#hope y'all liiiiike i am so grateful for the luv on pt. 1 😭😭

[crushribbons]

𝖇𝖎𝖗𝖉𝖎𝖊, 𝖕𝖙. 𝖎𝖎

summary: Sebastian Sallow should have been a Ravenclaw, again. (series masterlist)

cw: 3.5k words, fluff, light angst-adjacent content but really just more pining, brief smut (18+ ONLY), oral sex (f receiving), penetrative sex, suggestions of dubcon, fem reader, i make you think abt seb in a towel again 😵‍💫 request

a/n: sorry for teasin' xx laney

The same annoying tendril of hair fell in her eye for the hundredth time that hour. She huffed hard in frustration and slapped it (and her own face, a bit) away, looking back down at the mostly-blank roll of parchment in front of her. The essay would not write itself, no matter how long she spent procrastinating by looking for and through any library books that would tell her how to get the essay to write itself. History of Magic was a special torture unlike any other. Might be best to pull out the old “dugbog ate my essay” routine on the impassive Professor Binns.

Besides, even if she had wanted to wax on about the Balkan Wizarding Summit of 1678 for several pages, she wouldn’t have been able to. Not with the thoughts that had been occupying the entirety of her brain since that fateful night two weeks ago. The night she kept finding herself returning to whenever her head hit her pillow, or whenever she had a quiet, absent moment brewing Wiggenweld in Potions, or whenever she walked or thought or breathed. The night when she’d witnessed her dear old chum Sebastian dripping wet out of the bath, water running down every line of his tanned and lightly freckled torso right to the top of a towel that was slung low on hips boasting a noticeable “V”, hair stuck to his forehead and cheeks flushed with embarrassment. The sight had floored her in such an unexpected way that a hysterical giggle had popped out of her mouth before she could stop it, and she saw Sebastian’s jaw tick in annoyance. 

As she’d walked away from the encounter, she had tried with all her might to pretend it hadn’t happened. It was funny, really, a silly and awkward little moment between two friends. That was all.

That was all, she’d reminded herself the next morning, brushing her teeth after a night of tossing and turning and peering at her puffy face in the bathroom mirror.

No great ordeal, she’d chastised her active imagination as she hopped on her broom and did a few laps around the Quidditch fields, hoping the bitter cold air would jolt her back to her senses.

And he probably doesn’t even remember it, she reasoned with herself every night while she closed the curtains around her bed, cast a silencing charm, and pulled her nightgown up around her waist. Sebastian had never been something to look at like that before, so why was she whining out his name every night, a hand that she desperately wished was his stuffed inside her underwear. 

This was Sebastian, she was dreaming about, after all. Her birdie, her inquisitive and acerbic classmate who seemed to need to know everything about her and whose laugh devolved into fits of snorting whenever he saw someone trip. And it wasn’t as if she’d seen him in the full nude; why was the sight of his bare chest and back sending her into such fits of ecstasy? It felt ridiculous, yet logic rarely won out over the way her heart pounded painfully whenever he made eye contact with her now.

Two days after the incident, they’d met in their usual seats in Transfiguration, and Sebastian had immediately broken the tension she was sure existed by bluntly saying, “I’m going to keep all my clothes on this time, I swear,” as she sat down beside him. She could feel red shame creeping up the back of her neck and prayed it wasn’t appearing over the top of her robes. 

“Good, I nearly had to go to the hospital wing and get my eyes removed after that,” she had sniffed in return, but both of them grinned and settled into their old routine of passing notes and coughing loudly whenever Ominis had to answer a question. For reasons unclear, it drove him mad.

Everything gradually fell back to normal, though she found that she could no longer use her affectionate nickname for him. She’d tried, once, when Sebastian had been pestering her for information on the Arithmancy exam she’d taken earlier in the day and that he was now staring down the barrel of. The stress had him grabbing at handfuls of his hair so they stuck out like he’d been hit with a blasting curse, and he’d begged for every detail she could remember, until she finally spluttered, “Questions, questions, questions! Leave me alone and go study yourself, birdie!” 

His mouth had clamped shut. Rare. Too rare. 

He had seemed so uncomfortable after that, shifting around in his chair so much and eventually getting to his feet and leaving with a weak joke, that she’d made up her mind never to call him birdie again. Clearly, he had lost his preference for it after their nighttime encounter, probably assuming condescension on her part. Nothing could be further than the truth; she just adored his incessant chirping so much that she wished she could carry him around on her finger all day. 

Whatever his thoughts on the matter were, something small had shifted between them that she couldn’t quite place her finger on. As the empty parchment roll looked glumly back at her in the dim candlelight of the library, she decided that she had had enough working for one day and slammed the tome in front of her shut. Dust flew everywhere and she spat it out of her mouth with disdain.

Trudging along to the Great Hall to see if there were any scraps of dinner still left, she considered a few other interactions with Sebastian and deemed them perfectly normal. The nickname was what seemed to set him off. Oh well, she sighed. Probably best that I don’t have a pet name for the man I can’t stop picturing naked, anyway.

Ominis and Sebastian were seated across from each other at the Slytherin table, and after passing by her own house table to snag a plate of shepherd’s pie and a small dessert, she sat down beside Sebastian and asked him how the Arithmancy exam had gone after all.

He screwed his eyes shut and groaned, his upper lip curling and head thrown back to expose his long neck. Her stomach swirled and she set the fork that had been on its way to her mouth back down. This man now made her lose all sense of reason. Her body was reacting in ways she wasn’t even familiar with now, all because of one stupid towel. “Oh, please don’t ask. I’ll be surprised if they even let me take my NEWT in Arithmancy. Horrendous.” 

She tried to pull herself together and respond as normal friends normally do. “I’m sure it wasn’t that bad. You always do wonderfully on exams and beat yourself up far more than you should,” she murmured evenly, picking at the pie. She turned to the man who looked far more appetizing. 

“Well, someone needs to,” he pouted, sticking his bottom lip out and resting his head on his hand as he looked at her. Ominis rolled his eyes and shook his head. 

“The ego on you,” he sighed, scraping the last bit of chocolate torte on his plate onto his fork. “Surprised your head doesn’t weigh down the rest of your body.” “It’s balanced out by the monster I’ve got down here,” Sebastian grinned like a devil and patted his upper thigh.

It’s a joke, it’s a joke, it’s a stupid joke made by a dumb boy with an ugly face and no sense of humor, it’s a joke. The mantra rattled around in her head for a few good seconds then drifted out her ears as she abandoned it in favor of considering what it might look like if he wasn’t joking. It was very unhelpful. 

She cleared her throat and pushed the shepherd’s pie away from her, replacing it with the dessert instead. It wasn’t until she scooped up a piece and brought it up to her mouth that her distracted brain realized what it was.

“Ah, my favorite again. Finally,” Sebastian said, and then he was leaning over her, hand resting on the top of her leg to steady himself as he intercepted the piece of cherry tart and pulled it off her fork with his teeth before she could eat it herself. Everything inside her shut down. Her mouth hung agape as she watched him hum in rapturous delight and chew the tart. He gave the top of her leg a swat and said, “All yours now. I’ve already had three.”

Words wouldn’t come. Thoughts wouldn’t come. Only the sensation of his large, warm hand pressing into her leg and the proximity of his face to hers as he’d stolen the bite existed. She had been able to smell whatever scent he wore, and it was something like pine needles and black pepper, although maybe that was just residual from a Herbology class. Even after he’d made a parting joke and climbed to his feet, Ominis and him exiting the hall engaged in a discussion of Quidditch prospects, the scent filled her nose and drove her light-headed. 

Having a massive, soul-sucking crush on your friend was not for the faint of heart, she decided, as she pushed the tart away, too, and left for her dormitory. Her insides were wound so tight she was worried they would snap, and her panties were so covered in slick by the time she reached her empty bedroom that she stripped down and tugged on her dressing gown. A bath, she needed a nice, hot bath to wash away the grime of her thoughts.

The dressing gown’s thin material slipped off her shoulders as she gathered clean pajamas and braided her hair up and off her neck, and she grunted with annoyance. She had really appreciated the gift of the robe, a hand-me-down from Poppy, but the aged and stretched cotton would not stay up on either of their shoulders. She tied the belt as tight as she could around her waist and slipped out of the dormitory, making her way through the sea of students sweating over homework and revisions in the common room.

The prefects’ bathroom sounded heavenly, especially as the cold stone floor of the castle bit through her thin slippers and the passing of a careless ghost’s cloak through her right shoulder left her shivering. She ambled up stairs and down them, through corridors, and used more than one hidden passage, old hat to her at this point, until she ended up in the faculty tower. Only a few more flights separated her and warm, soapy relief from the thoughts of Sebastian plaguing her. 

It wasn’t terribly late yet, and a couple Ravenclaw students mingled on the landing just below the bathrooms. They waved at her and she waved back, their names escaping her but giving them a jovial smile all the same. Beginning her final ascent, she watched the steps in front of her and tried to recall where she knew their faces from. She was still racking her brain for their identities when she ran into a wall.

“Ugh!” she cried, irritated that she had been jostled out of her thoughts by the unyielding stone. Then the stone did yield and she looked up, startled.

“We can’t keep meeting like this,” Sebastian said with raised eyebrows. He stood on the step above her, wearing dark blue pajamas, a towel slung over his shoulder and wet hair carefully parted and combed. Even fully-clothed, he took her breath away. As usual. A small knick under his jaw told her he’d cut himself shaving, and she wished with everything inside her that she could kiss the tiny cut. Not really friendship behavior, though.

She tried to clear her throat, searching for something witty to say in return. “No,” was what she finally came up with. “We can’t.” 

“Prefects’ bathroom is superior, isn’t it?”

“Mmmm.”

“Aren’t you glad to see I remembered these this time?” He plucked at the pinstripe pajama pants. 

No. “Yes, I certainly am.”

“Are you going to bed straight after?”

“I think so.”

“What time are you getting breakfast?”

“Is that enough questions yet?!” She spluttered, feeling her nerves recede a bit as his chirping tickled her. He smiled broadly.

“What else can you expect from your b-birdie?” He tripped over the last word and his smile faltered. Something unchecked in her chest stirred. Sebastian Sallow did not trip over his words. He picked each one carefully and considered the potential outcomes they would elicit in every situation. Why was this one ridiculous little pet name causing the both of them so much awkwardness?

She opened her mouth to try and tell him that she expected nothing less, but stopped when she saw his hazel eyes suddenly widen and travel down from her face to her chest. Before she had time to be confused, she realized that her shoulders were suddenly freezing and goosebumps had broken out over her clavicle. The damned dressing gown had once again slipped down, nearly to her elbows, and couldn’t pull it back up fast enough. A large swathe of her chest had been exposed, and despite the cold, heat flared in her sternum and rose up her neck to her face as she yanked the gown up and clutched it closed at her neck. 

“Fuck off, it was an accident,” she hissed without thinking when Sebastian’s eyes did not return to their normal size. Humiliation was seeping into her bones, settling there like a disease that no healer could cure. Things had just returned to normal, (well, as normal as they could get now that she could think of little else than Sebastian’s body), and now they were having a repeat performance. Whatever god was orchestrating this rigamarole had a cruel spirit indeed. 

“I-I know,” Sebastian stammered. Ever the charming Slytherin, he recovered himself quickly and added, “Hey, we’re even now. You saw me and I saw–nothing!” He turned course mid-sentence and threw his hands up in a defensive pose when she glared at him. He really never knew when the right and wrong times to make a joke were.

“Just…good night!” She all but snapped, brushing past him and up the rest of the stairs, not bothering to look back at him as she jogged towards the bathroom door. The prefect standing sentry outside waved her in and she bolted for the women’s baths. 

How fucking humiliating could life get? Like a silly, love-drunk girl, she had developed some very confusing and sinful feelings for Sebastian, all because she’d seen him a little bit wet. Granted, his tanned skin had been shining under the droplets of water, and his back was taut and muscular from years of bludger-beating, and his legs were long enough to make her lose her way, and gods, what on earth had that thin, grey towel been concealing…

As she sunk into the steaming bath and mounds of bubbles, she let out one final wail of lament for her dignity before plunging underwater.

Her dreams that night reached a new summit of horror.

First, she was lost in a maze of hallways. They weren’t Hogwarts hallways, but she knew she was running late for an exam all the same. Every corner she rounded and door she opened displayed empty rooms and brick walls. Time ticked past at an extraordinary pace, the exam start time creeping steadily nearer but her destination refused to show itself, despite her panicked sprinting. When she finally found herself in something resembling a classroom, fifty students crouched over individual desks and scribbling away, she felt a momentary wash of relief. 

Then, a hand was wrapping itself around her leg and she was screaming. The hand yanked her backwards out of the classroom and down the hall, the room fading from her view as her unseen kidnapper pulled her at an impossible pace. A bright flash of light and she felt the hand unwrap from her calf and something retreat into the darkness. Sebastian was suddenly in front of her, taking her head in his hands and murmuring something she couldn’t make out. He seemed to be concerned about her, but all she could feel was his warmth and safety and she felt herself tumbling into his lake-hazel eyes. 

They were kissing before she could figure out why the exam didn’t seem to matter anymore. “Oh, God, sweetheart,” Sebastian was rasping as he pulled his lips away, face hazy with want. She whined and tugged him back to her, and she found herself in a location she couldn’t quite make out in the semi-darkness, but her back was pressed against something more comfortable than the marble hallway floors that Sebastian had rescued her from. 

He was slotting a leg in between hers and kneading it gently around. Her body felt vaguely light and floaty, a new breed of arousal building as she bumped herself against his leg and pulled his bottom lip into her mouth. 

“Seb,” she gasped, but he was already gone, pulling her dressing gown–goddamn that dressing gown, haunting her even here!–down and ripping it off entirely so she was exposed to him. Dream Sebastian had longer hair. It curled slightly around his ears and brushed the bottom of his neck, tickling her when he leaned back down to kiss her neck with hot, wet lips. 

She would later admit that she quite preferred the power she held in the realm of her subconscious to the power she held in reality; perhaps wielding ancient magic was a benefit for some, but willing Sebastian’s clothes away and feeling the all-too-real heat of him pressed against her naked body gave her more of a thrill than she ever could have summoned.

In an instant, she found him sunk between her legs, hot mouth ghosting over her weeping heat and then delving into it. She shrieked, letting it dissolve into a moan as his tongue swirled around her clit and he sucked it into a gentle kiss. Her hands dug into his sandy brown hair, using the extra length to her advantage and tugging. Why was it so long?

"You taste so divine, I knew it," he was groaning. "Better than any fucking tart."

Time was strange. They stayed wrapped in each other for a year and a minute simultaneously, and then he was fucking her with a savage gentleness that made her weep. His slow, hard movements were almost cruel in their sweetness. And she even managed to notice, through her daze, that his cock was just as he'd promised, its thickness splitting her open and making her eyes roll back in her head.

He was panting, his words once more indiscernible but seemingly lust-fueled. The sensation of his cock pushing into her made her body, small under his powerful frame, shake. Using his defined abdomen, he pushed himself up as he continued fucking her and cried, “Shit, baby, come for me! I’m all fucking yours.”

Her orgasm gained ground and was cresting high and wide when he added, “Let me see you cry when you come real pretty, please? Hm? Come on, I’ll be a good little birdie, I swear.”

Her eyes snapped open and she sucked in a huge breath of air, chest heaving, her sheets wrapped around and clinging to her sweat-ridden body. She was positively drenched, both outwardly and inwardly, and the rising frustration when she realized that she was very much alone in her bed and that the dream was slipping through the cracks in her memory like water made her roll over, stuff her face into her pillow, and scream.

Ominis thought about what a wonderful friend he was for putting up with that disorganized slob Sallow as he dug through the disorganized slob’s school bag for a new bottle of ink. When he had run out in the middle of his homework, Sebastian had absently waved him upstairs to the bedroom and told him to grab a fresh bottle from his bag, his gaze never leaving the teetering tower of shortbread he was building. 

“What a prince,” Ominis grunted to himself, feeling around for anything glass and instead receiving several paper cuts from the loose pages Sebastian kept stuffed away, in case he was ever caught needing garbage. His slim hand closed around a small bottle and he smiled in triumph, eager to be done with his spelunking expedition. As he yanked the bottle through the layers of debris in the bag, the force required caused him to stumble backwards, just a step, and into Sebastian’s nightstand. Something thudded onto the floor and Ominis bent to sweep his hands over the floor and find it.

A book, hardcover, without rips or tears to indicate its age. Ominis picked it up and felt around the cover, curious to see what nighttime reading his friend was doing, and curious to see if it happened to be his first voluntary non-Quidditch-related read. The embossed letters on the front were so shiny and slick that he found it hard to make out the title using just his touch, so Ominis pulled his wand from his pocket and held it over the book, words coming into clearer focus in his mind’s eye. 

Legilimency and the Dreamer, the book proclaimed. A subtitle at the bottom of the cover read: “Infiltrating the sleeping mind, for the beginner.”

Ominis snorted and threw the book back on Sebastian’s night stand, wondering whom it actually belonged to. Definitely not Sallow's.

pt. 3

masterlist