Archive of Our Own ^beta

One of the most normal things to ever happen in Hogwarts, is Kayn arriving late to his morning classes.

It doesn’t even matter which class, except for Professor Snape’s class, because one, that’s his house teacher, and two, it’s Defense Against the Dark Arts, the one thing he’s absolutely invested into (it’s not because he’s a Slytherin, shut it). But besides this, the other only class he does put more effort into arriving not-so-late to, is Slughorn’s Potions class, since, well, the guy is one of the few professors he can tolerate, and sometimes he gives small vials of good stuff to the students that excel in his class.

So, there he goes, almost the only student walking down the corridors, five minutes late to his Potions class. Out of the corner of his eye he can see Filch walking around and grumbling whatever, as he usually does. Kayn then goes down the flight of stairs he already knows by heart as he hums a low tune from one of his favorite rock bands. He’s really hoping Slughorn will finally teach them how to make Felix Felicis, he could really use some for his upcoming Divination test. Only a few selected by God personally can understand whatever goes on in that class.

The Slytherin gets to the wooden door, and from the outside he can already hear Slughorn’s raspy voice over the silence of his class. He pushes the door open.

“… will be different for everyone.” The professor finishes his explanation before turning around at the creak of the old hinges. “Ah, young Shieda, welcome, welcome. You’re just in time.” That’s a lie, Kayn knows that, but he also knows that Slughorn is always happy to see his students, no matter if they’re late to his class or not. Another reason why Kayn is chill with the old man.

“Hi, professor”, Kayn returns the greeting, his bag slipping down his shoulder after he closes the door and walks towards the rest of students. “Sorry I’m late. What are we doi-?”

A sudden, overwhelming aroma stops him in his tracks.

It’s like a brick was thrown to his face. He expected to smell herbs and some creature vomit brewing inside the cauldron, but no.

This smell is different from all that. Sweet, enticing, embracing him like a pair of warm hands caressing his cheeks. It’s the scent of teakwood cologne, and lily of the valleys.

Kayn knows that scent all too well.

“Jeez, what is that?” He immediately reaches to pinch his nose between his fingers, all too aware of the strangely expectant stares of his classmates and a few giggles coming from the back of the group.

“Is there something wrong, Kayn?” Professor Slughorn asks with a notorious hint of worry in his tone. He also has that expectant look on his face, but it is mixed with uncertainty and something else, as if he was puzzled.

“Well, yeah, it stinks in here!” The boy in question cringes a little, his free arm coming to wrap around him, so his elbow has something to rest on. “Is this some scent amplifying potion of something? Ugh, damn.”

Slughorn’s expression only deepens at that.

“Wait, Kayn, please tell me. What is it that you’re smelling right now?” He asks, voice soft.

The pink-haired boy doesn’t answer immediately. He first looks at the black, rusty cauldron as if it had personally offended him, and then he looks around, nose still pressed between his index and thumb. He scans the room, and the faces all around, many of them still staring back at him.

Until his eyes land on the one face he has been looking for.

“Ezreal’s cologne”, he says, nodding his head in the direction of the boy.

There’s a collective gasp rising at the new information, and heads are snapping in between both males, followed by small screams, a chorus of “oooooh”s, and some obnoxious laughs coming from other Slytherins in the room.

The forementioned boy, Ezreal, just stands there looking at Kayn with wide eyes, his cheeks turning redder the longer he stares at him.

Kayn is not understanding a single thing going on right now.

“What?” He speaks again, voice coming as menacing as he can make it. No one seems to take him seriously, however, if the smiles and grins of his classmates are any sort of telltale.

Professor Slughorn clears his throat.

“Kayn, my dear boy”, he starts when the boy turns to look at him. “You came into the room telling me it smelt badly. Now you’re saying the smell is that of your classmate. That doesn’t make any sense.” That last sentence comes accompanied of a hearty chuckle.

Kayn frowns, still feeling like he’s missing a crucial piece of information.

“Why not?” He asks, hand dropping from his face, arms crossing over his chest.

“Well, because this is none other than the Amortentia potion!”

As soon as he hears this, the Slytherin freezes.

Oh, crap.

His brain is both malfunctioning and going at a thousand miles per second, processing the situation and thinking of different ways to get out of it as unscathed as possible. If there even is a way to survive it, for he knows what that potion is all about, when he read about it last week as he snooped through a book in the library in hopes of learning the recipe for Felix Felicis.

“Considered one of the most dangerous potions in the magic world, Amortentia gained this status by being the most powerful love potion ever created. Despite this, it’s not meant to make a person fall irrevocably in love with another, it rather puts the drinker into a powerful stupor of infatuation, an irrational obsession with the other. Its pearly sheen is one of its main characteristics, the dreamy spirals being another. But perhaps its most distinctive quality, is the ever-changing smell, vastly different to everyone, for it takes the scents of those things which are of one’s liking and attraction.”

It finally hits Kayn, the reason why the liquid looked so familiar to him. It’s an uncanny resemblance of the moving drawing in that book. Heart spirals and everything. He should’ve recognized it the moment he stepped into the classroom.

But alas, he got distracted by the damn scent, and now, he has just said, in front of everyone in the room, that the Amortentia smells to him of Ezreal.

Hell no, he thinks. He has kept his composure and put on what he assumes has been a pretty convincing act until now. He ain’t about to let a damn potion out him just like that.

“Is this a joke?” Kayn snorts, praying to whatever deity there is that no one noticed the full-on mental breakdown he just went through. He peers over the border of the cauldron with a look that hopes comes out as skeptic. “How can this be Amortentia? I mean, I do see some pearl dust in it, but isn’t it supposed to smell, I don’t know, like literal sunshine or something?”

“Quit it, Kayn!” A voice he recognizes as one of his fellow Slytherins raises over his own. “It’s over, bro, you’re exposed!”

More giggles are heard. Kayn is going to kill them for sure.

“Silence, please, everyone”, Slughorn raises his hand to make a stop sign, and slowly everyone quiets down. He then places his hands on the table, a position Kayn recognizes as his full-on explanation stance. “Kayn, this is not a joke, and there’s no mistake made. I’ve spent my lifetime perfecting all kinds of potions and most of them, I know by heart. This one, I personally made it to show all of you on today’s class, and I assure you that it has all the correct ingredients. It’s unmistakable.”

“Professor, I’m not doubting your expertise on this matter”, Kayn replies with a small chuckle. “I am in no position to do so. I’m just really confused. If Amortentia is meant to smell of the things I like, why is it that to me it smells like… this? It’s just so unpleasant.”

“Oh, my dear boy”, Slughorn laughs a hearty one, hands clasping together. “You still have a lot to learn about it. But that’s why we’re here today, to learn that nothing is impossible when it comes to potions! Now all of you, come around, I’ll tell you everything there is to know.” He motions towards the rest of his class, and all the students move closer to the cauldron, forming a small circle. Kayn is now trapped between the table and the crowd of bodies pressed together, and as Professor Slughorn is enthusiastically talking about the ingredients inside the potion, he only heaves a long sigh. Before he can pay attention, however, he feels the strength of a gaze upon his figure. He looks around only to see Ezreal on the opposite side of the table, standing near the pointy end, staring at the Slytherin, before quickly averting his eyes when he realizes he’s been caught. A honeysuckle shade is still tainting his pale cheeks.

Sixth year Hufflepuff, seeker of the quidditch team, on the top 3 of highest grades of his year, only beaten by his Ravenclaw friend. Passionate about Ancient Ruins and Herbology, Professor Sprout’s favorite. Adored by many, hated by none.

Ezreal is all of that and so much more.

It’s very common to find him helping the house elves in the kitchen on his free time, or studying alongside a struggling student in the library, or having a nice chat with any professor on the corridors. He has a strong, cheerful personality and great social skills to pair with it. He’s even made friends with some Slytherins, and if there’s one thing everyone knows about them is that they rarely allow someone into their circles that doesn’t belong to the snake’s house. But somehow Ezreal managed to break that barrier.

He's also been crowned as the school’s sweetheart for four years in a row. He’s always receiving love letters and invitations to a butterbeer date at Hogsmeade. And although he’s rejected every single one of them, saying he’s not currently looking for a relationship, no one has held it against him; they would never hurt the boy who’s always smiling and lighting up every room he steps into.

All in all, Ezreal’s like a star with its own gravitational energy, pulling every single person around towards him. And Kayn is one of them.

Lunch time has rolled around and the Slytherin is looking over his shoulder at the Hufflepuff table, where Ezreal is sitting, laughing with his tight group of closest friends, all from different houses. Kayn recognizes the other Hufflepuff in the group as Sett, a seventh-year student, just like Yone, the Ravenclaw who’s always with his nose behind a book. Next to them is Aphelios, another Ravenclaw in the same year as Ezreal, and by the other side of the table, next to the personified ray of light, is that enormous Gryffindor boy, K’Sante, another seventh year. Such a picturesque group, and yet Kayn has eyes for Ezreal only. From his angle he can see the Hufflepuff grinning as he plays around with Sett’s beanie, his green hair slightly floating whenever his body shakes in laughter. That smile has been plaguing Kayn’s mind for months now, even appearing in his dreams.

His staring session is interrupted by something colliding with his head. When he turns around, he sees the crumpled piece of paper has fallen on his mashed potatoes.

“Oi, Kayn! You’re being too obvious!” One of his fellow Slytherins calls out at him from his seat a few feet over, and the students around him are cackling annoyingly, at least to Kayn’s taste.

“Obvious about what?” He inquires as he picks the paper ball and throws it over an empty space at the table.

“Come on, that huge crush you got on Ezreal over there! Amortentia doesn’t lie, you know?”

“I have no idea on why you guys insist on saying I like him”, Kayn rolls his eyes, still putting on the façade of indifference, acting as if that wasn’t the biggest truth about him.

“Oh, stop it!” The girl with blonde hair sitting the closest to him, Ahri, exclaims, sounding a little annoyed. “No one’s falling for that, you’re a shitty liar, Shieda.”

Kayn sighs as he picks up his fork and gathers some of his food in it.

“First of all, I’m not lying”, this statement gains him a lot of scoffs and incredulous noises towards him. “And second, you heard Professor Slughorn. He said sometimes the scents we smell are of things we don’t know attract us, so yeah, my subconscious is weird for liking that smell but that doesn’t mean that I like Ezreal because of it. It could be anyone else wearing that cologne, for all I know.”

“Yeah, right, because there’s about half of the school going around smelling like that.” The first boy replies, not at all convinced by Kayn’s reasoning.

“Meh, I wouldn’t know, I don’t go around sniffing everyone’s neck like a dog.” Kayn shrugs as he takes the bite of food on his fork.

“Still, you specifically said it was Ezreal’s cologne, why would that be if not because you are in love with him?” Now that whole group of losers is whistling and hooting in his direction, completely sure that Kayn doesn’t have an answer to that.

Kayn glares at them, swallowing his food. “Dude, he reeks of that smell. I’m getting whiplash every time he passes by my seat, like what the hell, does he bathe in it every day or what? Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed.”

“Ugh, aren’t you a tough nut.” The boy growls in disappointment, getting tired of Kayn’s stubbornness. “Listen, bro, you can go believing whatever it is that makes you sleep at night, but we know the truth, you’re obsessed with him, period.”

At that, the pink haired boy snorts.

“Obsessed, huh? You don’t even believe that yourself. When have I ever been obsessed about something? Or someone, I don’t care.” Now that’s something everyone knows to be true. Kayn has never lost his mind over anything, neither has he shown any behavior that could tell people otherwise. Always collected, judgmental, and hard to read. Not giving a single care to anything happening around him. Like that time in fifth year when everyone was losing their marbles over the upcoming O.W.L.s, even the most dedicated students were seen swallowing book after book with a sheen of sweat on their foreheads. But not Kayn. He simply lounged around the common room, blasting music on his airpods and relaxing on the couches. Everyone who saw him was so sure he would fail the tests. It was hilarious to Kayn, the moment their faces dropped in shock at his almost excellent results. Truly a sight to behold.

“Whatever, you’re no fun.” Ahri’s fox tail swishes behind her in disgust as she turns around to face her friends, who just like her look absolutely done with Kayn. “One thing you should know, Ezreal’s looking at you right now.”

Kayn’s heart skips a beat.

“Yeah, sure I’m falling for that”, he chuckles lowly.

“I’m not pranking you, dumbass.”

“Alright, nice try, you done?” Kayn looks at her in a way that ends their conversation then and there. She flips him off and proceeds to ignore him, which is a relief to Kayn. Her words, however, are gnawing at his insides. He’s aching to turn around and see if it’s true but doesn’t want to look desperate in front of everyone. Only after another couple of bites he dares to look behind him, and just as he thought, Ezreal is not looking at him. But his friend Sett notices and leans closer to him to tell him just that. And almost immediately there’s a couple of amber eyes looking at his own. The eye under his black patch is begging to be set free, to stare just like its brother, into those beautiful gems. Despite being caught, Kayn doesn’t stop looking. He sees this as a challenge he must win, to show he’s unaffected by the other even though his heartbeat is rapidly accelerating.

Their stare contest lasts for a few seconds after that. Ezreal is the first one to look away, ears burning and hiding his face in his arms at the table. Kayn internally smirks at that as he turns his head back. Cute.

“Kayn, wait!”

The voice that calls him from behind makes Kayn shut his eyes and sigh heavily. He really hoped there would be no other interaction between him and the shorter Hufflepuff today, but it seems destiny had other plans, plans that are getting on his nerves. But, since he has a reputation to maintain, which does involve appearing unfazed at anyone’s presence, now specially Ezreal’s, he turns around and raises his brows at the boy who’s slowing down on his running.

“What is it, Ezreal?” He calmly says, watching him stop before him and waiting for him to recover his breath.

“I…”, he takes a deep breath. “I want to talk to you.”

Oh, no. Kayn knows exactly where this is going and he doesn’t like it at all. One thing is to fool the others, those who taunt him and want a reaction out of him, but another completely different thing is to fool Ezreal, to whom he offers his silent, undying, and unwavering devotion ever since that day in their second year when Ezreal protected him from the young mandrake’s chilling screams. Of course, after four years he’s had a lot of time to put his acting skills to use with the younger, but their interactions over the course of those same years could be counted with the fingers of his hands, so yeah, this is going to prove to be quite difficult.

“What about?” He puts on a nonchalant tone, trying to play dumb when it’s painfully obvious what the other wants to say.

Ezreal huffs a little laugh. “What do you mean, “what about”? About what happened in Potions class today, silly!”

“Oh, that”, Kayn drawls out the ‘oh’ a little, before chuckling himself and readjusting the strap of his bag on his shoulder. “I don’t think there’s much to say about that.”

“So do you like me?” Ezreal unexpectedly says, interrupting whatever Kayn was going to say next.

The Slytherin chokes on air, that question came out so bluntly he couldn’t control the way his eyes widened a little.

“Sorry”, despite hiding his giggles poorly behind his hand, at least Ezreal has the decency to look sheepish, tucking a few strands of his hair behind his ear. “Uh, that came out worse that I thought it would.”

“You went straight to the point”, Kayn manages to let out, clearing his throat a little. “Which is… fine, I guess. It’s not everyday someone says the Amortentia smells like you, so…” He stops himself before he continues that sentence, for he fears the situation will become harder to handle.

“Yeah, but… you also said you didn’t really like the smell?” Ezreal pouts at this and Kayn has to count to ten to not fucking explode of cuteness right there. He lets out a sigh after, having held his breath for a while.

“Don’t give it too much thought, lest your brain turns to mush.” The Slytherin says, reaching to ruffle the mop of green hair which makes Ezreal pout even more. He chuckles (and internally screams) at the sight. “It must be someone else using that same cologne. Slughorn said a person can not know they’re attracted to a certain smell, so I probably must have stored that subconsciously at some point. It doesn’t necessarily mean I’m attracted to you because I recognized that smell as your own.”

“So… you don’t like me?” The poor Hufflepuff boy is squinting his eyes at Kayn in confusion, trying to make sense of what he just said.

“Not in that way, no.” The lie is hurting his tongue, prickling at it with every word he utters. “But I do think you’re a cool guy. Anyone would be lucky to have you. As long as it’s not under the effects of that potion, though.”

“Oh, yeah, that would be a mess.” Ezreal agrees and shares a laugh with Kayn. As the sound dies down in their throats, he just stares at the taller boy, shifting his weight from one leg to the other. “So… we’re good, right?”

Kayn just grins at him before turning around.

“Like I said, don’t think too much about it.” He ends their conversation with that, walking away and biting the inside of his lower lip as he gets further from the object of his affection, his heart beating brutally within his ribcage and hurting him.

As expected, over the course of the next few days everyone and their mothers know about what happened on that morning between Kayn and Ezreal. And of course, people have been absolutely feasting on that, which to Kayn’s dismay, translates into them being insufferable about it, and all the weight of it falls over him. And only him. Ezreal has barely received a couple of playful comments about it, but he just laughs it off and quickly manages to change the subject, and they let him do that because almost no one denies him anything. But oh, how Kayn wishes the situation had been more balanced between the two of them.

As much as he’s relieved the Hufflepuff hasn’t been bothered too much by it, he’s starting to slowly lose his marbles for taking all the fall of the situation. He can’t hang around the common room of his house without the rest of Slytherins calling him lover boy or something of the sorts. He walks down the corridors and he’s enveloped by the whispers and giggles of other students. Whenever Ezreal walks into the same classroom as him, Kayn’s desk mates elbow him and say “look who’s here" in a sing-song voice. They’ve only recently stopped since the Slytherin grabbed one by the neck and almost slammed him into the table, teeth bare and a death threat in his eyes, which made the other guy recoil into his seat and stay silent until the end of class.

All in all, Kayn’s week has been a living hell.

Things do certainly take an interesting turn when he’s approached on Friday afternoon by none other than Aphelios, one of Ezreal’s Ravenclaw friends. Kayn is walking to the main hall for lunch when he feels a tap on his shoulder. He turns around and is surprised to see the blue haired male, mask over his face and looking at him intently.

“Aphelios? What’s up?” Kayn asks, not sure as to why in the world would the Ravenclaw approach him. They’ve never interacted before. At all.

Aphelios suddenly moves his hands in coordinated motions, as if making figures with his fingers. Kayn just stares blankly, not knowing any sign language. This makes the other roll his eyes and take out his phone from his pocket to type something.

‘I need your help. Follow me.’ The message reads on the screen.

“Oh, what do you-” Kayn doesn’t finish his question as the Ravenclaw is already on the move and passes him. He frowns as he watches the male for a couple seconds. “Okay then”, he sighs and follows the other.

Aphelios is moving towards the main hall, and Kayn wonders what kind of help he needs in there. Or what kind of help he needs at all. The Ravenclaw is known for being a jack of all trades, knowledgeable in many different subjects and concepts. He’s also very crafty, so if it was something like a potion or a more tangible task, he would have it done in a breeze. So really, Kayn has no clue as to what could possibly be of his assistance that Aphelios needed him for it.

They cross the giant wooden doors and walk through Hufflepuff and Gryffindor’s tables, a passage away from Kayn’s usual spot at the Slytherin table. He does feel a couple of curious stares coming from some of them but as usual, he ignores them. It’s only when he’s reaching the middle of the room that he realizes something.

Aphelios is not going to his house table, where he usually sits when he’s doing his homework. He’s directing him towards the loud laughter coming from a certain group sitting at the Hufflepuff table he already knows too well.

This makes the Slytherin stop dead in his tracks.

Why in the world is Aphelios taking him towards his clique? More specifically, why towards the green haired boy sitting by himself on that side of the table?

Oh.

‘This has to be a joke.’

Aphelios seems to hear (somehow) his footsteps stop over the waves of conversations and turns around almost immediately. His eyes are questioning the still figure just a few meters before him.

“Aphelios, what the fuck?” Kayn blurts out. He already has his mind made and is about to turn around, but the blue haired boy is having none of that. He swiftly approaches Kayn and grabs him by the arm, pulling him forward with all his weight. “Hey, hey, hey! Stop that!” Kayn’s voice raises in volume, and this prompts a lot of heads to look at them and their pulling battle. This includes the Hufflepuff and his friends.

“Hey, Phel, what’cha got there?” A voice calls from their spot on the table, which makes Kayn stop wrestling for his freedom to look at the owner of said voice. It’s in that moment when Aphelios sees his chance and pulls him again with all his might, catching the other off guard and forcing him to walk the remaining distance between them, almost tripping in the process due to the sudden force.

“Yo, is that Kayn?” Another voice, deep and with a thick Egyptian accent, is heard. The Slytherin barely manages to regain his balance before Aphelios wraps his arms around him and pushes him in front of the group.

“Heeey, Kayn! Good to see you, bro!” Sett stands from his seat smiling and reaches across the table, pulling said boy from the shirt and, again, almost making him trip and fall face first onto the table, had it not been for his hands catching him before so. Kayn hears some giggles coming from around (he swears he’s heard more of them this week alone than in his entire lifetime) and drags his legs over the seat.

“Hi, uh, it’s nice to see you guys too, I guess”, Kayn looks like a beaten puppy as he takes a seat, resigning to his fate for today’s lunch. Now he knows he’s not going to hear the end of this for at least a whole month.

“I don’t think we’ve talked before”, the guy next to Sett says, offering his hand to him. “I’m K’Sante, welcome to our little group.”

Welcome to the group?

Yeah, Kayn is now one hundred percent sure this is all one big joke. He’s barely interacted with these people over the past six years, and now, all of a sudden, he’s part of their social circle? There’s just no way this is for real.

Fuck that Amortentia potion.

“Uh, thanks”, he decides to say, shaking the hand extended towards him. “Although, I think this is a one-time thing, don’t welcome me all that much.”

“Aw, come on! You’re basically part of the gang now”, Sett says enthusiastically, his vastaya ears perked up on his head. “I mean, it’s only fair since you’re basically Ezzy’s boyfriend now.”

Kayn takes a sharp breath and chokes on it.

“Wha-”

“Shut it, Sett!”

The Slytherin whips his head around at the sound of that voice. He had completely forgotten about the boy next to him.

‘Oh, no’, he takes one look at Ezreal and needs to remember how to breathe. The object of his affection is currently shooting daggers at his Hufflepuff friend, eyes wide and cheeks tinted a bright coral color. His hands are gripping the edge of the table, knuckles turning white. Poor little thing is just as embarrassed as Kayn, but he’s not trying to hide it at the risk of his sanity like the latter.

Ezreal must feel the stare he’s getting from Kayn, because a second later his golden eyes are locking with Kayn’s green one. And he looks as beautiful as ever. His little ponytail is tied up in a small, messy bun, and from the distance he’s at Kayn can see the small freckles below his eyes and on the bridge of his nose.

And his scent. What put them in this situation in the first place. God, Kayn can never get enough of it, how subtle and fresh it always is. He’s so tempted to just close the gap between them and bury his nose in the curve of his neck, just to soak his mind with that wonderful perfume of his…

“Boys.”

Before he can do so, a stern voice pulls him out of his trance. He blinks a couple of times to refocus and, realizing the setting they’re in, turns his head back around, grateful to the one that interrupted their (or maybe only his) moment.

“No fighting, please.” Yone’s the one speaking, putting his book down for a moment. “And Sett, you already know that Kayn isn’t in love with Ezreal, he told us they’ve already talked it out.”

“Wow”, Kayn looks at Yone in amazement. “You’re literally the first person to take my side on this.”

The older boy just shrugs and picks up his glass of juice. “I don’t have a reason not to believe in your word.”

“Uh, yeah, there is one reason, a very obvious one.” Sett pipes in. “He himself said it smelt like Ezreal’s cologne! How can you say it ai-”

“Sett.” Yone’s voice shuts the other boy immediately. “Leave it alone, you’re making them both uncomfortable.” He moves the glass in the direction of the blushing sixth years.

“Ugh, fine”, the vastaya pouts and sits down. “I was just saying…”

“Please”, Ezreal speaks in a soft tone, “I’m tired of hearing it.”

“Yeah, me too.” Kayn seconds the Hufflepuff, leaning his head on his arms on the table. It’s been a couple of minutes and he’s already exhausted by the conversation.

K’Sante has been watching the scene unfold silently, but as everything lulls down, he looks at Aphelios, who’s been standing behind Kayn to catch him in case he tried to run away again. Since that’s no longer the case, the Ravenclaw moves to sit next to Kayn, pushing him slightly towards Ezreal as he finally takes a seat.

“Ugh, what now?” Kayn grumbles as he’s forced to move, and his shoulder bumps with Ezreal’s. The two of them look at each other once again and away in almost the same motion. Kayn can somehow feel the warmth radiating from Ezreal, he’s that embarrassed. Not sure about what to do, Kayn looks at Aphelios who has taken off his mask and is offering him a plate of mac and cheese. He narrows his eyes in silent threat but takes the food, not at all convinced by the other’s innocent looking expression. As he digs in, however, he feels a small sense of gratitude towards him. This is the closest he’s ever been to Ezreal. His day has just been made.

Kayn’s happiness, however, is short-lived.

He truly should’ve seen that coming. After the whole school saw him hanging out with Ezreal and his friends, he should have known the teasing towards him would only increase, and some people just wouldn’t give him time to prepare for it.

“Eeeey, Lover Boy!” That group of fellow Slytherins from the other day catch up to Kayn as he’s walking through one of the corridors by the yards. Someone wraps their arm around his shoulders and manages to ruffle his hair, getting a growl in return. Of course, this doesn’t deter them from targeting the pink-haired boy. “Having a date with your boyfriend, huh?”

“For fuck’s sake, he’s not my boyfriend, stop that”, Kayn answers, exhaustion already present in his voice. It’s Friday and all he wants to do is relax from the stressful week, lay on his bed for the rest of the day, or maybe go to Hogsmeade for some butterbeer before that.

“Not what it looked like to us~”, Evelynn, the other girl in the group besides Ahri, says in a sickeningly sweet voice, on the other side of Kayn, her yellowish eyes gleaming with malice. “Little baby Kayn was so red, sitting next to his crush, how cute was that!” Snickers follow the sentence, and Kayn has to grit his teeth, trying to will the heat away from his cheeks before he exposes his feelings again.

“I saw that too! He was trying so hard not to look at him, I swear there was a vein popping on his forehead.”

“Will you stop that, dude?” Kays feels it, his frustration getting the better of him. He must control himself somehow.

“Nah, it’s so fun to see you like this! Kayn, the boy who never gives a shit, actually turning soft for the school’s sweetheart, aww~”

“I said, stop.”

Kayn’s getting more pissed by the second. The nonstop teasing and laughter, the fingers pointed at him, it’s becoming too much. He prides himself on his patience but even that has a limit, and if they don’t stop, he knows it’s going to shatter and let the beast out-

“Kayn and Ezreal, sitting on a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-Ahhh!”

The chorus of voices turns into yelps of surprise as Kayn suddenly grabs the boy by his throat and, in a swift movement, slams him against a column, making him wince in pain. A wand is poking at his neck by the time his voice gives in. Kayn’s characteristic wand, which takes the form of the blade of a scythe by the handle.

“I said, stop involving me with that pathetic piece of shit!” Kayn explodes in the other’s face, his voice echoing and bouncing from the floor to the ceiling. His teeth are showing and somehow the eye patch on his left eye seems to be glowing a little, red light coming from behind it. The sight of it is enough to make the other boy tremble beneath his hold. Everyone is so shocked by the sudden outburst that it takes them a while to realize what Kayn just said.

“What?” Ahri cannot seem to believe her ears at that moment. “What did you just call him? A piece of…?”

“You heard me.” Kayn turns his head around ever so slowly, menacingly, making a couple of people step back in fear. On the other hand, Ahri looks completely puzzled and Evelynn frowns. They’ve never seen him like that before. “A disgusting, useless piece of shit. A house elf is worth more than him!”

“Kayn, what the fuck?” The Slytherin is pushed away, stumbling a little before turning to look at the one he previously had in a chokehold. “You just don’t talk about him like that-”

“Why not?!” Kayn raises his voice again. “All of you are stupid if you think he’s all that! Oh, he’s beauty, he’s grace, I ain’t buying it! All he ever does is stand somewhere and look pretty and he gets anything he wants! He hasn’t worked a single day in his life to earn something, the fucking spoiled brat!”

“You know that’s not true!”

“It is, and this just proves my point that he manipulated you all! Wake up, fuckers, he’s a fraud and a cheater and nothing more! He pretends to be an over achiever, but he just knows every single trick in the books, how to look at you, how to talk, how to get his way into your heads! So that you see what he wants you to see! Helping someone? He wants to be owed a favor. Friend with all professors so that he can get good grades. And now!” He points at the whole group, the expression of a mad man on his face. “You’re all fucking convinced I’m obsessed with him because of the Amortentia, and you don’t even question it because everyone looooves him and he can do no wrong, huh? Well, let me tell you, I despise that Hufflepuff rat with everything I’ve got, and I rue the day I ever met him!” He spits the last part, angry orange sparks coming out of his wand.

Everyone is looking at Kayn in horror, as if he had just said the greatest blasphemy the world has ever heard. Every word he said was coated in layers of venom, so strong it burnt through the skin of whoever was listening. His breath is coming out in heavy huffs, having spent most of his energy in that outburst, so terrible, impactful in the worst of ways. An evil side of the Slytherin no one had ever seen.

“Kayn…” Evelynn starts, and when his attention is on her, she nods her head towards something behind him, her eyes wide in concern, an emotion no one’s seen before on her.

Confused, Kayn turns around. And his face, previously red in anger, drains of all blood and turns ghastly white when his eyes lands on the figure standing just a few meters away from him. A person always full of joy and happiness, now staring at the Slytherin with tears falling from his beautiful golden eyes.

Ezreal’s stare is that of betrayal.

“Shit.” Someone says behind Kayn, the same word currently running through his head. Shit, shit, shit. He’s done it. He’s fucked up, tremendously so. He knows there’s no way to ever turn this around. Everything has changed, forever, in the fragile bond that connected them, made of the little interactions they’ve ever had. Kayn can feel it breaking, along with his heart, pieces no longer salvageable. Whatever little trust they had; it’s completely gone.

Kayn has lost Ezreal.

“Ez…”, he still tries to do something, anything, his voice cracking when he speaks. How he’s hoping this is all just a nightmare, a very lucid one, some sort of fucked up daydreaming crafted to awaken his biggest fears. He probably fell asleep at the Hufflepuff table, and he’s going to wake up at any minute now, yeah, that must be it. He just has to wait, will himself to open his eyes and come back to his senses, to reality.

But it never happens, for this is reality, and it takes on the form of Ezreal shaking his head, still staring at him, before turning around and running away from the scene. With every step he takes, Kayn can feel his heart leaving with him. He lifts his hand in his direction, in vain. He can’t stop him. He can only watch in hopelessness the consequences of his creation.

“Kayn.” Ahri says, voice now void of any playfulness. “You’re the absolute worst.”

No one says anything else as they leave him there, with his words and his guilt rooting him in place. The few students hanging around in the courtyard, who watched the scene unfold, are exchanging breaths quietly, their eyes piercing through the body of the Slytherin, who still has his arm raised in the direction Ezreal left. He doesn’t need to get close to them to know what they’re saying about him. And he, for the first time in days, wholeheartedly agrees with them.

I’m the worst.

Kayn doesn’t leave the Slytherin bedroom after that. He’s sure everyone knows by now what went down on the corridors that day, and he doesn’t want to deal with whatever it is that’s waiting for him, even though he knows he absolutely deserves it. He stays in his bed for the rest of the weekend, not even leaving for the meals, getting his daily sustain out of snacks he’s kept locked away in his nightstand. The only time he gets up is when nature calls, and even then, he does it when he knows he’s alone in the room. Because everyone stares at him. Whenever someone enters the room, he gets thrown the coldest of stares, and is ignored afterwards. The beds adjacent to his own remain empty for most of the day, the loud banters of his mates now replaced with silence. They’re mad at him, not on Ezreal’s behalf, but because they like the Hufflepuff and think quite highly of him, as everyone does. Or well, almost everyone, since now Kayn has them convinced, he’s the exception to that.

He got what he wanted. No one is talking about them now. But that cost him his reputation, the perception people have over him. He’s now seen as the cruelest person in Hogwarts, surpassing Snape on that ranking. Huh, how ironic, he at some point wanted to lead the rankings, be the very best. Now he’s done it, because of the one thing he wishes he hadn’t done.

Memories of that day flash through his dreams at night, waking him up, a film of cold sweat draped over his body. He barely sleeps after, his heart heavy and cold, the blankets futile in their attempt to warm him up. He closes his eyes and on his eyelids he can Ezreal’s face imprinted on them, the silent tears, the rage, the confusion, the hurt. All because of him. Ezreal had been the light of Kayn’s life, and now Kayn is the dark stain of his. He can’t stand it. His voice whispers apologies at no one, words directed at someone that cannot hear him. Mouthfuls of ‘I’m sorry’s and ‘I didn’t mean it’, are the things he utters before he manages to fall asleep again, only to repeat it all the next night.

It's torturing him, and yet he feels it’s not enough. This punishment by the heavens, he accepts it, the pain he’s going through only a fraction of the pain he must’ve felt that day, Kayn thinks, and if that’s so then he hopes he’ll go through this for the rest of his miserable life.

On Monday, he’s rudely awoken by two of his roommates, bed covers snatched away and harsh shoving shaking him awake.

“Wake up, shithead!”

“Mmh, what is it?” Kayn manages to say, the lights in the room hurting him and he rubs his eyes to push the pain away.

“Ezreal is gone!”

That washes away all sleep that remained on Kayn.

“What?” He looks up at the angry looks on the others’ faces.

“He disappeared, idiot! Because of you!”

No…

No one has seen him since Saturday night, Kayn’s told. He stayed all day in his room, not talking to anyone, before being convinced to go out for dinner. He didn’t show up at the main hall. His house mates and friends went looking for him on Sunday, all around the school, to Hogsmeade, and even to the Forbidden Forest, with the close supervision of Hagrid, who was also very concerned about the boy. He was nowhere to be seen. Professor Sprout had informed Professor McGonagall at night after all searching trips came back empty handed, and she immediately sent an urgent letter to Headmaster Dumbledore, who happened to be overseas. It would take a while for them to receive a response. Until then, they couldn’t do anything else except wait, and continue looking for the boy.

As Kayn gets out of the common room and into the corridors, he’s immediately given the stink eye by each and every student around. He has to shake the uneasiness away and will his legs to move forward into the school instead of back to the bedroom. He had thrown his clothes on haphazardly (it made no difference on his everyday look anyways, his shirt always messy and sleeves up to his elbow, cloak hanging on his wardrobe, forgotten) and rushed out with just his wand after the news were broken to him. He’s insulted by many as he walks deeper into the corridors, and though they do get to him he doesn’t stop for them. He has only one thing on his mind, one person taking over his thoughts…

Thoughts which he is shaken from as he’s about to turn into a corner but is instead lifted off the ground by his clothes and pushed against the wall in the same motion.

Surprised gasps follow the sudden action. Kayn hits his head on the wall behind him and the breath is knocked out of his lungs. Sett is holding him by the shirt, grip ever so strong, his hair turning a shade of golden just like his eyes, who hold the fury of a thousand men and are now focused on the Slytherin.

“What did you do to him?!”

“Sett, wait-”, a voice calls from behind the Vastaya.

“What did you say to him, huh?! Why is he suddenly missing?!” Sett is shoving Kayn against the wall again, and then multiple hands wrap around his torso and his arms, pulling him away from the other with difficulty. “You’re dead meat, Shieda Kayn! I’m going to kill you!”

“Sett!” Yone’s voice emerges from above the rest, the group pulling Sett backwards. “Control yourself! This is not going to help in any way!”

“Like hell if I care!” The booming voice responds. “He’s the one that hurt Ezreal, I’m gonna make him pay!”

“Not like that, you’re not!” K’Sante restrains him from behind, hands clasped over the other’s chest. Aphelios is standing in front of the bigger boy, forcing him to look at him and moving his hands desperately, rushing through sign language.

“You got to calm down, I’ll be the one to handle this.” Yone speaks again, hands leaving the Hufflepuff’s arms to turn around and look at Kayn, who’s stayed glued to the wall during the whole exchange, not daring to move an inch. His eyes are stern, but his voice remains controlled as he asks, “Are you okay?”

Kayn looks at him as if he had grown another head. Did he fucking hear that correctly? Is Yone… showing care to him?

“Wh-”

“Why do you care?!” Sett yells once again, also in disbelief at the question. “He’s going to be my new punching bag, I swear-”

“Shut it!” Yone turns briefly to scream at his friend. His attention returns to Kayn. “I asked you if you were okay. You have dark circles under your eyes and look quite sunken. Is the guilt eating you up?”

Oh.

It wasn’t care behind Yone’s question.

Kayn just stares at the other in bewilderment, the awful feeling of humiliation beginning to form inside of him. Oh, how Kayn hates it, hates it. It’s been long since the last time he ever felt it.

Yone steps up to him and leans over, keeping eye contact. The anger is evident in the flames behind his eyes. “I hope it is”, he says, voice as steady as before, “I hope it consumes you, turns you into dust. I hope it follows you wherever you go. I hope you suffer, as much as you made Ezreal suffer. Only then I can consider forgiving you.”

Kayn gulps hard. He knows he deserves this, but coming from someone as unnervingly calm as Yone has him close to shitting his pants.

“You better hope we find him.” The Ravenclaw continues. “If we don’t, I’ll allow Sett to fulfill his wish of using you as a punching bag. I will not care if you wound up almost dead at the hospital wing. And if we find Ezreal, you’ll never get close to him again. Do you hear me? You’re forever prohibited near him, near his table, near our group. Don’t ever get close to him again, or I will be the one to take matters into my own hands. Are we clear?”

The way Yone speaks makes it clear to Kayn that his decision is final, and his promise to finish him is true. As much as he wishes to say no (even though he has no right to wish for Ezreal’s presence by his side anymore), he can only nod in response, very slowly, as if showing the other how seriously he takes it.

“Good.” And that’s the end of it. Yone turns back around to face his friends, who are staring at him in awe and a little bit of fear. “Let’s go, we still have some places to check.”

“Bro, you obliterated him with just words, what?” Sett, who has calmed down, follows Yone like a puppy. Aphelios goes next, but not without throwing Kayn a dirty glare and an obvious sign of ‘I’m watching you’ first. K’Sante stays for a few more seconds, watching his friends walk away before turning his gaze to Kayn. Surprisingly, there’s no anger within his eyes, but there’s a deep disappointment simmering behind in its place, as if he had hoped for something entirely different than what unfolded. With a sigh, he leaves Kayn by himself, catching up with his friends.

The Slytherin just stays with his back against the wall, indifferent to the hushed voices around him. He feels the weight of it all dumped on him: Ezreal’s disappearance, the hate of his clique, Yone’s words…

Kayn slides down the wall, lets himself be weighed down and squashed by it. He throws his head back, not caring about the pang of pain he feels when he hits his head yet again and lets his arms rest over his knees. He feels like dying. He’s actually thinking death may be a suitable punishment for him. Maybe he should take up on Sett’s offer (threat) and get beaten to a bloody pulp.

Days go by and there’s still no sign of Ezreal. At this point everyone in the school is looking for him, some people have even made teams with the Prefects to stay on night watch and keep an eye around the school. The professors haven’t said anything about it, clearly as worried as the students and silently praising them for their efforts and dedication to the cause. At Hogsmeade, madame Rosberta hast been keeping her shop open the twenty-four hours of the day, just in case Ezreal appears, and there’s also some villagers spending their nights awaken, searching for the boy.

Strangely, there’s been no answer from Professor Dumbledore, even though McGonagall’s sure the owl must have arrived by now. Despite this, she’s done her best as the one in charge of the school, organizing search parties and going down to Hogsmeade every day for news. There’s only hoping that the Ministry of Magic doesn’t hear about this just yet.

Kayn is devastated. He’s not paying attention to classes anymore. His head hangs low, avoiding everyone and doing his best to ignore them. He’s been barely eating, not going to the main hall at all for his meals. He simply stays in his seat after classes, staring onto the emptiness and into nothingness. It’s only when a professor finds him and calls him that he shakes himself out of the thoughts that consume him. Thoughts filled with Ezreal, Ezreal, Ezreal.

It's been three days since his disappearance. Three days in which Kayn’s wished he could turn back time and stop himself from ever saying those damned words. They’ve become his very personal ghosts that haunt him every moment he spends awake, eating away at him and his heart, just like the last memories he has of the green haired. He remembers how shiny his eyes looked as they turned wetter by the second. How despite that, they were void of the usual sparkles they always held. It was the first time he’d ever seen Ezreal like that, and it’s the look he hates the most on him. He hates more the fact that it was unleashed because of him. He hates how it all turned out for them, how he let himself be affected by the murmurs of others and worrying about how they’d look at him after that. If only he had been honest from the start…

“Kayn, wait!”

It’s past six on Thursday and the Slytherin is dragging his feet towards his common room when a familiar raspy voice stops him. He turns around to see Professor Slughorn jogging to try and catch him.

“Professor”, despite his throat feeling rusty because of the days he’s spent not uttering a single word, Kayn manages to speak in a clear tone as he approaches the man to stop him from overexerting himself. “Is everything alright?”

“Yes, my boy, don’t worry”, Slughorn says as he catches his breath. Kayn is a bit worried he might pass out from the heaviness of his intakes. “I hope you’re not too busy right now, I need your help.”

“Yeah, sure, what is it, professor?” Kayn rearranges the bag on his shoulder, a bit relieved at the distraction.

“I’m currently doing extra hours to help a student. He’s brilliant, of course, but has some trouble preparing the Amortentia potion.”

Oh, no. Not that. It’s the reason why he’s in this current predicament. The bane of his existence. Kayn says nothing and just bites the inside of his cheek as the professor continues.

“From what I recall from our classes together, you did an amazing job at preparing it. I would like for you to tutor this boy, just for today. I’ll give you points for your house after this, of course.”

Kayn can only smile at that. Before, he would’ve (not literally) killed for an opportunity like that, but now, not even the mention of points is attractive enough. The only thing he truly wants, the one prize he wishes he could have, is to have Ezreal back.

He does not want to do this, doesn’t want to face both the Amortentia and a fellow student that most likely despises him just like the rest of the school. But Kayn’s always had a soft spot for Professor Slughorn, and seeing how he trusts him enough to help him, Kayn is not willing to disappoint his expectations.

“No need for the points, professor, I’ll gladly help you.”

“Marvelous!” Professor Slughorn claps his hands together and returns the smile. “Then let’s not waste more time, come with me to the Potions room. I’m sure our friend must be waiting for us already.”

And so, Kayn follows his professor, his feet still feel heavy, but he tries not to let it show. He doesn’t want the man to see and ask him if something’s wrong. Which, of course, everyone knows there is, something fundamentally wrong with him, but thankfully Slughorn hasn’t changed his attitude towards him at all. He actually stopped Kayn once after class and patted his shoulder, giving him a sad look and saying “Everything will be okay, my boy. I know it will”.

Kayn wishes he could believe those words.

It takes them around five minutes to reach the room where it all started. Kayn can feel the smell of all the different potions from outside the door and it gives him whiplash, his memories taking him back to that one Tuesday morning. His heart clenches at the thought, but he composes himself quickly when Slughorn opens the door.

“Ah, you’re already here, K’Sante!”

Kayn’s eyes widen at the name.

Fuck.

There he is, the seventh-year Gryffindor, his brown skin glowing gold at the light of some candles lit here and there. He smiles at the old man. “Good to see you, professor”, he greets him. But then his eyes look behind him and he sees the Slytherin, and the smile vanishes slowly, a small frown appearing in its place. Kayn looks down as the guilt comes back in full force.

“Nice to see you too! Here, this is the student I told you about, Kayn is one of the best in my class!” Professor Slughorn announces proudly. His enthusiasm doesn’t reach Kayn, though. “Now, I know he’s a year younger than you, but he excels at preparing the Amortentia potion, so he’ll be tutoring you alongside me today. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Not at all, professor.” K’Sante says lightly, crossing his arms in what anyone could assume is a relaxed manner. Kayn, however, sees it differently. He knows K’Sante does mind, he’s Ezreal’s friend and is being tutored by the one who made him go away. Despite the small interaction they had on Monday, Kayn is sure he loathes him as much as the rest of his friends do.

“Good, then let’s get started. All hands-on deck!” Professor Slughorn jokes, lightening the mood slightly.

They go over the preparation of the potion step by step, with Kayn helping K’Sante measure the quantities of the needed ingredients. He soon takes notice of the big amounts of, well, everything, that the older boy uses for a small cauldron of potion. He mentions this and K’Sante can only sheepishly smile at Professor Slughorn, who gives him a look. Since not only the amounts are more than necessary, but also the measurements are off, they have to throw the whole potion away and start anew, this time Kayn observes the ingredients carefully and tells K’Sante how much is actually needed, so that no more product is wasted. Seeing as how the older is now adding things pinch by pinch, Kayn considers this potion will come out better than the first one.

At some point during the preparation, Professor Slughorn speaks up.

“Ah, boys, I’ll need to step away to my office for a bit. I remembered I have to write a letter to a colleague of mine. I assume you both will be okay by yourselves for a while?”

Kayn gulps. He doesn’t want to be left alone with the much bigger boy (his biceps are the size of Kayn’s head, how is that possible?), as he can only imagine another hate speech thrown his way. K’Sante, on the other hand, simply shrugs. “I think we will be alright, with Kayn here, I feel I’m going to ace this potion.”

“Alright then”, Professor Slughorn chuckles. “I won’t take long. If you need me, I’ll be right there”, he points towards a door in the other side of the room, and he waves to the boys as he walks away, much to Kayn’s dismay, disappearing behind the door a moment after.

The silence that follows is tense, none of the boys looking at each other. K’Sante stirs the liquid in the cauldron and Kayn prepares some extra pearl dust since most of it has already been used. He puts the dust in the jar and slowly slides it over to the other, who looks up at the friction noise.

“Okay, uh, now you need the pearl dust. With two teaspoons of it should be fine.” Kayn flatly says, before stepping away to clean the tools he used, not daring to look up or say anything else than what’s required. He can feel K’Sante’s heavy stare on him, and shivers run down his spine, yet he does his best to not let it show.

“You look like death.” K’Sante suddenly comments.

Kayn snorts. He does feel dead inside.

“Thanks. It’d be better if I really was, though”, he answers, using a cloth to clean his side of the table.

K’Sante frowns at that.

“No one should ever feel like that. No one deserves death, Kayn. Not even you.”

“Why not?” Kayn sighs, cleaning his hands in the same cloth. “I hurt Ezreal, and I made him run away. I’m actually surprised you haven’t punched me yet.”

“Because I don’t want to do that.”

“Why wouldn’t you?!” Kayn snaps, lifting his head up, now looking at the older boy. “Everyone in the school would like to see that! Hell, even I would feel good that you do it! Or Sett, I don’t care which one of you! Isn’t it obvious just how much I deserve it? I did something horrible, I said awful things about your friend, to the point I broke him! And yet here you are, still willing to talk to me? Why aren’t you being a jerk to me, just like everyone else?!”

K’Sante doesn’t bat an eyelash at Kayn’s outburst. He simply continues looking at him in the eye, his expression softening. And then, he speaks again.

“Because I can see how much this is hurting you too. It’s clear as day to me, just how much you care about Ezreal.”

“Yeah, right.” Kayn chuckles, with almost no energy left. “You don’t hurt the ones you care for.”

“Not intentionally, yes”, K’Sante says. “But I know for a fact that whatever it is you said, you didn’t have the intention to hurt him.”

“How can you be so sure of that?” Kayn says, bewildered.

The Gryffindor doesn’t answer. Instead, he takes the pearl dust jar, uses the big silver spoon inside to take a small amount, and then lets the dust fall into the cauldron, along with the rest of the stuff. Then, he begins to stir again.

The smell of teakwood and lilies fills Kayn’s nostrils again. The Amortentia potion is finished, and it’s perfect.

How he missed that smell.

Kayn closes his eyes and grips the cloth tightly, his senses basking in the feeling it gives him, his heart beginning to beat quicker.

“It’s him, isn’t it?” K’Sante voice is heard again. “The scent Amortentia takes for you. It’s Ezreal’s.”

It’s not a question, but a statement. K’Sante is telling him what he already knows, what he had been so keen on denying to everyone, hoping it would remain a secret.

“How?” Kayn’s voice is soft, eyes opening to give K’Sante a tired look. He’s tired, indeed, but of running away. “How did you know?”

K’Sante hums. “I figured it out over time. You tend to look at Ezreal for a second more than the rest, and you always do it whenever you think no one is looking. You’ve done it that way for the past three years. Whenever someone mentions his name, I can see you leaning an inch closer to listen to what they have to say about him. And on the sweetheart competition, you always write his name. I’m in the committee, I read the ballots, and I recognize your handwriting every time.”

Kayn sighs in defeat, and a little bit of embarrassment. He drops the cloth and runs his hands through his disheveled and oily hair. He hasn’t showered since last week.

“When I got to know about what happened that day on Slughorn’s class, I thought it was over”, K’Sante continues. “That your days of silent pining had come to an end, and you would take the chance to talk to Ezreal about your feelings. But you didn’t and were very insistent on saying it wasn’t like that at all. As weird as it was, it got me thinking. Something was stopping you from taking the leap of faith, even if it was right there. Whatever this reason was, it was strong enough to keep you from being true to your feelings. And I couldn’t hold that against you, I mean, I don’t know what you have gone through in the past. So, I continued to watch as you kept on denying everything all the time. And then what happened last Friday…” He shakes his head, braids moving along with it. “I didn’t blame you in the slightest. You had been under so much pressure; I knew everything would come to a boiling point one day. I just expected that whenever that happened, you would confess, and stop hurting yourself like that anymore.”

“But it didn’t”, Kayn says, “and instead things went south.”

K’Sante nods, a little bit of sadness clinging to his eyes.

“I completely understand Ezreal and why he did what he did, and I also don’t blame you for what you did. And even if you wish things weren’t the way they are now, that’s all in the past and you have to stop torturing yourself over it. All you have to do now is learn from your mistakes as we all do and do something about it.”

“But how?” Kayn asks. “Ezreal is gone and there’s no way to find him, and even if he came back, I’m sure he wouldn’t listen to me. He hates me now, for sure.”

“Um, I wouldn’t be so sure about that”, K’Sante murmurs, talking more to himself than to Kayn.

“What do you mean?”

“I guess you have to find that out, I won’t tell you.” The Gryffindor chuckles, and it’s a hearty, sincere laugh. Kayn immediately feels better hearing it, as if the whole conversation didn’t lift his spirits already.

“Well, what do you think I should do?”

“Find him, first.” K’Sante says, and it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “Go look for him, and then you’ll figure it out. I promise.”

Kayn looks at the older boy with new eyes. It’s like he was sent as glorious salvation, giving him a chance to redeem himself. Maybe he’s not entirely a lost cause. And K’Sante is right, he has to give it a try, and seek for Ezreal’s forgiveness. And tell him the truth, once and for all.

“Thank you, really.” Kayn says as a goodbye, turning around and rushing to the door, leaving at the same time Professor Slughorn comes out of his office.

“Kayn, wait!” The old man calls for him but the pink haired boy’s already gone. He looks at K’Sante. “Where is he going?”

“Oh, he had something important to do.” The student smiles, stirring his cauldron of Amortentia. “He’ll be okay.”

When Kayn gets to the top of the stairs, he notices it’s dark outside. Students are flooding the corridors, going to the main hall for dinner presumably. He pays them no mind, as he gets through the waves of students and sprints in an opposite direction to them. He has no idea where he’s going, he doesn’t know where to look for Ezreal first. He has to stop his racing mind for a second to think about any potential place within the school where the Hufflepuff might be.

His first guess is the library, so he runs there and almost trips on his way inside. It’s almost completely empty, a couple of students sitting around the place. Kayn doesn’t mind them as he races through the room, looking on every corner, every balcony, between the farthest, most hidden spots between the shelves. The librarian spots him and threatens to kick him out if he doesn’t stop running. Kayn, however, is already leaving, seeing as how there’s no sign of Ezreal in there.

He then goes to the kitchen, where the elves are busy finishing the dishes for dinner. Kayn looks around to no avail, but seeing the small hallway that leads to the Hufflepuff common room, he pales and turns around immediately, fearing bumping into Sett right now. He doesn’t have a death wish, for the first time in a while.

After that he visits the greenhouse, knowing of Ezreal’s green thumb. The leaves make it difficult for him to get through but after going from one end to the other and making sure there’s no hidden spot under any plant, he accepts defeat and moves on.

Kayn does what he hadn’t done in the past few days because of cowardice; he exhausts himself by roaming every single floor, every single room he can ever think of. He clears the quidditch changing rooms, breezes through the third floor (even though students have it prohibited), climbs up to the observatory, is kicked out of the infirmary…

His legs give in when he goes back to the first-floor corridors, and Kayn falls to the side, holding himself up in one of the columns. He’s breathing twice per second and his face is red, not to mention his legs are hurting like hell. He allows himself to close his eyes and relishes in the silence that engulfs him. He’s the only student still going around the school, all the rest in the main hall by now. Even when his stomach growls at the thought of dinner he has no energy to walk himself there. He slides down to the floor, trying to rest for a bit before continuing to look for Ezreal. But where else can he go? He already looked through the school, something that others have already done multiple times. He can’t leave the school grounds as it is late, and he can’t go to the Forbidden Forest at this hour, he’d probably get lost and end up under a stampede of centaurs or something. There’s nowhere else to go.

And Ezreal is nowhere to be seen.

Kayn tosses his head back against the concrete structure, his heart hurting not only because of the constant running but also because of the thought of the other. Wherever he went, it’s clear that he didn’t want to be found by anyone. He’s probably not even at school, he must be far away by now, maybe going back to London by himself. All alone, with the last words of Kayn as his sole company, torturing him with every step he takes away from him…

“I’m so sorry, Ezreal”, Kayn whispers to no one, somehow hoping that his words will reach the other. “I am sorry for what I said. I… I never meant to hurt you like that, please! Please, come back… I miss you… miss you so much. I don’t hate you. I love you so much. You have no idea. Please…”

He feels something prickling the inside of his eyes. He bites his lips and shuts his eyes tight to avoid the tears from escaping. A sob does make its way out of his throat, eventually.

Kayn is overwhelmed by the guilt, the fear, the regret. Guilt of what he’s done, fear of not seeing Ezreal again. Regretting not telling him how he really felt towards him.

His thoughts are so loud inside his head that he almost misses the sound of falling sand and rocks against rocks. He opens his eyes as he turns in the direction of the sound, and is left surprised when he sees a big, rock-hard door materializing out of nowhere on the wall at the dead end of the corridor. He scrambles to get up and stumbles a bit in dizziness but regains his balance quickly and slowly approaches the door, now fully materialized. It stands at nine feet tall, completely solid and molded perfectly into the wall, as if it had always been there. Kayn stares in awe yet very puzzled at the sudden apparition, wondering what kind of room in Hogwarts can move from one place to another. He finally realizes it as the door unlocks with a soft click and barely opens an inch, inviting Kayn inside.

It's the Requirement Room.

The room that comes and goes, equipped with anything and everything, for any given situation. Only appearing to those who are in need, no matter the situation.

The perfect place to go to when you want an escape from the world.

Kayn walks to the door and reaches for it with a shaky hand. He’s nervous, scared of what he may find inside, or more accurately, of who he may find inside.

He pushes the door open softly, very grateful when he notices it doesn’t creak or make any sound. The door slides back to its extent, revealing Kayn what’s inside the room.

The room is quite big. Many windows on the top half of the walls, clear enough to see the stars in the night sky. A crystal chandelier hangs in the middle of the ceiling, the pendants looking like frozen teardrops. And despite being almost completely empty, it’s very warm. Although it’s probably because of the chimney at the opposite wall from where Kayn’s standing. A chimney that lights the room enough to make out the shapes in front of it. There’s… pillows? Dozens of them, scattered on the floor, of many shapes and textures. And laying over them, close to the warmth of the chimney, facing the flames, there’s a small human figure covered with a big fluffy blanket. From where he stands, Kayn can see the green hair ponytails sprawled on the pillows behind his head.

Ezreal.

Kayn stares at his sleeping figure in relief, so much relief, and so much love. How he has missed him, terribly so.

He steps inside the room, leaving the door open in his trance. His steps are soft, noiseless, as to not wake up the other. The more he gets closer, the more warmth Kayn feels; he hadn’t noticed until then that his skin was icy. He wouldn’t have cared anyways, his focus solely on finding the source of his vitality, the reason why he looked forward to their shared classes, the reason why he had spent money on every single quidditch game he would play in, just to see his triumphant smile as he caught the golden snitch and held it high and proud.

Kayn stops when he feels a pillow under his feet, and at the same time he hears the slide of the door closing behind him. He turns around just as it closes with a not so soft click.

The sound prompts another, of fabric sliding against fabric. Kayn turns again to see the small figure moving slowly, awakening with a soft groan. Ezreal turns on his back and raises his arms over his head, face scrunching as he stretches. The movements remind Kayn of a cat, but his face is that of a bunny, the cutest one Kayn has ever seen. Now that he can see his profile, he notices how red his face is, most likely because of the heat, but he can also see the unmistakable shine of tear tracks running down his cheeks.

Kayn wants to die all over again.

When Ezreal is done stretching, he sinks back on the pillows and opens his eyes slowly, eyelashes wet with tears that escaped him in his sleep. He doesn’t notice Kayn’s presence, however, as he stares at the ceiling, his sight focusing on reality and the place he’s at.

“Hm… I guess I slept a lot, huh?” He sleepily says, seemingly to no one. Kayn drowns in the sound of his voice. After being starved of it for days, this is like water in a desert for a thirsty man. And Kayn wants more. But he’s still afraid.

He’s found Ezreal, what now? What is he supposed to do? Apologize, that’s a given. But he doesn’t know where to start. He’s not even sure Ezreal will want to talk to him. And he doesn’t want the moment to end, he wants to keep on watching Ezreal like he’s a moving painting hanging on the walls of Hogwarts.

But he shouldn’t. He can’t keep on delaying this anymore.

You’ll figure it out, K’Sante’s words echo in his mind. And he was right.

He has to speak now, even if words feel heavy on his tongue. Kayn swallows some spit before using all courage he has left to utter his name.

“Ezreal.”

A head snaps quickly in his direction, golden eyes growing wide in shock and fear, and the Hufflepuff sits up in a swift motion, hands gripping the edge of the blanket tightly.

“You?! What- How-” Ezreal has so many questions dying on his mouth, staring in bewilderment at the Slytherin. It’s like he’s seen a ghost, with how pale he is quickly turning. He even shakes his head vigorously as if convinced Kayn will be gone just like that, like he’s an illusion or a trick of his mind. But to his surprise, he’s still there, and Ezreal’s mouth goes agape. “How did you even get here?!”

Kayn has to look down at the intensity of Ezreal’s stare. He shuffles his feet a little and puts his hands in his pants’ pockets. “I was looking for you”, Kayn mutters yet it sounds loud in the vastness of the room. “And, uh, the door appeared in front of me and, uh, yeah, I found you, I guess.”

“Looking for me? What-? Hold on”, Ezreal stops himself from whatever he wanted to say to stare back at the chimney. “Did you let him in just like that?! How dare you!”

The flames on the chimney die down a little at the betrayal in Ezreal’s tone.

“Who are you talking to?” Kayn is very confused as he looks up to see no one else in the room besides the Hufflepuff.

Ezreal turns back to face him with a frown on his delicate features. “To the room, you dumbass. It has a conscience of its own. And they knew I wanted to be left alone! But of course, of all people that could’ve been looking for me, it had to be you that they appeared to. You’re the last person I want to see now, Kayn!”

His words are more than justified, yet Kayn can’t help the visible hurt displayed on his face. He had imagined this scenario more than a thousand times, but the images on his mind couldn’t compare to the actual thing, Ezreal screaming at him from a place of hate Kayn himself had conjured.

“I-I know, Ezreal, I know.” Kayn raises his hands in surrender, trying to dissipate some of the anger coursing through the other. His tone remains soft. “You don’t want to see me, and that’s… I understand. But I needed to find you, tell you how sorry I am-”

“You’re sorry?!” Ezreal barks out a laugh fueled by hatred and disbelief. “I don’t think so. You made your stance about me very clear the other day, remember? And you were so passionate about it! How did it go? Oh, right, ‘he’s never had to work a day in his life’, ‘he gets whatever he wants by just standing there and looking pretty’!” He doesn’t stop his speech as he kicks the blanket away and stands up, stumbling a little on the pillows. He’s still wearing his uniform, all wrinkly from all the days he’s had it on. “It’s not like I have labored day and night for the past six years to get to where I am now! All those months of incessant studying, all the broken bones I’ve had just to be good enough to get into the quidditch team, all the help I’ve received from professors and the extra hours I’ve taken to go over and over the same notes! And for what? For a chance to prove myself worthy of the opportunities I’ve been given! Unlike you, I don’t have a family of wizards to back me up, just my uncle who always made sure I had everything I could ever need. He taught me the importance of hard work, of never giving up and never taking anything for granted! And I did not burn out all of my energy just to have someone say I’m using tricks on people to manipulate them!” At this point Ezreal has closed the breach between them and stands in front of Kayn, face red and eyes watery, his index jabbing onto Kayn’s chest. “And what’s more, from someone who’s been given everything he has on a silver platter like you! I thought you were different than other purebloods I’ve met, but it seems you fit on the Slytherin stereotype perfectly! You don’t care for anyone else other than yourself, Shieda Kayn! And oh, since you rue the day you ever met me, as you so kindly said, then why is it that you were looking for me, huh? Why did you even care I was gone?!”

It's too much, for both of them. Kayn has to tear his gaze away from Ezreal, again, closing his eyes as he takes on hit after hit, every word he hears turning into lava and burning his insides. He did know Ezreal was a hard worker, but never knew all the things he went through. Hearing it from Ezreal himself, it just makes him regret everything even more. Kayn wishes he could choke his past self so that he never said anything that day. Maybe then he wouldn’t have ever seen the painful sight that is Ezreal’s eyes full of tears, his wobbling lips, the way his whole body stands dejected, his limbs giving in on gravity. He’ll do anything to never see him like this again.

So Kayn turns his head to Ezreal again, and in a small voice, he answers him:

“Because I wanted to apologize… I didn’t mean any of the things I said.”

“Sure you didn’t”, Ezreal snorts, although it comes off more like a sob. “The way I heard it, you had those words deep rooted into you. I never knew you could be this cruel.”

“I’m serious”, Kayn says, regaining some of the strength in his voice. “I don’t believe those words myself, I just…”

Ezreal crosses his arms, waiting for the other to continue.

“I lied to them so they would leave me alone-”

“And that’s your excuse? That you said those things to get them off your back?! You’re so pathetic, Kayn!” The Hufflepuff suddenly pushes the other. “Coming up with the lamest idea to justify your actions, and you think I will believe that?! Hah, you must really think I’m stupid enough to fall for it, and even more if you think I will forgive you! Just so you know, I never will, you hear me? I don’t want to see your stupid face anymore!”

“Ezreal, please-”

“Stop it, I don’t want to hear it! All I want is for you to leave, I’m done listening to lie after lie after lie, I don’t even know why I even gave you a chance to explain-”

“EZREAL!” Kayn yells as he grabs the other by his arms and stops him. The shock at the sudden action effectively shuts Ezreal up, his eyes going wide, and Kayn sees this as his chance to say what he has been aching to say since he entered the room. “I… I love you, Ezreal. I have loved you ever since that Herbology class in second year, when you saved me from the mandrake.”

Ezreal blinks once. Then twice. Thrice. He does that while he catches on the words Kayn has just said, processing the new information he just received. And when he does, a shiver runs through his body, his brows furrowing. “W-What?”

A sigh escapes the other’s lips. “You asked me to tell you the truth, and this is it. I’m in love with you.”

“No, you are not”, Ezreal shakes his head, convinced this is another lie.

“I am. You must remember what I said that day in front of the whole class, when I smelt the Amortentia. It was your scent, Ez. That’s the irrefutable truth. It smelt of you because I love you.”

Ezreal grabs Kayn’s arms and pushes them away from his own.

“Then why did you keep on denying it? Even when I asked you upfront if you liked me, you said you didn’t! Why?!”

His voice is still raised, hurt still there. Kayn bites the inside of his lower lip, not ready to tell the whole truth but also having no escape from it, plus he doesn’t want to lie to Ezreal anymore.

“Because I didn’t want them to know. If they did, they would have probably used it to play me and humiliate me, in front of you and everyone else. That’s the thing with weaknesses; once you reveal them it’s game over for you.”

The hurt in Ezreal’s face grows tenfold. “How is it a weakness to be in love? Is it really that embarrassing to be in love with me?”

“That’s not what I meant-”

“That’s how it sounds like! Why are you so concerned about who knows about it? Why is it such a big deal to you?! It’s not like you’re going to be punished for it-”

“How can you be so sure of that?”

“Because no one in their sane mind would treat someone like shit for it? Even less in here! If you think you’re going to receive some sort of punishment for it, then you must be-”

“I have, Ezreal!” Kayn snaps, finally revealing what he’s been bottling up for such a long time. He rubs the eye patch over his eye as it begins itching. “I’ve been tortured because of my weaknesses before, by my own family. By my very own parents.”

Ezreal’s words die in his throat at the revelation, all hurt in his face wiped away to give room for disturbance.

“Your parents? But… you live with your dad’s brother. Didn’t your parents stray away from your family? Didn’t they leave you?”

“They did, forever.” Kayn looks down, the memories painful to him. “They’re dead, Ezreal.”

A gasp is covered behind both hands. The green haired boy begins tearing up again. “Kayn, I’m so sorry, I didn’t know…”

Kayn lets out a dry chuckle. “No one does. We’ve told everyone they went away, and that they left me under my uncle’s custody. That’s not what really happened. The truth is… something I’ve never wanted to speak about. But,” Kayn looks up at the boy in front of him, so sweet, so uncorrupted, unlike himself, “I think it’s only fair for you to know about it. You must know why I act the way I do, and why I am who I am.”

As he speaks, Kayn reaches behind his head to grasp the bands of his eyepatch, pulling them upwards and taking the patch away. What is revealed under leaves Ezreal staring in horror.

In the place where another green eye should be, there is a glowing red one, its iris of a ghostly white color, the small veins of a black coal as if they were burnt. The pupil is just as red as the rest of the eye.

“What…” Ezreal’s voice falters, not daring to finish the question.

Both eyes look at him in defeat.

“This is what my parents left me with.” Kayn responds to the silent question. “The remaining scar of the Cruciatus curse they inflicted on me.”

“My mother was a very unstable woman. She came from an unwanted arranged marriage who neglected her completely. She had fits of rage and more often than not she was violent. Her mental health had deteriorated to a point where she couldn’t tell right from wrong, doing things out of sheer impulse with no self-control left. My father loved her regardless of it all. He turned a blind eye to it, excused her behavior at all times. It was an infatuation that never left, some sort of fucked up obsession he had.

“When I was born, mother’s behavior changed for a good while. From what I’ve heard, she did take good care of me for the first three years of my life. Everyone who knew her was surprised. It was as if a switch went off in her head, and whatever was consuming her before had been left behind. For three years, we were a picture perfect, happy family. Unfortunately, it all came crashing down after my fourth birthday, the day my powers manifested.

“Of course, coming from a pureblooded family, everyone was delighted, seeing as my magic awakened in my early years, and therefore was labeled a prodigy for it. Father was proud and wanted me to begin my studies almost immediately. Mother took that upon herself as a task. She became my teacher, and had me learn all types of spells, every day, from dusk until dawn. And I was a fast learner, got them all right in the first try. Until one day, I didn’t.

“At first, mother seemed patient enough to give me another chance, which I also failed. And then a third chance. But when I didn’t get it right, something snapped in her. All of a sudden, I felt pain all over me, so much pain. I remember seeing black and red. I was screaming so loud, but the pain only got worse. It wasn’t until father came that it finally stopped. I saw him holding my mom by the wrists. She had her wand in her hand. The last thing I saw was him cradling her in his arms before I passed out. That was the first time she used the Cruciatus curse on me.”

“The first time?” Ezreal looks at Kayn horrified, leaning closer to him from his spot on the pillows, sitting cross legged in front of the chimney with a cup of tea in his hands, courtesy of the Requirement Room. “You mean there were more?!”

“Countless more. After that first time, I was terrified, of course. With that fear already ingrained, I stopped being the golden child who perfected spell after spell. I stopped getting them right on the first try. And this made mother angry. The Cruciatus became a constant during my studies. Father intervened the first few times it happened, but then he pulled me aside one day to tell me that I should stop being weak, to take the punishments as they would make me stronger. But that curse is not something you can’t just get used to after a while. You can’t hold the pain back. There’s a reason as to why it’s known as the torture curse.” The Slytherin chuckles and shakes his head, trying to lighten up the mood, which obviously doesn’t happen.

“So, mother continued to torture me, and it got worse over the years. Even if I correctly conjured a spell, a tiny mistake on the movements of the wand was enough to warrant a punishment. She went down the spiral of madness again. And to keep up all appearances, father did something just as bad. Whenever we were in the public eye, he would use the Imperius curse on her to keep her image of the calm, reformed woman who became a doting mother. So, they were using two Unforgivable curses behind everyone’s back.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Ezreal interrupts him again. “How come no one caught on what was happening?”

“Father threatened me to not utter a single word about it, saying that if I ever slipped up, he’d do something worse than what my mother did to me. And I, as a young child, believed him. How could I not? He failed to protect me from mother, and instead protected her even if she didn’t deserve it. To him, she could do no wrong, and all the times she’d torture me, he saw them as disciplinary measures.

“This went on for three years. All that time, I had no one to lean on. I lived with just my parents, and our house elves did not involve themselves in our family affairs. Hell, even they were instigated by my mother to watch as she tortured me. I was belittled in front of them, and they wouldn’t even blink, neither spare me a single glance after. So I grew up feeling lesser than a house elf. I was all on my own. And then when I was seven…” Kayn falls silent as the memories invade him. He shifts uncomfortably on his seat next to Ezreal and rubs his red eye again.

“Hey, it’s okay”, the green haired boy scoots closer to Kayn and places a hand on his shoulder. “You don’t have to tell me everything if you don’t want to. We can stop here.”

“No, no, it’s fine. It’s just… it’s been a long time since I last thought about them. I figured all the pain attached to them would be gone by now, but it seems not.”

“I don’t blame you one bit for that.” Ezreal assures him, rubbing back and forth from his shoulder to his arm. “What you went through, no one should ever have to, and even less a child.”

“And yet my parents had zero reservations when it came to making me “tough”. The two of them were unscrupulous, it took me a long time to come to terms with the truth.” Kayn sighs heavily before continuing. “As I was saying, I had turned seven when the worst happened. We were in the yard, and I was practicing the levitating spell. I was doing good, and mother seemed pleased for the first time in a while. But then the sound of thunder in the distance distracted me, and I dropped the bust I was levitating. It broke into pieces and mother came charging towards me. She slapped me so hard I fell to the ground while she called me useless. When I saw her raising the wand I blindly reacted. As she threw the Cruciatus curse at me, I responded for the first time, by using the Protego spell. I learned it by myself when I read a spell book mother had thrusted on me to continue my studies. And it worked. Almost too perfectly.” Kayn turns more and more tense by the second, the veins on his neck beginning to show. “It bounced back. The curse, it was thrown back at her. She flew away while I held my eye in pain, for the spell had also bounced back on me. And then… when, when I looked at her-” His face twists in a display of the horror the mere thought brings him. “She had collided against an archer statue. And the arrow… it- God, it was horrible, the way it had pierced through her neck.”

Ezreal gasps loudly at that, dropping his cup into the pillows to cover the noises from his mouth. The liquid spills into the pillows and the spaces in between them. For the nth time that night, his eyes fill with fresh, salty tears. Shivers begin coursing through his whole body. Concern and compassion are evident in his body language. Yet, he says nothing, as Kayn doesn’t stop there.

“Her blood was pouring on the grass. She was gasping and gripping the arrow, trying to move away. I watched as she fought for her life. I watched her as her arms fell to her sides and she stopped moving. Her eyes were looking at the sky. I called for her, but she didn’t respond. By the time one of the elves noticed, it had started raining. It was that elf who informed my father, who burst through the back doors and wailed at the sight of his dead wife. He pulled her body away from the statue and held her for the longest time. I could only watch as he called her name over and over, as if it would bring her back. He was still holding her when I stood up and walked up to them. I couldn’t wrap my head around the whole situation, I didn’t know that I unwillingly caused my mother’s death. But father did, as soon as he saw me. The red eye was all he needed to know what had happened, or what he thought happened.

“He dragged me from my hair back to the house, and in front of the house elves began punching me, kicking me, and when it wasn’t enough for him, he threw me all around the house with the magic on his wand. I was thrown against the walls, up the ceiling, on any surface he could see. He no longer saw me as his son, only as my mother’s murderer, and he wanted me to suffer. He didn’t want to kill me just yet, not until I was on the brink of death, begging at him to stop. But he wasn’t stopping. And probably wouldn’t have if it wasn’t for my uncle Zed. He came to pay us a surprise visit when he heard my screams from the outside. He suddenly appeared in the room between my father and I and protected me from his endless torture. They fought, if I recall correctly, because I heard burst after burst. And then I saw a green light and it all ended.”

“A green light… Oh, Kayn, please don’t tell me he…” Ezreal can’t bring himself to say it.

Kayn, who had until then been staring at the dancing flames from the chimney, turns to look at him. The look on his eyes confirms Ezreal’s suspicions.

“By age seven, I had witnessed all three Unforgivable Curses. The last one was used by my uncle against my father, his own brother.” Kayn says.

Tears are already falling down Ezreal’s eyes, and he barely wipes them away before uncrossing his legs to crawl even closer to Kayn, and unexpectedly he wraps his arms around the other, a bone-crushing hug that catches the Slytherin off guard. The initial shock wears off after a few seconds and Kayn then returns the gesture, his arm coming to wrap around Ezreal’s back.

Kayn’s memories happened a long time ago and he barely reacts to them now, but Ezreal’s empathy is very strong, and he feels a lot, feels Kayn’s pain as if it was his own. And this trait of his, accompanied by the sensitivity to react accordingly to the situation, is why many people have opened up to him, just like Kayn has done. He’s a good listener and has a golden heart.

Kayn rubs soothing circles with his thumb over the ribs he can feel underneath the shirt, as he lets Ezreal cry on his shoulder. Inconsolable at first, his sobs die down eventually. He continues to tremble for a while, and Kayn has no trouble holding him until he’s okay. Had the situation been different, he would’ve heard sirens blaring within his system with the proximity to him, would’ve had trouble hiding his feelings towards him. But now it comes so naturally to him, feelings out in the open, nothing left to fear, and nothing left to lose.

A couple of minutes pass before Ezreal is moving away, his figure limp from exhaustion. He averts his gaze to the side, seemingly gathering himself after the ordeal.

“S-Sorry about that.” His voice breaks a little. “I didn’t mean to… you know, invade your personal space and stuff.”

Kayn internally coos at the image in front of him. Ezreal’s cheeks are flushed from all the crying but also in embarrassment, if his current position says anything about it, kneeling and fidgeting with his own hands over his lap.

“There’s nothing to forgive, Ez.” He assures the other. “At least from my part.”

Ezreal does look at him after that sentence, eyes puffy and wide. Kayn turns on his side to face Ezreal with his whole body, one knee folded and his arm resting over it.

“I still have one thing left to explain to you.” He starts. “So far, I’ve told you all the things that I went through living with my parents, but I know that doesn’t really relate to my fear of loving you freely, or why I considered it a weakness akin to my parents’ definition of one. That came years after they passed. Remember our first year in Hogwarts? Viktor and Jayce.”

The sole mention of those names makes Ezreal grimace. “How could I forget that? I’m sure it scarred everyone in our year.”

“Yeah, no kidding.” Kayn agrees. “The way Viktor was treated, and all because he decided to confess to Jayce one day in public. I still remember those older Slytherins that bullied him so much afterwards.”

“Dude, they appeared in my sleep for years after. That’s how terrible it was.” Ezreal comments. “And to think Jayce was the one who came up with pushing him off the astronomy tower?”

“That was the fucking cherry on top.” Kayn frowns deeply. “Viktor did not deserve any of that. Good thing Dumbledore was there to stop him from hitting the ground. But to see him fall from that high, that’s something I will never forget.”

“Oh Lord, please don’t remind me”, Ezreal throws himself face first onto the pillows, groaning.

“Sorry.” Kayn follows after Ezreal, laying down on a big heart-shaped pillow, looking up onto the ceiling. “But you were right when you say it was traumatizing. Specially to me.” By the rustling he hears from the side, he assumes Ezreal is now looking at him. “It reminded me of… everything. The curses, the pain, the lonely suffering. I thought I had left it all behind when my parents died, and Uncle Zed took me in. But to see it happening again in front of my eyes… to think of my peers doing that to me as well… and just for loving someone…”

“I understand.” It’s the way Ezreal says it, Kayn knows it goes beyond understanding his unfinished sentence. He turns his head to see Ezreal laying on his right side, and he mirrors his position. Ezreal lifts his hand towards Kayn’s face, and once he gets the approving nod from Kayn he touches his cheek, caressing it with flitting touches of his fingertips. “It doesn’t excuse your behavior that day, but I understand now why you reacted that way.”

“Ezreal, I don’t think I will ever forgive myself for the things I said that day. You are none of those things, never have been. I lied to everyone’s face and hurt you deeply. I didn’t care about the consequences then, but had I not been so stupid and realized it didn’t have to be like what happened then- I know you are a good person, amazing even, and you wouldn’t do anything like Jayce did, and yet I couldn’t get it off my mind-”

Kayn’s shushed by fingers over his lips.

“I know the truth now.” Ezreal simply says. “And… I do forgive you, Kayn.”

It’s as if the pain had been washed away by just the sound of his voice, a weight off his chest. Kayn stares at Ezreal for the longest time, lost into those golden orbs that hold no more hate and no resentment towards him. There’s only calmness swimming in them now, and it passes on to Kayn through his own eyes.

He reaches for the hand over his mouth, holds its fingers so delicately as he pulls softly on them to reveal the back of his hand, and presses a feather soft kiss over it.

“Thank you”, he whispers, prompting a smile from Ezreal. He sneaks his hand out of Kayn’s hold to ghost it over the cheekbone under his red eye.

“Can I?” He asks softly. Kayn nods. Almost immediately he can feel the ghostly touch of warm, small fingers over his skin. Ezreal’s gaze falls over his cursed eye, no fear present anymore. Kayn closes his eyes, allowing Ezreal to trace the shape of his eye, run his fingers over his eyelid. It’s sweet, just like him.

His touch disappears, and Kayn opens his eyes again to see Ezreal’s hand curled over his mouth, his cheeks turning red, suddenly very shy. His gaze is now fixated on Kayn’s lips.

The Slytherin feels nervous once again. If that means what he hopes it does… He’s confessed his feelings but has no idea about Ezreal’s own. It hadn’t crossed his mind for the entirety of their talk.

Ezreal’s eyes look up to meet with his own. “Can I?” He repeats the question, knowing Kayn understands what he means.

Kayn gulps his worries down his throat as they were unwarranted. Ezreal’s never shied away from showing his feelings to others. Now’s not an exception. So, the pink haired boy moves closer to Ezreal, letting the tips of their noses touch, loving how his cheeks turn redder by the proximity.

“You can.” He speaks.

And Ezreal takes a deep breath before removing his hand from his mouth and leaning in to press their lips together.

The first time Kayn ever saw fireworks, he was eight. Under his uncle’s care, he tugged at the adult’s hand as he pointed up to the sky, small flickers of light exploding into millions of pieces, a beautiful spectacle for a Christmas celebration that left the crowd in awe. That same feeling, is what Kayn is experiencing now. A thousand fireworks inside of him, the marvel and delight of then, now present in the sensation that is Ezreal and his lips shyly touching his own in a sweet kiss.

They feel like petals, so soft and smooth against his own chapped and rough lips. They taste like the chamomile tea he was drinking just moments prior. They’re perfect. Ezreal is perfect.

Their lips part away for a second and Kayn immediately closes the distance, not giving Ezreal a second to breathe. He’s found his new favorite taste in the world, and he’s quickly becoming addicted to it. A small noise comes from Ezreal’s throat, but he doesn’t pull away, instead grabbing onto Kayn’s shirt to keep him close. This encourages Kayn to wrap his arms around his tiny waist, something he’s been itching to do for months now. These actions add more intensity to the already intimate moment.

“Kayn…” Ezreal sighs his name when they part to breathe. His eyes flutter open like a butterfly’s wings, and Kayn falls even more for him.

“Since when?”

“Huh?”

“Since when do you… feel the same for me?”

“Oh…” Ezreal bites his lower lip as he hides his gaze behind his lashes. “I-It was, uh… around our fourth year, I think. I saw you by the lake and, uh, well… Y-you- you were-”

“Hey”, Kayn rubs his thumb over the curve in Ezreal’s waist. “It’s alright, love.”

The pet name leaves Ezreal gaping at the other. “Love?”

“Is it too soon to call you that?”

“Uh, m-maybe…” His face disappears behind his hands, and Kayn can hear him wheeze a little. He chuckles lowly and leans to press lithe kisses over his fingers.

“So cute.”

“Stooop! Kayyyyn!” Ezreal whines and puts his hands over Kayn’s lips, revealing the small pout on his own pinkish ones.

Kayn smirks under Ezreal’s palms, kissing them before moving back to get into the space between his arms, face to face again and kissing the Hufflepuff deeply. A hand tangles in his hair, Kayn’s pulled along with Ezreal as the latter lays down on the pillows, with the Slytherin ending up on top of the other. There’s a huff coming from Kayn, and he breaks the kiss to place his arms on each side of Ezreal’s face, supporting his weight.

“So… what did you see that day?” Kayn can’t help but ask.

Being reminded of their current conversation topic, Ezreal blushes again.

“W-well, I saw you near the lake, and you were… doing pull ups on a tree branch… shirtless.”

Kayn lifts his brow in interest at the information.

“Oh? Did you see something you liked?” He teases the other.

“Uh…” Ezreal’s ears begin to burn red as well. “Y-your back. The muscles you had.”

Kayn feels invigorated at the confession. He reaches for Ezreal’s hand and moves it towards his back, never stopping the eye contact with the green haired.

“I still have them, if you want to feel them.” His voice drops a little, and Ezreal shivers underneath him.

“M-maybe next time!” He hurriedly says, although his fingers curl on the shirt where they’re currently staying.

Kayn smirks, yet it comes out as half one and half a smile. “So, there’s going to be a next time?”

Ezreal bites his lip and brings his arms to wrap around Kayn’s neck. “I hope there will be.”

Kayn has so much love for the boy in front of him, he cannot contain himself anymore now that he’s given the chance to show him every little thing he feels. So, he leans down again to capture those lips with his, heart fluttering at Ezreal’s happy hum, already giddy at the idea of future days spent together. He can already imagine Ezreal by his side during classes, at lunchtime, by the yards, just the two of them, Kayn hugging him from behind and losing himself in his warmth and scent-

Hold on.

Ezreal whines in complain at the sudden loss of lips against his own, but that is quickly replaced with a gasp as Kayn dives into the junction of his neck and shoulder.

“Kayn-”

“Sorry”, he hears the mutter before Kayn buries his nose over his skin, inhaling deeply. There it is, the real thing, and it’s so much better than the smell the Amortentia could concoct. The fresh acidity of teakwood, and the subtle sweetness of the lily of the valleys. Kayn exhales hotly over Ezreal’s neck, eliciting another gasp from above him. “I couldn’t help it.” And as he keeps himself there, his hand goes up to tangle into Ezreal’s hair, the other coming to hold his waist and pull him even closer to him, if that’s even possible.

“Hng…” Ezreal squirms a little but otherwise lets Kayn do as he pleases. “You… you really like my scent, huh?”

As if to prove that point, Kayn takes another huge whiff of that delectable aroma, and then places an open-mouthed kiss on Ezreal’s neck, the Hufflepuff closing his eyes and sighing in delight at the feeling.

“Very much”, is the only thing Kayn says as he looks up into the golden eyes he adores.

They continue kissing as the night grows darker, sweet words whispered over skin, soft pants and grunts filling the silence in the room, only accompanied by the rustle of fabric against fabric and the sound of wet lips brushing against each other.

Behind them, the flames on the chimney begin dancing around in sheer happiness.

“Mmh…”

It’s the morning sun over his eyelids what stirs Ezreal awake from his sleep. He tries to shield himself from it, pulling the blanket over his head but soon realizes it is not moving an inch. He blinks his eyes open slowly, frowning in distaste at the blinding lights coming from the window, and buries his face back into the pillow. He attempts to stretch his limbs but soon finds his body colliding with another behind him as his back curves. That stops any further movements and shoots his eyes open again. His mind is still trying to catch up with reality and, with no recollection of yesterday so far, he slowly turns around to be greeted with the sight of unruled, magenta hair, tanned skin, and a face he’s grown used to see in a perpetual frown, now completely relaxed as he sleeps.

Kayn.

Memories of their encounter yesterday begin to flood Ezreal’s mind: Kayn finding the Requirement Room, their discussion, Kayn’s story, his declarations of love…

A smile erupts in the Hufflepuff’s still sleepy features, and he turns his body around to be face to face with the Slytherin. His hand reaches out to trace the shape and sharp lines on the other’s face, softly, not wanting to wake him up just yet. It’s the first time he’s ever been this close and intimate with Kayn, having slept together, his arm still wrapped around Ezreal’s waist, keeping him close. The touch makes Ezreal’s skin tingle where there’s points of contact, and he has to hold back the shiver that betrays to spread around his body.

Having Kayn this close is something he had only seen in his best dreams, dreams that began after that day by the lake. He remembers it clearly. He’d wanted to have some peaceful reading done, but he stopped dead in his tracks when he saw the boy exercising by the tree Ezreal used to sit under. The way his back muscles moved had Ezreal’s mouth go dry, and his biceps flexing had Ezreal imagining himself on a chokehold in them… He turned around and left quickly, flustered, hiding for the rest of the day under his blankets. That same night, he’d first dreamt of the Slytherin, pinning him against that same tree and kissing the life out of him, while Ezreal’s hands roamed around that strong back.

Since then, he couldn’t look at Kayn the same way ever again. He’d catch sight of him hanging around the school, the first two buttons of his shirt undone, and Ezreal would bury his face in his books as to hide the furious blush on his cheeks. At nights he’d wake up sweaty after a fictional make out session with the other. And as he took notice of his seemingly uncaring personality and mysterious past, yet the way he was still attentive and a helping hand for whoever needed it, Ezreal felt himself pulled more towards him. He fell in love by watching Kayn from afar.

And now, that same boy is in front of him, looking even more handsome than he did years ago (how is that even possible, Ezreal ponders, he was already so handsome before), and the best part? He reciprocates his feelings. He’s always belonged to Ezreal, but now, he is a hundred percent sure Kayn’s completely his.

Mine.

Ezreal’s never been a possessive person, but he hopes this one time he can be given a pass. This one time, he doesn’t want to lose him.

His hand moves down his face, to his neck, caressing the curve there, and continues moving down until he’s touching the other’s sternum, where the same two buttons of his shirt remain undone. He gulps at the warmth underneath his palm, and at the sensation of the solid pecs on his chest. Fuuuuck, he’s ripped, Ezreal thinks, feeling his cheeks growing hotter by the second. Before his thoughts go down that path, he takes his hand away, instead going back to its original position over Kayn’s cheek, but he’s not content with just watching him sleep anymore. He wants more, he wants to feel, and now he can go for it.

He leans towards Kayn and immediately crushes his lips against his unmoving ones. He came to the realization last night that he can’t get enough of tasting them, feeling them glide in sync with his own. So, he presses himself closer to Kayn, deepening the kiss, and just taking, taking, taking. Until he feels a pair of hands grab his waist and the kiss being returned with as much intensity as he’s pouring into it. He’s suddenly pressed down over the pillows (again) and Kayn’s body hovering over his own, and Ezreal gets lost in all those sensations. The weight of Kayn over him, pressing in the most delicious of ways; the hands on his waist tightening the grip and making him feel so small underneath them; the burning passion in the kiss that makes his head spin in overstimulation.

It's only been around twelve hours, but he already knows, loving Kayn and being loved in return, is the most magical experience he’s ever had.

Kayn breaks the kiss with a sloppy noise, leaving Ezreal gasping for air.

“Good morning to you too, baby”, he says in a bed voice so deep Ezreal’s stomach does somersaults.

“H-hi”, is all Ezreal manages to say in a strained voice. The sight of Kayn’s messy hair and sultry looking eyes first thing in the morning was not in his bingo card for the year, and while he’s not complaining about it, he doesn’t know what to do with himself now.

“Aw, why so shy, Ez?” Kayn’s tone has suddenly turned teasing. “Weren’t you feeling me up just now?”

Oh, dear Lord, Ezreal wants to be swallowed by the pillows underneath him.

“I- Wha- Ahem, I mean-…” He doesn’t know where to look right now but Kayn’s face is the one thing he’s avoiding. His already red cheeks tinge with color even more, Ezreal’s sure he’s the personification of a tomato now.

“Heh, relax”, Kayn chuckles, giving him a peck on his lips. “I don’t mind.”

“I’m sorry…”

“Ezreal, I just told you it’s okay. You’re my boyfriend now, you can do it if you want to.”

Ezreal’s brain short-circuits.

Did Kayn just…?

“W-what did you just call me?” His eyes lock with the other’s, now open wide.

Kayn blinks at him. “My boyfriend”, he states as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “Aren’t we… Wait, did I ask you to be mine yesterday?”

There’s no such a memory in Ezreal’s mind, because if it’d happened, he would be replaying it all over again.

“No?”

Kayn puffs out the air in his lungs and groans, frowning as he lets his head down to rest on Ezreal’s shoulder.

“Fuck, sorry. I thought I had…” He whines like a little child. Ezreal can’t suppress the giggle that bubbles up.

“You’re an idiot”, he says lovingly. “But I’d love to be this idiot’s boyfriend.”

Kayn lifts his head up so quick Ezreal’s concerned about his neck breaking.

“Really? Will you be mine?” Kayn asks with as much hope in his voice as there is in both his eyes.

Ezreal purses his lips before placing his fingers below Kayn’s chin, pulling him closer with a motion.

“Only if you are mine as well.”

The kiss that follows seals their promise.

It’s only a few moments into the kiss that it becomes fiercer, more needy that their previous ones, a sense of urgency washing over them. Ezreal needs Kayn as close to him as possible, and Kayn needs to feel Ezreal under his hands, every part of him that was forbidden territory before. A hand sneaks under the untucked shirt to roam around the expanse of skin, over his abdomen, the contact making Ezreal gasp silently, a chance Kayn takes as well to slip his tongue inside the other’s mouth. The feeling of another tongue tangling with his own increases the warmth Ezreal is beginning to feel all over, and another strained sound leaves his mouth. Ezreal hasn’t heard himself make that noise ever, but he recognizes what it is by the way Kayn mirrors it in that low tone of his, messing around with Ezreal’s head. They’re moaning, basking in the pleasure and heat of the moment.

Ezreal can feel Kayn moving over him, probably making himself more comfortable, but he barely pays it any mind, his hands targeting the other’s shirt, looking for more buttons to undo. He manages to open two more before Kayn pulls away from his lips, tilting his head to the side to begin mouthing along Ezreal’s jaw. Another moan escapes him, loving the way Kayn’s lips feel like a gentle caress despite leaving a wet trail wherever they go. Ezreal’s mind is hazy but still clear enough to continue with his previous mission. He pulls Kayn’s shirt down, past his shoulders, and lets his hands through the small opening it leaves. Fingers grip on Kayn’s back muscles and oh, glorious heavens, it’s so much better than all the times he had imagined running his hands down that wide and defined back. Kayn’s figure is slimmer than that of his friends K’Sante and Sett, but he’s built like a Greek statue, and his muscles feel just as hard, rippling with every move of Kayn’s.

He doesn’t know when it started but there’s a sway rocking both their bodies, something pressing against Ezreal’s pants where he hadn’t noticed until now that there was some strain inside them. He looks down for just a second, enough to realize Kayn’s moving his hips down into Ezreal’s pelvic area. He’s grinding onto him, pushing one of his legs aside for a better movement. Ezreal tosses his head back as pleasure begins to build down there, gasping and whining and just needing more. His nails dig into Kayn’s back, which earns him a growl in return and a small bite on the pulse point below his ear. It sends shivers down his spine, straight to the growing area beneath his pants. He can feel Kayn’s too, rubbing against his own, a bit faster, a bit more friction between them.

“Kayn…”, Ezreal’s voice cracks, his throat tight and dry, chest heaving and back arching off the pillows. It’s so much, it’s so good, it makes him delirious, makes him want to get drunk in all that pleasure and the one to come. Kayn must be thinking the same, if the way he pants and rolls his hips and bites on Ezreal’s neck soft enough to not leave any marks is any indication. Ezreal does want him to leave marks, though, wants them red and wants purple bruises to match, and show them to everyone in the school as he walks around, wants everyone to know he belongs to Kayn, oh how he wants it-

Ezreal opens his eyes as the situation dawns on him.

“Wait, Kayn- ah, stop-”, he pushes the other away weakly, and when that doesn’t work, he starts hitting him on his shoulder repeatedly. “Kayn…”

Said boy finally stops moving and reluctantly lifts his head. The wild look on his face, his pupils blown wide, almost makes Ezreal forget about everything and continue what they’ve been doing.

“What?” He says, clearly annoyed at the interruption.

“Stop, please”, Ezreal begs him. “I don’t want this… don’t want to do this.”

Kayn frowns in confusion. “You clearly do.”

“Yeah, but not now.” Ezreal sighs, leaning on his arms to lift himself halfway. “We’ve only started dating like… five minutes ago? It’s too soon, I’d like to wait some time.”

“And how long will that be?” It’s clear Kayn hasn’t stepped out of the horny mind space yet.

Ezreal rolls his eyes but kisses Kayn sweetly. “Until I get to know my boyfriend a bit more. We’ve liked each other for so long and yet, I feel like I barely know anything about you. I want us to spend more time together, go on dates, just do other things before we get to this point. Please?”

The fire in Kayn’s eyes slowly dies down, and he blinks a couple of times as he focuses on reality again. He moves backwards then, sitting on his ankles and pushing his hair back. The open buttons on his shirt reveal more of his pecs and a small part of his abs and Ezreal almost drools at the sight.

Don’t you dare backtrack now, Ezreal! Focus!

“You’re right”, Kayn says, effectively distracting Ezreal from his body. “This is not how our first day together should go… I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.” Ezreal pushes himself off the ground and crawls a little until he’s sitting over Kayn’s legs. His boyfriend watches him curiously as the green haired buttons his shirt closed. “I want you too, but I want to love you first.” He fits the last button through its opening and then straightens the shirt a little with his hands. He’s stopped by other hands that hold his own, and Ezreal watches as Kayn intertwines their fingers on both.

“I already love you.” The Slytherin says, looking at Ezreal as if he was an angel. “And if you let me, I want to show it to you.”

Ezreal smiles. “You can.”

And so, he’s pulled down to receive another kiss from Kayn. The passion may be gone, but the sweetness and gentleness are not.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Kayn asks Ezreal as they hold hands, waiting for the door to materialize.

They spent the rest of the morning cuddling with each other, talking about small things, trivial things, classes, friends, holidays, birthdays, quidditch, the Thestrals Kayn’s uncle owns, and so on, only stopping when their stomachs grumbled in hunger and Ezreal took a look at the time to decide they needed to leave the room. Lunchtime was approaching, and he didn’t feel the need to hide away anymore. Literally and figuratively, as he looked at Kayn.

“I am.” Ezreal flashes Kayn a bright smile. “And you?”

Kayn had time to ponder on it. He was still reluctant to go meet everyone, as he continued to be the Undesirable number One at school since last week. But they didn’t matter anymore, they never even mattered in the first place. All Kayn could care about was the little ray of sunshine in his arms, vibrant with energy and filled with joy once again.

So he doesn’t hesitate to lean and place a kiss on Ezreal’s forehead.

“As long as you stay by my side.” He answers. And it seems enough for Ezreal.

The door becomes rock solid and unlocks, opening by itself slowly, heavily…

… to reveal Dumbledore on the other side, seemingly waiting for them.

“Professor!” Ezreal squawks, letting go of Kayn’s hand and pulling out of his embrace. “I- We- There was just talking! We were doing nothing, I swear!”

“Calm down”, Dumbledore chuckles at the student’s frantic explaining. “I’m not here to lecture you. Whatever happens within that room is a secret. I will not tell you what to do or not to do. The room knows better, after all.”

“Wait, professor”, Kayn steps out after Ezreal, standing under the doorframe. “How are you here? How did you know where we were?”

“I wouldn’t be Hogwarts’ headmaster if I didn’t care for each and every student under its roof”, Dumbledore simply states, caressing his beard. “And that also means knowing their whereabouts. I always knew where Ezreal was, there was no need for me to rush back after I received that letter.”

“You knew? And you did… nothing?” Kayn is confused, Dumbledore has always been cryptic like that. “You decided to say nothing about it?”

Dumbledore gives them a knowing look.

“The Requirement Room appears to whoever needs it. Ezreal needed it and had his reasons to remain away from the rest. Limits exist to be respected; I won’t be the one to breach them.”

Cryptic but wise and understanding, Kayn has to give him that.

“Thank you, Professor Dumbledore”, Ezreal sighs in relief. “Thank you so much.”

“No need to worry about the past”, he says. “It cannot be changed. What matters the most is the present and the future, for both can still be shaped. And if you ask me…” Dumbledore looks at them from over his glasses, “… you two make a beautiful couple.”

Both students turn red and share a look between them.

“Uh, thank you, Profes-” Kayn turns to the hall only to find it empty. He splutters. “What the fuck?”

Ezreal is as shocked as Kayn but giggles anyways. “Dumbledore being Dumbledore. Six years and you still aren’t used to it?”

“Are you?” Kayn retorts, and Ezreal opens his mouth to answer but then mulls it over and slowly joins his lips together again. It’s Kayn’s turn to chuckle. “Let’s go, shall we?”

The corridors are unusually silent, everyone must be at the main hall by now. Ezreal and Kayn walk hand in hand, with the Hufflepuff swinging their arms playfully, excited to see everyone and his friends again. Kayn, on the other hand, is doubting his decision. He hasn’t told Ezreal, but even under his tough exterior, he’s scared. He does not want to be judged and pointed at anymore. After talking about his past, some of the wounds reopened ever so slightly. The humiliation and belittling, and how he wasn’t strong enough to handle it. How he still doesn’t know how to handle them. But despite his apprehensions, he hopes today will be a new start for him. For Ezreal. For the two of them.

He left his eye patch in the Requirement Room intentionally. Kayn likes to think of it as the first step in the right path.

Behind the closed doors of the main hall, they can hear the loud conversations and the clatter of plates and utensils. They stand a good amount of feet away from it, both of them mentally preparing themselves for what’s to come.

Kayn suddenly lets go of Ezreal’s hand. He turns to look at him questioningly.

“You go first”, Kayn says. “They’re waiting for you.”

“Are you not coming?” Ezreal goes straight to the point, dread looming over him.

Kayn gives him a small smile and reaches to tuck a strand of hair behind his ear.

“I’ll be right behind you, sweetheart”, he assures him, caressing his cheek with his thumb before pulling away and taking a step back. “Go ahead.”

Ezreal frowns a little but nods, understanding that this is a nerve-wracking moment for the Slytherin. Listening to his words, he turns around and walks towards the giant doors, all the time feeling a strong gaze behind him.

When he’s close enough, the doors begin to open, revealing the boisterous atmosphere in the hall. Of course, with the creaking of the doors some heads turn towards the direction of the noise, and is one of those heads that emerges over the rest and screams loud enough for everyone to hear:

“EZREAL!”

The entirety of people in the hall look up and chaos ensues. There’s loud cheering everywhere and students stumbling out of their seats, pushing against each other in a swarm of black cloaks rushing to greet the missing Hufflepuff. Ezreal can only laugh at the crowd of people surrounding him, hugging him and ruffling his hair, all of them speaking over each other in an attempt to be heard by Ezreal. From somewhere way in the back, he can hear Sett’s voice yelling “Let us through, people!” and knows his friend’s being promptly ignored. Hands are shaking his nonstop as new people appear in front of him, and then he’s being pulled further into the room, away from the doors, and Ezreal has to stomp his feet into the ground to stop the pulling. He looks behind him, through the few people that stand between him and the doors and realizes there’s no pink hair in the crowd. He frowns and slips his hands from the current grip.

“Wait a minute, everyone! Let me through! Stay there!” He loudly says as he makes his way through the students, people groaning and asking him to come back, but Ezreal is keen on stopping them with a smile and telling them he’ll be back soon. He immediately runs through the threshold and looks around. To his left, Kayn is standing a few feet away, leaning on the wall, away from the eyes of others, and away from the celebration going on inside the main hall. His eyes are locked onto the floor, a frown on his face.

“Hey”, Ezreal calls out softly for him. Kayn raises his head, his expression softening at the sight of the love of his life. He looks torn, between wanting to stay out there and wanting to stand next to the other. Ezreal decides to take the next step. He lifts his arm in Kayn’s direction, hand open and waiting to be held. “Are you coming?”

The Slytherin stares for a while, just enough for the cheering inside the room to die down a little as everyone waits for Ezreal to go back inside again. Kayn takes a deep breath, can feel his fears seeping through his pores, still raw and very present, but then he remembers why he’s doing this for. To shape his present, who he is and who he wants to be, and to be able to create a future with Ezreal in it. He wants nothing more in the world than that. He exhales it all, gives no more room in his mind to the thoughts that paralyze him, stands up straight and ready to face it all. As long as Ezreal is by his side.

The distance between them becomes smaller, slow steps reaching their destination, and before the light from the hall can reveal him, Kayn extends his arm to take Ezreal’s hand, and finally takes the remaining steps to stand by his side.

Silence follows the sudden appearance of the Slytherin, smiles quickly replaced with frowns and weirded out stares that go back and forth between the two boys. People begin talking amongst themselves, not understanding the situation, and not liking it, not at all pleased with Kayn standing so close to Ezreal and even less holding hands with him.

“What is he doing here?” A voice raises over the rest, and Ezreal turns his head in its direction to throw them a frown, which shuts that student up. That just riles everyone up; conversations get more heated as Ezreal steps inside the hall again, hand pulling Kayn inside as well. The crowd parts for them like the Red Sea as they walk, everyone is so confused as to how and why are the two of them together. There are some horrified comments at the sight of Kayn’s uncovered red eye, which makes lots of people uneasy. The group of annoying Slytherins stand on their seats to take a good look at the scene. Kayn doesn’t pay them attention, his focus remaining solely on the boy ahead of him, taking him wherever he decides to go; Kayn would follow him to the edges of the earth if he ever did so much as ask. The look on his face says it all. Kayn’s looking at Ezreal like a man seeing the sun for the first time in his life.

They reach the Hufflepuff’s usual spot at his table. Sett, who had been trying to make his way through the crowd before, is standing by the place with his ears pulled back and teeth bare, looking at the pink haired boy behind his friend. The rest looks just as alert and cautious, Aphelios stands behind the Vastaya with his hands around his bicep, holding him back, Yone stands up in anger at the sight of the unwanted guest, and K’Sante, well, he’s trying to suppress a smile.

“What is this, Ezreal?” Yone inquires. “What is he doing here?”

“Wow, okay, hello to you too, guys”, Ezreal jokes, his hand never leaving Kayn’s. “I’m okay, thanks for asking, just needed some time to cool off-”

“Not funny!” Yone slams his hands on the table, all white noise from the other conversations is cut off. “You better have a good explanation as to why you almost gave us a heart attack, why you left for the whole week, and why is he with you!”

“Yone, stop”, K’Sante whispers to his friend.

The Ravenclaw throws daggers at him and is ready to tear Ezreal another one, but Kayn decides to take another step. He lets go of Ezreal’s hand to wrap his arms around him.

“Isn’t it obvious enough?” His voice sounds challenging, and although the situation is becoming more tense Ezreal can’t help but find it hot, his own arms resting above Kayn’s. “I’m here because Ezreal asked me to. He’s my boyfriend, after all.”

“I seriously cannot understand you!” Yone repeats for the third time as he rubs his eyes, his other hand by his hip.

The whole group is having a private talk by the lake. After the revelation of Kayn and Ezreal dating, around ten people had to hold Sett back from lounging at the Slytherin, not enough professors in the room to diffuse the situation. Yone then had to make sure Ezreal was in his sane mind, because he was almost certain some spell had to be used over him for this ridiculous situation to happen. The antidote for Amortentia proved to be unfruitful, and when he checked on Kayn’s wand, he realized there was no Imperius curse being cast, meaning that Ezreal was completely fine. This did not placate him in the slightest, and immediately called for a meeting, thus taking them to where they are right now.

“There’s nothing to understand”, Ezreal replies, holding onto Kayn’s arm as they are backed against the tree trunk. “I like him, he likes me, we started dating. It’s as simple as that.”

“It’s not!” Yone’s voice raises again. Aphelios is standing beside him, glaring dangerously at the couple but specially at Kayn. Sett and K’Sante remain a few meters away from them, with K’Sante using calming techniques on the other as he pats his shoulder. “Just a week ago I found you crying in the bathrooms saying how much you hated Kayn, and now you’re head over heels for him?! Excuse me for not understanding your sudden change of heart, Ezreal!”

“There was no change of heart, just some misunderstandings we had to clear out-”

“Misunderstandings? What type of misunderstanding leads you to disappear for an entire week?! I spent nights awake looking for you, the boys took turns to guard the corridors with me, hoping to find you at some point! Even Hagrid did not leave the Forbidden Forest for two days as he cleared it completely! We were worried sick about you! And you didn’t stop for a moment to think about it before leaving, you didn’t care about us at all!”

“I had to take care of myself first, okay?” Ezreal’s volume begins to match his friend’s. “I needed some time alone, I had to prioritize myself first!”

“Like hell you did!” Yone’s eyes now focus their rage onto Kayn. “You went crawling onto his lap as soon as he said ‘I’m sorry’, didn’t you? So much for self-preservation!”

“Excuse me-”

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Kayn speaks for the first time since the whole thing had started. “How dare you say that about him?!”

“Please!” Yone laughs at Kayn while the latter comes to stand in front of Ezreal. “Don’t come playing the innocent card on me as if you weren’t the one who said worse things about him! Now you want to play knight in shining armor?”

“I apologized to Ezreal already, and he knows I was lying back then!”

“Apologies aren’t enough, Shieda!”

“That’s up to him to decide so!”

“It’s obvious you’re manipulating him!”

“Am not!”

“Lies!”

“Prove it if you can!”

“I will!”

“STOP IT, BOTH OF YOU!” K’Sante voice booms around them, stepping up to put distance between the two who are snarling at each other. “This is not helping at all, you’re scaring Ezreal, for God’s sake!”

Sure enough, Ezreal is trembling behind Kayn, hands holding onto his shoulders as he barely dares to peek at the scene.

“He’s being blinded by him!” Yone begins again. “Whatever it is that he said to Ezreal has him wrapped around his finger! He’s not seeing things correctly!”

“Ezreal is smart enough to discern between the truth and lies!” Kayn yells at the other, feeling it’s his duty to defend his boyfriend’s honor (dramatic much?). “You are dumb if you can’t see past your stubborn head!”

“What did you just say?!” Yone charges at him again, wand in hand ready to destroy his sworn enemy, but K’Sante’s gigantic hand holds him in place.

“Stop it, Kayn”, Ezreal’s voice comes up to his ear, and the pink haired boy turns his head slightly to look at the nervous face of his boyfriend. His frown softens a little and he nods, placing his hand over Ezreal’s in a reassuring manner.

“That’s enough!” The Gryffindor pushes Yone away and roots himself in between both sides. “There’s no point in continuing to fight. Things are already like this, and we cannot interfere in its course anymore. All we have to do now is support Ezreal’s decision and care for him as we always have.”

The other three friends silently question K’Sante with their glares.

“You are okay with this?!” Yone waves his wand in the direction of the couple, sounding scandalized at the thought.

K’Sante just shrugs. “I’ve been waiting for this to happen since last year, honestly.”

Except for Kayn, everyone stares at K’Sante with their eyes bulging out of their heads. Kayn would’ve laughed if the situation hadn’t been this serious.

“The hell does that mean?” Sett asks from a distance.

The Gryffindor chuckles. “You guys haven’t seen the way Kayn has been drooling for Ezreal every single day, have you? It was so painfully obvious, I wanted to drag him by the scalp and push him towards Ezreal.”

“Wouldn’t have been so bad”, Kayn mutters to himself. It would have spared them all this trouble.

“But he… They aren’t…” Yone looks so utterly confused at the new information, words can’t seem to form correctly in his head.

“Yone. Leave it.” K’Sante stops any other argument from escalating. “As long as they’re okay and happy, then that’s all that matters.”

The Ravenclaw is not very happy himself, and he lets it know by huffing in disagreement and turning on his heels.

“I can’t believe you, Kas!” He yells as he begins walking away, done with the conversation. Said boy laughs and follows after the other.

Sett, who until then hadn’t said much, approaches the lovebirds. Kayn doesn’t budge when the red headed Hufflepuff stops in front of him, arms crosses and a scowl on his face as he stares down at the Slytherin.

“Don’t think that just because you’re dating Ezreal, we’ll be friends.” He warns Kayn. “I still want to punch your guts for what you put him through.”

“Would it make you feel better if you did it anyways?” Kayn genuinely asks. A surprised expression flashes through Sett’s face, the ears above his head perking up as he ponders on the suggestion.

“Yes?”

“Okay then-”

“No, don’t do it!” Ezreal almost screeches when he sees Sett raising a fist and he quickly moves; now he’s the one standing in front of Kayn.

“Ez…”

“Come on!” Sett whines. “He already gave me permission!”

“I’d like to have my boyfriend in one full piece, thank you very much.” Ezreal clings to Kayn’s body, pouting at his friend.

Aphelios, still standing at the side, rolls his eyes at the stupidity unfolding in front of him and reaches out to tug on Sett’s sleeve. When the Vastaya turns around he simply shakes his head, and Sett throws his head back and groans. “Okay, fine.”

Pleased with the response, the Ravenclaw turns to look at Ezreal, who hasn’t let go of Kayn, and signs something with a serious expression. Kayn doesn’t understand but Ezreal is fully focused on his friend. He nods once Aphelios is finished.

“It is. He is all I want.” Ezreal confidently says. Kayn’s chest fills with so much pride and love for the Hufflepuff.

Aphelios sighs deeply but gives his friend a curt nod. Then he looks at Kayn and points at him with narrowed eyes.

“Huh?” Kayn watches as the Ravenclaw signs something else, directed at him. “What?”

“He says ‘treat him well’”, Sett translates for the other.

“Oh.” Kayn blinks. He doesn’t even need to be told such a thing. He takes Ezreal’s hand from where it’s placed behind his neck and brings it to his lips to kiss it. “With my life in the line, I will.”

Such response is accepted by Aphelios, and even Sett seems a bit impressed by it, despite being understandably apprehensive. The two share a look with each other before Aphelios takes Sett’s hand and makes a head motion to leave. They walk away with the Vastaya waving his hand to the couple as a goodbye.

Kayn watches them leave with a puzzled look on his face. “Are those two… dating?”

Ezreal looks up at him and giggles. “You noticed that just now?”

“You say it as if I should have been giving them my undivided attention or something.”

“Nah, it’s okay. I’d rather have your attention on me instead of them.”

Kayn smirks at that, backing Ezreal up until his body stops by the tree. “You already do, prince.”

Ezreal blushes at the nickname and pulls Kayn down for a kiss. The stress from the meeting with his friends slowly melts away with every second their lips are locked, and being by the lake, out in the open, makes it feel so much better, so right.

“Hey”, Kayn points up as they take a breather. Ezreal follows the indication and sees the multiple tree branches above them, nothing that should capture his attention. He gives Kayn a blank stare, and his boyfriend’s smirk grows wider.

“Want to see the upgraded version, two years later?” The Slytherin backs up a few steps before jumping up to hold onto the lowest branch.

Ezreal’s eyes widen in realization.

I’m so fucked.

His jaw falls to the floor as he watches Kayn do pull ups with little effort, going so far as to pull his whole upper body over the branch. His shirt goes up every time he prepares for another pull up, revealing his rock-hard abs and a happy trail under his navel, and the over all sight paired with the display of strength is about to send Ezreal to Heaven, his thoughts spiraling down a dangerous trail that leaves him all hot and bothered.

You should come with a warning sign, Shieda Kayn. You’re lucky I love you.

The first day of snow falls on a Saturday. Little white trinkets cover the ground since the early hours of the morning, and by the time afternoon rolls around, the layer of snow is thick enough to hide the grass by a couple of inches.

It’s been two weeks since they officially became boyfriends, and Kayn is now walking down the corridors in the direction of the kitchens, inside which there’s the door to the Hufflepuff common room. There aren’t many students around at this hour, and no one pays much attention to him anyways, which is a relief. The first few days after the whole ordeal were hard on him, with people still gossiping around and not looking too kindly at him. It was only after Ezreal sat one day at the Slytherin table next to Kayn, after he began saving the seat next to his during their shared classes, after many times hanging around in the courtyards, after Kayn knelt down to tie Ezreal’s shoelaces for him, after accompanying him to the outside of the kitchens when night fell, making sure he got there safe and kissing him goodnight, only then everyone realized they were serious and Kayn was absolutely smitten with his ‘little prince’. What’s more, the smile on Ezreal’s lips had never been so big and so bright, and seeing the school’s favorite boy happy was enough for people to stop holding a grudge against the Slytherin. Life at Hogwarts had gone back to normal for Kayn, with one beautiful exception that made it even better.

Outside the common room, Kayn sends a text to Ezreal and waits for the boy to step out. It’s their first date and they’re going to Hogsmeade for a much-needed time out, what with tests and preparations for the N.E.W.T.s piling up on their desks. His foot taps the floor following the beat of his newest music obsession, rolling his trusty wand between his fingers, and humming to the chords playing in his head. The door opens once to let a couple of Hufflepuff girls out, and they give Kayn a curious stare before going on their way. He doesn’t mind them, leaning on the wall and waiting for Ezreal to come out.

When the door opens again Kayn sees a mop of green hair from the corner of his eye and he immediately looks up. Clad in a coat a size bigger than his, winter boots, and the telltale yellow scarf of his Hogwarts house, Ezreal stands by the door, biting his lip at the sight of his rockstar boyfriend, dressed in all black, his pink hair standing out from the monotonous color palette. Kayn is looking at him like he’s the most precious star in the night sky, and that feels like the truth to the Slytherin.

His moment of appreciation of his boyfriend, however, is interrupted by a second figure standing behind Ezreal, arms crossed over a wide torso. Sett is glaring at Kayn from behind Ezreal.

“Hey there, baby.” Kayn chooses to ignore him for the time being in favor of his boyfriend, who skips the steps towards him.

“Hmm, hi.” Ezreal buries his face in the crook of Kayn’s neck, arms automatically coming to wrap around his smaller figure. A kiss is planted on his head, Kayn burying his face in his freshly washed hair.

“Just so you know, I’m not comfortable handing him to you.” Sett speaks from the door like a father giving his daughter away. “He better come back without a single scratch, got it?”

“Sett.” Ezreal looks so done with his friend. “Stop worrying, I’ll be fine.”

“Yeah, heard that one before, didn’t see you for a week afterwards.”

“Ugh, really now?”

“Well, forgive me for looking out for you.” The Vastaya replies before turning around. “Have fun, I guess.”

“Wait, Sett.” Kayn stops the other from disappearing inside the common room. “If it worries you so much, why don’t you come with us?”

Two pairs of eyes turn to look at him wide eyed at the unexpected invitation.

“What are you doing, Kayn?”

“Are you serious?”

The Slytherin shrugs. “You want to look after Ezreal, I don’t see why not. Tell Aphelios to join us too, we can make this a double date.”

Ezreal pulls at Kayn’s jacket, silently asking him tons of questions with his gaze alone. Kayn squeezes him once, using no words to tell him to trust him on this.

“You know what, that doesn’t sound so bad.” Sett scratches the back of his head. “Let me text Phel and see what he says.”

The door is left ajar when he leaves to do so. Ezreal looks upset with Kayn.

“Why did you do that?” He drawls out his whine, hitting Kayn’s chest with no real force in it. “I was finally getting him off my back for a day.”

Kayn coos at the cuteness and squishes Ezreal’s cheeks with his hands, pecking the fishy lips he makes. “Don’t get mad, sweetheart. It’s been hard for them too, to have you back but tied to a person they don’t fancy. We should make it easier for them. And uh, I would also like it if they warmed up a little more to me.” He mutters, a bit embarrassed at saying it out loud. Ezreal pouts but nuzzles his nose against the other’s.

“They don’t hate you.” He assures him. “One day they’ll come around, they have to. Otherwise, I’ll erase them from my will.”

Kayn chuckles at that. “What are you bestowing upon them, anyways?”

Ezreal pauses for a moment before answering, “My plants.”

The Slytherin snorts but hugs Ezreal tighter, so in love with that crazy little mind of his.

Half an hour later, both couples are strolling around the shops at Hogsmeade. Aphelios makes a show of dragging Sett to the Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes, most likely to buy supplies for his pranks. In between laughter at the scene, they agree to meet at the Three Broomsticks, where Ezreal and Kayn head just after parting ways from the others. It’s surprisingly not crowded, plenty of tables from where to choose. They sit on the closest one to the only chimney in the place, and after ordering a couple of butterbeers they cuddle up to each other, using their coats as makeshift blankets. Ezreal talks about the new batch of hydrangeas he’s been caring for alongside Professor Sprout and Kayn can focus on nothing more than the sound of Ezreal’s sweet voice, filling a space inside of him that’s reserved for that only. He has other spaces where he stores more pieces of Ezreal, like his touch, his sparkling eyes, each and every new little thing he learns about him. And there’s also a special place where he keeps the memory of his scent, as strong as the first time he ever smelt it.

Ezreal notices Kayn is no longer listening to him, and he stops his story time to stare into those mismatched eyes of his. “Is everything alright?”

Kayn remembers the day he began falling in love with Ezreal. It was on their second year, during the introductory class to mandrakes. Professor Sprout had given the whole class earmuffs to protect themselves from the disastrous effects of the baby mandrakes’ crying. As she showed her students the way to pull out a mandrake from its pot, the wrinkly little thing had everyone pressing their earmuffs harder into their ears. Everyone except Kayn, who suddenly had his own snatched away from his head. He immediately began feeling dizzy, the screeching drilling into his ears and his brain. He fought the incoming loss of consciousness, but he could barely move. When he was about to pass out, a couple of hands covered his ears, taking away all the pain and steadying Kayn, who no longer felt like dying. It took him a while to become conscious of his surroundings again, but when he did, he found himself sitting on the floor, those hands were no longer over his ears, and he could hear the teacher reprimanding the Gryffindor who dared to pull such a dangerous prank. When Kayn looked up, he saw those golden eyes filled with worry, a tiny voice asking if he was okay. Kayn knew right then and there he was looking at an angel.

Pushing those sweet memories away, Kayn leans in to press his forehead against Ezreal’s, his boyfriend preening at the touch.

“I’m alright. I’m better than ever.”