Up and Down

Hide and Seek

The leaves turn golden and crackle underfoot as autumn envelops the Highlands. It would be beautiful and rather enjoyable... if only they had any time to enjoy it. Professors won't stop reminding the exhausted seventh-years that NEWTS are coming. Every. Single. Day.

And they assign the homework accordingly.

"If I'm going to hear that one more time my ears will bleed," Sebastian drops his head on a stack of musty library books, "Merlin, I need a break."

In between Quidditch practice for both of them and study, they haven't had much time or energy left to spare. A break is long overdue.

Anna hums in agreement, scribbling away at her Polyjuice Potion essay. Something she baulked at brewing in her fifth year, but now she has no escape - she will have to learn how. She isn't a natural at Potions, everything she manages to make is a product of diligent memorisation and trial and error... so many errors.

Unlike Sebastian. Merlin, sometimes she wants to strangle him in the middle of the lesson. His absolutely effortless understanding of potion-making is often driving her insane.

But... at least she is yet to blow up her cauldron to pieces. Something she's better at than Garreth.

"The essays won't write themselves, Sebastian."

The brunet turns to pointedly stare at Ominis' as his phoenix feather quill hovers over the half-filled page.

"I can feel you glaring at me. It's recording what I'm telling it, not whatever it wants. Ergo, I'm still the one writing it."

"Uh-huh."

"Boys, please, I'm trying to think..." Anna pulls at her hair causing a few more strands to fall out of her messy bun. A brass cauldron requires... she groans, reaching for a dusty tome buried under many other open books. She forgot how many minutes exactly, not that it wasn't an arbitrary number without any regard for the convenience of memorisation.

The three of them have long staked a claim on a particular table in the Library, in one of the nooks in between shelves, close to a window. Someone - probably Sebastian - had even burned out a winged snake on the scratched wooden surface.

She sometimes wonders what future Hogwarts students will think of the scorch mark. Will they wonder who made it and why?

With her mind wandering away again, she pulls it back into the present.

Just as Sebastian's heated palm runs up her thigh. Her quill stalls as he strokes her leg through the skirts, almost idly... but she can see a corner of his lip curling up.

Ominis sighs, reaching for another book to reference.

"She asked you to not distract her. That's not exactly it, Sebastian."

"Spoilsport," reluctantly, he withdraws his hand and Anna takes a steadying breath.

"How about this..." she finds the passage on brewing times she was looking for before Sebastian's interruption, "another hour and then we'll take a stroll in Hogsmeade. We haven't been in ages."

"Not with the mountain of homework we've been getting, no."

Ominis taps his long slender fingers on the desk in thought.

"That... works, I suppose."

Anna smiles and can't help herself. Reaching over she strokes his face. The pale peach fuzz on his cheeks and chin - previously almost invisible against his alabaster skin - has been getting thicker, and given his condition it's not exactly easy handling a straight razor so close to his face.