#JK Rowling is at the front

[itsawritblr]

Scotland as of April 1.

[endusviolence]

Rowling isn't denying holocaust. She just pointed out that burning of transgender health books is a lie as that form of cosmetic surgery didn't exist. But of course you knew that already, didn't you?

I was thinking I'd probably see one of you! You're wrong :) Let's review the history a bit, shall we?

In this case, what we're talking about is the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, or in English, The Institute of Sexology. This Institute was founded and headed by a gay Jewish sexologist named Magnus Hirschfeld. It was founded in July of 1919 as the first sexology research clinic in the world, and was run as a private, non-profit clinic. Hirschfeld and the researchers who worked there would give out consultations, medical advice, and even treatments for free to their poorer clientele, as well as give thousands of lectures and build a unique library full of books on gender, sexuality, and eroticism. Of course, being a gay man, Hirschfeld focused a lot on the gay community and proving that homosexuality was natural and could not be "cured".

Hirschfeld was unique in his time because he believed that nobody's gender was either one or the other. Rather, he contended that everyone is a mixture of both male and female, with every individual having their own unique mix of traits.

This leads into the Institute's work with transgender patients. Hirschfeld was actually the one to coin the term "transsexual" in 1923, though this word didn't become popular phrasing until 30 years later when Harry Benjamin began expanding his research (I'll just be shortening it to trans for this brief overview.) For the Institute, their revolutionary work with gay men eventually began to attract other members of the LGBTA+, including of course trans people.

Contrary to what Anon says, sex reassignment surgery was first tested in 1912. It'd already being used on humans throughout Europe during the 1920's by the time a doctor at the Institute named Ludwig Levy-Lenz began performing it on patients in 1931. Hirschfeld was at first opposed, but he came around quickly because it lowered the rate of suicide among their trans patients. Not only was reassignment performed at the Institute, but both facial feminization and facial masculization surgery were also done.

The Institute employed some of these patients, gave them therapy to help with other issues, even gave some of the mentioned surgeries for free to this who could not afford it! They spoke out on their behalf to the public, even getting Berlin police to help them create "transvestite passes" to allow people to dress however they wanted without the threat of being arrested. They worked together to fight the law, including trying to strike down Paragraph 175, which made it illegal to be homosexual. The picture below is from their holiday party, Magnus Hirschfeld being the gentleman on the right with the fabulous mustache. Many of the other people in this photo are transgender.

[Image ID: A black and white photo of a group of people. Some are smiling at the camera, others have serious expressions. Either way, they all seem to be happy. On the right side, an older gentleman in glasses- Magnus Hirschfeld- is sitting. He has short hair and a bushy mustache. He is resting one hand on the shoulder of the person in front of him. His other hand is being held by a person to his left. Another person to his right is holding his shoulder.]

There was always push back against the Institute, especially from conservatives who saw all of this as a bad thing. But conservatism can't stop progress without destroying it. They weren't willing to go that far for a good while. It all ended in March of 1933, when a new Chancellor was elected. The Nazis did not like homosexuals for several reasons. Chief among them, we break the boundaries of "normal" society. Shortly after the election, on May 6th, the book burnings began. The Jewish, gay, and obviously liberal Magnus Hirschfeld and his library of boundary-breaking literature was one of the very first targets. Thankfully, Hirschfeld was spared by virtue of being in Paris at the time (he would die in 1935, before the Nazis were able to invade France). His library wasn't so lucky.

This famous picture of the book burnings was taken after the Institute of Sexology had been raided. That's their books. Literature on so much about sexuality, eroticism, and gender, yes including their new work on trans people. This is the trans community's Alexandria. We're incredibly lucky that enough of it survived for Harry Benjamin and everyone who came after him was able to build on the Institute's work.

[Image ID: A black and white photo of the May Nazi book burning of the Institute of Sexology's library. A soldier, back facing the camera, is throwing a stack of books into the fire. In the background of the right side, a crowd is watching.]

As the Holocaust went on, the homosexuals of Germany became a targeted group. This did include transgender people, no matter what you say. To deny this reality is Holocaust denial. JK Rowling and everyone else who tries to pretend like this isn't reality is participating in that evil. You're agreeing with the Nazis.

But of course, you knew that already, didn't you?

Edit: Added image IDs. I apologize to those using screen readers for forgetting them. Please reblog this version instead.

[spider-doctor2]

Oh nooo, the disgustingly wealthy bigot doesn’t like just ONE of the MANY ways in which Just Stop Oil is desperately trying to SAVE THE PLANET? The same reaction she will ALWAYS have regardless of what they do? How awful oh noooo

[theygender]

Went to an 80s themed restaurant with pizzas named after popular movies the other day and someone next to us ordered "a Pretty Woman, 9 inches" and I had to physically restrain myself from saying something stupid

[libracorpvs]

terf truck terf truck terf truck

[dongiovannitriumphant]

can someone please make jk rowling shut up already im fucking done

[a-substantial-trash-pile]

I know you said you were not going to draw Harry Potter things anymore, but I was trying to find your old Snape art,because I liked how you made him act, but I can’t find any of it on your blog anymore? Did you remove it all?

yea sorry i deleted it all. it gave me Bad Feelings in my soul whenever i got notifs of people liking/reblogging my old hp stuff. i was debating for a while if i should go through and delete all that cuz i didn’t want to look like i was trying to hide my past. but man. just looking at anything hp related—especially things i MADE—did not feel good. which just goes to show how much of a POS jkr is. a person so vile and actively harmful to multiple communities that seeing anything she’s associated with makes me feel sick. not literally sick but like emotionally sick. soul sick. yknow. idk. she just sucks so much. ☹️

anyway sorry for the not so fun answer. figured i should be transparent with this at least.

[obesecamels]

.

[dlasta]

I love seeing shelves after shelves of discount Harry Potter crap and everybody walking by like it’s nothing.

[raphael-angele]

I just overheard this argument...

I was waiting for this friend of mine in a gazebo in front of our building cuz we needed to study. Over to the next gazebo, I overheard these two people arguing. I don't know about what though.

This girl told this guy, "Give me one time a man was better than a woman."

The guy stayed quiet for like 5 seconds before saying, with no hesitation: "Rick Riordan and JK Rowling."

I just looked over at them to see this guy with the smuggest face. The girl just looked at him and said "Touché"

[sideprince]

Eileen Prince

I'm relentlessly curious about how a witch from Slytherin, a house that values cunning and ambition on paper, and bloodlines/nobility in its culture, ended up living in a muggle slum.

Unfortunately for me, she's a barely mentioned character written by an author who consistently fails to portray female characters with depth or dimension. The women in Harry Potter are portrayed as either maternal or villains, or, in Ginny Weasley's case, as redeemed by their masculine traits (because Rowling's Thatcher era feminism dictates that equality for women = emulating patriarchal ideas of manhood). About as much as you can expect from an author who's as unable to acknowledge the personhood of trans women as she is to write women as actual people. This leaves a lot of room for interpreting or delving into what Eileen Prince's life may have looked like, and how that would have affected her son's development.

There are three direct mentions of Eileen in the text :

“The picture showed a skinny girl of around fifteen. She was not pretty; she looked simultaneously cross and sullen, with heavy brows and a long, pallid face. Underneath the photograph was the caption: Eileen Prince, Captain of the Hogwarts Gobstones Team.”

HBP Ch. 25

“I was going through the rest of the old Prophets and there was a tiny announcement about Eileen Prince marrying a man called Tobias Snape, and then later an announcement saying that she’d given birth to a" “ — murderer,” spat Harry.

HBP ch. 30

“Harry looked around: he was on platform nine and three-quarters, and Snape stood beside him, slightly hunched, next to a thin, sallow-faced, sour-looking woman who greatly resembled him.”

DH Ch. 33

(Shoutout to Harry James Potter, who didn't recognize Eileen's fifth year photo despite her resemblance to Snape, the teacher whose classroom he got his used Potions book from. Shoutout also to Harry James Potter who didn't connect the dots between the Prince's handwriting and Snape's, a teacher who regularly wrote instructions on the board. "I needed to make the plot work, ok?" - JK Rowling, probably.)

Other relevant excerpts:

“Snape staggered - his wand flew upwards, away from Harry - and suddenly Harry’s mind was teeming with memories that were not his: a hook-nosed man was shouting at a cowering woman, while a small dark-haired boy cried in a corner ”

OoTP Ch. 26

“Harry delved into his trunk and pulled out his copy of Advanced Potion-Making before getting into bed. There he turned its pages, searching, until he finally found, at the front of the book, the date that it had been published. It was nearly fifty years old.”

HBP Ch. 16

Supplemental material re: Gobstones from JK Rowling:

"...it remains a minority sport within the wizarding world, and does not enjoy a very ‘cool’ reputation, something its devotees tend to resent. Gobstones is most popular among very young wizards and witches, but they generally ‘grow out’ of the game, becoming more interested in Quidditch as they grow older.  ... Gobstones enjoys limited popularity at Hogwarts, ranking low among recreational activities, way behind Quidditch and even Wizarding Chess." [There's an additional sentence on the Harry Potter wiki's Gobstones page: "...it is also known as 'the thinking wizard's Quidditch.'"]

A few conclusions can be drawn from what little information we're given about Eileen:

She's described as "cross and sullen" around the age of 15, and as "sallow-faced, sour-looking" when she's older.

She's captain of the Gobstones club around her fifth year, so she likely marched to the beat of her own drum - given that Gobstones isn't particularly popular - and owns it proudly enough to take, or even seek out, a leadership role.

The sport is described as "the thinking wizard's Quidditch" which would imply Eileen was more interested in intellectual challenges and was clever (and can be paralleled with a young Severus' comment about "if you'd rather be brawny than brainy" to James Potter when they first meet on the Hogwarts Express).

Her marriage and the birth of her son are both announced in the paper, which might mean the family she came from was of some importance or note, or perhaps something else... but we'll get to that.

If we assume that Severus' secondhand copy of Advanced Potion Making was originally Eileen's (reasonable, though there is no textual evidence) then its publication date is likely around the time she was a sixth year, given that this particular text was specific to students beginning to prep for N.E.W.T. exams. Harry begins his sixth year in 1996 when the book is "nearly fifty years old," so we can assume Eileen was 16 years old sometime not long after 1946. Severus was born in 1960, which would mean Eileen was in her mid-late 20s at the time.

Her marriage was dysfunctional at best, abusive at worst. As per a Pottermore post that is still up on WizardingWorld.com: "...the desperately lonely and unhappy childhood [Severus] had with a harsh father who didn’t hold back when it came to the whip." Based on this, we can assume Tobias was abusive, and given Eileen's cowering as he shouted at her, she presumably feared him.

From these bits of information emerges the image of a woman who either had a surly personality, or at the very least was guarded, though perhaps just formal. There isn't really any difference in how her face is set when she's in an everyday setting like King's Cross, or when she's having her picture taken for the Gobstones Club. It's possible she was a stern, unsmiling person, but it's also possible - given that her wedding and child were announced in the paper - that she came from a family of some standing and was raised to conduct herself with hallmarks of British class, such as dignity and unaffectedness. After all, there are several wizarding families - such as the Potters - who are wealthy purebloods with social standing but are not part of the Sacred 28. Additionally, the Gobstones Club portrait would have been taken around the mid-1940s, when portraits were formal and their subjects did not often smile, and given that we see only a snippet of Eileen, we don't have enough information that she was unhappy or sour. It's also important to remember that we see her portrait and Snape's memory of her through Harry's perspective and, like his perception of Snape himself, this may convey Harry's biases.

We also know from the text that Snape had a house in a deserted part of Cokeworth, a fictional Midlands town that presumably had a collapsed milling industry, at the end of a street called Spinner's End. There's a great thread that goes into details about the kind of 2 up 2 down house it would have been, and we can assume that this is Snape's family home given that we know he and Lily grew up in Cokeworth. For all intents and purposes, the conclusion we can draw from this being the Snape family's home in the 60s is that they were working class and cripplingly poor. Most estates like this had been cleared by the 60s, and no longer exist today.

This begs the question: how did a witch from a possibly well-off family end up in an abusive marriage in an irrelevant slum?

Buckle up kids, we're leaving the world of textual references and veering into deep meta territory now. I won't label any of this as head canon because I'm not set on these interpretations, and am just drawing conclusions from the text, but some of it may be a bit loose even for meta.

If Eileen was 16 years old not long after 1946, then she would have finished school in the late 40s, possibly even 1950. While some people (including past me) posit the theory that Tobias may have been injured in WWII and his injuries debilitated him, forcing him to go on the dole and affecting his mental health, I'm increasingly skeptical of this theory. It would make more sense if Eileen had known him before he was drafted/enlisted and had committed to a relationship with him, which would then have changed when he came back from the war and was altered. If we assume Eileen's age based on the idea that it was her own copy of Advanced Potion Making Severus used, then she would still have been at school during WWII (which makes an interesting parallel with Severus' own experience of spending the bulk of the first wizarding war against Voldemort as a student at school).

I do think, however, that there's merit in the theory that Tobias suffered some kind of altering injury and that he wasn't necessarily abusive before Eileen committed herself to him. It makes little sense for a Slytherin graduate who was confident and self-posessed enough to be the face of an unpopular club to be drawn to a partner so abusive his shouts caused her to cower and who whipped his child freely. If, however, he was a charming, happy man when they met who suffered a life-altering injury, the trauma of which left him a shell of his former self, then someone like Eileen might stick around for the sake of the parts of his old self she can still see in him.

It's interesting that she didn't seem to use her magic to protect herself or her son, or even to dress her son in clothing that fit, but we know from the text that depression can cause a wizard's powers to wane:

“...it is also possible that her unrequited love and the attendant despair sapped her of her powers; that can happen”

HBP Ch. 13 (Dumbledore talking about Merope Gaunt)

The fact that the Snapes retained the house in Spinner's End seems to indicate that they continued to live there even when the local industry dried up and the slum was cleared as workers were moved to other parts of the country where they were needed (presumably what happened given *gestures at British history*). The most likely explanation for this would be that Tobias wasn't able to work, and perhaps did suffer an injury, only it was at work, and not during the war. This would mean the family lived on the dole (ie. welfare) and also that he would have spent a lot more time at home. It would also explain his anger and frustration that led to abusive behavior (which isn't to say that disabled people are abusive by any means, but it would have been emasculating for a man who considered himself the breadwinner in the 60s, and chronic pain coupled with limited abilities would give anyone a short fuse).

Moreover, this living situation seems to indicate that there is no additional support coming from anywhere. Where is Eileen's family? Why were they not helping? There's no indication in the text that there is any connection with them at all. We can infer from Snape's memories that, as a child, he learned what he knew about the magical world from his mother. This implies that she talked to him about it a fair amount, and his conviction that he and Lily were going to Hogwarts well before they got their letters also implies that Eileen expected him to go there and was set on her son having a magical education, despite how little she seemed to use her own powers.

Severus knows a lot about the wizarding world as a child, including that prisoners are sent to Azkaban and that it's guarded by Dementors, Hogwarts' house structure and what to expect when he and Lily get there, and about the Statute of Secrecy and the laws around it. When Lily asks him if it makes a difference being Muggleborn, Severus hesitates before replying no, presumably because he's aware of pureblood bias being a part of wizarding culture.

Perhaps that's the reason Eileen's family doesn't seem to be in the picture. My own theory is that Eileen hadn't planned to commit herself to Tobias long-term, and Severus was an accidental outcome of an innocent tryst in which a young Eileen, an educated witch from a well to do pureblood family, was having fun slumming it with a working class muggle and ended up pregnant. While we don't know the wizarding world's attitude around pregnancy and abortion, we do know it's a conservative and classist society that parallels muggle British culture fairly closely, and that the late 50s/early 60s were a time when an out of wedlock baby would have been considered a disgrace.

Add to that the anti-muggle bias of a pureblood family and it sounds like Eileen was disowned her for her mistake (and don't @ me, but even though I know that not all Slytherins are purebloods, it does seem to be a persistent cultural value of the house reaching back to Salazar Slytherin himself, so Eileen's being sorted into it can reasonably be taken as an indication of her blood status). Perhaps the marriage and birth announcements in the Daily Prophet were put in by Eileen herself, if she was a woman from a family where this was customary. It may have been her way of letting her family know of the events, or even of asserting herself and even deliberately defying them, announcing to the whole wizarding world that a Prince married and had a child with a muggle. It makes sense that the girl who wasn't just in the Gobstones club, but became captain, would also say to herself, why shouldn't I have my marriage announced in the paper like everyone else in the family?

It's worth noting that mid-late 20s is pretty young to have a baby in the wizarding world, where the life expectancy and child bearing years are much longer than they are for a muggle. According to the Harry Potter wiki:

"Wizard life expectancy in Britain reached an average 137¾ years in the mid-1990s, according to the Ministry of Divine Health ... Wizards in general have a much longer life expectancy than Muggles, usually living two or three times as long as their non magical counterparts, some living even longer than that depending on circumstances. In addition, seeing as James Potter's parents had him "late in life,” witches likely have significantly longer childbearing years than Muggle women."

Although we see several characters in Severus' generation getting married and having kids not long after leaving school, there's a mention in the text that a lot of people were doing this during Voldemort's reign, as the fear he inspired made people more eager to get a move on with life since they thought they might die any day (I think Mrs. Weasley says this but I can't find the quote, @ me if you do). It's clear this wasn't the norm in the wizarding world. Eileen was a Slytherin, a house that values cunning, ambition, and strong wizarding heritage. Something must have gone very wrong in Eileen's life for her to end up having a child so young and living in a muggle slum.

And so it's possible Eileen Prince found herself pregnant and alone, having been disowned by her family to save face in light of her disgrace, and dependent on the only person she was still close to, the father of her child. It's the kind of storyline that Rowling would write, and it would parallel fairly closely the story of Voldemort's mother, thus adding another to the long list of similarities between Voldemort and Snape.

Lorrie Kim makes an interesting point when she talks about how Snape has a strong reaction to other people having a love life or romantic experiences (the context being Rowling's intention of his love for Lily being romantic and unrequited), but doesn't react particularly strongly to mothers sacrificing themselves for their children, whereas Voldemort does. Her insight, and I think it's a reasonable one, is that Severus accepts the idea of mothers making sacrifices for their children, whether it's Lily giving her life for Harry or Narcissa risking all she did to ask for his help in protecting Draco, because his own mother protected him from his father as much as she could.

There's a lot of room for interpretation on what Eileen's relationship with her son looked like, and what it says about her own state. She may have prioritized not angering Tobias to protect Severus, who as a child might have perceived her actions as a form of rejection. At the same time, she seems to have prepared him thoroughly for life in the magical world, perhaps in the hope that he would find his place in it and escape home. Perhaps she missed it and told him so much about it so she could live through her own memories.

The only time we see her argue with Tobias, in Severus' memory, she's cowering as he shouts. We know from JK Rowling that Tobias used corporal punishment liberally, which implies Eileen didn't stop him despite her magical abilities. We also see in the text, however, that while at school Severus stood up for himself against bullies and fought back, and that he was an exceptionally clever and powerful wizard. As an adult he was brave enough to face Dumbledore when he betrayed Voldemort, and later fought against Voldemort right under his nose (or lack thereof). So it stands to reason that at some point Severus began to stand up against Tobias too.

How much of that was Eileen's influence, or the result of Severus seeing her acceptance of her fate and rejecting it for himself, is hard to say. As for what happened to Tobias and Eileen that their house was Severus' by the mid-90s and they were nowhere in sight, I don't think there's enough information in the text to infer.

[antennatoheaven]

meta knight is the character ever. he got to wish for literally anything he wanted and he wished to fight against the strongest warrior in the galaxy, he has zero communication skills, he didn't like how everyone lazes around all day so he decided to overthrow the government and failed, his ship has his face plastered on the front for no reason, he decided to go down with said ship, he has a strict moral code but is willing to throw hands with an 8 year with no hesitation, he keeps getting his ass kicked by said 8 year old, he has a sweet tooth and feels the need to hide it even though literally everyone around him loves sweets. he's punched jk rowling in the face

[tinyowlthoughts]

"I want to be remembered as the Anti-JK-Rowling."

"JK Rowling the billionaire author (which, by the way, billionaires should not exist) who instead of using her wealth and reach to better our world has decided to spend her days on Twitter attacking trans people for having the audacity to exist. Imagine, you are one of the BIGGEST authors the world has ever known, writing books for standing up for what's right, only to turn into the villain you warned about.

"What a slap in the face that is. What an absolute betrayal. People like that - people who think that they are somehow better than others, more human, deserve to be shunned from society, no ifs, ands, or buts, and nothing less than just that. At the end of the day, Rowling has no idea who I am, and that's okay. I'm going to keep on doing what I'm doing, writing for my community who deserves to see themselves in books.

"Our stories matter. Important stories that show all the different facets of our lives. Stories where we get to be the heroes. Stories where we get to be the villains. Stories where our truths are put down on page. Trans and nonbinary authors like Ryka Aoki, Anna Marie Macklemore, Andrew Joseph White. Those authors are telling trans stories in a way that no one has ever done before, putting trans characters front and center where they belong in stories that defy imagination."

TJ Klune Library Journal Day of Dialog 5/9/2024

[chiefofboatwatsonstittymug]

"nobody outside Tumblr knows jk Rowling is like that"

HER OPPOSING A NEW LAW AGAINST HATE CRIMES IS ON THE FRONT PAGE OF THE WIDEST DISTRIBUTED FREE NEWSPAPER IN ENGLAND IF NOT THE UK. EVEN IF YOU DON'T READ WHO SHE'S ESSENTIALLY THREATENING WHEN SHE DARES THE COPS TO ARREST HER YOU KNOW SHE'S A PRICK

[onlycosmere]

What is an industry secret that you know?

- Typical_Affect8207 

frostandtheboughs:  All the most famous living artists have workshops full of people who make the art for them.

They spend their time choosing concepts, talking to their gallery reps and schmoozing buyers. The only time they touch the work is to sign it.

iwillfuckingbiteyou: Similarly, there's a very strong chance your favourite author uses ghostwriters. Unless your favourite is George RR Martin, whose publishers probably fucking wish he'd let them bring in ghostwriters so they could finally sell you The Winds of Winter, or JK Rowling, because if a ghostwriter turned in text so riddled with adverbs we'd be replaced with a more competent writer.

Source: Was a ghostwriter. Not a particularly high-level one, but I wrote a couple of minor bestsellers before I packed it in to languish in obscurity under my own name.

Andrew_Squared: /u/Mistborn [Brandon Sanderson] say it isn't so!

Brandon Sanderson: Ha. No, it's isn't the case for me. I don't think it's as common in writing as /u/frostandtheboughs says it is for other kinds of art. Though...I can unfortunately corroborate it does happen in fine art more than people expect. Not any of the fantasy artists I personally know, but some other artists.

I think /u/iwillfuckingbiteyou might be overstating their case. I've never known a person in f&sf to use a ghost writer--even myself, when called in to write on the Wheel of Time, was credited. They didn't need to put my name on the cover, but there was never a question if they would. Maybe it happens in thrillers or the like.

If I write a book with one of my pals, their name is on the book--and often, they do quite a bit of the work. But if my name is the only one on the book, I'm the one who wrote basically every word. (I did hire out the songs in Words of Radiance, as talked about in the front material, to have an actual poet in that seat. And editors do make suggestions that I often take, leaving their touch on the book in the shape of changed words here and there.)

I've never written a book with anyone but one of my pals, really--closest is the Legion story that we did in audio only (death and faxes) which I had very little input in, and insisted it be listed as "Brandon Sanderson's Legion" rather than with myself as an author. But even though they ignored that in some regions, it still has the other author credited as co-author. (It was pitched more as a television type deal, with an attempt at turning it into a serial run by a writer's room. Never took off.)

Anyway, no, this doesn't happen very often among the people I know and have met. Basically never. But different parts of the industry can be very different--nonfiction, for example, is a completely different world. It's full of ghostwriting. And I know in romance, pen names are very, very common, much more so than F&SF.

[lemonsprite]

Fooling around || Sebastian Sallow x Male!Reader

Summary: you teach Sebastian to let loose a little

Word count:

Warnings: slight suggestive themes (?) nothing crazy just snogging (hate that term as an American)

A/N: might make a Verizon about Ominis where he’s jealous of m! Reader and Sebastian idk tho TT okay off topic I HATE JK ROWLING SO MUCH WITH A BURNING PASSION AS A TRANSGENDER but! I am also autistic and unfortunately have a special interest in Harry Potter (I’ve had one since I was nine) AND ITS SUCH A BAD CONFLICT I want to make content but at the same time don’t (anyways make sure you pirate Hogwarts legacy xoxo) NOT BETA READ IM SORRY

“Okay okay-“ smiled Sebastian, leaning backwards against the nearby wall of the undercroft. “I dare you…” he paused, thinking of what next to say. “To send Amit Thakkar an owl full of belch powder!”

“Godric’s Heart Sebastian that’s awful!” You exclaimed, rolling your eyes.

Sebastian tsk’d, waving a finger in front of your face. “Ah-ah-ah you choose dare, remember?” He smirked.

With a sigh you admitted your defeat, reluctantly producing a blank piece of parchment to begin your nasty prank. Despite your reluctance to this task, Sebastian had welcomed you in to the undercroft even with all his prejudice towards you in the beginning- part of you felt like you had to go along with his dare even if it was a bit cruel (and a little funny).

Having never played many muggle games growing up, you’d thought now would be a better time than ever to introduce Sebastian to the wonderful word of ‘Truth or Dare’. Part of you regretted that decision now, with how wonderfully he was adapting to the game already.

“Alright Sebastian- Truth or dare?” You ask, not looking up from your letter.

“Truth.”

“Got any one in the castle you fancy?”

Sebastian’s silence is what finally drew you from your letter, looking up to meet his flushed gaze.

Part of you had expected a ‘no.’ After all, Sebastian never struck you as the romancing type, but seeing his face dusted in pink wasn’t unwelcome- in fact you quite liked the look on him. A voice in the back of your head urged you to make him blush more often.

You raised your eyebrow at him, prompting him to answer.

Sebastian whispered something, you could not make it out.

“What?” You asked, staring at him confusedly.

“You.” He whispered.

“Me what?”

“You- I Like you!” Sebastian exclaimed, his voice raising in frustration at your obliviousness.

Oh.

That went from zero to one hundred.

There was silence for what felt like eternity before you let out a small chuckle, taking a sip of the pumpkin juice Sebastian had brought the two of you.

He stared at you, his eyes a mixture of emotions.

Sebastian began hurriedly covering up his earlier confession. “I know you probably think that strange- I mean a boy liking another boy? Weird right anyways-“

“I like you too.” You said, staring at him over your cup of juice.

That effectively stopped Sebastian’s rambling, he peered at you- bewildered.

“But… but we’re both men?”

“And?” You asked. “Back where I’m from It’s quite normal for boys our age to fool around with each other before we marry- course’ I feel like we should all just be able to marry whom ever we want, never really found myself fancying girls.” You ranted, waving your hand animatedly in the air. All the while Sebastian stared at you, wide eyed and curious.

“…really?” He asked after a moment. You nodded your head, very serious.

“Have you ever… kissed another boy?” Sebastian asked.

“Oh yeah, plenty- a few girls here and there too…” you smiled, leaning in closer to Sebastian.

It seemed impossible to shock Sebastian any further yet here you were.

“And… fooling around… that too?”

“Occasionally… once or twice.”

Again there was silence, Sebastian staring at you intently.

“Could you…” Sebastian paused, thinking of the best way to go about this increasingly awkward conversation. “… teach me?”

It was your turn to be shocked now, staring at him for a moment.

“Teach you?”

“To like… you know- fool around…” said Sebastian, averting his gaze to the floor, that adorable pink flush returning.

You smiled at him, finding his clumsiness adorable.

“Sure.”

Tentatively, as if afraid of scaring away a small creature, you reach your hand over to Sebastian, placing your palm over his and guiding his hand to your waist.

“Like this okay?” You hum, looking up at Sebastian who swallowed heavily and nodded his head.

“I’m gonna- lean down here…” you explain with a grunt, shifting yourself backwards so that you were almost laying on the ground with your elbow propped up to support your weight, Sebastian’s hand still on your waist.

“Now I want you to put one leg over me… kinda like a broom.” You explained, watching with a smile as Sebastian clumsily followed your orders, straddling your legs.

“Good.” You praised, moving Sebastian’s other hand to cage in your body against the floor, your own tangling itself into his hair.

Sebastian’s mouth was slightly agape, his pupils blown wide and his eyes alight with excitement.

“This alright?” You asked, looking up at him to make sure he was still doing good.

“Very.” He breathed. “Could we uh…” he trailed off.

“Get to the kissing part?” You asked with a smirk.

“Yes.” Said Sebastian. “That… Please.”

Using your hand buried in his hair you guided Sebastian towards you, his head dipping to meet your lips in an inexperienced kiss.

It was clumsy and awkward, a mess of teeth clashing against each other and rushed apologies from Sebastian’s mouth.

Your chest was alight and if you hadn’t known any better you’d expected fire works to burst straight from your torso like one of Garreth’s wild potions.

“(y/n)…” breathed Sebastian into the kiss, his hand digging into the fabric on your waist. You pulled him closer deepening the kiss as you opened your mouth.

Pulling away from the embrace you look up breathlessly at Sebastian, his lips plump and swollen from all the kissing.

“Can I take your cloak off?” You ask quietly, your voice echoing in the undercroft. “It’d make this whole thing a lot easier.” And before you could even reach a hand up to unbuckle the clasp of Sebastian’s cloak he’d beaten you to the chase, practically ripping the fabric off his shoulders as he tossed it behind the two of you.

You looked at him in shocked silence, a smirk tugging at your lips.

“Eager are we?” You asked.

“Hush.” Said Sebastian, taking the lead as he bent down, his free hand not on your waist going to your chest, wrapping around your torso and pulling you in closer still.

Sebastian enveloped you in a kiss once more. Your mouth opened into his, turning messy as you searched for Sebastian’s tongue, the undercroft filling with the noises of breathless moans.

The sound of someone clearing their throat pulled you from the moment, Sebastian’s head whipping around to meet the intruders.

“Ominis!” He smiled forcefully, dropping his hands causing you to fall and smack your head against the old tiled floor with a ‘thump!’.

You groaned in pain, Sebastian reaching out his hands to help you before stopping himself, looking back at Ominis.

“Sebastian.” Ominis growled. “Are you seriously snogging a girl in the undercroft? I thought this was our place!”

“No! I mean yes! I mean-“ floundered Sebastian, helping you sit up from the floor and whispering apologies into your ear.

“I just… I really like this guy Ominis.” Sebastian mumbled, looking at the floor embarrassedly, not realizing his words till they’d already slipped out.

“Guy?” Asked Ominis, his voice suddenly soft.

“(y/n). I’m with (y/n).” Admitted Sebastian, his face that adoring shade of pink once more.

Ominis was silent for a long moment processing this new information.

“Okay… it’s- it’s okay Sebastian just… just go make out somewhere else yeah?” Ominis said, his voice suddenly soft and as soon as the tender moment happened it disappeared, the blonde boys voice snarky once more. “And if I ever catch you snogging in here again I’ll have your head, got it?”

“Very.” Said Sebastian with a small smirk, relieved at his friends response. He wrapped his hand around yours, hastily grabbing his discarded cloak and standing up. “Now I’m gonna…”

“Please do get your sorry excuse out of here.” Scoffed Ominis. “I’ll have to disinfect everything, who knows what you two’ve been getting up to.”

Jojo try not to rush another fics ending challenge (impossible)