Chapter Text
Sung Hanbin first discovered the sanctuary of the Hogwarts Great Hall in his second year during the winter holidays. At that time, he wandered through the castle in the early hours of Christmas, feeling guilty about missing the holiday with his family for the first time in his life. He had decided to stay at the school over the break to keep his friends company, but unfortunately that came at the expense of his mother’s beloved family time. Even though she had given permission, he could sense the disappointment.
Deep in his thoughts, he ended up stumbling upon the Great Hall an hour before breakfast. In its vastness, it exuded unlimited possibility, the low hum of the castle’s ancient magic resonating throughout the space. Basking under the warmth of the morning sun, Hanbin started to feel rejuvenated, guilt subsiding into a dull ache at the back of his mind. He sat in the middle of the empty room, almost meditating, until he heard the massive doors open and the voice of his friend, later the love of his life, call out, “Hanbin-ah! There you are. Merry Christmas.”
Now, a much older Hanbin sat at the Gryffindor table, decked out in his red-and-gold accent robes with a shiny “H” badge pinned to his chest, biting the top of a quill that truly had seen better days.
It was the end of his final year at Hogwarts, just barely a couple months from graduation.
On the eve of entering the real world, Hanbin had plenty to be proud of. His school record was flawless as a local Quidditch celebrity (second only to Matthew, the Gryffindor team captain), and he was the top of his class in his house. The Auror’s Office had already granted him a spot after graduation, as long as his NEWT scores checked out. And above all else, he’d made seven full years of memories with his best friend and boyfriend, Zhang Hao.
In some ways, he felt totally invincible.
In other ways, he was ready to flip the table, set it on fire, roll into a ball and let out a big shout.
He had been loitering in the Great Hall for three hours, quill in hand and unruly splatters littering his face. In front of him was a mess of a parchment, full of angry ink marks. Big, bold words were scrawled across the top of the page in his earnest handwriting: How to Propose to the LOML, Hao.
If he were to be honest with himself, those were the only words that were legible in the whole document.
He twirled the quill in his hands rhythmically, as if the steady cadence of motion could ground his mind and strike him with a bolt of enlightenment, pushing him out of his mental block.
Across from him, a younger, much more animated boy waved his wand around, telling him about his cursed wand. Hanbin tried to pay attention, but his brain was working overtime. What was that muggle composer’s name again? Chai-key?
“...So I told Yujin, hyung will show you, I can cast a lumos maxima in my sleep. A third year charm — easy peasy, right? So then I tried it with this new wand that my parents sent me, and instead of turning on all the lights, it shattered every single lamp in the room!”
Hanbin looked up from his own crisis momentarily, furrowing his eyebrows with horrified wonder.
“Uh — are you sure you cast the right spell?”
Gyuvin pouted at him in outrage. “That’s offensive. I feel offended. Of course it was right, that was the first thing I learned last year.”
“Well, don’t take it from me, but that sounds more like bombarda than it does lumos,” Hanbin responded, pointing the back end of his feather quill toward the other boy.
At the lecture, Gyuvin rolled his eyes and stretched out his palm, staring at the quill in Hanbin’s grip. A second later, that same quill was in Gyuvin’s hand, and all that was left in his own was a streak where the pen tip had dragged against his skin.
“Hyung, trust me. I wouldn’t make an amateur mistake like that. It’s definitely the wand.”
Hanbin reached over to grab the tool back, shaking his head at the other’s display of advanced magic.
“I’m joking, I know you know the difference. You’ve gotten a lot better at wandless magic these days. And non-verbal. Impressive.”
Despite the younger boy being a fourth year student, Gyuvin was an immensely talented spellcaster (when he applied himself, as Headmaster McGonagall liked to say). If asked, he’d mention that his family had forced private illegal tutoring on him even before starting Hogwarts, in his signature teasing voice that made sure no one could ever tell if it were true or false, but Hanbin thought part of his skill simply came from Gyuvin’s personal determination to achieve.
After all, nothing motivated a teenager more than proving to their parents they could do better without them.
“But why would your parents send you a cursed wand? It’s so close to exam season. As bad as they are, they wouldn’t directly sabotage your grades like that.”
“Who knows, it could just be their sick way of getting back at me for how I broke my first wand.”
Hanbin grinned at the thought. Gyuvin’s other vice, besides dabbling in magic more advanced than his years, was in terrorizing Hogwarts students and faculty, one prank at a time. Harmless, for the most part, but always a spectacle. The last prank he had pulled had completely fallen off the rails, which in Gyuvin’s mind, meant it was a screaming success, but ended up putting him in the branches of the Whomping Willow (uninjured, somehow) and his wand as another twig on the castle grounds. At least they all got to skip their Herbology classes for a week — the professor had been too preoccupied with growing back a whole portion of the Forbidden Forest.
“Maybe it’s my sign to just give up channeling my magic through a wand,” Gyuvin said with a dramatic sigh. “I’m just destined for better things.”
“You can’t ask them for another wand?”
“I tried. They sent me a Howler, telling me to stop making up lies,” he said as he twisted the wand in his hands, examining it up close. “They each did.”
Hanbin grimaced. He had only met Gyuvin’s father twice, once at a Sung Manor holiday party, where he’d almost hexed the elder, and once when he and Hao were buying school supplies in Diagon Alley. That time, he actually did draw his wand, only to be physically pulled back by his more rational half before he could be shipped off to the Improper Use of Magic Office for underage spellcasting.
Of all the prejudiced pureblood families he had ever heard of, Gyuvin’s family was one of the worst.
“If they won’t help you, I can ask my parents, if you want. I’m sure we have some wands that are just gathering dust somewhere.”
“Really?” Gyuvin slapped his hands together dramatically in a praying motion. “If it’s a wand from your family, I’d feel so much better. Less dark arts hocus pocus.”
“Some things have been in there since the Goblin Rebellions, so no promises, but I can write to my mom. I need her to go in this week anyway, for Hao’s ring.”
With a sigh, he looked back down at the parchment in front of him, reminded again of why exactly he had been planted in the Great Hall since the start of daybreak. Noticing the dip in the mood, Gyuvin summoned the parchment to his side of the table, squinting as he tried to parse through the scribbles.
“How many times have you re-written this?” Gyuvin asked incredulously.
Hanbin nibbled at his quill. “Five. Maybe.”
The other boy raised an eyebrow. “I know you’re a planner, and you want to make it all special and stuff for Hao-hyung, but is this really necessary?” He stabbed at a line with his finger. “500 roses with muggle classical music in the background. What are you going to do, rob the greenhouse?”
“No, not personally, I’d ask Jiwoong — he’s on Professor Longbottom’s good side,” Hanbin joked. He grabbed the document back over. “I’ll keep working on it. I just want it to be perfect for him, you know? Something he’ll remember forever.”
The other opened his mouth, probably ready to protest against more ink on the parchment, but the tell-tale scratch of the Great Hall doors scraping across the castle floors interrupted him. They both looked over at the noise, and at that moment, Hanbin froze.
Gyuvin was faster to react, masking his wide eyes with a big grin. “Morning Hao-hyung! You’re up early!” He kicked Hanbin’s leg under the table and slid his paper back over discreetly.
“Oh Gyuvin? What are you doing up already?” Hao asked as he made his way over to the table with rehearsed ease. “Don’t you usually sleep in longer?”
Glancing at the clock, Hanbin realized time had passed by much faster than he had thought. He sent a quick wave and a hasty “Morning!” to his boyfriend as he eyed the parchment that sat in front of him. He needed to hide it, somehow, before Hao reached his side of the table.
“Yeah, I was telling Hanbin-hyung about my wand. Did you hear what I did to the Slytherin common room?”
By this point, Hao had reached their table, standing on the other side as he talked to Gyuvin. If Hanbin had to guess, he probably had two minutes before this particular conversation topic would come to a natural end. Focus.
“Yujin said you blew up all the lanterns in the dungeons,” Hao responded. “Was that before or after you set off the fireworks in History of Magic?”
Hanbin tuned out of Gyuvin’s explanation, eyes darting around for his book bag. Maybe he could just grab the bag, slide his parchment into the bag, and tuck it away under the table without Hao noticing. It felt like a pretty doable plan, if he could just find it.
“...Ricky’s potion combusted on its own, I had nothing to do with it…”
Hao was moving again, to walk around the table — damn his ability to multitask so well — and Hanbin regretted writing such an obvious title on the top of the page. His bag… where was his bag…
Gyuvin’s words started to taper off, or maybe the thumping of his own heart had just become louder than their voices.
Finally, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a sliver of light reflecting off a familiar black leather material, three seats away. Right. He had moved seats an hour ago, when the sunlight became too bright.
He reached for his wand holster to accio the bag over, trying to be as discreet as he could, and almost had it out when Hao’s voice called out from beside him, barely two seats away —
“Oh, is that the Defense essay?”
A jolt of panic rushed through his body, adrenaline kicking in as if he were in the last ten minutes of a Quidditch match, and in desperation or maybe just pure instinct, he dove forward, his upper body draping over the parchment with a loud thud.
Gyuvin gaped at him.
Hao stopped in his tracks in confusion.
Hanbin felt his ears turn red.
If this had been an exam, he would’ve gotten a Troll for subtlety.
“Y-yeah! His defense essay! Wow, hyung, how did you know?!” Gyuvin exclaimed brightly. His tone was tinged with anxiety, but at that moment, Hanbin was grateful for the help. Even if his real defense essay was sitting at the bottom of his book bag, fully written.
“Is it really that bad that you had to cover it up?” Hao laughed, buying Gyuvin’s fib.
“He was groaning about it all morning — you should have seen him. Can’t believe he wants to be an auror. I had to tell him the difference between bombarda maxima and lumos maxima earlier, and those are third year spells!”
He was going to kill Kim Gyuvin after this.
“He’s joking — Hao, I know the difference. He’s completely joking,” Hanbin whined, momentarily distracted to convince his boyfriend he wasn’t a complete idiot.
Hao dropped down next to Hanbin, chuckling.
“Well, whatever it’s about, want some help? I finished that paper last week.”
His sweet, brilliant, generous Ravenclaw boyfriend. Hanbin didn’t deserve him.
“Hand it over, I can help revise while you work on finishing the draft. Let me just grab a quill.”
As Hao turned around to dig through his back, Hanbin switched his attention back to Gyuvin.
Do something, he mouthed. His expression must have been wild. He just needed more time.
“I swear I had it in here. Where’s my wand…” Hao patted at his robes and began to pull out his wand, ready to summon his quill out of the bag.
At this point, Hanbin considered just running out of the room, explanation be damned. He was already lifting his body up in anticipation when Gyuvin’s voice suddenly boomed out, “Oh, Hao-hyung, let me help!”
Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Gyuvin lifting his — cursed? — wand.
“Accio quill.”
But wait — something was off. Gyuvin was right-handed, but he was holding the wand in his left hand, pointing at Hao’s bag. His real wand hand was outstretched, empty, like it had been earlier when the younger boy snatched Hanbin’s quill. That hand was directed at Hanbin.
He felt a brush of heat graze against his arm, more intense than the rays of sunlight streaming into the Great hall, more persistent, more… warmth?
Wait, no. Warm wasn’t right — it was just straight up hot.
He looked down to catch sight of a flash of light spread across his sleeve, and onto the paper. Except it wasn’t light, it was fire.
He leapt out of his seat with a yelp. Not even a beat later, Hao caught on, concern written all over his face as he pointed his wand at Hanbin’s blazing arm, voice steadily calling out, “Aguamenti!” A spray of cold water immediately drenched Hanbin’s side, putting out the flame.
For a split second, Hanbin stood still, mind blank, trying to process what had just happened.
“Are you okay? Are you hurt?” Hao asked, rushing to his side. “Gyuvin, what the hell?”
“I — I think I’m okay.” Hanbin said, starting to regain himself. He checked his arm. A ruined robe sleeve and a tinge of redness on his skin, but otherwise perfectly unburnt.
Relentless, Hao continued to prod, checking him for any other injuries.
With his boyfriend preoccupied, Hanbin chanced a look back down at the table. Oh, oh, oh. The remnants of his parchment — his precious, detailed, meticulously crafted parchment — were in a black, fragile-looking pile on the aged wood, like ashes ready for burial. Gyuvin, looking sheepish, met his eye, held up his right hand, and wiggled his fingers.
“Sorry, I forgot… my wand is definitely cursed.”
–
Hanbin spent the rest of the morning with his boyfriend, who insisted on helping Hanbin “rewrite” his DADA essay. He ended up submitting a much better paper than the one he originally had written on his own, damn Ravenclaws. Later, when they're alone and safely away from Hao's ears, Gyuvin showered him with apologies.
"Sorry hyung, I panicked. Setting it on fire was the only thing I could think of... but at least it worked?"
But despite the loss of all of his planning, Hanbin felt oddly at ease. Maybe it was a sign from the universe that he needed a blank slate, to start over.
"I’ll come up with something else, something better. Just don’t light that one up too."
"Yep. Won't happen again. Promise."
Never, ever, trust a prankster.