hard against the door, to invade the gap of space between the other’s feet with
the weight of his boot as he leans in close over the other.
“Say the word,” he says, growling the words against Justin’s mouth as he
reaches out to brace his free hand against the wood over the other’s shoulder,
to tilt his weight in until he’s casting Justin in his shadow and the threat of
his body is all but pinning the other flush to the door. “If you want to back
out of this, now’s your chance.”
“No,” Justin says, immediately, giving voice to the word even before he shakes
his head in a jerky motion of negation. “I’m not leaving.” He’s breathing hard;
Giriko can feel the shallow pant of the other’s inhales gusting hot against his
mouth and spilling against the wall of his gritted teeth.
“Alright,” Giriko says, and the agreement feels like a verdict on his lips.
“We’re doing this” and he’s moving, fast, before Justin has a chance to even
gasp an inhale for a response. His hand at the door slides down, his fingers
close into a bruising hold at Justin’s shoulder, and at the same time, in the
same motion, with the same heartbeat, Giriko leans in and crushes his mouth
hard against Justin’s.
Justin’s lips are soft. That much Giriko was expecting, was sure of; he’s spent
long enough watching the deliberate curve of them to know how soft they would
be against the rough line of his mouth. He’s the harder for it, he thinks,
shoving back to force Justin to the wall as he weights his mouth against the
other’s, as he feels that pouting softness give way to the push of his own
lips; there’s an edge in him, a growling ache in his chest, a need to crush and
break and take that is rather heightened by the feel of Justin’s mouth against
his than otherwise. Justin makes a sound against Giriko’s lips, a whimper or a
gasp of surprise, Giriko can’t parse the difference and doesn’t care; it’s
enough to feel it, to have the shudder of vibration run down the back of his
skull and prickle hot against the whole length of his spine, and he wants more
immediately, wants to push past Justin’s lips and lick the sound up out of his
throat again, wants to taste the thrum of the noise in his own body. Giriko
opens his mouth, licks roughly against Justin’s lips, and Justin parts them
immediately, so quickly it’s as if the motion is half-complete in his head
before Giriko even touches him. He tastes sweet, candy-bright over something
darker and richer that clings to the back of Giriko’s tongue, and then there’s
a pull in Giriko’s hair and he realizes Justin has his hand up against the
other’s body, has his free hand at Giriko’s neck and his fingers twisting up
into the other’s hair and that he’s pulling as hard as Giriko is pushing. It’s
not just taking; Justin is shoving back, he’s offering resistance to match and
meet Giriko’s, and when Giriko licks into Justin’s mouth Justin’s tongue trails
the edge of Giriko’s lips too, the motion deliberate and focused like he’s
trying to map the whole of the other’s mouth instead of following the rough
force Giriko is offering himself.
“Fuck,” Giriko says, but the clarity is lost to Justin’s lips, the rough edges
of the word turn over to raw heat against the inside of the other’s mouth.
Justin makes another sound, something lower and farther down in his chest, this
time, and Giriko can taste the coppery weight of it on his tongue in the moment
before he tightens his grip at Justin’s shoulder and pushes the other away
against the wall. Justin gasps a breath, his voice audibly strained with heat
as Giriko forces him away, and his hand tightens with useless desperation, his
arm flexing in a futile attempt to drag the other back in against him by force.
“Robes,” Giriko says, his coherency too scattered to allow for something more
detailed, and he closes his fingers at Justin’s shoulder to a fist on the
fabric, dragging hard to force it free. Justin stumbles at the action, his
balance jerked roughly sideways by Giriko’s hold and the fastening at the
collar of his clothes; but in spite of the haze in his eyes he’s moving
quickly, freeing his grip from the other’s hair so he can reach and shove hard
at the clip at the front of his robes. Giriko growls, something between
encouragement and frustration straining on his tongue, and then the fastening
comes open and Justin’s robes give way to his pull, and he makes a sound of
satisfaction and lets his hold at the other’s elbow go to shove against the
dark fabric instead. Justin’s moving as quickly, twisting against Giriko’s hold
to slide his arm free of the cloth as fast as Giriko can strip it off him, and
underneath there’s another one of those t-shirts, a darker grey this time but
still clinging just as close to the lines of Justin’s chest. Giriko drops the
robes to the floor, disregarding whatever tidiness they might have had in favor
of freeing his hands as rapidly as possible, and the next place his fingers
land is Justin’s hip, his thumb catching and shoving against the hem of that
absurdly thin t-shirt. The fabric slides up easy, giving way to Giriko’s shove
without offering any resistance at all, and Giriko fits his fingers in against
Justin’s waist, pressing in hard like he’s trying to draw blood under the force
of his nails. Justin shudders, his whole body trembling against Giriko’s touch,
and when Giriko pulls Justin arches in towards him, making a concession of his
body as quickly as Giriko’s force makes a demand of it.
“Get these off,” Giriko growls, biting the words off harsh against the part of
Justin’s lips as he pins the other in close against him, as he reaches to shove
roughly against the waistband of Justin’s jeans. Justin is reaching for the
button at the front already, fumbling for traction as quickly as Giriko demands
it, but it’s not fast enough; Giriko is pushing at the denim as the button
slides free of its hold, forcing the weight of the clothing down by an inch by
aggression more than care. Justin still has his head turned up towards Giriko’s
mouth, is still tipping in like he’s trying for another kiss; Giriko gives it
to him, bruising heat against the give of Justin’s lips as the other manages to
get a hold on the zipper of his jeans and drag it down enough for Giriko to
shove the clothing off his hips. He can’t get it far -- it’s impossible to push
past Justin’s knees, for one thing, and for another the other hasn’t yet
managed to struggle free of his shoes -- but he can get the denim down enough,
can strip Justin to the soft stretch of boxers and the pale skin of bare
thighs, and that’s enough for what Giriko wants of him right now anyway.
“Yeah,” he says, encouragement so strong in his throat it sounds
indistinguishable from anger, and he presses his hand hard against the front of
Justin’s boxers, palming roughly over the heat of the other’s cock straining at
the fabric. Justin jerks at the touch, his whole body canting forward so hard
Giriko thinks he’d lose his balance if it weren’t for the grip he has at
Giriko’s neck; but Giriko isn’t particularly concerned about whether Justin can
keep to his feet or not, under the circumstances.He’s far more interested in
growling satisfaction over Justin’s lips, and grinding pressure against the
other’s cock to feel the way Justin’s thighs tremble, the way the other’s body
shudders with every motion of his hand. Justin’s clinging to Giriko’s neck,
now, relying on the other to support the whole of his weight with just his one-
handed hold, and his other is sliding down, tracing against the edge of
Giriko’s jeans like he’s looking for an entry point to the other’s clothes.
There’s the press of fingertips, the catch of contact against the angle of
Giriko’s hip; and then Justin’s touch is sliding down lower, pressing between
the weight of Giriko’s pants and the flushed heat of his skin with uncanny
grace. It should be an awkward angle, should be a struggle to press even
slender fingers down into the barely-present gap; but Justin makes it feel
fluid, like an inevitability, and then his fingers are sliding down below the
barrier of Giriko’s clothes and his touch is skimming the flushed head of the
other’s cock and Giriko is growling far in the back of his throat, desire
spiking too high in him to allow for any coherency at all. He bucks his hips
forward, a single rough jolt of motion to shove hard against Justin’s touch;
Justin’s wrist ends up caught between their bodies, Giriko’s palm shoves harder
even than he intended against Justin, and Justin gusts a whimpering exhale at
the force, his fingers tensing to scratch hard against the skin at the back of
Giriko’s neck.
“Ow,” Giriko says, but the pain sounds like heat on his lips and tastes like
want across his tongue. “You trying to make me bleed?”
“No,” Justin says, but his fingers are still tense at Giriko’s skin, and when
Giriko bucks his hips forward to grind hard against him the shudder that runs
along Justin’s spine scrapes his touch farther by an inch. Giriko can feel the
ache of the dull pain run down the whole of his spine, can feel the heat of it
spill to knot low and heavy in the depths of his stomach. “I’m trying to make
you fuck me.”
Giriko huffs a sharp spill of amusement. “Is that the kind of language they let
Head Boys use at this school?” he asks. He hooks his thumb under the waistband
of Justin’s boxers and pulls down in one quick movement to free the other’s
cock from the fabric; Justin catches a startled inhale, his lashes fluttering
heavy over his eyes, but Giriko doesn’t give him time to collect
himself before he’s fitting his grip around the other’s length and pressing
callused fingers to sensitive skin. “What would your Headmaster say if he heard
you talking like that?”
“He’s not my Headmaster,” Justin says, dragging the words in the back of his
throat until they come out rough and darker than Giriko has ever heard him
speak before. His eyes are all shadow under his lashes, his lips parted on the
gasp of his breathing, but his speech is unquestionably clear, even if his
voice is almost unrecognizable for how much heat it carries. “I’m not a student
anymore.”
Giriko hums in the back of his throat, agreement and appreciation growling into
sound he can feel all against the inside of his ribcage. He tightens his hand,
settles his grip against Justin’s length; when he pulls up it’s deliberately
slow, carefully so he can see the way Justin’s lashes dip and flutter at the
friction. Justin’s mouth comes open, his breathing rushes out of his lungs, and
Giriko is grinning without thinking about the expression at all.
“Good thing,” he says. “Since I wouldn’t be doing this to a student.”
“Ah.” Justin’s fingers are seizing hard at the back of Giriko’s neck; he’s
sagging against the support of the door behind him, his body relying on the
resistance of the wall to keep him upright over legs trembling visibly with too
much heat to hold his weight. “Yes. I know.”
Giriko snorts. “Guess you do.” He jerks his hand up hard, forcing enough
sensation into Justin’s veins that the other arches back against the door, his
head angling back sharply against the support, and then Giriko lets him go,
reaching down to close his fingers tight on Justin’s wrist and drag the other’s
touch back out of his pants while Justin is still trembling helpless to heat
against the support.
“On your knees,” Giriko says, and grabs at Justin’s shoulder to shove him down
while his legs are still shaky and unsteady. Justin goes all at once,
collapsing into more of a fall than a careful descent, and Giriko pushes at his
shoulder to knock the other sideways while he’s still blinking in an attempt to
clear his vision. Justin topples at once, tipping to fall across the dark heap
of his dropped robes, and Giriko turns away as fast as the other is falling,
grating out “Stay there” as he steps across the narrow span of the house. It’s
only a few strides to the table where he left his wand, only a breath to close
his fingers around the handle; by the time he turns back around Justin is only
just starting to push up onto his elbows, only just blinking the last effects
of his impact with the floor from his gaze. His eyes are dark, his focus pinned
on Giriko from across the room like there’s nothing else in the entire world
except for the other, like he’s tied a line of his attention to Giriko’s body
and is intent on reeling him in, and Giriko would swear he can feel it like a
knot behind his ribcage, as if Justin has cast a wandless, wordless Accio on
him and is pulling him nearer by sheer force of will.
“Fuck,” Giriko growls, and he’s returning back over the distance faster than he
left, feeling anticipation thrum taut across the span of his shoulders. He
drops to a knee, landing half atop the tangle of Justin’s clothes around the
other’s legs, but he doesn’t stop to move to a better position or to charm the
clothes out of the way; he’s reaching for Justin’s boxers instead, pulling them
down by force instead of care to leave the other’s skin bare from the hem of
his shirt down to the angle of his knees. “You haven’t done this before.” It’s
a statement, not a question; still, Justin shakes his head in agreement, his
knees tipping wider in instinctive submission as Giriko leans forward to reach
for his hip, to spread callused fingers hard against the silk-soft pale of
Justin’s skin. His fingers fit against the edges of Justin’s body as if by
design, as if the other’s hips were made to be handholds to fit his grip; the
thought shudders across his shoulders, hunches heat against his spine, and he’s
stretching his other hand out to follow, tipping his wrist to angle his wand to
fit into the gap between Justin’s spread-open knees.
“It’s fastest this way,” Giriko explains, glancing up to see the way Justin is
staring at him, to watch the panting heat dragging hard against the other’s
shoulders under the fall of his t-shirt. Justin’s gaze is fixed on Giriko’s
features, his eyes enormous and liquid like he’s trying to drag Giriko down
into them, like he’s the siren in truth he has so often seemed to be, and
Giriko is ready to let the dark shadows of the other’s lashes close over his
head and pull him down to the water’s depths. “I could use a toy--” as he
touches the end of his wand against Justin’s entrance, as he twists his wrist
through the wordless charm to slick the wood to polished wet, “--or my fingers,
maybe.” Justin’s thighs flex, his body trembling in anticipation of the force,
and Giriko slides his wand forward into the other’s body, pressing the cool-
slick effect of the spell deeper into Justin as he goes. Justin’s forehead
creases, his mouth shifts on some not-quite-voiced reaction, and Giriko draws
back to push in over that inch again, angling his wrist so the force swells a
little wider to press Justin farther open against the weight of the spell.
“But this is quickest.” There’s a rhythm to this charm, a pattern to the
movement that goes with it; Giriko hasn’t thought of it in years, not since the
last time he had occasion to use it, but it comes back to him with the ease of
muscle memory, his wrist flexing and fingers sliding through the action before
he quite remembers how. The forward shift is to give another spill of
lubrication to the motion, the wrist rotation to increase the pressure
stretching Justin open; by the third stroke Justin’s mouth is open, his
breathing coming hard enough that it takes the parted lips and audible gasping
that come with it to fill the need of his lungs. His gaze has dropped down,
now, his focus entirely pinned to Giriko’s hand working the other’s wand
between his legs; Giriko is left to stare unobserved at the dark shadow of
Justin’s lashes over his eyes, to gaze as long as he likes at the pale tangle
of hair catching at the other’s forehead. He watches the crease tighten between
Justin’s eyebrows, watches the flicker of tension wash across the other’s
expression, and finally: “It gets better,” rough enough to bring Justin’s head
up, to pull the glazed blue of the other’s eyes onto him. Justin’s expression
is knocked out of all composure, his gaze hazy even when he blinks in a visible
attempt to collect his sight back to clarity; he looks undone already, as if
some knot of tension behind his expression has been cut clean through to leave
him shaky with heat even before he’s been satisfied. Giriko holds the other’s
gaze, keeping his attention fixed even as he maintains the rhythm of his
motion, and eventually Justin’s eyes clear enough that he feels he has at least
a semi-coherent audience.
“With practice.” Giriko shifts his wrist, strokes through a slow thrust. “It’ll
feel less weird next time.” He clears his throat. “There’s a charm I could
use,” he suggests, framing the words for the tension across Justin’s forehead
and the tremor of parted-lip sensation at his mouth. “If it’s too much. It’d
make it easier this time, if you--”
Justin jerks his head, moving so hard through the outline of negation that
Giriko’s offer dies on his lips. “No,” he says aloud, his voice sharp and
certain in his throat. His shoulders are tense, his forehead is creased; but
his words are sure, his tone as clear as Giriko could hope. “No, I want to feel
you. No charms.”
“It’s gonna hurt,” Giriko tells him, twisting his wrist to underscore his
point. Justin’s lashes flutter, his mouth falls open on a gasp; but his knee
tips open, his legs spreading wider even as the inside of his thighs tremble
with sensation. It makes Giriko’s heart race, makes his cock swell harder
against the inside of his jeans, and Justin: “Fine,” as he reaches out for
Giriko’s shirt, as his fingers catch and twist to a fist against the give of
the fabric. “I don’t care. I want it.”
“Yeah,” Giriko says, his voice dropping over the edge to a growl of
appreciation and desire in equal parts. “You asked for it.”
“I did,” Justin agrees, and Giriko pulls his wand back, drawing it free of the
other’s body with a speed that leaves Justin hissing and tensing in reaction.
Still, his hold at Giriko’s shirt doesn’t ease, and when Giriko rocks back
Justin starts to sit up to follow him, more willing to shift from his sprawl
across the floor than to loosen his hold.
“Let go,” Giriko tells him, letting Justin’s hip go so he can grab at the
other’s wrist instead. “Get your pants off, I’m gonna have a hell of a time
fucking you like that.” Justin’s attention drops, he blinks at the tangle
they’ve made of his clothes, and Giriko moves back entirely, taking his weight
over his heels as he turns his focus to his own clothing. His shirt is off-
center, straining uncomfortably over his shoulders and clinging to sweat along
the line of his spine; he drags it up and over his head in one quick movement,
peeling it off his skin and tossing it aside as the easiest solution to his
discomfort. His pants are harder, would require working his boots off before he
could shed them completely, and he doesn’t need them gone entirely; they’re far
looser, much less of an active discomfort than his shirt was. All he has to do
is unfasten the fly, working over denim and metal to loosen the attachments
keeping the clothing in place, and then he can push the fabric open and reach
down to draw the heat of his cock free of the restraint. He closes his fingers
around himself, stroking up for a brief moment of relief for the aching want
tensing all across his shoulders, and then he looks up, and Justin is staring
at him, his gaze fixed to the motion of Giriko’s hand. His eyes are dark, the
blue eclipsed almost entirely to black by his dilated pupils; he did get his
pants off after all, has shoved them aside to end up by the door and half-atop
Giriko’s discarded shirt, and his knees are angled open, the whole inside line
of his thighs making a suggestion for Giriko’s gaze to trail down to the flush
of Justin’s cock to the slick invitation of his entrance.
“God,” he growls, and he’s reaching out, he’s leaning in, his hand is closing
at Justin’s hip and his body is pressing between Justin’s knees and Justin is
gasping an inhale of adrenaline under him, his head turning up so the dark of
his eyes is fixed entirely on Giriko’s face. Giriko slides his fingers back,
braces his hold tight around the base of his cock, and when he looks down it’s
only for a moment, only to glance to make sure he’s lined up with Justin’s
body. Justin’s breathing harder under him, his fingers coming up to weight at
the back of Giriko’s neck, but Giriko doesn’t pause for the contact; he moves
instead, holding Justin steady as he rocks his weight forward to push hard
against the other’s body. His cock catches at the other, slick skin dragging
over the flushed head; and then he’s thrusting forward, and Justin’s groaning
into heat, and Giriko is sinking deep into him on the first forward motion.
Justin tightens around him, his body flexing involuntarily against the
intrusion of Giriko’s cock, but Giriko doesn’t wait for him to adjust; he has a
hand at Justin’s hip to brace him, after all, it’s an easy thing to draw back
and rock forward again to push deeper into the other’s body. Justin shudders
with the force, his back curving like he’s trying to slide free of Giriko’s
hold, his thighs tensing around the other’s hips, and Giriko huffs an exhale
and keeps moving.
“I told you,” he says, the words going to a low growl of heat in his throat as
his knees brace at the floor, as his body finds a rhythm to thrust hard against
the satisfying friction of Justin under him. “You want that charm now?”
“Ah,” Justin groans, his head angling back, his throat curving into a line of
pale beauty. Giriko can see the thrum of the other’s pulse coming hard just
over the collar of his t-shirt, can see tendons strain under the skin as Justin
reaches for words. The hand at Giriko’s neck flexes, fingers drag rough against
his skin. “No,” Justin manages, gasping the word into the gap between Giriko’s
movements over him, his lashes still dipping heavy over the haze of his eyes.
“No, keep going.”
Giriko’s eyebrows raise, his breath huffs out of his chest in a cut-off laugh.
“You like this,” he says, statement more than question, and snaps his hips
forward in a sharp thrust to punctuate. “Is this what you’ve been wanting all
along? How many times have you dreamt about getting fucked into the floor by
your professor?”
“You,” Justin pants. He’s breathless with heat, his voice straining in his
chest, but when he tips his head down and opens his eyes they come into focus
on Giriko’s face, the shadows behind his lashes catching to cling at the
other’s features. “Not just my professor. You.” He arches through another of
Giriko’s thrusts, his expression shuddering into blank heat for a moment before
he can collect himself back to speech. “And you’re not my professor anymore.”
Giriko growls something halfway between irritation and amusement. “Guess I’m
not,” he says, and thrusts forward into Justin hard enough that the other’s
gaze fractures out into stunned heat, that his breathing catches and strains
over a shocked groan. “That wasn’t an answer.”
“No,” Justin admits, his fingers tensing at Giriko’s neck as his lashes flutter
shut, as his mouth falls open over a desperate draw of air. “It wasn’t.”
“Fine,” Giriko says. He slides his knees wider, bracing his weight hard against
the floor between the open angle of Justin’s thighs; Justin whimpers, voicing
some incoherent almost-protest, but he’s arching up to meet Giriko instead of
trying to pull away, his hips angling up as one foot digs in hard against the
other’s back. Giriko shoves at Justin’s hip, bracing the other to stillness and
taking his balance with the same motion, and when he closes his free hand
around the heat of the other’s cock Justin jerks with the contact, his whole
body flexing on heat as he hisses into the friction.
“Don’t tell me,” Giriko says, and jerks up fast, his hand sliding into a rough
rhythm that draws Justin clenching tight around the rhythm of his thrusts still
working the other open. “Doesn’t matter. It’s not like I can’t tell how hot you
are for this already.” Justin’s hot to the touch, the head of his cock slick
under the weight of Giriko’s fingers; whatever coherency he once had is gone,
now, scattered along with the focus in his eyes as he shudders with helpless
reaction to Giriko’s motion over him. “I’m gonna make you come so hard you
never even think of being with anyone else.”
“Yes,” Justin pants, and “Giriko,” like a plea, like a prayer for some uncaring
god. Giriko can see the haze over the other’s blue eyes, can see Justin’s
expression falling open on the same tension rising through all the rest of his
body; in Justin’s voice his name sounds like a spell, like an enchantment that
starts its work before Giriko has even made sense of it, before he has the
least chance to dodge its effects. It doesn’t matter anyway; he’s not moving
away, not likely to stop now, not when he can feel the strain of anticipated
pleasure in every breath Justin takes under him, in the flex of the other’s
fingers close against his skin.
“Come on,” Giriko growls, giving voice to encouragement in time with the
tension coiling low in his stomach and spiking higher up his spine with every
convulsive flutter of Justin’s body around him. His vision is going hazy, his
movements falling out of his established rhythm as his attention starts to give
way, but he’s still staring at Justin’s face, and still working hard over
Justin’s length, and there’s no part of him ready to let himself come before
Justin does. “Come on, kid, isn’t this what you’ve wanted all this time?” A
hard thrust, a harder stroke; Justin’s nails are drawing blood at the back of
Giriko’s neck, Giriko is sure, but he doesn’t try to shift himself free of the
other’s hold. “Is it as good as you dreamed it would be?”
“Oh,” Justin chokes, “Giriko” hot enough to be an answer all by itself, and
Giriko’s hand slips up over him and Justin arches off the floor, his whole body
curving into an arc of uncontrolled heat as his voice gives way to a helpless
groan of pleasure so sharp it’s almost a shout. His cock jerks in Giriko’s
hold, come spilling over the other’s fingers and the trembling strain of his
own stomach, and Giriko’s growling satisfaction, the sound of his voice low and
heavy enough to match the breathless heights Justin’s is breaking over. He lets
his hold on the other’s length go, grabbing to pin Justin hard against the
floor with his sticky hand as well as his clean one, and beneath him Justin is
still shuddering, still quivering through aftershocks as Giriko sets his knees
steady and starts to move with rough intent. Justin’s panting with heat, his
whole body clenching hard around Giriko with every stroke the other takes into
him, and Giriko is growling wordless satisfaction, encouragement and arousal
and anticipation melding together to a low sound in the back of his throat. His
thrusts are coming faster, rougher, going out-of-rhythm with the rushed pace of
his breathing, and Justin is under him, his eyes gone hazy with heat and his
lips parted on panting exhales and his skin warm and slick with sweat and
Giriko is losing, he’s falling, he’s toppling over the edge of arousal and into
orgasm without any attempt to hold himself back. His hips snap forward, his
chest flexes on a groan, and then he’s shuddering into pleasure, all his
awareness fading out with the first overwhelming surge of relief that runs
through him. He keeps moving, thrusting through the waves of heat that break
over him as his fingers flex and ease at the other’s hips; and finally his
vision clears, and he sighs himself into stillness over Justin still trembling
underneath him.
Neither of them speak for a moment. Giriko’s hands are still printing their
weight in bruises into Justin’s hips, Justin’s nails are still catching
scratches that Giriko can feel aching against the back of his neck. Justin’s
mouth is open on the rush of his breathing, his cheeks are flushed with heat;
the blue of his eyes is all shadowed over by the fall of his lashes, his focus
clinging to Giriko’s face with a hazy attention that speaks more to his
stubbornness than to his actual ability to focus his thoughts.
Giriko clears his throat roughly. “Right,” he says, the words dragging to
gravel over the strain of pleasure still rushing fast in his heartbeat. “That’s
that, then.” His fingers flex, his thumb slides across Justin’s skin; he can
feel the sheen of sweat catch between them to make the motion slick and clammy
with moisture. He doesn’t look away from the hazy blue of Justin’s eyes. “Still
think it was worth it?”
Justin’s smile is startling, a bright splash of warmth all across an expression
Giriko is used to seeing fixed into blank attention or tensing on frustrated
determination. It softens the set of his lips, and crinkles at the corners of
his eyes, and lights up the shadows of his gaze like sudden sunlight on a
cloudy day. Giriko’s breath catches, his thoughts stall, and it’s into the
silence of his parted lips that Justin speaks, his voice as clear and steady as
Giriko has ever heard it.
“Yes,” he says, the word coming bright around the curve of his smile. “Yes, it
was worth it.”
Giriko can’t find words for any kind of a response to that. The best he can
manage is a huff, and that barely passing for skepticism, and the way Justin’s
smile goes wider says he hears the struggle as clearly as Giriko feels it. The
hand at Giriko’s neck slides up, fingers dig in against the back of his head;
and when Justin arches up to offer his mouth for a kiss, Giriko ducks down to
provide it to him.
In the end, he thinks, Justin has more of a knack for handling wild animals
than Giriko ever gave him credit for.
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