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sheeple · 8 months ago

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Heirs of Hogwarts | part 1

Genre(s): Nuisance to Lovers / Fake dating / Fluff / No Voldy au Fandom(s): Harry Potter Pairing(s): Mattheo Riddle x Hufflepuff!Reader Summary: After finding out your (now ex)boyfriend cheated on you with the girl he told you not to worry about, you decide to get into a fake relationship with the kid of another founder of Hogwarts. What could go wrong? Warning(s): Cheating boyfriend (Matt could never) / Matt is a cheeky shit A/n: Kinda tried something new with the notes. Lmk if you like/dislike it [Masterlist] [HoH masterlist]

There is a certain expectation that comes with having a well-known surname. People expect you to act in a way that befits a Malfoy, Abbott, Prewett or any other name on the Sacred Twenty-Eight list. And while there is no person left who carries the Gaunt name anymore, a Riddle is as good as a Gaunt in the eyes of the Pure-Blood community.

The one thing nobody realises that also carries on for the ones who are literally Wizarding World royalty. Like you. A Hufflepuff. No, not like the house. But your surname is literally Hufflepuff. Helga Hufflepuff is your great-grandmother many times over. And it sucks.

You're expected to be the embodiment of Hufflepuff House. Be kind, be ready to help everyone who asks, be patient, be humble, be just, be good at Herbology. You hate Herbology! The dirt under your nails. The smell of the classroom. The way magical plants are not really safe for children to be around. I mean... hello? Mandrakes? Yeah, didn't think so.

And it's not like you're not all those things. You are kind, you do help others when asked, you are humble, maybe not as patient as you should be, and just. Just not all the time.

Like right now. Right now you are not patient with Hannah and Susan for hogging the bathroom. You've slept like shit and you are hungry. So, you've decided to go to breakfast without them and have them join you later. You can always brush your teeth after breakfast

As you walk across the common room, you greet your Great-Grandmother in passing. "Morning, Meemaw."

"Good morning my little Badger!", she calls after you cheerfully, earning a couple snickers from your housemates. You choose to ignore them and make your trek up the stairs in silence, giving every student who greets you a polite smile.

You don't even know half the people who call out your name when you pass them. They don't even use your name. Just a variation of Hufflepuff. Huff. Puff. Badger. Queen Badger — you really hate that one. You nearly punched a guy for calling you the Top Notch Yellow One. But to be fair, you were in an abysmal mood that day.

By now you've got a pro at tuning out the stares when you walk into the Great Hall. It's mostly the first years who stare at you with wide eyes and mouths agape once they learn who you are.

You plop down at a free spot and start to plate up some food and pour in juice. Just as you're mid-sip, you feel someone loom over you.

"Good morning", gets whispered in your ear before your boyfriend takes a seat next to you.

You hum and slump against his shoulder. Malcolm pats your head as he knows that is the best attempt at getting a response from you before you've got a semblance of food in your stomach.

Malcolm Preece and you have been dating for almost a year now. He's a year above you and on the Quidditch team. Your friends don't really like him — and if you are completely honest with yourself neither do you. He's too possessive. He always needs to know where you are and with whom. It also drives you absolutely up the walls.

It has always been expected of you to be in a respectable relationship by the sixth year. Even non-Slytherin families have that kind of pressure. Surprising hmm? You needed your parents off your back and Malcolm was there. Do you feel bad for the guy? Yeah, of course. And it's not like you don't care about him but it's more an obligation; the kissing and the touches and the handholding.

"Guess what", you grumble, whipping your mouth. Malcolm hums as he butters his bread. "My first class of the day is Herbology."

Malcolm laughs and shakes his head. He places a kiss on your hair before saying, "I know. You've been whining about it all last evening. Is there absolutely nothing you can find to enjoy about the subject. Or why don't you ask Sprout if you can drop the course?"

You give him a look. "You know I can't do that. Everybody in my family graduated top of their class and I am not about to be the first one of my siblings to royally piss off my parents. Amelia came close when she almost dropped Meemaw's cup."

Your boyfriend laughs but doesn't say anything else. Because your hate for Herbology doesn't come from your general dislike of dirt. It comes from the first thing you see when you walk into the glasshouse.

You share many classes with other houses. You also share many classes with Slytherin. That also means you share many classes with Mattheo Riddle. He's a pompous prat who likes to make your days worse for absolutely no reason.

Normally you sit on the other side of the classroom and ignore him and his friends. He's not above pulling your hair or bumping against you in the hallways. It's petty. And you have no idea why or how it started in the first place.

Herbology is the only class you actually have to interact with Mattheo. For the others you usually sit with Hannah or Susan. But Professor Sprout wanted to hustle up the usual groups and pair random students with each other. That's how you got stuck with Mattheo.

"What is it, princess? Scared a little mud will ruin your manicure?", he says with a shit-eating grin as you put on gardening gloves. You shoot him a glare but continue to tend to you Fluxweed.

"Looks like your Fluxweed can use a little manicure." You give a pointed look at the sad sprig that used to be a plant and continue to do your own thing. "That reminds me, we have to finish our report on Fluxweed. Do you have any time this week? I mean, between your busy schedule of pestering first years and tripping up Neville Longbottom."

You hear a snicker behind you. Hannah holds up her hand to her mouth to stifle her laughter and you wink at her while Mattheo sends her a scalding glare.

"Sure", sneers Mattheo, "if you have any room between tea parties and snogging that sad sack you call a boyfriend."

"I don't have-", you want to interject but you know it has no use. Only if Professor Sprout wouldn't be hoovering around you all the time you would have 'accidentally' stomped on his feet.

You turn your back towards him and walk towards the supply closet, searching for a pair of shears. But Professor Sprout keeps them on the top shelf. As you want to grab your wand, a hand suddenly tugs at the ribbon in your hair.

With a gasp, you whip around and you are met with Mattheo's chest, his tie hanging loosely around his neck. He gives you a bored look before turning around and walking back towards his table.

You shake your head and turn around. When you want to Accio the shears to you, you see that they've been placed on the shelve at eye height. Huh.

Once your classes before lunch are finally over you walk out of the classroom with a smile as you spot Malcolm waiting for you. But your smile soon falters at the person standing next to him. Gladys Prescott stands way too close to your boyfriend. She's twirling a lock of hair with her finger as she laughs obnoxiously at one of Malcolm's jokes. They're great, but not that funny.

When you first started dating Malcolm you voiced your questions about his and Gladys' relationship. You were under the impression that they were dating because of how close they were. You and your friends were surprised when he asked you out on a Hogsmeade date.

The worst thing is that Malcolm swears nothing's going on between the two. That they're just friends. But the way he looks at her and treats her makes you glower. It's not that you're jealous. Just... you don't want to get berated by your parents for choosing the wrong partner.

"Ready?", you plaster on a wide smile, clutching your books in your hands.

Gladys and Malcolm look like they are snapped out of their little world before Malcolm registers that it's you and he returns your smile. "You don't mind if Gly joins us, do you?"

You turn to the girl, who gives you a fake ass big smile. "Of course not. The more the merrier! Now, tell me about your morning."

The two of them speak more to each other and don't bother to include you. Resting your chin on your hand, you look around the Great Hall. Susan and Hannah are doing their Prefect duties so they are unable to join you for lunch.

Tuning out Malcolm and Gladys, your eyes flicker to the other students who are enjoying their lunch. You suddenly make eye contact with Mattheo over at the Slytherin table. He raises his brows at you. You mimic his expression before continuing with your surveying. But when you look back he's still looking at you.

His expressionless eyes flicker towards your boyfriend and Gladys before back to you. He raises a single eyebrow at you, silently asking if you tolerate it.

You send him a pinched look back before zoning back into the conversation. Malcolm and Gladys are laughing loudly and Gladys has a hand clasped over his. The hold on your fork tightens and you swear you feel it bend in your hold.

You stand up abruptly. Gladys and Malcolm pull their hands away like they're burned and look up at you. "I'm... I have to ask Professor Slughorn something before class begins." You think up the excuse on the spot.

"Oh... Do you want me to walk you..?" Malcolm looks at you with big eyes.

But you shake your head. "No. I wouldn't want to pull you away from your fascinating conversation." You give Gladys a sickly sweet smile, which she doesn't return.

Instead of making a left once you leave the Great Hall, you keep on walking until you're at the edge of the forest. You survey if nobody's following you. With a deep breath, you crouch down and feel your bones and skin snap and pull.

One thing that nobody seems to know about Helga Hufflepuff is that she is a born Animagus. And she has given the ability to transform into a badger at will to all her descendants. The Ministry knows about it and every Hufflepuff descendant gets tested at age ten. By then most children are already used to the transformation.

And you love it. It helps you clear your head and release frustration. As of late you've been doing it a lot more.

Your little legs move easily over the forest floor towards your little burrow. You know, the Dark Forest isn't that scary when you're one of the animals. Mostly because you know which sides of the forest you need to dodge. Badgers are vicious but spiders are a paint in the butt.

The afternoon is spent frolicking in flower fields, munching on berries and nuts, and reinforcing the little stick bridges you made for your fellow badgers and woodland creatures over the many rivers that pass through the forest.

By the time you return to the castle, it's already dark and you're tired. You want to curl up in your bed and hear about Susan and Hannah's day.

But something stops you in your way when you pass a dorm. A whiney, feminine voice comes from Malcolm's room. Gladys. "For how long do you have to pretend to like that stuck-up brat?"

You inch closer to the door and peer between the crack. Malcolm and Gladys are on his bed, her between his legs and they're pecking each other's lips, naked. Your chest tightens at this display of intimacy Malcolm never wanted to show you. Too 'old-school'. Or so he claimed.

Malcolm hums. "I know, Pookie. But next year I'm graduated and I want a good job. If I manage to sit it out any longer Mr Hufflepuff might recommend me for a good position at the Ministry."

Anger bubbles from within you and you turn around, marching out of the common room. You ignore the calls of your name and keep on walking until you're outside and on one of the old defence walls of the school. Your thinking spot.

It doesn't hurt that he is cheating on you. You weren't blind. What hurts is that he is using you to get further in life. He's just like the others.

Your shoulders tense up at the sound of someone making them up the stairs and the smell of cigarettes. Great. You really need him to bother you right now.

Mattheo halts once he spots you sitting between the battlements, your feet dangling off the edge. He blows out a puff of smoke before sitting next to you. Out of politeness, he offers his cigarette. He doesn't expect you to accept it and take a drag.

"I didn't know you smoked", muses Mattheo as he watches you blow out the smoke mesmerised.

You glance at him while giving the cigarette back. "I don't."

The two of you stay silent, neither of you wanting or knowing what to talk about. Until it's Mattheo who breaks the silence. "What has the pretty Princess so stressed?"

"I'm not stressed." You opt to ignore the princess part for your sanity.

"Sure. And I can't talk to snakes. You're destroying your nailbeds", he points out and you look down. Your fingers are picking at the skin around your thumbnails. You've managed to make it bleed.

Sticking your thumb in your mouth to suck the blood away, you stare defiantly at the darkness that envelops the forbidden forest. "Malcolm's been cheating on me", you say after some contemplating, eyeing the Slytherin boy next to you.

Mattheo raises one brow unimpressed. "What?", he asks when you give him a look, "do I have to act surprised?" He dramatically fake gasps. "Oh, my Merlin! He did not!" He impersonates an American Valley Girl while covering his mouth with his hand.

You roll your eyes annoyed. Of course, you shouldn't have brought up the subject to Mattheo fucking Riddle. "Forget it if you're going to be a dick about it." You push yourself up and dust off your hands.

But Mattheo's hand around your wrist stops you and he leans back, his eyes somewhat apologetic. "No, don't go. I'm sorry. How did you find out?"

This time you raise your eyebrows. Mattheo Riddle never apologises. What in the...

Against your better judgment, you sit back, your hands folded in your lap. "I just came back and I heard him talk about it with Gladys. How he wants my dad to give him a good job when he graduates." You take a deep breath, the nicotine tickling your nose. "I had a hunch he was fooling around with her. But using me, that hurts, you know?"

He nods as you glance at him. Mattheo knows. He, just like you, is used to people only talking to or befriending him because they want something from him. They think getting in his good graces gets them somewhere. Absolutely not.

"You knew?"

You hum. Your fingers start to attack your nailbeds again as you think back to the many times you've had to bite your tongue. To keep face in front of the others at school. "I needed someone to keep my parents off my back. My parents expect all of us to have a steady partner by our sixth year. My siblings did it, but only the oldest actually had a girlfriend. The twins just told me to find someone to play the part."

A groan escapes you as you bury your hands in your face. "And now someone will rat to their parents about my break-up, who in turn tell my parents and then I'll get a stern letter about my future. This whole break-up is more an irritation than a heartache."

The Slytherin boy next to you is deadly silent. Why would you be so stupid to air your grievance to him? It's not like he cares. Standing up for real this time, you give him a curt nod. "Thank you for listening, Riddle. Best not to mention our meet-up with anyone, alright? Goodnight."

You make your way back towards your dorm and crash into your bed. Pressing your face against your pillow, you try your hardest to forget today.

But as suspected, sleep doesn't come easily. Or not at all. And you feel like a zombie walking towards breakfast, your friends giving you worried looks after you explained what happened last night — minus the Mattheo part.

"I swear if one more busybody comes up to you to say they're sorry", grumbles Hannah as she gives the students around you glares. She balls up her fists and punches the air in front of her. You and Susan chuckle while students around you look at her weirdly.

It's the worst when you enter the Great Hall. The general breakfast noise quiets as your peers start to whisper when you pass them. You keep your eyes focused on a far-off point until you are at your usual breakfast spot.

The three of you eat mostly in silence. Hannah and Susan try to engage you in a conversation but you just play with your food.

"Can we talk?"

You tense up and drop your fork. Slowly, you turn around and look up at Malcolm. He has a guilty look on his face and it angers you. "I don't know. Can we?" You cock your head condescendingly to the side.

You turn back around and start abusing the piece of toast on your plate. Malcolm lays a hand on your shoulder but it gets promptly ripped off by Hannah. "I strongly advise you to back off."

Malcolm scoffs, looking down at the girl who stands protective in front of you. "Or what? Can't I speak with my girlfriend?"

You slowly rise and turn around to face the prick. "Don't speak to her like that, you insufferable twat. You best believe my dad will make sure you won't get a job anywhere in the Ministry, not even as a wand polisher", you bare your teeth, your chest raising rapidly. The Great Hall has fallen silent, watching the exchange.

"You little bitch." Malcolm's jaw ticks and he balls a fist. But the voice of a teacher stops him.

"Mister Preece, I would strongly advise you to step away from Miss Hufflepuff if you don't want to lose your position on the Quidditch team." Professor McGonagall comes striding from the teacher's table, where they could have seen the interaction between the two of you clear as day.

Malcolm's eyes flicker from you towards the professor and back. "This isn't over", he grumbles before leaving the Great Hall.

"Thank you, Professor." You give the woman a small smile as you collect your schoolbag. She waves you away and you grab both Hannah and Susan's hands, dragging them out of the Great Hall, the stares the whole ordeal created starting to creep you out.

Hannah grumbles all the way towards Charms how's she going to 'beat his face in the next time he dares to look at you'. Susan and you share a look but you're glad you've got Hannah to look out for you.

It's again Hannah who sends glares around as the three of you take place at your usual spot — upper bench all the way at the end. That way the three of you can whisper among each other without bothering anyone.

The class goes as usual before a paper bird lands before you. You look surprised to the other side of the classroom. Mattheo Riddle is already looking at you and miming for you to unfold the bird.

You raise your brows at his note. He has such a chicken-scratch handwriting.

"What is it?", asks Susan in a whisper, leaning closer to you to read the note. A soft gasp escapes her and she looks over at Mattheo. Who's eyes are still trained on you, by the way. "Since when are you and Mattheo Riddle sending notes to each other?!"

"Since never!", you hiss, "what time are we done today?"

Hannah looks up from her book. "Three. Why?" She snatches the note out of Susan's hands and her eyes trail over the words. "He needs to fix his handwriting, my brother in Christ. Is 'Fluxweed report' some kind of secret code?"

You snort and swat her chest, earning a smug smile from the girl.

"I think it's rather romantic", says Susan, the hopeless romantic that she is.

A grimace forms on your face. "What is so romantic about finishing a Herbology essay?"

Susan sighs exorbitantly as she rolls her eyes. "You're officially single now! Free to go and explore and find someone who you really like! Mattheo obviously has seen his chance and took it!"

You and Hannah look at Susan as if she just swallowed a flobberworm. She gives the two of you an exasperated look. "What?! Isn't it like so romantic if the two descendants of Hogwarts founders end up dating? I bet ten galleons that he asks you out on a Hogsmeade date."

You huff out a breath. "Fine. But if he ends up humiliating me I'm going to enjoy those ten galleons with all my heart. Now, what do I write him back?"

"Oh! You should ask to meet at those tables at the back of the library where nobody really comes. That way you two could really cosy up."

You turn towards Hannah, feeling betrayed. "I thought you were with me on this?"

Hannah shrugs. "I'm always down for some drama. Besides, he has been staring at you and I always wondered when he would make his move."

"Since when has Mattheo Riddle been staring at me?", you ask genuinely shocked.

"Since like forever! He always manages to look away just in time. You were also too busy with him who we won't name. Bad joojoo."

You ignore Hannah's observation and pen an answer back.

You wait to send it towards him when Flitwick isn't looking before chucking the balled-up paper towards the other side of the classroom and hitting him in the face.

You clasp a hand over your mouth while you and your friends stifle your laugh. Mattheo unfolds the paper, his eyes following every letter you wrote before he shows a thumbs up.

"Dibs on being you guys' child's Godparent", whispers Susan with a grin and you elbow her in the ribs.

You try to bring your focus back to Flitwick, but you keep on glancing back at the curly-haired boy across the room. Has he some sort of plan to ask you so publicly to study? What is his motive? It can't only be studying, right?

Throughout the day you've grown quite nervous about meeting Mattheo. If it wasn't for your stupid friends and their stupid words you wouldn't have thought about this afternoon like any different from any other Herbology class.

For Merlin's sake! You just broke up with your boyfriend and your friends are already pushing you onto the next. You wanted to take it slow for a while and enjoy the rest of your year without the worry of having to please a guy!

You fix your hair and uniform behind a bookcase as you see Mattheo already sitting at the table. With a curt breath and nod to yourself, you walk up to the table and take place in front of him. "Hi. Sorry if you've been waiting for long." You send him a small smile as you grab your book and notebook out of your bag. "It takes more time than I imagined to get from Divignation to here."

Mattheo gives you a half-smile and waves away your apologies. "Don't worry. I just got here too actually. So... what needed to be in that essay again?"

The two of you work together surprisingly well. If Mattheo isn't throwing his snide remarks around anyway. You also don't feel the need to be as snappy as you usually are with him. It's actually... nice? For once.

As you're writing the last part of the essay, you feel his eyes on you. You look back up and raise your brows, silently asking what his deal is.

"I was thinking", he begins.

You let out a chuckle. "That's dangerous."

Ignoring your quip, he continues, "you need your parents off your back, right? And I imagine that you would like to smite Preece after that embarrassing stunt he pulled this morning."

You lean back with your eyes narrowed. "I wouldn't quite call it that. But continue."

Mattheo licks his bottom lips as he instead leans close to you, his voice softening. "Go out with me. Just a couple of dates so that you're seen with me. You know it will drive him nuts seeing you move on so quick."

You contemplate it for a moment or two. He is right. Malcolm always was a bit too paranoid for your taste when you talked with a boy.

He hums. "So you agree?"

"What do you out of it? This all is a bit too suspicious."

He laughs and he runs his tongue over his teeth. "You don't believe me that I'm just content with having a pretty girl by my side?" When you shake your head he grins. "Smart girl. Maybe by 'dating' you, it will pull Preece's attention away from Quidditch and they'll lose the cup."

"So I'm sabotaging my own house?", you muse, your eyes flickering between his own.

Something seems to falter inside Mattheo's eyes for a second before a teasing smile grows on his face. "Well, you can't have everything princess."

Huming, you fall back into your chair. "Sure. When and where will our first 'date' be?", you use air quotations when you say date.

"I've heard that Saturday is going to be a sunny day."

"Sure. Eleven okay? We could meet up in the Clocktower courtyard. That way a lot of people see us leave together."

And with that, quite casually, your totally not fake date with Mattheo Riddle is agreed.

Taglist (bold means I couldn't tag you): @mylosz0 @kermits-bitch

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bookshelfdreams · 24 days ago

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What is your Hogwarts house?

yk, I always thought it was a shame that we (here on the Overanalyzing Dumb Pop Media website) consider HP a forbidden topic; or rather, have collectively decided that, because its author is an idiot transphobe, it is unworthy of discussion. There are so many things worthy of discussion about it, about what it believes in, what roles it assigns to people, why it ultimately fails in delivering its message.

Actually, the houses are a big part of that.

What is evil in the world of HP? Not what the text says outright, not the lip-service it pays to Fascism Bad! No, what is shown as evil? What marks an evil person, and in contrast, a good one? (Aside from superficial and again, obvious traits like cruelty or intolerance)

The defining trait of the "evil" house is ambition and cunning - and intelligence. Ravenclaw might not be "the villain", but the characters placed here, when they feature at all, are often morally ambiguous or downright antagonistic. The big bad villain comes from devastating poverty, just like the secondary villain.

What does HP believe in? Well, underlying seems to be the assumption that it is inherently suspicious to want to rise above one's station. It is fine for characters to explore and make use of their natural gifts, but it is wrong and a mark of evil to have ambitions beyond that. Wanting to be better is fueled by bitterness and jealousy; in HP, you either have innate talent, or you're a fraud and a villain.

This isn't something that's put in consciously, I am almost certain of that. Rather, it stems from a cultural background, where everyone ought to stay within their class. Where good fortune, wealth and talent is a mark of God's favour, and trying to achieve better status despite not being born into it, is hubris that ought to be punished.

Now, on the surface, HP obviously rejects this. Harry himself grows up a destitute, abused orphan! Doesn't he?

But he is lifted from his old life when he learns that he was always special. Fate has marked him favourably. He is innately talented in all the right ways, and he's heir to a fortune.

Contrasting that, there's Ron, whose family is actually poor, but who bear poverty gracefully. Who would, of course, never accept charity! And who's father could have had a better, more lucrative carreer, but never had because he enjoys working in his deadend position so much! (And then look at Ron's brothers: The twins find success and a fortune by exploring their innate talents, seemingly without too much care for financial gain. Percy, otoh, who actually has career ambitions, is painted as shallow and selfish for it.)

Even of the protagonists, the one who is the most hardworking - Hermione - is also the most ruthless, even cruel and dangerous at times. And she is allowed to work for success only because all her motivation is purely academic (and also rooted in poor self-esteem). She studies for a love of studying, and because she is terrified of failure. Not because she wants to be the best.

Being the best is something you simply are. Not something you work for.

On the surface level, HP is about defeating fascism. But the whole framework of HP, its underlying worldview, is far more compatible to that of fascism than antifascim. Voldemort kind of has a point! In HP, muggles are constantly portrayed as clueless and idiotic not-people who are needlessly cruel and intolerant towards wizards. Voldemort's offense isn't thinking wizards are inherently better - the narrative believes this too - it's that he's going to far. He's targeting other wizards and that's inacceptable.

Because in the world of HP, the traits and talents you're born with determine your worth as a person. They're the mark of goodness and achieving success beyond your "station", that's evil.

In the world of HP, not everyone is born free and equal. From birth, it is determined whether you're good or evil, and that's unchangeable (which is why there's so little character development in the entire book series). Redemption is impossible. At 11 years old, your character is declared in front of everyone, and this is unchangeable.

So, to answer your question: idk, man. I'm 35, I'm beyond that age when you want to categorize yourself into a neat little box. I don't think people can be easily divided into "brave heros", "loyal servants", "kinda suspicious nerds", and "evil masterminds", we're more complicated than that.

#anonymaus #message #idk if this was bait but thanks for giving me an excuse to talk about hp!#harry potter #thoughts

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iamnmbr3 · 1 month ago

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I was thinking about how fun it would be to do an It's A Wonderful Life type AU where postwar Draco, consumed by guilt, wishes he had never been born and thus realizes that actually his life mattered more than he thought. And as I was thinking about how a fic like that might play out I realized just how much might change and just how central to Harry's narrative Draco really is.

Draco is so intimately connected to so many things that happen in the story. If suddenly Draco doesn't exist, potentially Harry doesn't join the Quidditch team in book 1 and doesn't catch the snitch with his mouth or almost die from Voldemort cursing his broom. He still likes flying and might join the team later though, but he's no longer the youngest Seeker in a century.

Or in book 2 without Draco Harry doesn't speak Parseltongue in front of everyone because Draco isn't there to conjure a snake and consequently the whole school doesn't conclude that Harry is the heir of Slytherin. This also means that Ginny doesn't mention Harry's ability to diary!Tom and so Tom doesn't try to use her to lure Harry into the Chamber since he has no reason to think Harry would be able to open it. Hermione possibly also doesn't figure out how the voice that Harry's been hearing connects to everything and thus the golden trio may not ever realize that a basilisk is on the loose. Tom might end up deciding that the best way to learn about Harry is to fully possess Ginny or to drain her life force and permanently come out of the diary. Potentially she ends up dying and no one ever knows. Harry doesn't get the diary and thus isn't able to surprise Lucius enough that he unthinkingly tosses a sock in Dobby's direction, meaning Dobby is never freed. Dumbledore may not ever return to the school though probably he does and probably Lucius's threats to other school governors still get exposed.

In book 3 depending on whether Harry ever ends up joining the Quidditch team, the whole plot with the Firebolt in book 3 might never happen. Harry's head also doesn't get seen in Hogsmeade which means Snape doesn't drag him into his office and force him to turn out his pockets which means Lupin doesn't find out about the map and take it from Harry. Lupin consequently doesn't follow the Golden Trio into the shrieking shack in the end of the story. Ron and Harry might also notice Pettigrew on the map but they might not. Depending on how things go down in the shack Sirius might not get a chance to tell his story and prove his innocence. Snape might even attack him and hand him over to the Dementors. Potentially Peter doesn't set out to bring Voldemort back. Lupin still probably loses his job because of the curse, but he might not end up outed as a werewolf. Peter might also have been brought back to the castle and Sirius's name might have been cleared.

In book 4 without Draco, Rita doesn't have a secret source about Harry that lays the groundwork for attacks on his character in book 5.

Assuming Voldemort eventually comes back he no longer punishes Lucius through Draco. Instead he likely directly orders Snape to kill Dumbledore. Because Dumbledore is still dying Snape probably does. Harry has no path to getting mastery of the Elder Wand (assuming we go by the canon version of wandlore and we don't believe the wand actually chose Harry). If Harry makes it to the end of book 7 he dies in the forest. Narcissa probably sees no reason not to say he's still alive. Voldemort kills him for a second time and he stays dead. Though quite possibly Harry is immediately identified and killed at the Manor since Draco is not there to lie for him. Also, Dobby may never have been freed and might not be there to help save him.

Of course, lots of the canon events could still happen and things could just play out a bit differently. But this really highlights how critical a part of Harry's narrative Draco is. From a fic POV I think the most fun would come from exploring how much worse book 7 would have played out without Draco there.

#Harry Potter #drarry #Draco Malfoy #my post #q

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unconventional-lawnchair · 2 months ago

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Desperate Love {Blurb}

Sirius Black x Reader / Remus Lupin x Reader / Wolfstar

Masterlist Series Masterlist

Summary: the moment you and Sirius found you were no good for each other. (This is a I'll Look After You / We'll Heal Together blurb to expand their relationship, not meant as a standalone but could be read that way)

Cw: Use of {Y/N}, Alcoholism, mentions of emotional infidelity, children, cussing, Sirius is mean and drunk, Right person wrong time

Wc-2855

A/N: There will be another post of the actual series soon!

Taglist- @otterlockholmes @stylesann @adhxmoony

You and Sirius stayed that whole night. Cleaning up around the place, taking care of Harry, and keeping the volume low. Remus came over and you and him worked to distract Harry and Sirius took a nap. That really only consisted of him staring at the muggle tv and flicking through channels. When the actual parents returned you and Sirius went home.

You went home and had one of the most vicious fights you had ever had.

When you and Sirius finally returned to your cottage, it was still early morning. The familiar smell of Sirius’s black candles, his cologne, the subtle left over smell of burning oak from the fireplace and your perfume filled the small space. It smelt like home.

You had grown so familiar, so comfortable, with the man behind you. Taking off your thick coat and hanging it for you, smiling softly as you turned to do the same. Everything you two had become was pure domestic bliss, a relationship modeled off your desires and not outside influence. Your relationship was so unapologetically you.

Sometimes that was the worst part.

You swayed your way into the kitchen, getting ready to prepare you and your fiance something to eat. You could feel his eyes on you, but he stayed quiet. Usually when he got like this he liked to stay mellow, but conversation never hurt. There was something you had been meaning to ask him, something you should have brought up years ago.

“You know, being around Harry, it makes you think.” You hummed and took down two mugs, starting to fiddle with the muggle coffee maker Lily gifted you.

“Think of what?” Sirius mumbled as he sat at the table and continued to stare at you. You glanced at him and slowly smiled, turning to face him fully.

“Lily and James. They were living. Truly living.” You gave a breathy sigh of fondness. “I admire it. Starting a family at a time like this.”

You used to wear rose tinted glasses. So in love with the idea of love, that your independent choices of who you loved made all the difference. You weren't marrying Sirius because your parents wanted you to, you were marrying him because you chose to. It was a hazy kind of bliss with the Black heir.

“Don't you think it's a bit.. foolish?” Sirius mumbled into his palm as he pulled down a book from the top of the counter and pretended to flick through the pages. You paused and slowly furrowed your brow, turning to face him. Watching as his jaw clenched and his hollowed cheeks dented.

“Foolish? Sirius, you were just telling them how happy you were about it.” You challenged and set the coffee cup down, Sirius never hesitated to say what he meant. You strained your lips, walking towards him curiously. Sirius had been ecstatic at the wedding, he had told the two the very words of praise you were speaking now. Sirius wouldn't lie so casually... You tried to catch his eye but he avoided you, he knew how well you could read him. One look in his eyes and he knew you'd see every thought, no magic required.

“Sirius, what's on your mind?” You pried and he shook his head.

“I don't want kids.” He interjected instantly. Pressing his thumb to his cheek. You felt like you had just been slapped in the face.

Now, your relationship with Sirius Black was fragile. Not that you both didn't understand what it truly was. You've loved him for three years, and he's sworn his devotion to you several times over those few years. You were both love sick and dangerous together, one of the many reasons you weren't allowed on missions together. It was like you both had something to prove.

How it all started, however? Sirius would call himself a rebound. Self deprecation was his best way to respond to the idea you had in fifth year, after Remus broke your heart. Your relationship was innocent to start, but Sirius would always toe the line. To the point James would tease you both to just go through with the wedding.

“Why don't we?” You remarked, your head lifting from Sirius shoulder and leaned forward on the couch.

“What?” Sirius muttered, looking like a deer in headlights.

“At least get engaged. If we do, we would both get access to our gringotts accounts. It was our parents only stipulation.” You continued and Sirius gave a small scoff.

“Even if I did marry you, dearest, my parents would never let me see a knut.” He chuckled, voice cracking a bit. Especially when you sent him that devilish grin.

“That's just it. It's up to the bank, not her.” You mused and Sirius slowly smirked. “You are insane.” He laughed and you bit your tongue, trying to hide a smirk.

“But as always, brilliant.” He purred and leaned down to kiss your palm, making your laugh.

It wasn't surprising the only person in the friend group who seemed against it was Remus. Even Lily supported the outlandish plan. Get engaged, collect your accounts, and call it off.

You never followed through with that last part.

“You.. don't want kids?” You repeated, a bit baffled. You had never once mentioned wanting to have a family with Sirius, but he had always made it painfully clear that was what he wanted. At least, that's what you thought.

He made absolutely sure the cabin could hold a family, two rooms, public space, a field to run in. He told you about the ideas he had, sending a child with his last name to a muggle school for his first few years would spite his mother in the best of ways. How having you as a wife was the best curse he was ever gifted by the hag. Not fiancé, wife.

It never once crossed your mind he didn't want this too.

“I don't want kids.” He muttered and you gave a deep sigh through your nose.

“That's.. that's a discussion for later.” You whispered and looked away from him. He scoffed, and you closed your eyes, sighing. When he got like this, you knew he was looking for a reaction. A reaction you refused to give.

“I don't want kids. There will be no discussion about it.” He grumbled and stood up.

You rubbed your temple and tried to focus your once loving and excitable energy on the more serious topic. The conversation he seemed so desperate to have.

He watched you try and calm yourself before he began to stand and grabbed his coffee cup and the expensive bottle of scotch on the shelf you had since you first moved in. James’s house warming gift.

You watched him start to open it and winced a bit. “Sirius, please, not now of all times.” You whispered and he scoffed.

“Seems appropriate. I just watched you play house with my best mate for hours, might as well.” His words were bitter and to the point, cutting through the rose tints you adorned and let you see the house more clearly. Thick layer of dust clinging to the lights you never clean, the hazy warmth of the yellow glow seemed much more like a medical white, and Sirius Black looked like the boy you hoped stayed at Hogwarts. Bitter and childish. Sharp and unapologetic.

He reminded you of what this was.

Once you processed what he said, you gawked at him. Eyes wide before your expression turned to slight anger as he continued to open the bottle and poured himself a decent amount of liquor, shooting it back. You watched as his hair fell down his jaw and seemed to frame the pale bobbing throat.

Sirius had just broken this habit, closing in on himself at the slightest push back. As if the demand of affections and attention from someone he didn't think he deserved was too much for him, and seeing Remus, someone Sirius seemed to believe was perfect for you, look at you like you could ail all his illnesses, mend every wound physically for emotion. Wounds Sirius himself marked you both with, it was pushing him closer and closer to an end you couldn't bare to see him meet.

“Sirius, you can't possibly be genuine.” You spoke carefully and Sirius gave a bitter laugh over the tail end of your words. Your expression turned sour, trying to hold back as your body shook and your shoulders square. You were fantastic with confrontation. Not when no party was truly in the wrong. There was no enemy in these matches of wit and skillful pin pricks to your hearts, aiming to scar more often than not.

“Do you think I'm daft, {L/N}?”

It was always the same conversation, the same points that broke skin on contact and contracted around your throat. Like the snake he was born to be, a boa to your neck and a cottonmouth striking you deaf. He wasn't the lion he claimed to be on nights like this.

He was a coward, hiding behind the drinks he threw back. Tomorrow, he would act as if nothing had happened. Showering you with adoration and love he swore he could take from you without a blink of an eye the night before.

“Don't-” You were too, a coward, that was. The snake you were born to be, the snake you became, coiling in itself and begging for him to loosen his grasp and return to your game of pretend.

“You don't think I see how he looks at you?” He slammed the mug on the counter. “He isn't over you. He saw you with Harry and I swear I could have offered him a cure for his furry problem and he wouldn't have looked away!” His voice boomed and you shook your head, turning to walk away. It pained you beyond belief to be reminded of how cruel he could be. How much of a Black he truly would become when rage met his weaknesses. He hated weakness, love was weakness. Some days, that was all you needed to know he loved you. His cruelty.

Sirius let out another string of profanities.

“I'm not doing this. No. We just got some fantastic news, Sirius. We just met our godson. You will not spoil it with your nonsense!” You shouted back and he took another shot. Drowning himself into the numbing elixir, taking away none of his pain and replacing his relational thought with reactive passion. You seemed to pick them that way, Severus, Sirius, Remus… Behaviors begging for reaction. Begging for you to care.

“You want a child so bad? Go and have Lupin’s. I'm sure he's more than happy to provide that service. Right after he's done howling at the moon and feeding on-.” Sirius declared to the roof, hands outstretched. You did your best to level yourself out, but slander to your shared friends was not something you could ignore.

“Sirius Black! You bite your tongue!” You shouted back and he scoffed, making you roll your jaw and close your eyes. Trying to steady your breathing. You hated to be angry. “... Sirius, it's been a long night. We haven't slept yet, you're drinking,” You gestured to him pouring yet another shot. Sighing heavily. “I want to sleep. I just- let's not talk about this.”

“Just like you. You're just so ready to drop it. Why's that? Hm? You don't want to slip up? Admit you want him too?” He taunted like a child. You shook your head and tried to calm yourself further. Reminding yourself every strike he took at you wasn't for you. It's a manifestation of his own feelings of guilt and stress, his awful and over used love language.

“Sirius, you're being cruel and vindictive-”

“Merlin, woman! Will you talk to me like a person! Forget the self help books! Tell me what you really feel!”

“You want to know how I truly feel?” You snapped back and he seemed to respond more the more angry you got.

“Yes! Merlin, finally! Give me a fucking crumb of life in your words. Like you bloody mean it!” He ranted and you began to pace, mirroring his erratic movements through the kitchen, as he waited impatiently. Your snake ready to strike as he continued to hiss and brandish his fangs at you.

“I think you think I'm a fool.” You shouted at him and he seemed absolutely giddy at the reaction. “I think you are hurting me because you're in pain and won't admit it!”

“That so?” He gave a laugh and it made you flinch. “I'm in pain? Is that what that book you love to read diagnoses me with? Oh, Doctor, what are my woes?” He prodded and you snatched the drink away from him as he tried to pour himself more. You capped it and sealed it away in the cabinet of other half drank bottles from arguments and parties over the years. “I think you're the fool? You're the fool who doesn't know what's going on in my head?”

“Yes! I think you think I'm a fool. Sirius, you want me to give up on you.” You demanded with a chilling calm. Sirius didn't seem pleased with this.

“Either that or you think I'd just ignore the painful fact that you've been in love with Remus since Hogwarts!” You snapped back and his jaw went slack. You stared daggers at him and he suddenly tightened his expression, your snake clinging to his neck and injecting years worth of your bane. He wasn't so excited anymore.

“What are you talking about?”

“The glitter incident? The jealous looks? The constant badgering? The dance? You clung to him like he was the last man on this earth.” You rattled on, speaking over Sirius whenever he opened his mouth. “I believe you love me, Sirius. I really do. But you need to analyze what exactly is making you so jealous about me and Remus. Is it that he's in love with me? Or is it that it's not you?”

Sirius slowly set his mug down and you sighed. Taking a few more breaths before you spoke slowly. “No one calls their friend ‘My Moony,’ Sirius. No one does. No one convinces his friends to keep a mandrake leaf in their mouth for a month to help them through a full moon. One friend who can't bloody shut up!”

You stopped your pacing and stared daggers into his eyes. He was speechless, paralysis from your venom taking over as he stammered to collect himself.

“I don't.. I..” Sirius’s voice was low, as if he was grappling with the news himself. You stared at him in shock. How had he not realized?

“I thought loving you would be enough.” You spoke carefully, steady, and Sirius shook his head. Flushed from the buzz in his mind. “I do love you, you know that? I think it's unfair. You love us both, but I'm wrong for wanting Remus in my life?”

You stepped closer and got a good look at his eyes, finally able to see the turmoil and desperation behind it. Then you found it. So much regret you yourself almost fell into it. “.. I'm over him, Sirius.” You whispered softly. “I have been waiting for you to be too. Merlin, you,” your breath caught in your throat. “You haven't even asked about a wedding date.”

Sirius opened and closed his mouth like a fish. Truly regretting drinking. Slowly, he shook his head and rubbed the bottom of his palms against his eyes. “... it seems you've given me too much credit.” He muttered.

Your throat tightened and you slowly closed your eyes. “I love you, Sirius.”

“And him.”

“You.” You repeated. “And I think you need to get your priorities in order. I truly do. I thought love would turn you into a man I deserve, like this would be the answer but,” You gestured to the alcohol. “It hadn't been. You made a choice at Hogwarts, and I think we both know you regret it.”

Sirius began to swirl his half empty coffee mug and stared down at the brown drink. He wet his lips and gave a strained laugh. “I think we both do.” He whispered and you closed your eyes.

“Figure it out, Sirius.” You whispered and pulled off the ring from your finger, setting it on the counter. You don't look at Sirius, but you could hear his sound of defeat. Instantly the regret rushed over him.

“{Y/N}-”

“When you are ready for me. I will be proud to wear it. Until then, figure out what you want.”

You waited months for Sirius to come back to you, tell you everything he's learned and lost, that he didn't want to lose you. He never did.

There was fault in both sides. You didn't ask him to forget about Remus, you wouldn't be so hypocritical. You wanted him to choose you. He never did, it was a reminder that it was simply a plan. A plan you should have cut off years ago.

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hush-writes-preg · 1 year ago

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Spooky Season Day #6: An Unholy Tome

Your father had always warned you of the danger of reading, but you'd never taken him seriously until this very day.

You're the young monarch of a small kingdom deep within the mountains. You'd been married to a king over a decade your senior as a way to solidify political alliances, and while your relationship was cordial, it'd never been particularly warm. The king seemed to hold little interest in members of your gender, but he still came to your bed like clockwork with the clinical intent to sire an heir. You endured it, because what other choice did you have? He had staff to cater to all of your whims and was never unkind, so you could have done much worse.

But still, you couldn't help but feel... neglected. You had needs, even if you didn't fully understand them, and no one with which to explore or satisfy them.

At least, not until you found the book.

Tucked in among your wedding gifts had been a slim volume wrapped in gilded leather, filled with strange things. You couldn't read the text, but the illustrations-- oh, those illustrations. Fantastic creatures of every size and shape were drawn in exquisite detail, not a single aspect missing the artist's trained eye.

It felt scandalous to gape at the familiar yet still alien shapes of their genitalia, but no matter how many times you slammed the book shut in mortification and hid it away, you always dug the tome back out. You always returned to a select handful of the pages, wondering why they made you feel so warm. If only you had someone to ask-- but as the king's foreign consort, you didn't have anyone you could trust with such an intimate query.

Then the dreams began.

And you quickly came to realize what that strange heat meant.

The monsters invaded your dreams like the fabled barbarians of the plains, swift and brutal. They chased you like a wolf hunting a rabbit, harrying your nude form through endless torch-lit corridors and toying with you until you could run no more. But instead of tearing out your throat, they flipped you onto your hands and knees. The horrible realization of what they intended crashed over you and choked off your cries of terror, leaving you frozen and trembling.

One of them mounted you like a beast on the hard stone floor. Thick shafts, tentacles, and appendages you couldn't even name flowed over your body with possessive intent, enveloping and fondling you in ways you'd never been touched before. Terror began to fuse with other things you couldn't name, similar to what you'd felt when gazing at that filthy book: heat, hunger, and a baffling emptiness between your thighs. Even while claws scraped over your skin, you wanted... you wanted...

"Accept us," a discordant voice rose from nowhere, countless voices layered over one another and ringing in your ears. Something nudged purposefully against your hole, teasing you with a taste of what your tormenter offered without truly entering you. Something hot and wet stroked its way down your neck until it curled around a nipple, plucking at the hardening nub until you whimpered. "Your body pleases us. Welcome us in, and we will overwhelm you with the kind of pleasure you'll never receive from your own kind."

You choked on a sob, your hips jerking instinctively back to meet the promised intrusion even as you shook your head. This wasn't right. You're married, and you had undeniable responsibilities to your husband and kingdom. Not to mention the fact that this thing at your back wasn't even human--

The shaft kissing your hole pulsed and began to vibrate, the sensation making your eyes roll back in your head.

"This is only a dream, little human," the voice taunted, its appendages winding even more closely around you. "There's no harm in indulging in a simple fantasy, is there?" There was a hint of menace behind the voices, sure, but it only seemed to stoke the flames in your belly even higher as your willpower began to melt away. "All you have to do is let us in."

Your hole clenched around nothing, eager to suck in anything that would fill it. You'd never felt like this before, and you didn't know how to handle the sensations crashing over you. How could such horrifying monsters make your body burn so hot?

What am I accepting?

Do I even care?

With a moan, you hesitantly spread your thighs in silent permission to the creature.

"Accept. Us."

"Yes," you whimpered, dropping your face to the floor in shameful submission. "Enter me. Ease this ache inside of me before I go mad, please!"

The beast's savage roar of victory nearly made you empty your bladder, but the sudden thrust of something impossibly hard and thick into your aching body immediately drove the fear away. The hulking creature wasted no time in fucking your soft, pampered body into the flagstone floor with all of the abandon of a wild animal. All you could do was hang on and take it. And when it finally finished inside of you, the sudden surge of wet heat painting your insides sent you tumbling over the edge of your very first orgasm.

Oh gods. Oh gods. This dream... sex couldn't possibly feel so good, could it? Pleasure that wiped your mind and left you feeling like you'd transcended to another plane of existence?

Sweaty, dazed, and leaking fluids from your freshly-fucked hole, all you could do was watch as the next creature moved to take its place at your back. Something cooler and more flexible slid into your sloppy hole this time, knobby protrusions along the length catching on the rim before popping inside. And how many more beasts waited along the edges of your vision for their turn?

Oh.

As the bumped shaft started to find its own rough rhythm, you deliriously found yourself hoping that this dream would never end.

It's been over seven months since your first experience with the dreams, and as promised, they fill your nights with untold pleasure. But there's been an unexpected complication.

You've fallen pregnant.

Your husband's kingdom is ecstatic with the news of the coming heir, his family embracing you with more kindness and attention than they ever have before. Your spouse is pleased, though he stopped bedding you the moment your condition became known.

Not that you mind. His disinterested late-night fumbling bores you; you'd much rather drift off to sleep and find satisfaction in the coils and claws of your imaginary lovers.

But as your pregnancy progresses, you can't help but wonder what has spawned in your womb. It seems foolish to imagine that the father could possibly be anyone but your husband, right? In reality, you've only ever entertained the king's attentions. The monsters aren't real. They haven't actually filled you with their seed, no matter how often they've left you sore and bloated from the sheer volume they've poured into you during your fantasies. You can't have been bred by figments of your imagination.

Yet still you find yourself plagued by apprehension. Your belly grows with unexpected speed, filling out into a taut sphere that hangs heavily from your frame. Your mother-in-law is sure this means you carry more than one child and begins taking every opportunity she can to rub your abdomen. This embarrasses you, but you don't feel like you can tell her no.

The midwife isn't as sure; she cautions your in-laws that you could just be carrying large for your first pregnancy. You can tell that she is puzzled by how quickly you've grown, since she's been attending you since your wedding in hopes of helping you conceive. At least you get along well, and she seems to be genuinely on your side. The last thing you need is someone suspecting you of trying to cuckold the king.

Because as much as logic dictates that such thoughts are foolishness, you still struggle against disquiet.

Maybe it is borne of guilt for being unfaithful to your husband, at least in your mind.

Maybe it has to do with the obvious pleasure that the dream-creatures take in fucking your gravid royal form.

Or maybe it is because of the way your belly sometimes moves, writhing and shifting like a bag full of eels. The baby's just active, right? It's not like you could possibly be carrying the offspring of some unnatural monster in your womb.

Of course not.

(A Spooky Season story.)

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shierajones · 4 months ago

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Rise of Red

So I’m watching this movie and doing Simone Biles levels of mental gymnastics to make this all connect to the original story and have the plot holes fill in. Here are my attempts at cohension from the beginning:

SPOILERS!!!!

It’s been 30 years since Auradon was founded.

The math isn’t mathing but sure, let’s say after D3, everyone went on adventures, Ben and Mal got married and they all took time to mature and grow in their roles. As the years have passed, they recognize what a terrible job Beast did as a leader and they want to increase trade and foreign relations with other countries.

Uma says that Ben and Mal put her in charge of everything while they (along with Evie and Jay) are making alliances with other countries.

Of course! Because Beast sucks as a leader so they don’t trust him to take back over even if only temporarily. Gil and Harry (and most of the pirates we’ve seen) are missing from Uma’s crew, because she asked them to help Ben and Mal on their journey. Hook is serving as Captain in Uma’s absence and Jay and Gil have grown very close since traveling Auradon together through the years so it makes sense.

Chad is Cinderella and Charming’s son, but Chloe will one day be queen of Cinderellasburg.

Cinderella and Charming had fertility issues at first and Chad is adopted. Chloe is their miracle baby and, though younger, is the true-born heir to the throne. They love and support Chad in all things and have pampered him his whole life. Given the struggles they had to conceive, they don’t regret showering Chad with love but they recognize he’s a bit spoiled and not fit to be king one day.

The future shows Red and the Queen of Hearts ruling on the throne together. I guess we’re assuming since she’s black and red it means she’s evil.

We never actually see that this future is prevented. The ultimate endgame may still be the same, that Red rules with her mother. I’m going to say, this future was not prevented, just that the Queen of Hearts turn to evil was delayed.

In the past, many of the heroes and villains that we know are in high school together.

Many but not all. This is just a blip in their histories and the stories to come in the future are still canon. We don’t actually see any of the villain/hero pairs (Maleficent & Aurora) (Hook & Peter Pan) (Hades & Hercules) so outside of two couples being established (Jasmine and Aladdin in love and Ella and Charming flirtation/mutual pining) there’s nothing that makes some of the stories automatically false. I’d say some of the events in high school just blacken their hearts more and turn them into real villains.

Bridget and Ella’s personalities seem to be switched (with a more evil skew on Bridget’s end as an adult). This one is long.

Ella was Bridget’s only friend and because she was grounded, she wasn’t supposed to be able to make it to the Castlecoming. She cancels on Bridget and leaves her alone. However, Fairy Godmother is also friends with Ella and has been practicing her magic more and is now in possession of a powerful spellbook (more on that later). She wants a way to help her and is finally successful casting an enchantment that gets Cinderella to the dance for a short time. When her curfew hits, the spell will be reversed and send her home. When she gets to the dance, instead of finding Bridget, she gets caught up in Charming and after the song playing changes to So This is Love, they share their first dance. The two are so engrossed in each other and discovering their feelings are mutual that she doesn’t notice anyone or anything else. However, Bridget sees her and is excited at first until she realizes Ella isn’t seeking her out. She’s stuck on Charming. The song playing when Ella walked in is Shuffle of Love and Bridget is trying to focus but makes a mistake. She turns again to Ella to see if she’ll jump in and help but she’s still too distracted by Charming. Left heartbroken she moves and just watches them on the dance floor while staying isolated on the sidelines. She tries to ignore her feelings because she should be happy for Ella but she can’t stop crying a little. She should’ve been there for her. Isn’t that what friends are for? Then, Uliana comes to talk to her and seemingly comfort her. For a second, she thinks she’s coming around to be her friend. She doesn’t think twice when she offers her a cupcake. Suddenly she’s transformed to a monster and everyone around her starts laughing. Ella and Charming’s attention is finally broken from each other and they turn to see what’s going on. Upon seeing this monster, they laugh too thinking it’s just a prank—with no idea who the monster is. But Bridget’s last shred of hope is broken seeing her only friend laugh at her pain after ignoring her the whole night. When Ella finally realizes who it is, she tries to run after her and loses her shoe. She almost catches her to comfort her but then is whisked away by Fay’s spell and finds herself back at, sitting in the barn. Ella, still grounded is left feeling a mixture of joy, love, pain and regret from the events of the night. She can’t contact Bridget or see her until school starts again on Monday. By Monday it’s too late. Bridget, having spent the weekend with no one to talk to or comfort her decides Love Ain’t It and takes on a new mantra for her life. She looks into the Looking Glass and sees her evil future with her daughter. Fine, if that’s what she becomes, why try? At school, Ella tries to apologize and beg for forgiveness but it’s too late. She tries to tell her how her kindness made her strong, how she’s always respected that about her and loves her like a sister but it’s not enough. She tries to show her with her actions. She takes on the persona Bridget always had because it was good, it was kind, it was true strength. She doesn’t want to suffer for one mistake and doesn’t want Bridget to allow that night to define her, but again, it’s too late. Bridget already knows how this story ends and it’s not with love and friendship. She decides to let the fear and power be her friend and becomes the worst bully they’ve ever seen.

Uliana and her crew were troublemakers so would never have been able to open the spellbook and prank Bridget.

Before Red and Chloe showed up, Uliana and her crew were going to lure someone else in to get the book. Fay! They manipulated her with fear and hope—the promise that she could use the Sorcerer’s book when they were done to perfect her magic. So she did it, just like her daughter tried to take the wand in D1.

Merlin just lets Red and Chloe into school, partners them with their mothers “coincidentally” and sees the open window after the break in but doesn’t try to find out who else was able to escape.

He’s aware that Red and Chloe are time travelers and knows there’s a reason to change the timeline as they have. He knows what’s to come with Beast banning magic and shipping off the villains. He wants to change that story too and these girls are the catalysts. This change in history is going to open the doors for magic to be welcomed back to Auradon in the future as they return and have to fix what they’ve changed.

#descendants rise of red #rise of red #descendants #brandy cinderella #chloe charming #chad charming #red descendants #auradon #merlin academy #bridget descendants #uliana descendants #uma descendants #queen of hearts

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timbit-robin-art · 4 months ago

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i loooove your band au it's so cute!! do they have a band name? why did the O5 have a falling out and what did jean, bobby, and warren play? i'm imagining they get their first gig at harry's hideaway because he graciously allows them to set up in the corner and play as long as they don't bother anyone lol. rogue and gambit both go (rogue drives them and helps them set up, gambit goes to cheer on storm) and that's how they meet

I’m glad people enjoy my silly band idea. I unfortunately have no idea what they would call themselves, but I’m sure some ridiculous ideas were proposed from each member. I’d love to hear ideas.

Ah, the O5… I think they split up because of a combination of reasons. 1.) Worthington Senior urging Warren to return home as Worthington Industries’ heir. 2.) Jean going to a prep school so she can graduate early be the professor’s intern in mutant politics. 3.) Hank’s plans to intern at Stark Industries, which he ultimately doesn’t go through with after he transforms. Of course, there would be petty drama on the side that would further strain things, but those three would probably be the main reasons.

I think Hank looking into Stark Industries would be a big contributor because Bobby would feel betrayed. They promised to stay together, and after Bobby learned about Warren and Jean’s situations, he at least thought that he would have Hank. So, to catch Hank researching about a full time internship would really hurt.

I also think that Warren would initially do everything in his power not to return home until he learns about Jean’s plans. He thinks she’s only doing this because it’s what the professor wants, but then he learns Jean is actually really looking forward to this. I also think he’s bitter about Scott’s encouragement of Jean’s plans, because it’s splitting their group apart. And then when Bobby and Hank finally have their confrontation, he feels like trying to ignore his fate is childish and he should just give in to his father’s plans.

They all used to live at the institute together, but then Warren returned home and Jean is abroad at her prep school. It’s very tense between Scott, Hank, and Bobby, but Scott and Hank eventually making up again probably makes Bobby get over his hurt. He didn’t really take the band as seriously as the others; he just wanted to hang out with his friends. Bobby would later show up to the band’s gigs as support, and who knows… maybe Warren and Jean would, as well.

Scott played the drums, Jean was the pianist, Hank was guitar, Warren was vocals (and maybe another guitar player), and Bobby was bass.

Back to the current band set up, Gambit 100% comes to their performances, which eventually leads him to meet Rogue;

Gambit is already the band’s uncle, so it makes sense that he hits it off with the band’s new aunt. Mr. Logan found Gambit suspicious at first (and to be fair, Mr. Logan is at least 80% sure he saw Gambit pickpocket someone from across the room), but when he sees how much Gambit cares for Storm, he begrudgingly lets go of his suspicions. He still keeps a watchful eye over Gambit and Rogue’s interactions, though. Rogue’s still his child.

Bahhh, so many fun ideas with this. I think it would be really cute if other X-Men are thrown into the mix. They may not be a part of the band, but they still contribute to the chaos of the private school (I think it would be funny if Piotr was an art club member who does art for the band, and Sean was one of their sound crew guys. Any ideas for other X-Men?).

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doremimosasol · 11 months ago

Text

𝐓𝐡𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐬 - 𝐌𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐨 𝐑𝐢𝐝𝐝𝐥𝐞 ⋆⭒˚.⋆

warnings: angst, mentions of abuse, mention of torture, slight mentions of death (hp storyline)

word count: 2,1 k

summary: the growth of yours and Mattheo’s relationship through all 7 years

⋆⭒˚.⋆

𝟏𝐬𝐭 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐫

You and Mattheo didn’t start on good terms. You didn’t get along with him and you thought he was a snob from the very first impression. He thought you were a prude himself. You both ‘met’ for the first time when Draco introduced himself. He unsuccessfully tried to become friends with Harry. Mattheo just looked at you, that look that’d haunt you for years from then on.

You were friends with the Golden Trio, he hung out with the Slytherin boys — both of these friend groups obviously clashing. You both held prejudices about each other but neither of you ever tried to actually get to know each other. Stupid of both of you, because little did you two know, you could actually get along much better than you initially thought. However, this discovery would take place after some years.

1st year was the year of innocent teasing. He sent you paper swans across the classroom, making fun of whatever he came up with that day. You always wondered why he put in all the effort in making those swans, just to make fun of you. He could just full-on say it to your face. You never threw those swans away, they were too pretty. The only thing you did to the paper was put some stickers on top of the degrading words. You, on the other hand, let him trip often in the hallways. No matter how many times you did it, he always seemed to just let it happen. It was a constant weird dynamic between the two of you.

“You’re stupid, y/n.”

“Well, you’re annoying, Mattheo.”

𝟐𝐧𝐝 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐫

Second year was a bumpy year for every student. The sudden petrifying of students who weren’t pure of blood had the school completely shaken. Everyone was scared to walk through the hallways, always making sure to stick by anyone’s side. The rumors of the heir of Slytherin opening the Chamber of Secrets again didn’t help in your view on Mattheo. Neither did you trust Draco, Theodore, Blaise, and several other Slytherins. You knew it was wrong to judge just because they were Slytherins, but the remarks they made about half-bloods and muggle-borns were too concerning to just ignore. Your friends tried to stay away from them as much as possible, even you.

You didn’t do your usual teasing and neither did Mattheo ever get the chance to that year. You avoided him and his friend group at all costs, just for the sake of everyone’s safety. The way Draco talked about it so carelessly, made you want to punch him in the face. It was for the best to stay away before someone ended up in the hospital wing after the release of whoever’s frustrations.

It was the first time Mattheo realized, he actually quite enjoyed your ridiculous banters. He didn’t see you that much that year and it felt off. You would be lying if you said it didn’t feel a bit off for you too. You did still share each other the usual glances. The glances that neither of you knew what they actually meant.

“Are you scared of me, y/n?”

“Just stay away, Mattheo.”

𝟑𝐫𝐝 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐫

The comeback of Sirius Black. The school wasn’t pleasant with all the Dementors around. Harry, your best friend, lived this year with the constant threat of this so-called murderer on the loose. And so did your whole friend group. Hagrid was miserable as well because of the whole situation of Buckbeak. It all felt a bit off, like danger was closer than before.

You used the Maurader’s Map a lot that year and immediately got addicted the first time Harry showed it to you. You’d use it secretly to watch what other people were doing. Harry didn’t need to know you borrowed stole it some nights. Professor Dumbledore constantly pacing around in his room, Professor Snape patrolling the hallways every night, and… Mattheo was seen at the Astronomy Tower almost every night. You wondered your whole year what he did up there, fascinated by his choice of scenery. Could it be that he was actually interested in Astronomy or did he just use that place to achieve some kind of mischief?

That year was the first time you kind of started to tolerate each other. You often visited the Astronomy Tower at night, usually sitting there together. Both of you never said anything, just sitting in silence. It wasn’t an uncomfortable kind of silence, it was quite comforting actually. You also learned from that day on that Mattheo was a smoker, he didn’t do it when you were around though. — Did he want to spare your lungs? — You never really spoke about these encounters to anyone else, it was just there for you two. He actually didn’t seem that bad after all. In public he still mocked you, and he even started degrading you for everyone to hear. Publicly humiliating you in front of everyone. But it was different, it was like he didn’t really mean it like he once did. He seemed to have grown… softer.

“I started smoking when I was 12. I’d rather have you not judge me, y/n.”

“I’m not judging. Just intrigued, Mattheo.”

𝟒𝐭𝐡 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐫

Wizarding Tournament. It was a bumpy year for your friend group, Harry’s name getting drawn from the Goblet didn’t do any good. Ron acted distantly, Harry was totally out of it, and Hermione was still her usual studious self. The thing that changed for you was that a guy showed interest in you for the very first time. It was one of the guys from Durmstrang, he was really tall… but he was a bit older. He asked you out for the Yule Ball, and of course, you said yes. Little did you know that Mattheo had actually been planning to ask you out for weeks now. It was the first time Mattheo felt something off in his heart and he didn’t like it. It hurt and he couldn’t believe it: he was jealous. Weird.

He didn’t speak a lot to you that year, trying to suppress those weird emotions he felt around you. While the jealousy hurt, the other thing he felt was much more unbearable. He didn’t know what it was… He felt disappointed in himself because he didn’t have the courage to ask you out sooner. The guy who asked you out, on the other hand, got a lot of daggers thrown at him. Daggers coming from Mattheo’s eyes almost daily when they crossed paths.

The year ended with Harry announcing the return of Voldemort. No one believed it. But to Mattheo, this could only mean one thing, the return of his malicious father. He was scared, to say the least. That summer he’d see his father again after years, leaving the safe mansion of the Malfoys.

“You should stay away from him. He’s bad news, y/n.”

“You’re not my boyfriend, Mattheo.”

𝟓𝐭𝐡 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐫

He had changed. His eyes had never looked this lifeless before. He started to wear more covering clothes, trying to hide the traces of his father’s horrible personality. He was quiet and was just utterly miserable. Not only was Mattheo miserable… So was Harry with his constant nightmares, and Hermione with the realisation of her feelings towards Ron. Ron, on the other hand, acted like an absolute headless chicken, always munching on Lavender’s face.

Mattheo didn’t notice a lot of difference in the treatment towards him, no one believed his father returned. People were wary of him at all times but that didn’t increase that year. Everyone thought it was a lie and that was because he was so good at covering up what happened to him that summer. You met up with him at the Astronomy Tower a lot that year. You wanted him to talk about it but he brushed it off every single time.

The end of the school year wasn’t what you expected. Fighting off Death Eaters in the Ministry of Magic wasn’t the way you wanted to end the year. Harry lost his godfather and Voldemort returned now for the world to finally see. A year of desperately trying to get it across that the Dark Lord returned… A year after his return, he finally ended up in the newspaper. This meant a lot of interrogations about his father’s intentions to Mattheo, getting him close to a breakdown.

“I don’t want to talk about it, y/n.”

“You’ll just burst one day, Mattheo.”

𝟔𝐭𝐡 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐫

6th year felt off. Everyone was scared and so were you. Though you didn’t know what you were more scared of or better; scared for. Voldemort or his son who was barely hanging on. There was not one night that passed without you two meeting up at the Astronomy Tower. It was the first time he actually opened up, telling him about his childhood and the past two summers. He also asked you a lot about your own childhood. You got to know each other on such a deeper level. It even started to hurt you when you saw his eyebags darken each night and how the scars from the summer didn’t fade. Your compassion had gotten even stronger when you accidentally saw the dark snake inked into his left wrist. You didn’t say a word about it, leaving it to be unspoken about.

Your friends warned you about him every day but you didn’t listen, you didn’t care about their opinions. They hated that you wouldn’t listen to them, calling you stubborn and reckless. Mattheo got bullied a lot that year and you wanted to be there for him. You actually wanted to be a good friend to him, leaving your history of teasing behind. Because behind that strong facade, he was also just a boy who needed someone to finally just listen to him.

The year ended with the murder of Professor Dumbledore. The Death Eaters broke into the school with the help of Draco and completely destroyed the school grounds. Mattheo left with them without saying goodbye…

“You can’t tell this to anyone, y/n.”

“I promise, Mattheo.”

𝟕𝐭𝐡 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐫

You were tired of the constant running, hiding,… The four of you spent weeks and didn’t even find one Horcrux. And even the one you had wasn’t able to be destroyed, actually, it destroyed each one of you more as the days passed. Everyone started to lose hope and all four of you were wretched.

However, there was one silver lining for you. You received several letters during those months, all signed with “MR”. You knew it was him. He left traces at every spot you passed. Flowers, letters, and even a necklace. The necklace carried a small snake, a heirloom of him. He wanted to give it to you, writing it’d protect you from all evil. And it actually would because little did you know, he actually bewitched it. There was this one night when your paths crossed. Looking into each other’s eyes and only saying a few words. But those words were more than enough for the two of you.

“I’ll keep you safe at all costs, y/n.”

“Be careful, Mattheo.”

He manipulated the Death Eaters into believing all four of you couldn’t be found. He misled them by saying he already checked certain places, those certain places you were hiding at during those times. He tried his best to make them stay away from you and to keep you safe.

It was at Malfoy Manor, when he saw you and the other three enter, that his heart dropped. You were found. And he couldn’t do anything about it. He had to withstand your screams of torture and the tears flowing down your face. It was only when you finally were able to leave that his heart got to rest. He wished he wouldn’t see you again, because seeing you again would mean they captured you for the second time. And that second would probably be the last.

During the whole fight-off at Hogwarts, he didn’t see you once. He was completely sure that you were killed and so were you of him. It was when you finally shared eye contact after the destruction of his father that both of your hearts started beating again. He missed you and you missed him. Finally in each other’s embrace. Finally sharing that kiss that both of you should’ve given each other years ago.

“I love you, y/n.”

“I love you too, Mattheo.”

⋆⭒˚.⋆

#harry potter #fiction #slytherin #slytherin boys #benjamin wadsworth #mattheoriddle #mattheo riddle #fanfiction #mattheo x you #mattheoxreader #mattheo x y/n #hp #hp fandom #hp fanfic #hogwarts #slytherinboys

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novelistrry · 1 year ago

Text

Harry visibly clenched his jaw, but that didn’t stop Y/N from going on, “You want to speak of your deception and your dishonor?”

“I don’t think you have any right to speak about deception or dishonor, Y/N. You parade yourself as the perfect princess, and yet, you lie to your subjects. Do not lecture me on deception or dishonor,” Harry drew the boundary between them, a harsh red line that was clear and hard to miss.

“Is blackmail honorable, Prince?” Y/N seethed.

“Is fucking the stable boy honorable, Princess?” Harry didn’t know if this was actually factual, it was only the assumption he made as to why the stable boy would lie for Y/N for so long.

Y/N stuttered over her words, “I-I’m not!”

Harry is a prince, Y/N is a princess, and Harry is incredibly deceptive

Tropes: Enemies to lovers, forced proximity, fake dating, tension, etc.

Warning: Mentions of panic attacks, nightmares, wet dreams, praise kink, deception, etc!

Word Count: 15k+ with the prologue, 12k without.

Prologue (A/N: only read this if you have not read the blurb, if you’ve already read the blurb you can scroll down to where part one “The Ruse” starts)

Y/N hated Harry.

Actually, she wasn’t quite sure the loathing could run quite as deep as it did. It was almost as if when her eyes locked with his, or she got a whiff of his cologne in the corridor, the hatred would flow through her veins and act as a power source. As if the only fuel she needed was how much she absolutely and utterly loathed that man.

So when her handmaid had told her summertime was officially in action, and she knew what summertime brought, Y/N wanted to stomp her foot like a child and throw herself onto the floor.

Summer was supposed to be excellent, filled with fruits and sunny skies. It was supposed to be warm and lovely, but when Y/N’s parents invite Harry and his family to the palace every summer, it’s hard to find enjoyment in the season.

He was beautiful, there was no doubt about that, and Y/N wasn’t one to deny it. Green mosaic eyes, captivating and alluring like a siren sat atop a rock luring sailors in with that beautiful voice. Only instead of using his rhythmic voice to lure her in, he used the gaze of his eyes. Soft features and delicate sculpting to his face that were so perfect it was absolutely infuriating. He was perfect, truly, in every way possible and the people loved his beautiful face and charming personality.

Except when the large wooden doors shut, leaving Y/N and Harry alone (which wasn’t supposed to happen per Y/N’s request, by the way), his mouth was foul and his charming qualities were consigned to oblivion. Around Y/N, Harry was his worst version of himself and Y/N could not stand him.

“I don’t want him to come this year, Dorothea!” Y/N exclaimed to her chambermaid as her heels clicked against the large tile pieces. She was pacing back and forth, a nervous tick she’s had since she was little.

Sweat accumulated in the pits of her palms, a telling sign that she was nervous, though she would never say that to Dorothea or let it be known to Harry because he would never let her live it down.

See, Y/N and Harry were similar in two ways. One, they were both heir to a royal bloodline. And two, they were both so, so stubborn.

“I know, dear.” Dorothea, the sweetest old lady the palace could find, spent most of her day assisting Y/N in her needs even though there weren’t very many of those. Y/N was relatively low maintenance and hated to be waited on, “It’s only three months.”

With that sentiment, Y/N sat on the edge of her bed that was just made and fluffed, deciding she would spend her day sulking in her room rather than participating in any of the start of summer festivities. As if Dorothea could tell Y/N just wanted to be left alone, she quietly made her way out of the room, and left Y/N to her own devices.

____

Maybe dreams do come true, because the summer season had officially been in swing for three days and there were no sights of Harry, or his family, lingering around the palace. Eventually, she thought she would turn the corner and catch him chatting up a chambermaid with a devilish smile and eyes that would turn a girl into a puddle of melted candy, but it had been three days and even the girls she passed (who were anticipating him heavily) were whispering about the prince being late.

By the fifth day, Y/N was beginning to feel the weight lift off her chest and the ease flood through her veins. Though she didn’t dare to ask her parents about Prince Harry’s whereabouts because that would come with an agonizingly painful interrogation (they truly believed their daughter would wed the man), and a small reprimand because of her prior years sour behavior toward him, though they didn’t know just how insufferable he was in return.

Small talk whisked throughout the palace by the seventh day, explaining that Prince Harry would not be attending this summer season because he was to be married by the end of the year to a princess Y/N had never heard of. A small twitch shot through her chest, but she brushed it off feigning it as relief she never had to deal with him again. While Y/N acted oblivious, everyone knew the reason Harry and his family visited the palace every summer is because the families were hoping for an alliance of sorts— for Harry and Y/N to form a union, to form a bond that would end in marriage. As much as she chalked the twitch in her chest and the hollow in her belly as a feeling of relief, she was confused as to why she wished he would have written. Not necessarily her, but at least to her parents, informing that he would not be there this summer (or any summer for that matter because he was getting married) that way she didn’t have to walk around for days on end, thinking there would be a jumpscare in the corridor or the dining hall.

A flicker of annoyance lit inside of her, an emotion she was familiar with and actually grateful for at the moment because it took away from the abnormal sensation in the chest and abdomen. Why wouldn’t he write? Or his parents at the very least? What kind of person does that? Y/N knew just how hard the chambermaids, the scullery kitchen, and the people who made the palace function as well as it did were working to ensure their guests were accommodated and comfortable for the three months they were staying with them.

It was very unlike Y/N, usually very polite and soft-spoken to feel that kind of irritation. The kind that was so pent up it was making her breathing slightly erratic and she was puffing breaths in and out through her nose. In a very un-Y/N like fashion, she decided that if Prince Harry wasn’t going to write to her, then she was going to write to him and tell him how distasteful his lack of presence or notification on the betrothal was.

Before she could even process what she was doing, she was in the main library of the palace, sitting at the writing table and crafting a heartfelt message to her dear friend Prince Harry, slightly berating him in each line for his so-called prince ethics (or lack-there-of).

Dear Prince Harry,

I am sitting here, writing to tell you how distasteful I find your lack of arrival. It is great news within our palace that you are to be married, which in turn, delays your arrival to our annual summer festivities, and possibly inhibits you from attending these festivities ever again.

A true prince, knowing royal ethics, would have written far in advance, revoking his acceptance to my family’s invitation. It seems that, as always, you are too engrossed in your own endeavors to care about the people around you who have taken the time to prepare for your arrival.

I know our royal household has been working gravely to make certain you and your family have a wonderful stay over the summer, as they have done every summer for the past two years—

“I knew I would find you in here,” his voice, clear and steady, echoed through the library bouncing off the walls and the leather bindings of the books which sat on the shelves of the wall, “You’re always in here doing something or another.”

She knew who it was by the sound of his voice, deep and sultry. He always spoke with such precision and so bluntly that even with her eyes closed, she could tell who it was just by the energy that filled the space. Arrogance and tempting were his two most significant qualities and they always filled the room, leaving her to suffocate in his presence.

Quickly, she jumped up and grabbed the letter, crumpling it in her hands. The ink was so fresh it smeared all over her hands with her rush, and when she looked to see him standing under the doorway, she noted that not a thing about him had changed. He stood with that same arrogance in his posture, his eyes were still that deepsea green, and his lips, chin, and jaw were as beautiful (if not more) as the last time she saw him.

Quirking his eyebrows, he couldn’t help himself. “Now I need to know what was in that letter you were writing. Are you in love, my dear Y/N.”

He took a step forward, and she realized he thought she would just hand the letter over to him, like it was his property to be read. And even though it technically was, the letter was now void because he did, in fact, show up for the summer season. While it may have been intended for him, the content of the letter did not matter, and because he expected her to walk over and drop the letter in the palm of his hand, that absolutely infuriated her.

“I will not give this to you,” Y/N shook her head and furrowed her eyebrows. She almost cringed at the tone of her voice, so abrasive and calloused. Harry brought out the worst in her, he really did. Though, she didn’t understand how Harry could make this frustration brew inside of her when the rest of the Styles were so lovely to be around.

In two long strides, Harry was rounding the writing desk and in front of her. He towered over her, reaching for the crumpled letter in her hands and before she could grasp the paper tighter, it slipped beneath her fingertips and he was reading it aloud.

“I thought you said this wasn’t for me, Princess?” Harry wasn’t asking, it was more rhetorical than anything. The mock in his tone sent a heat through her, plummeting up from where her heart dropped in her stomach to the apples of her cheeks.

He held the letter above the both of them, the words still readable even though the ink was smeared on the page. As he read aloud, Y/N wanted to drop to the floor and cover her ears from listening to speak her foolish words out loud. If anything, the letter was an act of catharsis. She probably would have never actually sent it to Harry, even if she said she was going to, but writing the words on the paper and pretending like she was going to send it to him was semi-therapeutic. By the second line, she was jumping in the air like a fish out of water, trying to grasp the letter from his hands so he couldn’t continue. To make matters worse, he was chuckling between words and flashing wide grins in her direction when he paused.

Eventually, the way she was jumping and frantically trying to snatch the letter from him was just as humiliating as the strong words she had put on that piece of paper he held in his hands, so she stopped and turned away from him so that he could not see the look of horror on her face as he finished reading the letter.

Finally, he got to the part where he walked in and startled her from her writing desk, her thoughts coming to an abrupt halt on the paper when his voice echoed throughout the room, and even though he was done reading the letter, she couldn’t bear to look at him. If there was one thing about Harry, he always had the upper hand with her. Always.

“I wish I hadn’t interrupted your thoughts when I came in here a few moments ago. I’m positive the rest of this letter would have been a great read, and you print your thoughts so eloquently, Y/N.” He was trying to get under her skin, even though he knew he had already burrowed himself under the flesh like a mite the second he walked in the room. That was another one of Harry’s traits— he wanted to see just how much he could push her until she snapped, because he loved watching her snap.

“Enough,” she spoke, barely turning to look at him. She caught a glimpse of him from the corner of her eye, enough for her to squint just barely and for him to know she was giving him a dirty look.

“Well, Y/N, clearly this letter was for me. Was it not?” He was doing it; pushing and pressing until the temper within her flicked on a light and her thoughts rifling through her brain started spewing like fire, the world around them turning to ash with each word that fell from her lips and targeted him like a huntsman and its prey.

“It wasn’t for you—” She began, getting cut off by the prince.

“It clearly says ‘Dear Prince Harry, I am sitting here, writing to y—”

Within under a second, she was turning on her heels to face him once more and trying to pry the letter from his fingers. To no avail, she didn’t think she could handle him reading the letter out loud once more, so she covered her ears and began begging him to stop. The worst part was the feeling she had in her gut, the feeling one gets in their gut and their throat before the tears start forming in their eyes. While Harry had many horrid qualities about him, one of her terrible qualities were tears that formed, not out of sadness, but out of anger. Deeply, she inhaled to smooth out her thoughts and quiet her mind. “Stop, stop, stop.”

Grinning like the devil, he spoke slowly and quietly so any chambermaids passing by could not hear the words he was about to speak to her, “Are you embarrassed, Princess? The girl everyone thinks is so ladylike and polite writing words that would tarnish that sweet reputation.”

“I was never going to send it, and I think you know that,” she countered, and even though she knew he knew that letter was never going to leave her possession, she felt like she needed to reiterate that point.

Carefully and slowly—almost painfully slowly— he brought his finger to her cheeks and swiped across to feel the heat radiating off of her skin and she knew he was gaining even more satisfaction at the heat in her cheeks confirming his question, that she was embarrassed by him finding her letter. To rub salt in the wound, he folded the letter up and stuffed it in the pit of his pocket where she would not dare to fish out, as it was not very polite to stick your hand in someone else’s pocket, “For safekeeping,” he stated.

Those two words made her want to do it— stick her hand in his pocket and fish the letter out, tear it in little tiny pieces, and then stomp on the shreds of paper right in front of him, but she wouldn’t do it because she, unlike him, did not lack manners.

“You are absolutely unbearable, Prince. Do not think my opinion on you has changed. I can assure you it has not,” she wanted to get under his skin the way he got under hers, so she added, “Where is your betrothed?”

He paused for a moment, searching for the words, “I am not to be married, Y/N.”

The tone was cut and brief, not the same tone he had when she was pushing his buttons, but a clear line was drawn showing her this is where the boundary was placed, and as much as she wanted to upset him the way he upset her, Y/N did not want to pick and pry about his presumably failed engagement. Though, she did not blame the girl for not wanting to marry someone with such an insufferable attitude. And maybe, just maybe, she also didn’t want to hear about the girl. She didn’t want Harry to talk about how beautiful she was, or what her hobbies were. She didn’t want to know a thing about her or how she wormed her way into the heart of someone so aloof and out of touch with the idea of love. To put it plainly, she didn’t want to hear about their courtship and what he did to make her swoon.

Y/N would never admit it, but the first time she ever met Harry, she was taken with him. And then he opened his mouth, all-knowing and witty bordering intolerable.

“Well, then,” Y/N didn’t quite know what to say in response, seeming to be more uncomfortable with the idea of him getting married than he was.

With a mere couple inches between them, he leaned down to whisper something in her ear. Soft lips grazed the tops of her ears, a warm heat shooting through her, and though she was disgusted with herself for having such an instinctual reaction to his body and his lips so close to her skin, she was graceful enough to remind herself that it was only natural for her core to stir and her stomach to flip.

And when he finally spoke, his lips moved against her ear, “I am going to enjoy playing with you this summer, Y/N.”

She wanted to scream. She almost did.

Instead she took a step back, gasping and brushing out the wrinkles in her dress, “I absolutely loathe you.”

“I love that you loathe me,” he replied before turning on his heels and walking out of the library.

Y/N knew it was going to be a long summer filled with taunts from Harry.

And much to her dismay, that night she dreamed about his lips pressing against her.

I. The Ruse

Y/N had told Dorothea she was feeling too ill to attend the breakfast table that morning. Albeit, the truth of the matter was that she was shaken by her dreams poisoned by Harry— maybe they were good dreams about his lips, his fingers, the way he caressed her cheek, but the fact that it was Harry doing those things to her was enough to deduce it was a nightmare. A terrible, terrible nightmare.

“Should I fetch you some tea?” Dorothea pressed her hand to Y/N’s forehead, feeling for a fever, but when the skin under her hands was cool rather than clammy, Dorothea raised an eyebrow in suspicion.

“No, no,” Y/N swung the covers over her, revealing her nightgown. Stiffly, she planted her feet on the wooden planks beneath the bed as she made a show of stretching, “Don’t fuss over me. I’m already feeling much better, Dorothea.”

“Better enough to attend breakfast?” Dorothea questioned her, the brow still raised in suspicion, and Y/N knows she should just tell Dorothea the truth but it was her stubborn nature that prevented her from letting Dorothea know about her encounter with the Prince yesterday.

“I believe it’s late anyway,” Y/N reasoned, “I will fetch something when the dining hall has been cleared out.”

Dorothea only shook her head in disappointment, but Y/N pretended not to notice.

______________

In an effort to maintain his dignity, Harry had to stop looking at the chestnut oak double doors separating the dining hall from the rest of the castle. Each time a servant opened the door to replenish something on the table, Harry’s head snapped over, hoping it would be Y/N that walked through the doors just so he could see her again.

It was agonizing, honestly. She was sweeter than droplets of nectar. Bees were probably drawn to her, knowing her personality was as sweet as the honey they produced, attracting to her like the pollen they longed to search for.

That, precisely, is why she aggravated Harry so much. From the time Harry was born, it was engraved in his brain that he was a ruler; he was honorable, decisive, and empathetic. All the qualities that made up a leader, and he knew it, too. Though, he was self-aware enough to know where he was lacking, and he was lacking (probably) the most important quality a leader can have—compassion and the ability to connect.

For Y/N, that was something that came so naturally. She could connect with just about anyone. The princess blended in with the common folk so... Seamlessly, it was absolutely infuriating. Harry had tried, plenty of times, to blend in, to connect with his people and his royal household but he could never achieve it the way Y/N did. She was a real princess, and it made him feel like a fraud.

Years had passed with him learning about how to rule, the best way, the honorable way. For Y/N, it seemed that she was born with the knowledge, never having to lift a finger or read a book.

So it pleased him, angering her to the point of outbursts. In her court, she was polite, loved, and deemed the absolute most charismatic one can be. When she was just about shaking with rage, foul words dripping from her lips, that is when Harry was content— when she looked less like a statue, the perfect creation this court has formed her to be, and more like a human. More like him.

That is when the irritation he felt toward her stopped festering, just for a moment in time.

And he knew he was absolutely terrible for it, absolutely atrocious, but he wanted to corrupt her. Ruin the molding she was fit into.

Sounds of fingers fiddling on the doorknob caused him to look up, and when a servant walked in with another tray of warm bread and fresh butter, his eyes averted to his plate to avoid the teasing that was about to come from the King’s Hand— or well, Prince’s Hand, really, since he wouldn’t truly be the King’s Hand until Harry’s coronation.

But he was too late, and the words were already coming out of Niall’s mouth, “If you’re going to keep glancing up every time someone walks in, wishing her to walk through those doors, then why don’t you just go seek her out?”

“I don’t wish for her to walk through those doors, Niall,” Harry’s jaw tensed as he spoke, the inclination that he was waiting for her making him somewhat irate, “I am merely observing, isn’t that important? To be aware of one’s surroundings?”

“Yes,” Niall sucked in his teeth, moving his gaze from the angle of Harry’s jaw back to his plate of food, “Indeed it is.”

Harry spread butter on a fresh piece of bread, ignoring Niall’s comment, and when Niall realized Harry wasn’t going to say anything else, he continued to poke the bear. “Why didn’t you marry Duchess Violet when you had the opportunity? Why push the wedding? So you could come here? See her?”

A hiss left Harry’s mouth before answering in a hushed voice, low enough that the people around them could not hear. “Why so many questions, Niall?”

“I’m trying to understand,” he shrugged his shoulders, the level of his voice now matching Harry’s.

“I pushed the wedding because I did not want to marry the Duchess, Niall. Simple as that. I came here because my parents are convinced that Princess Y/N and I will form an attachment if I spend enough time with her. That is what they want after all.”

“Then what?” Niall’s questioning was causing sweat to bead on Harry’s forehead. He didn’t want to think of the then what factor.

“I suppose when I return home, the arrangement between the Duchess and I will initiate once more.” Harry cocked his head over to Niall, dropping the piece of bread on his plate. Suddenly, he wasn’t hungry anymore.

“What is your game here this summer, Prince?” Niall asked, locking eyes with Harry’s whose eyes were the same pigment as a field of green clovers populating in the crisp months of Spring, mischief dancing in his irises.

Slowly and carefully he gave Niall the essence of his plan, “I will convince the Princess to form an alliance with me— A facade, if you will. We will put on a show, and before our attachment is sealed with a ring, she will say she can no longer do it. And I will be so heartbroken, to the nation’s knowledge, that they will not pester me about marrying. I do not need to marry. I will not need to marry.”

“And will you be heartbroken, Prince?” This seemed to be Niall’s only concern.

“No,” Harry paused and then added on, “I do not believe so.”

“And what if she does not agree to a facade?”

“Then I will charm her. Seduce her.” This was all Harry was willing to say on the matter as he pushed his chair up.

______________

Y/N, to her credit, was full of secrets.

Every now and again, she would poke her head out, scan the corridor, then jump back into her bedchamber when she heard the sound of heels clicking against the flooring.

And she’s never felt quite so childish before. Usually, when Harry came for the summer, Y/N didn’t go out of her way to avoid him, but after their interaction in the study she didn’t think she was ready to face him yet.

If Y/N was honest with herself, two years ago when she first met the prince, she was quite smitten. And maybe it was the fact that he was engaged to someone else. .. Someone Y/N didn’t know. Maybe it was the fact that he didn’t bother to tell her, or write to her family that got her so worked up. Maybe, just maybe, it was the fact that someone wormed their way into his icy chest and planted a seed of fire that caused him to want them.

She had trouble admitting it to herself, but she fancied Harry more than she let on. The only person in the entire castle that knew just how deep her feelings for Harry ran was Dorothea, though the words had never left Y/N’s lips and they might not ever.

Rage has simmered in her gut, boiling over into her fingertips that flowed against the page where she etched words onto a canvas that conveyed her grievances with Harry. The memory of her sitting there, rage-writing a letter she never intended to send, and Harry snatching it out of her hands and reading aloud sent a churn in her stomach, the humiliation of the moment festering inside her once more.

The true reason she had been avoiding him, at last. She was utterly embarrassed by the entire ordeal. All he had to do was read in between the lines, and all of her feelings were on display. Harry having that letter was a different kind of vulnerability.

So she snuck out to the stables, where her good friend Brad worked as the stable boy. Y/N and Brad shared a secret the people did not know, it was kept between the two of them, and she liked Brad for the fact he has known her secret for about four years and has not told a soul has made her like them all the more.

Boots trudged in the muddy grass as she made her way out to the stables, where Brad tended to her horses (and the other horses, of course). Birds cooed in the sky, the sing-song noises filling her ears and putting her at peace for the first time since yesterday.

When she had finally made it to the big barn, nearly a quarter mile away from the actual castle, Brad was nowhere to be seen. Quietly, she lurked around, craning her head around corners and scouting him out.

Right as she was about to call out his name, because it was very unlikely for him to not be here, she rounded one more corner and saw him nestled next to the Prince— next to Harry.

She almost audibly groaned when she saw him standing there, invading her space. Where she liked to go to clear her head, but before a noise could escape her lips, she realized if she slowly backed out of the hall then she might escape the pair before either of them saw her.

As she slowly tried to back out of the hall encompassed by horse stables, the two rather close together, both snapped their heads in her direction. Two sets of eyes locked with hers, her mouth watering as her stomach turns nervously when Harry’s green gaze of disapproval scans her up and down.

“Y/N?” Brad asked, projecting his tone down the length of the hall so she could hear him clearly, “What are you doing all the way down there?”

“Nothing!” Her tone projected as well, matching Brad’s. “I was thinking I could see Freya, but I see you’re busy.”

“Why don’t you come closer, Princess? So we don’t have to shout too loud.” Harry said, and Y/N knew the look upon his face. Whenever he was about to do something devious, a smirk would spread across his lips, his eyes sparkling with the game he was about to partake in.

And Y/N doesn’t know why she listened to him, why she didn’t just turn away, but before she could tell herself to stop, she was walking toward the both of them. Each step felt shameful, her eyes averting from Harry’s and to Brad. She couldn’t stand the way Harry looked at her, like she was a toy, like he could burn holes through her soul if he really wanted to.

She shifted her body to angle more toward Brad, not completely cutting Harry out of the circle they were now standing in, but angling herself enough to show that her body language was more open to Brad than she was to Harry.

“Isn’t this one Freya?” Harry pointed to the stall directly across from them. There stood her light gray horse, mane and tail braided perfectly.

Actually, if someone saw Y/N and Freya standing side by side, they would simply know Freya was meant for Y/N by the way she holds herself; strong, with a gentle demeanor radiating off her. The only problem is that people would never see Freya and Y/N side by side, because Y/N (as much as she loved Freya) was too afraid to take her out of her stall. In Y/N’s kingdom, it was inevitable that every young prince or princess had to ride, because at their coronation one of the requirements was to ride in on their horse. The issue wasn’t that Y/N didn’t know how to ride. She did. The issue was that Y/N wouldn’t because of an accident that happened three years ago, leaving Y/N scared to ever get on the back of a horse, or to even walk around with her lead rope in hand. Nobody knew, except Brad, that Y/N hadn’t been on the back of her horse since the accident, it was a secret the two of them kept together.

“Yes,” Y/N turned to him, just slightly, “That is her.”

“Go on, then,” Harry motioned toward her, “We don’t mind if you take her out.”

Y/N’s stomach dropped, glancing at Brad to see if he could help her worm her way out of this situation. He has helped her before, when her parents would find her in the stable and ask if she wanted to go on a ride with them. Brad would say something like, Princess Y/N just put Freya back, they went on a lengthy ride earlier and Freya is resting now. It made Y/N feel selfish to know how much trouble Brad could get in for lying, but she was too much of a coward to tell anyone her fears.

Brad interjected, just not with what she hoped for, “Y/N doesn’t ride.”

Confusion contorted Y/N’s features as he outed her secret to the one person she didn’t want to know an inkling about her. “Brad!”

Brad’s eyes widened slightly, his brows raising as he replied, “I’m sorry, Y/N! I thought it was okay for him to know? It’s not as if he lives in the palace.”

Harry stepped closer, putting a pin in the conversation Brad and Y/N were beginning to have right in front of him, “Why doesn’t she ride?”

Brad waited, momentarily, for Y/N to respond but when her lips stayed sealed, withholding the information from Harry he decided to come clean for her. “Y/N has panic attacks when she gets too close to horses. Nobody knows.”

At least he didn’t tell Harry why horses made her panic.

“Yet you come out here anyway?”

Heedfully, she took in a deep breath and began to collect her thoughts which seemed to be swimming everywhere. These past two days, she had never felt so exposed, so bare in front of him. First with the letter, and now with Brad’s indiscretion to Y/N’s secret. “As you may already know, horse riding is big in our culture, so I come out here to keep up appearances. And, I do love my Freya.”

“You’re a fraud, then? A liar?” Harry sucked in a breath, that grin teetering on amusement— a fine line between pure and utter cruelty.

“If that’s what you will call it,” Y/N tried not to let the emotions welling inside show on her face, remaining neutral and stoic was the best way to ignore Harry. She, too, could sink her claws in him and tear him apart by simply ignoring him. “I must be going.”

Swiftly, she turned, paying no mind to Freya and blocking out the snickering coming from Harry as she walked out of the barn. Her boots trudged in the mud once more, and the frustration brewing inside was threatening to spill over, though she would not allow it to until she was alone in the privacy of her own room.

The palace was in plain sight, she only needed to walk a straight narrow path before she could take a side door to the main corridor and scurry off to her room (hopefully avoiding many of the household staff on the way). It was unfair, but she wanted to yell at Brad for offering Harry such private information. Should she blame him, though? He’s been keeping her secret for nearly three years, lying for her, and obviously he didn’t know that Harry had brutish tendencies— especially when it came to her. In fact, she thought back to it. The way the two of them were standing, how Harry was shifting closer to Brad with each word. If Y/N didn’t know better, Harry was trying to turn Brad into putty in his hands which honestly might have been more of an issue than him knowing her secret panic attacks she would have in the privacy of Freya’s stall. Was Harry interested in Brad, trying to charm him with his good looks and that personality that oozed sweetness? Y/N may have never seen that side of him, but amongst the chambermaids he was quite the sweet-talker.

“Y/N,” a low, gruff voice called from behind her. When she tried to pick up the pace, she only heard the shuffling of Harry’s boots behind her go faster.

It wasn’t like she would be able to escape him, if he truly wanted to pester her he would find her in her bedchamber. It was better to have a discussion with him out in the open instead of him tainting her bedchamber with his attitude.

“What?” She turned on her heels and snapped her head toward him, the tone of her voice laced with anger.

“I wanted to have a discussion with you,” he took a few steps closer so they were only an arms distance from each other. He wanted his next words to be just barely above a whisper.

“Then speak,” Y/N pursed her lips together, crossing her arms so that she could shield herself against him in some way. Clearly, crossing her arms wasn’t actually going to protect her from him, but in a way, it felt like a mental shield, keeping him out of her head and far away.

“It has been two days of me gracing you with my company, and within those two days, I have obtained a letter I’m convinced you would not like to fall into the wrong hands, and I have discovered you have been deceiving many people and getting the stable boy to lie for you,” Harry’s pointer finger traced under her chin, noting the shiver that ran down her back as she stepped away from his touch, “Now, if you do not want that letter circulating throughout the palace, and if you do not want everyone to know you are a fraud, then you will offer me something I need.”

Her breath caught in her throat. Harry was blackmailing her? She had always taken him for possessing a certain cruelty about him, but never thought he would stoop low to the point where blackmail (quite literally when she takes the letter into consideration) would be hanging over her head like a bundle of mistletoe.

“What is wrong with you?” Y/N furrowed her eyebrows, stepping backward as her arms tightened around herself once more.

“What is your answer, Y/N?” He spoke with such an airy indifference that she almost couldn’t tell if he was playing a very humorless joke on her.

“I don’t believe I have much of a choice in the matter!” She barked back, and that flicker of anger displayed on her face and in her tone of voice made his lips curve up into a cursed smile, so she tried to cool herself down and remain stoic— just as unbothered as he seemed to be.

“I am giving you a choice, darling,” Harry said, the word rolling off his tongue like the pet name was second nature to him, “One option is unfavorable, though. For you, at the very least.”

It was written across his face; either answer she gave him was a win for him. This was a situation where she was going to lose, a situation where the upper hand was in his court and he was playing the game with no mercy. If she said yes, she was indebted to him, owing him a favor. And if she said no, the shame of her actions would not only reflect on her, but her family as well.

“Tell me what you need,” an exasperated sigh she didn’t mean to let out, falling from her lips.

“Agree first.” Harry was a politician first, a prince second, and a human being last.

She couldn’t help but roll her eyes, “Do you believe I haven’t learned to never agree to something binding without knowing the stipulations first, Prince?”

“And do you think I would present my vulnerabilities to you without an answer first? I tell you, you don’t agree with the clause, and now you know what I need. Why should I do that?” His reasoning was valid to her, though she would never admit to it.

“Then my answer is no,” Y/N began turning on her heels to walk away; get as far away as she possibly could, but she stopped in her tracks when he caught up behind her, hooking his fingers around her waist and pressing his front against her back.

Incredibly cool and collected, he pressed his lips against her ears before he spoke, causing a chill to rip down her spine and a tightening coil in the pit of her stomach. “You’ve made your choice, then. Tonight in the dining hall, while we are in the middle of dinner with the most important people, I will stand and tell everyone of your fraudulent activities. In fact, I might even embellish it— explain how you’ve been keeping the stable boy so quiet with your mouth. Do you know what that means, princess? I will tell them how you’ve squandered his innocence, and when the shame is rising from here,” Harry’s fingers trailed from her hip to her stomach, and then all the way up to the apple of her cheeks, “To here… That is when I will twist the knife, and begin reading your finest letter aloud. And when you are crying, I will not stop.”

Y/N turned back around, stepping away from him to get distance before spitting out, “You are cruel, Harry. So, very, cruel.”

“You are flattering me,” he quirked an eyebrow, and she so badly wanted to connect her fist to that stupid smirk on his face.

“Fine,” Y/N nodded her head, refusing to give him any more leverage, “I will help you.”

“Great, then I will court you for the entire summer, and just before it is time for me to propose to you… You will come up with some excuse to break it off, and I will pretend I am utterly heartbroken and need time to heal.”

Y/N was shocked his ruse was not nearly as bad as she had expected it to be. She thought maybe he would be requesting her to break into the general’s office and steal classified military documents, or something absolutely absurd and dangerous. But a courtship under false pretenses was… Dishonorable, but not a crime.

“That’s it?” She shrugged her shoulders. “Why?”

“Because,” he was beginning to feel frustrated, and Y/N could tell by the way he pinched the bridge of his nose in between his fingers. “I do not want to marry the Dutchess, and I fear if I do not place a ring on your finger, that is my destiny. However, if you end our courtship and I feign heartbreak, how could anyone tell me I need to marry when I lost the love of my life.” He rolled his eyes as he spoke the words.

“And—” Y/N began to ask another question before Harry interrupted her.

“That is all the information I will give you on the topic.”

“Fine,” she, herself, was done with the conversation anyway. There were much better things for her to do than scheme with Harry, “Now if you would leave me be, I would like some space from you.”

“Take what you need, because after dinner we will be attached at the hip once we announce our courtship.”

This might be the death of Y/N.

______________

Pretending to be under the weather was not going to cut it this evening, Y/N knew she couldn’t get out of another meal with her family, Harry’s, and the other important people that made it to the dining hall list without a stern talking to from Dorothea.

On top of that, she knew that Harry was going to announce their courtship, and he probably wouldn’t be too keen on the idea of announcing it without her there. Actually, she wasn’t too keen on the idea, either. Who knows what he would say?

With thoughts racing through her head, and the click of her ballet flats on the mosaic tile, she made her way down the corridor until she was standing just outside of the tall oak doors. As soon as they opened, she would find her seat, and her fate for the summer would be sealed.

“Looking nervous, darling.” Harry spoke from behind her, creeping up on her for the third time since he’s been here. Rolling her eyes was beginning to become a natural reaction at this point.

“Don’t call me that,” Y/N hissed out, barely taking her eyes from the door as he walked up behind her so he was nearly touching her backside as his fingers reached for the knob and turned it slowly.

It was quiet when her eyes locked with her mother and father’s eyes, and when she slid her gaze over to Harry’s parents, she couldn’t help but feel shame that ticked in her lower stomach. It was one thing to be deceptive to her own parents; it was another to be deceptive to someone else’s. This was definitely something she was going to bring up to Harry later.

Dorothea was sitting beside Y/N’s mother, and when she noticed her, Dorothea offered an approving smile and a small glance toward Harry’s direction. On multiple occasions, Dorothea had tried to convince Y/N that Harry was not that horrible as she knew him since he was a young boy, but Y/N would gawk and scoff and exclaim with exasperation: Why are you taking his side? Now, Dorothea had believed Harry finally charmed Y/N just enough to weasel his way into her heart, but little did Dorothea know, it was quite the opposite.

Dinner was going by smoothly. Every now and again, Harry would make some small talk with Y/N, and as soon as the pair began speaking softly under their breath, the entire table would stop talking to hear what the two of them were conversing about. It was making Y/N rather anxious to have so much attention thrown in her general direction, but she supposed if she were in their shoes, she would be just as curious.

Before the meal came to a close, Harry tapped a shiny piece of silverware against his glass, gaining everyone’s attention. Though, Y/N wanted to tell him if he wanted all eyes on him, all he would have to do is look at her, whisper her name, and the chattering amongst the table would cease so everyone could hone in on their private conversation. “Everyone, I wanted to announce mine and precious Y/N’s courtships. After two long summers of denying our tension amongst one another, we decided it was in everyone’s best interest if we gave our compatibility a shot.”

A couple people clapped, and Y/N tried so hard to repress the eyeroll and the scoff that wanted to surface so badly. Dorothea shot a wink in her direction, so Y/N offered a small smile because a grimace would lead to questioning from her later, and lying to Dorothea was not something she felt too good about. Y/N had already deceived her once today by feigning illness, and twice with Harry’s speech of their courtship, but she did not want to have a separate conversation with Dorothea that contained the weight of her lies.

As soon as dinner ended, Y/N found herself rushing from the dining hall, nausea filling her gut as bile threatened to creep up her throat. In a few turns, she was down the corridor, and finally, she was on the terrace, breathing in the crisp night air. Stars illuminated the sky, the moon brightening the path she was walking down, and she should have known better to think she would get just one moment alone (or one moment where Harry was not creeping up behind her).

“Y/N, I want to talk,” Harry whispered, although the words may have been hushed, but they were on the louder side like a… Hushed shout?

“I’m not sure I would like to talk right now,” Y/N replied back, kicking scattered rocks out of the path they were taking that led to the gardens on the right side of the palace.

“I promise I will leave you alone for the night after this,” Harry sounded sincere, “I just want to work out the logistics with you.”

“The logistics with me?” Y/N scoffed, pivoting on her heels and throwing her hands up in exasperation. The tone of her voice was laced with venom, and the scrunch of her nose which led all the way up to her eyebrows, giving her the look of an angry kitten was enough to tell Harry she was quite upset with the ordeal, “You mean, you would like to speak of your deception?”

Harry visibly clenched his jaw, but that didn’t stop Y/N from going on, “You want to speak of your deception and your dishonor?”

“Is blackmail honorable, Prince?” Y/N seethed.

“Is fucking the stable boy honorable, Princess?” Harry didn’t know if this was actually factual, it was only the assumption he made as to why the stable boy would lie for Y/N for so long.

Y/N stuttered over her words, “I-I’m not!”

“Maybe you’re not,” he looked her up and down, the sinister glare in his eyes making her want to recoil into herself, “But you want to.”

Y/N did not deny her attraction to the stable boy, though, she had never fantasized of him in such salacious ways, and that little flicker of emotion that ran across her features was something Harry picked up on immediately.

“Would it break your little heart, Princess?” Harry took a step closer, the vein on his neck popping out as he clenched his jaw harder, “If I let your stable boy lay in my bed?”

Y/N gasped. She had never heard someone be so… Vulgar.

The response she was looking for swam through her head but she couldn’t quite locate it as she filed through the crevices of her brain. How could she answer that? To her luck, Harry was on his heels and walking toward the direction of the stables so she didn’t have to respond to him. He muttered out the grumpiest, “I’ll find you later,” and Y/N’s heart sank as she realized Harry was trying to find Brad to either bed him, or tell Brad about her embarrassing little crush. Y/N had never felt so exposed in her own territory.

______________

“This is never going to work, Niall!” Harry exclaimed, kicking off his riding boots and pacing his way back and forth in Niall’s personal cabin. Niall was the Prince’s Hand, his second in command, but he needed his space. When they would come for the summer, Niall would occupy the cottage on the outskirts of the palace, the only way to get there was by horseback, which is part of the reason he felt so comfortable being open with Niall. There was no possible way the princess would be strolling down the corridor and overhear him chatting with Niall when they were so far away, and the only way she could get there was by horseback, which he knew she wouldn’t do.

“What do you mean?” Niall looked over at him, pouring a glass of sparkling wine that was located on the bar top near the kitchenette. Harry noted that Niall was pouring two glasses, one for Harry and one for himself.

“She’s too stubborn.” Harry sighed out, taking the glass from Niall as he reached his hand out, then plummeted into one of the cushion filled chairs in the corner of the room. “She won’t be able to go through with it.”

“And you have leverage over her, do you not? I thought that was why you were so sure of your plan?” Niall pressed the frosted glass to his lips, then tipped his head back.

Harry followed suit, tipping his head back after pressing the cool glass to his lip. The slight carbonation of the alcohol, and the burn of the alcohol itself singed the back of his throat before he shook his head and shut his eyes tightly. “I do have leverage as I told you about. I fear if she backs out, I would never be able to put her through that, though.”

“It was my understanding that you didn’t care and you do not like her. If that is the case, then what is the issue, Prince?” Niall questioned.

“I do not care about her and I do not like her, but what would it say about me if I grasped that leverage and exposed her so openly like that…” Harry’s voice trailed off as he brought the glass back to his lips once more.

“So you do not care about her, and you do not like her, but you care about what others would think if you humiliated her so publicly?” Niall was beginning to understand.

“Exactly,” Harry agreed.

Niall didn’t like giving Harry advice like this, but he was loyal to Harry first and always. When he began fitting the puzzle pieces together of the dynamic between Harry and Y/N, before he could even process his own thought process he blurted, “If you think she is too stubborn, then change that. Have you thought that maybe the reason she is so stubborn around you is because of the fact you are so mean to her. Stop being so cruel. Be a gentleman, make her like you. Hell, make her even love you, and at the end of the summer, if you still do not believe you are the type of man to marry, then begin corresponding with the Duchess again, forcing Y/N to break it off with you. You told her it was all a ruse, then so be it. However, that does not mean you have to make her life a living hell. You can charm her, make her fall for you, and when you invite the Duchess to the ball at the end of the summer, Y/N will have no other choice than to call it off.”

Harry paused, sitting upright in the chair rather than slouching over, “So you are saying to charm her still, even though she’s already agreed to the facade with me?”

“Precisely,” Niall pushed the guilty feeling down.

“And at the end of the summer when I want her to call it off, let her find me entangled with Duchess Violet?” Harry was the one asking questions now.

“Yes,” Niall let out a small breath.

“Smart man,” was all Harry said, and that was the end of the conversation as Harry slipped his boots on, bolted out the door, mounted his horse, and rode back to the main palace so he could talk to Y/N.

______________

Y/N was still in the garden, ruminating over the argument she just had with Harry. How could someone be so handsome, resembling a person who was probably carved by the most delicate angels themselves, have such a crude mouth and an evil demeanor? If Harry was a little bit nicer, she thinks he would be the easiest person to fall in love with.

“Y/N?” Harry whispered, and when she turned around to look at him, he noted the way the light from the moon reflected off the top of his curly brown hair, where it hit the highs of his cheekbones, and she noted the delicacy in his sea moss green eyes.

“I’m too exhausted to argue, Prince.” She remained grounded, her feet planted into the soil. Her cheeks were still wet from the tears spilled over after Harry left her feeling silly, and even though the streaks remained on her cheeks, there were no more droplets forming in her eyes.

He stepped closer, so close that his body was almost pressed against the front of hers. She noted the way his hand lingered by her hip, wanting badly to close the gap between them by positioning his hand behind her and pulling her close. “I didn’t mean to make you cry.”

“It wouldn’t be the first time.” She was strong, she was going to be tough.

“I feel terrible, Y/N,” the sincerity in his eyes was enough to send a ripple of shock through her. Honestly, the sincerity he felt was enough to send a ripple of shock through him. It was true, he did feel terrible. He never meant to make her cry.

“It’s fine,” Y/N said, beginning to turn away from him, but he caught her with his hand around her hip, then closed the gap between them so there was no space between the pair.

“It’s not,” he disagreed, “I… I want to be your friend, Y/N.”

“My friend?” She was so fucking confused.

“Yes,” he nodded his head, creeping his free hand under her chin and forcing her to look up and directly at him. “I do not want to be the only person benefiting from this deception.”

“Okay,” she didn’t know what else to say.

“Let me teach you how to feel comfortable on a horse again. I can give you lessons.” He decided showing her how to be confident atop a horse would be something she would benefit from. She wouldn’t have to feel confined to the palace anymore or lie to the people around her.

“So you can belittle me in our lessons?” Y/N asked, raising a brow at him.

“No, Y/N. No more of that, I can assure you.” He sounded so sincere, he was convincing himself. Maybe the truth was that arguing with her, getting under her skin, and picking her apart was exhausting and he didn’t like feeling like the worst version of himself around her. He was so confused. So confused. He hated this perfect princess exterior she put on, but he disliked being an asshole more.

“You really want to help me?” She could hardly believe it.

“Yes,” he dropped his hand from her chin and her hip, taking a step away from her, “Tomorrow morning, meet me at the stables.”

With that, he turned away and found his way back to his bedchambers. Harry really needed to decompress.

______________

The next morning, Harry found her in the stables. She had gotten there before him and was waiting by Freya’s stall. Brad wasn’t there quite yet. It was so early, the sun was just starting to poke through the horizon.

Colors of red, pink, and gold reflected from his skin as he approached her, and Y/N noted that the colors peaking from the horizon were almost as beautiful as him. While the sun rise was beautiful, it was not nearly as beautiful as him.

“Are you ready?” Harry asked, walking up to where she leaned against Freya’s stall.

“I’m ready,” she explained.

They had spent hours talking about how to form a bond with a horse, how to treat a horse, and where not to stand when around a horse. They talked about how to saddle a horse up, how to put the bit in a horse’s mouth without injuring yourself or the animal you need to be taking care of. Harry was actually a very good teacher. He wasn’t pushing her out of her comfort zone, he wasn’t belittling her for the things she was taught when she was younger but forgot how to maneuver. Harry even brought up what Brad had said about her having panic attacks when she was too close to horses, and told her that if she was feeling anxious to let him know, they could find a spot where she felt safe. Overall, working with him wasn’t too bad.

Y/N tried not to talk about the incident that made her so fearful of horses to begin with, and as much as Harry wanted to know why she was so afraid of them, he didn’t want to push and pry. He knew what it was like when people pushed their way into your personal space, and it was his biggest pet peeve, so he wasn’t going to subject her to something he hated deep in his bones.

Brad was surprised the first day when he came in, and saw Y/N, with shaky hands, petting on Freya. Freya seemed to enjoy it, and Harry stabilized her shaky arm as she reached in the window of the stall and pet her, whispering small encouragements in her ear. He was standing directly behind her, the front of his body pressed to her back as she reached in.

“Good girl,” Harry said, his fingers clutched around her elbow to combat the shakiness in her arm.

“She is a rather good girl,” Y/N said, touching the softness on Freya’s nose.

“No,” Harry laughed out, his fingers still gently holding her elbow steady, “I was talking about you. You’re being a very good girl.”

Y/N felt the heat rise to her cheeks, but chose to say nothing, and much to her good luck, Brad had finally showed up for the day, amazed at how Harry stood there with Y/N and held her from behind as she touched Freya.

“Wow,” Brad said, dropping some of the grain he was holding into the stall next to Freya’s, “You’re doing very well, Y/N.”

Y/N didn’t think she could handle all the compliments, so she redirected the attention to Harry, “It’s all him. He's a great teacher.”

“I bet he is,” Brad shot a look toward Harry, a smirk forming on the edges of both their mouths. It made Y/N wonder if they actually had some sort of relationship like Harry hinted at the night he told her he was going to bed Brad in order to spite her. “I just hope you don’t have nightmares tonight.”

“Nightmares?” Harry’s grip around her elbow tightened, pulling her arm out of Freya’s stall and letting Y/N’s arm fall to her side. “What does he mean?”

Y/N turned around, and threw a scowl in Brad’s direction. Her back pressed against the stall door as she let a sheepish smile appear on her face when she turned all her attention toward Harry. “I used to have nightmares about the incident.”

Harry’s lips pressed into a hardline, a serious look glossed in his eyes. “If you start having nightmares again, tell me. Please.”

“I will.”

______________

Y/N didn’t know what to do about the dreams she was having regarding Harry. It seemed that every single night her dreams of Harry were becoming more and more graphic. The first night she dreamt of him was the first night he was in the palace, and she dreamt of what his lips felt like on hers.

The second time she dreamt of him, she dreamt of the ways his hands felt around her body, and ever since then she had been having that same dream of him, over and over again. He would start by kissing her neck and touching her all over, calling her sweet names, and making her cry out in pleasure.

Every morning she woke up feeling debauched, and when she would meet Harry at the stables in the morning, she tried her best to not let the emotion flood her face. Sometimes she was scared that he could just look at her and know she was having inappropriate dreams about him.

A week had passed of her spending time with Harry. She learned about his favorite food, what he loved about his own kingdom, and even found out that the Marigold flower was native to his kingdom.

“You kind of remind me of a Marigold.” Harry said softly.

“Why is that?” She looked over at him, as he began putting the bit on Freya. Y/N wasn’t ready to ride yet, but today she was going to walk Freya along the property with Harry to get used to her holding the lead rope in her hand.

“They’re bright and beautiful,” Harry buckled the bit, pulling the lead rope through as he spoke to Y/N, “A lot like you.”

“I think we’ve come a long way,” Y/N noted, grabbing the lead rope with shaky fingers when Harry handed it to her.

When Harry realized that her fingers were shaking and her eyes were nervously glancing around, he grabbed the lead rope back from her and began walking Freya out of the barn and toward a trail nearby, “I’ll walk her for now. I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable.”

They walked together, talking about the most random things and getting to know each other. Y/N couldn’t believe she didn’t like Harry at first. Fine, he was slightly annoying, and when she thought about how she was technically still being blackmailed it made her a little furious, but when he was being so pleasant and lovely, she tried not to think of those things.

On top of all that, how could she say she still disliked him when she was dreaming of him every single night?

“Why don’t you try holding the lead rope as we walk, and I’ll hold your hand over it?” He suggested, coming to a stop in the middle of the trail. As much as he liked walking Freya, he did want Y/N to make some progress.

“I think I can do that,” Y/N agreed, grabbing the rope in her hand and locking it securely between her fingers. Her hand wasn’t on the rope for even two seconds before Harry threw his hand around hers and gave her a look that she knew said I’m here for you.

Her heart nearly skipped a beat as his hand enveloped hers and his eyes brought comfort to her hammering heart. For a moment, she closed her eyes and imagined how his lips would taste— probably sickeningly sweet. She thought of the way he might moan against her, like he did in her dream. The vibrations flooding through her, feeling like pure ecstasy.

What the hell was she doing?

______________

Y/N thought back to the first night Harry had been to the palace. That night, she had a dream of Harry pressing his lips against hers. The more time she spent with Harry, the more she dreamt about him at night, and as the days passed, the more graphic they got.

Today wasn’t the first time she had woken up with a puddle between her legs due to a steamy dream she had about Harry, though, it was the first time she had reached her climax in her sleep and she couldn’t help the shame that picked away inside her.

Quickly, she cleaned herself off and began putting on her riding clothes to meet Harry in the stables.

______________

This morning, Y/N could barely look Harry in the eye, and he wondered why that was. They had been working together for a little over two weeks now, and she was growing much more comfortable with him each day. Actually, it was rather frustrating for him to find out that he somewhat enjoyed spending time with her. She was kind of funny, a little sweet, and overall, easy to teach.

“Will you tell me why you can’t look at me today?” Harry grinned at her, and noted the way she dropped her gaze from his eyes back down to her hands, an emotion he couldn’t quite place lingering on her features.

“Sorry,” she mumbled out, still refusing to meet his eyes. This might actually drive him crazy.

“Tell me, darling,” Harry reached for the water that was sitting atop Freya’s stall door, and began taking a few sips, his eyes still locked on Y/N, waiting for her to explain. Sooner or later, she would tell him. She was quite bad at keeping secrets.

“Did you actually take Brad to bed?” Y/N still didn’t look up at him.

Harry choked on his water; that was the last thing he expected Y/N to say to him. “Why do you think that?”

“You told me you were going to take him to bed the night you told me you wanted to be my friend,” Y/N recalled.

“I did say that,” Harry hummed out, placing the water back atop the door of the horse stall before moving toward her, “No, I did not take him to bed.”

“Do you want to… You know? Do you like him in that way?” Y/N was trying to avoid certain words, too shy to actually say what she was thinking, and the shyness in her tone was enough to make Harry’s knees almost buckle.

“I think he’s handsome, Y/N, but I would not hurt your feelings like that,” Harry explained, shrugging his shoulders.

“So you only like him, then? That is why you would not marry the Duchess?” Y/N had so many questions rifling through her mind, she didn’t know where to begin.

Realization dawned on Harry’s face, “I have a preference for both, Y/N. I do find men attractive, but I find women attractive too.”

“Oh okay,” Y/N nodded her head, “I’m sorry I was just thinking of that night and how maybe you and Brad—”

“That’s so naughty, Y/N.” He took a couple steps toward her, reminding her of the night he told her he would teach her how to ride. There was only a small gap between them, the front of his chest pressed to the front of her chest, but this time, there was a wooden wall behind her and if he only took one more small step, she would be pressed against the wooden wall in the barn and the front of Harry’s bodice. She was so depraved.

Harry’s voice was full of teasing, but Y/N was so wrapped up in her thoughts, she thought he was chastising her, “I’m sorry, Harry! Not like that!”

“Darling, I’m only teasing you,” Harry’s grin was contagious, Y/N couldn’t help the small smile that spread across her lips, “Now won’t you tell me a secret? I’ve given you one of mine.”

Y/N didn’t even think about it before blurting out, “I wish I knew what it was like to be kissed.”

Harry raised an eyebrow, his hand pressed against the wooden wall, trapping Y/N between his body and the wall (still offering her a way out from the position on his left). All he needed to do was bend down and connect his lips to hers and she would know what it’s like, but he would never do it without asking first. “Would you like me to teach you?”

“I would like that,” she breathed.

So, he would give her what she wanted. In the matter of seconds, his knee was positioned in between her legs, almost touching her center. His head had swooped down so his lips were just a few centimeters from her own, and his eyes were full of peer lust. Without much thought, he pressed his lips against her gentle ones, sliding his tongue across her bottom lip, begging for her to open up for him and let him in. Though, Y/N didn’t understand the cue, and Harry understood that since this is her first time being kissed, she wouldn’t know the trick of sliding your tongue against someone’s bottom lip and what that was asking for.

Gently, he brought his lips to her chin and pulled down ever so slightly, parting her lips and allowing access to her mouth. It was the most pleasant noise he had ever heard, the moan that vibrated into his mouth and warmed his muscles. The blood was flowing to his cheeks, his heart rate quickening and pumping the blood through his body, and straight to his cock. Honestly, if they didn’t stop kissing, he might actually come in his pants, so he pulled away, leaving her breathless and hot.

“How was that?” He asked.

“I think I liked it a lot,” she panted out, pressing her legs together and Harry knew the signs of that all too well, but decided not to comment on it.

“We can do it again sometime.” He shrugged, removing his hand from the wall and taking a few steps back.

“O-okay.” She muttered.

Y/N was feeling things she had never known were possible.

______________

Harry’s lips were pressed against her neck, his hands wandering to the waistband of her underwear before looping his fingers around the elastic and pulling them down her legs. Before she even had time to process what was going on, he was gently laying her against the bed, but they weren’t in her room… No, she didn’t know where they were, and for a moment she was dissecting the bedchamber and all its decor until Harry’s thumb found its way to her clit and one of his fingers sunk into her, rubbing against the button that had her back arching off of the bed.

“Oh,” she gasped out, her breathing becoming erratic with each stroke. “Please, Harry. Please…”

In this scenario, she didn’t feel ashamed for calling out his name, for begging for his fingers. Harry had positioned himself so that he was on top of her, one hand holding him up so that he good get a good look at her face (in this scenario, he liked to watch the way her nose scrunched when she hit her climax) while his hand worked her clit and flicked against her g-spot.

“Don’t worry, darling girl,” he leaned down, his lips pressed against her lips as he spoke, “I’m going to get you there.”

She couldn’t help it, she needed him so badly. When he pulled his fingers out and inserted another, expanding the space inside her, she arched her back off the bed and bucked her hips into his hand begging for more friction than he was supplying her with.

“Don’t be greedy, love.” He found a different position so he could use one hand to pin her hips to the bed, and the other one to tease her with his fingers. “You need help orgasming, darling?”

“Harry, I need help!”

“Y/N!” Harry shook her shoulders, causing her whole body to shake as her eyes opened to reveal a panicked Harry peering down at her.

It took a moment for her to understand what was going on, but when she looked at her surroundings which were dimly lit by candles, Y/N realized that she was in her bedchamber, and no longer in the bedchamber in her dream, and Harry had pulled the chair sitting in the corner of her room to the side of her bed.

A dream. It was just another dream. And it took a moment before she realized that Harry was here, waking her from her dream frantically.

“Harry,” she breathed out, and though he heard the breathiness in her tone as a sigh of relief, for Y/N she was coming down from the orgasm she just had in her sleep. In front of Harry. “What are you doing here?”

“Baby, you were having a nightmare. You’ve been screaming my name,” he tucked a strand of hair that was coated in sweat behind her ear, and she noted the softness in his voice, a guilty feeling ripping through her.

Actually, his voice wasn’t the only thing soft about him. Harry was still sporting sleepwear, white linen pajama pants and a matching button top. His curls which were normally assorted and crisp looking flopped against his forehead, and she couldn’t help but notice the way he stroked his thumb against her head whispering sweet nicknames he had never called her before, but what she really couldn’t stand was the guilt and worry flooding those cloverfield eyes of his.

“I—” she went to explain that she wasn’t having a nightmare, but before she had a chance to get the words out, he was telling her what happened.

“They came and got me. Dorothea told me this is the fifth consecutive night you’ve been screaming my name, why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you tell me the lessons weren’t working, and they were putting you in such a bad place. I didn’t want this for you, baby,” Harry continued to stroke his thumb against her head, this time lowering his hand so that his thumb was stroking along her lips which wasn’t helping the sticky wetness pooling in her panties and the ache in her lower belly.

Y/N, filled with shame at the guilt in his eyes and the crude dreams she’s been having, tried to find her voice, “Wasn’t having a nightmare.”

“What do you mean, darling? You were screaming my name, asking for help?”

In response, Y/N only pulled the edge of her blanket closer to her chest, tucking herself away from him.

It took Harry only two seconds to understand, “Oh?”

“Sorry,” she muttered, dropping her head and inching away from the touch of his fingers.

“No!” He exclaimed, hooking his fingers around her arm as she tried to scoot to the other side of the bed, “Don’t be sorry. There is no need for that, Y/N.”

Y/N didn’t know how to respond, so she nodded and expected him to get up and leave her to her own devices.

Harry’s voice dropped to a whisper, “I just didn’t take you for a beggar, darling girl.”

It could have been the nickname, the same one dream Harry had given her as he brought her to her climax or the fact that he was calling her a beggar but she couldn’t help the heat that flooded through her cheeks as she averted her gaze from his, “Stop!”

“Don’t be embarrassed,” he said, and Y/N noted the way his fingers that were once tracing circled over her cheeks and then rubbing against her lips were now touching and grasping at her arm, like he had to be in constant contact with her. “You should never be embarrassed of what your body naturally desires.”

“Easy for you to say,” she scooted closer to him, back to where she was before she began inching away, “You’ve never been embarrassed.”

“I have. The first time I ever let someone touch me, I reached my orgasm in my trousers,” he began, offering her a questioning glance to ask if this is okay? When she nodded, letting him know he could climb into her bed, probably against her better judgment, he stood from the chair and put his knee on the bed. Before she knew it, he was putting his knee over her, straddling her momentarily, then found his way to the other side of her bed, so that they were laying side-by-side. Y/N couldn’t help the way heat filled her cheeks, tearing at the tiny tendrils of muscle throughout her body and igniting a fire from deep within her abdomen. How could she think straight when she was dripping with need, her body begging for some sort of release.

Harry continued what he was saying once he was in a comfortable position next to her, but Y/N had trouble listening to his words when the only thing she could focus on was regulating her breaths, “That was pretty embarrassing. The second time I was embarrassed was the first time I met you, and you were standing there looking so beautiful and perfect, I tripped over my words. The third time I felt embarrassed was when I read your letter in the office and you expressed that my actions were not that of a gentleman, and you were right.”

She didn’t know what to say, only that she was burning with desire and needed him as close to her as possible. “Why are you being so nice to me?”

“You’ve got me all soft tonight. I was under the impression you were having nightmares because you were too nervous to tell me you didn’t want to continue with lessons. I am cruel, Y/N, you have always been right about that, but I am not a monster,” his words were honest and true, something he would probably regret tomorrow, “Believe it or not, I never wanted to give you nightmares.”

“You haven’t given me nightmares,” Y/N was used to feeling shame around Harry, even though she could cover it quickly by hurling a snarky comment toward him.

“You have no idea how relieved I was to hear that your dreams about me are nothing but good… I would like to rectify the situation for you.”

“Rectify the situation?” Y/N was beginning to feel even more confused than when she woke up in her bedchamber with Harry’s fingers wrapped around her shoulder, waking her from her vivid dream.

“Yes,” he breathed, turning his body so he was laying directly parallel to her, “Would you like me to take care of you?”

“I… I would like that,” her fingers held the quilt tighter to her chest, not quite sure if this was going to be a mean joke to toy with her and then laugh about it later.

“Do you trust me?” His eyebrow raised, knowing her answer without her even needing to speak the words.

“Not… particularly,” her breathing was becoming more rapid as the conversation took such a sultry turn.

“If you don’t trust me, I can’t make you feel good, darling.” He tried to reason with her, and as much as he wanted to run his hands over her sides and touch her all over, he knew he couldn’t do that. Not while he was trying to gain her trust.

“I’ve never done this before,” she said quietly, barely audible.

“I know,” he agreed, “We are going to take it slow. You are safe with me.”

And Y/N didn’t know if it was the look in eyes, or if it was because of the fact he rushed to her bedchamber when someone woke him up from his peaceful slumber to come comfort her from her “bad dream,” but in this moment, she really felt as though she could trust him. On top of that, he knew her biggest fear, and never let her feel uncomfortable when he was teaching her how to ride, so why shouldn’t she trust him?

“I feel safe,” she told him and expressed her limits, “I trust you. No mean words, Harry.”

“No, baby, only praise for how well you’re doing.”

Those three little words, the innocence in her eyes, and the way she clung to her blanket for a security measure could have sent Harry into a downward spiral. He tried to compose himself, tried to contain himself, because he knew he had to take it slow with her. He propped himself up so that he could loop his hands around where she clutched her blanket so tightly. “Have to relax, darling.”

She took in a few deep breaths, just how he taught her when she was trying something new, and her body released the tension as she made eye contact with him. Something about Harry was so contradictory. How could he make her feel so guarded and upset, but also make her feel so safe in her most vulnerable moments. As her grip loosened from the blanket, he asked if it was okay for him to remove it, to expose her body only dressed in her white nightgown. When she murmured a small yes, he peeled the blanket from her body. Cool air encompassed her, and she hadn’t realized just how hot she’d been under the blanket.

Y/N used her elbows to prop herself up, leaning back against the pillows, giving herself a full view as she sat up right, and Harry took this moment to lean back, so his upper body was still parallel to hers, but he still had enough room to use his fingers to work her to the brink of her orgasm. Fortunately for her, he was reading the situation thoroughly, checking for the signs that she wasn’t ready and verbally communicating with her to make sure she was feeling okay.

“How are you feeling, love?” Small touches is what he started with, using the arm that he wasn’t propped up on to trace heart shapes (though, Y/N couldn’t tell what shape he was making) with his forefinger around the bare skin of her hip.

“Feeling good,” her words were breathy, making his cock twitch in his pants, “I’m ready for you.”

Harry let out a small chuckle, his eyes glancing between both of her eyes as he spoke, “We’re going to take it very slow. I’m gonna teach you about pleasure, darling, with my fingers. How does that sound?”

“With your fingers?” She hated how demure it sounded, how underprepared and unknowledgeable the words sounded coming from her.

“Yes. With my fingers first,” he trailed his fingers from her hip, to her lower abdomen until he was over the cotton of her panties, feeling the wetness seep through, “You’re so wet, it feels like you’ve already reached your pinnacle. Did you?”

Sheepishly, she nodded. Though she may not know what it felt like when she was awake, she knew the signs when she woke up from a dream about him. Typically, she was as wet as she is now, a sticky feeling between her legs. “In my sleep.”

“Christ,” he breathed, pulling her panties to the side, but not taking them completely off in an effort to make her not feel so exposed. First, he used his thumb to touch her clit, using small circular motions at a very steady pace. When her breathing picked up once more, and small guttural moans fell from her lips in encouragement for him, he picked up the pace. Harry couldn’t help it, he couldn’t take his eyes off of her.

Slowly, he lowered his head, pressing his lips against her own as he continued to rub in circular motions. Her back arched from the bed, his lips still on hers as he swallowed the noises she was making against him, and her mind was spinning with absolute desire. Pure bliss is what she felt, her flesh hot with each touch as he continued to work her most sensitive spot while his lips moved against hers. She didn’t know she could feel this… Good. In her dreams she was a sweaty, whiny, mess, but in this experience. In this very, very real experience, she couldn’t hold back the whines or the way her back kept arching into his touch. It was a complete parallel to the way she felt in her dreams, the way dream Harry took care of her and the way real Harry was taking care of her now was so similar.

____

Harry’s mind was a whirlwind of emotion; he loved the way he was making her come undone beneath his fingers. While his thumb worked her clit, he slipped his middle finger in, the cool gold of his rings making her gasp against his mouth, and he took this moment to slick his tongue over her bottom lip and find his way into her mouth. Her mouth was warm, tasting of sweet fruit and honey… She was everything he could ever desire, and he hated the way he crumpled beneath her. She made him feel so out of control, but in this very moment, he had all the power. For a second, he removed his lips, staring down at her with her eyes shut. Her ribcage flared with each breath, her chest heaved as small whimpers tumbled from her lips with his name somewhere in the mix.

As soon as he found that spot inside of her, the spot he knew could make a woman buckle at the knees, she was finding her release and rocking against her hand. Normally, he would tell his partner to stop riding his hand to control the situation, to make them so pent up with frustration and desire that they could barely stand it. He loved to see tears form in his partner's eyes due to overstimulation and pure desire, but this time around, he just wanted her to feel good and comfortable as she reached her climax. This was a vulnerable moment for her, and he didn’t want her to remember it by looking back and thinking about how he wouldn’t let her cum… No, she was being such a good girl for him, rocking against him with such a politeness as she whimpered small pleases and thank you’s that he didn’t want to reprimand her for feeling what she was feeling. In fact, he decided she needed a good reminder.

“You’re being such a good girl, Y/N. So good for me,” as soon as those words filled her ears, her walls began pulsing around his fingers and he knew she was about to reach the brink of the universe, so he continued to encourage her, “Let it out, baby.”

“T-thank you,” she said, clutching the sheets in her hands as her back arched from the bed, and she clenched once more around his fingers, drenching his hand, his wrist, and the end of his pajama sleeves.

“So polite, darling,” Harry noted as her hips thrusted up once more, riding out her orgasm on his hand. Once she was completely fucked out against his hand, Y/N’s eyes fluttered open as she tried to maintain eye contact with him, and when Harry brough his hands coated in her arousal to his mouth and licked them clean, another wave of arousal shot down her spine.

“Is it your turn?” She asked him, barely able to keep her eyes open.

“Not tonight, darling,” his hands found their way to the quilt, covering her up with the blanket so she wouldn’t get cold after she fell asleep. Normally, he would clean his partner up before allowing them to get cozy in bed, but the thought of making her get out of bed and wash up felt too evil as she could barely keep her eyes open.

“When?” She muttered, eyes still closed, “I want to.”

“Let’s talk about it tomorrow, Y/N.” He lifted himself off the bed, and she mumbled a small okay as he walked out of the room.

Harry was so fucked.

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