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delusioniste · 1 month ago

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Quirinus Quirrell | Reader

It's Christmas and I was watching The Philosopher's Stone when my long-time thirst for Quirrell flared up again. The reader is female. Warning(s): explicit sex, violence, abusive behaviour, angst, death, foul language, it's possibly a bit dark.

Albania, August 1991

You stumbled through the trees spread through the deep gorges that had formed, like murky forest pools, between the towering crags of the Accursed Mountains. Night was falling, falling faster than you had expected it to, and perhaps it was your own fear - but you had a feeling that it might be connected to the reason why the mountain range had come by its name.

You gritted your teeth as each step felt increasingly like lead. Where was he, for God's sake? You were following the path faithfully, but it seemed to have no end. You admitted to yourself, at long last, that you were worried. No, you weren't worried - you were frightened. Your thoughts circled around and around, and images flashed before your mind's eye that caused your heart to seemingly snap and beat out of your ribcage like a rabid beast. Not only were you scared, you were angry. At him and at yourself. Rage coursed through your veins at the same time as your fear, and you thought that you could kill him with your bare hands for the delusions he insisted on following and for the vanity that enabled it - even if half of it was bitterness.

And now the trees, tall conifers with half-naked branches like bones, seemed to grow even taller and larger, merging at times with the hazy darkness that coiled like mist around their trunks and slowly surrounding you. You were half out of your mind, now, each noise making you start in fear. Your lower lip was bitten bloody in fruitless attempts to calm yourself, to gather your composure, to think straight. You looked to your feet and breathed a small sigh of relief that you were still on the path. Quirinus had told you where he expected to be, you had walked this path a few days ago together, but you hadn't come this far then. It wasn't even a path. It was a trail that had been created by treading down the sparse shrubbery and moss and dead pine needles that lined the forest floor. If you didn't look carefully, you could easily lose your way.

What had he said to you the night before leaving? I-I'm going to meet someone - and I might be away for a while, so d-don't worry about me.

You remembered being curious, and you had asked him where he was going.

Oh, I - I'm going to search for an old f-friend I met - last time I was in Albania.

Are they a muggle? You knew he had a fondness for them. After all, his father had been one.

N-no. He... he's a v-vampire, if you must know. Quirinus gave you a faint smile before sitting down beside you on the narrow bed you had been allotted by the inn.

Oh. You thought of Dracula at first, a Muggle novel you had particularly enjoyed reading, even if its depiction of vampires was inaccurate. Then a vaguely worried feeling crept into your mind at the fact that Quirinus was aquainted so well with a vampire that he wanted to go in search of him, but you pushed it down when he brushed his lips over the shell of your ear and whispered: Do you mind if I - if we...

With the forest closing in around you and the fear-fuelled sweat cooling rapidly on your skin, you were sure that he had known all along that it was no simple vampire he was seeking out, but someone or something other, and that they most likely harboured malevolent intentions. Your heart continued to beat erratically, and nausea rose in your chest.

It was this path. You were sure. And you also thought that you knew why he had shown it to you, it must have been so that you would know where to find him if anything went awry. He was intelligent like that, resourceful, and it was all because he was afraid and always on edge - perpetually conscious of anyone or anything that tried to hurt him. God, it was pitiful, but it wouldn't do to dwell on it now. You dragged a hand over your forehead and shook your head to rid yourself of the nervous daze you kept falling into, when you glimpsed a flicker of light in the periphery of your sight.

With your heart in your mouth, you looked around slowly. The light had been faint, but it had been there, pale and flame-like, in the direction of the ascending slope of the mountain that was to your north. There were occasional jagged boulders that lay about between the conifers and ridges of rock that pushed through the forest floor like veins. You narrowed your eyes to adjust to the now almost grainy darkness.

There.

Another wan flicker of white. With a hand held in front of you to steady yourself in case of a fall, you cast a rudimentary silencing spell and tread carefully towards the assumed and elusive source of light.

Please...stop...

You froze. The voice - you recognised it. A tear rolled down your cheek and you wiped it away, suddenly angry at yourself for your weakness. Oh God, Quirinus, please, you begged silently. The light flared up again for a moment, so you took another few steps. With a hand over your mouth, you reached the huge trunk of the pine from behind which you had seen the light appear. Pressing yourself to it, you listened.

It was certainly Quirinus. Please, he whispered. No. No, I cannot - I cannot -

There was no response from his counterpart, it seemed.

Then Quirinus screamed, and you left the safety of the pine tree and went to him as quickly as you could, wand drawn in front of you in your shaking hand. You had expected to see someone there with him, but to your shock, there was no one. Quirinus, alone, was on his knees on among the dead leaves and needles and moss, rocking back and forth, his face ghastly white and his eyes full of terror.

Quirinus! you whispered urgently, falling on your own knees to take him by the shoulders.

He seemed not to be able to hear you, but instead continued to rock back and forth. His face twisted at times into a grimace of what looked like agonising pain, and the only sounds that left his parted lips were groans of what also seemed like pain and terror.

You were at a loss. There was no time to lose, you were desperate to return to the safety of the village, but with Quirinus in this state, it was becoming more and more unlikely that you would manage to do so by daybreak. As gently as you could with your trembling hands, you touched the side of his face, prompting him to look at you. It worked. He raised his eyes and saw you. Suddenly, he grasped your wrist as his gaze turned slightly blank. Leave, he said, and you instinctively flinched backwards as soon as you heard his voice. It had become raw, like metal, and harsh, almost a hiss.

You knelt, slumped, in front of him, wondering what in God's name had happened to him. Quirinus, who was it? you whispered. Please. Tears of frustration pooled in the corners of your eyes and blurred his face in your sight. Please, you cried. Talk to me. Tell me who it was - who the fuck - it was - You can't just sit there and - and be like this.

He opened his mouth and began to speak, but the first syllable was swallowed by violent convulsions as soon as he had uttered it. Do not dare...to speak my name, he hissed after struggling. Now he was strangely still, unmoving, alert.

You took the chance and took his hands in yours, holding them tight out of fear that he would do something to harm you or himself. Quirinus, please, look at me. Tell me what you're - well, what you're talking about. We don't have any time, Quirinus -

Rid yourself of this creature, he said, in the same harsh voice as before. With a sudden jerk of his arms, he freed himself from your grip and had his hands around your throat in an instant.

You screamed and struggled against him, but it was in vain. His sudden strength was astonishing. The calculating look in his eyes was directed at you, and you were frightened out of your wits. Cold sweat ran down your face and your breathing was heavy and irregular. Quirinus' hold on your throat grew tighter, gradually but surely, and you wondered whether this would be your death. Let go of me. Let go, you cried.

I'm afraid...I cannot do that... Quirinus replied. Then he jerked again and cried M-master! in a weak tone that sounded more like his ordinary voice, slackening his grip on your throat by a little, as though he was fighting against something within him.

Evidently, it overpowered him, and he let go of your neck to clutch at his head. My God, he cried. Please, my lord, I cannot - I am too weak -

At the words my lord your skin prickled in another kind of fear. Who was this vampire? What was it, if it wasn't one? You were now sure that he was now the host of something parasitical that was more powerful than him. Master. Lord. Quirinus, what did you let in? You drew your wand and placed it like a knife at his jugular, drawing courage from your frustration. Who were you looking for?

He replied to you, but it was the parasite speaking. I am grateful to this man, he said, and his voice was smiling and soft, like a snake's. He has given me life again... regrettably not his whole being...but enough to sustain myself...

Who are you? you asked again, digging the tip of your wand a little deeper into his skin.

There was a sound like the licking of snakes' tongues, then: I am Lord Voldemort...

You froze and stared, not believing what was coming out of Quirinus' mouth, no, this was a dream - a nightmare. It was all an illusion. You weren't deep in the heart of an Albanian mountain range cursed according to widespread belief by Satan, you hadn't gone anywhere with Quirinus, you didn't even know him. There was no vampire and no Dark Lord.

Kill her...she is of no use.

No. It was Quirinus' voice again. N-not her.

Fool.

N-never, you can n-not make me harm her. As he spoke, blood began to trickle from his nose, over the thin ridge of his upper lip and into his mouth. Moments later, it started to dribble from his ears, and it ran down very slowly, soaking into the collar of his moss-smeared shirt and turning it dark red.

You began to cry again, desperately trying to quench the blood and only spreading it further over his pale skin and over your own hands. Quirinus, please, we have to leave. You pushed his damp hair away from his eyes and wiped the sheen of sweat from his forehead with your sleeve. Listen to me. Can you hear me?

Y-yes. He nodded weakly. He looked at you with eyes that seemed to swim, struggling, between recognition and blank distance. Y/N? He began to tremble, and you wrapped your arms around him as he buried his face in the crook of your neck.

England, May 1992

The air is still a little cold, even though the summer has begun to set in. The sycamore tree down the road is crowned in lush green and its bark shines like silver in the weak sunlight. You watch a magpie settle on a branch and cock its head before walking on, hoisting the carrier bag up from the ground where you let it sit while observing the bird. The bottle of absinthe you bought clashes alarmingly with the milk. Silencio.

Quirinus lives at the end of the road, in the last house before the rapeseed field and ancient hazel copse. You reach it, slightly out of breath, and unlatch the gate with a soft click. The house is an old detached one, from after the war, and it has copious amounts of ivy climbing its walls to the left and bare, worn down bricks to the right. A chipped enamel plate with an ornate '46' on it is hammered next to the front door with its peeling black paint.

You say alohomora in your head, concentrating on the handle, and the door swings open. The subtle smell of dried flowers and incense greets you as you step inside. On the walls of the narrow hallway there are several picture frames, each containing a collection of pressed petals, leaves and grasses. If you look a little closer, you can see that each specimen has been named in Quirinus' unmistakable cursive handwriting, slanted and elaborate. Cephalanthera rubra, parnassia parnustris, viola odorata. June 1980. October 1977.

Quirinus was a devotee of the art of herbology in his time at Hogwarts. You often found him in the greenhouses or the potions dungeon with Slughorn, studying various plants and their magical properties in painstaking detail. He would spend hours in the library with a pile of botanical works and miss mealtimes and lessons. Often, you would have to run to fetch him against his will. Quirinus, you'll lose points. Quirinus, you're late to Charms. He would protest weakly, but his report and grades were more important than anything, so he complied hurriedly. Despite his occasional digressions into those fields that he loved the most, he was still the best student in most of his classes and the object of both envy and mockery.

The mockery was what broke him in the end.

You bite at your lip as you break your gaze from the gallery of pressed flora. In the small and dingy kitchen, you put the shopping in the fridge and the bottle of Hill's on the countertop. Muggle drinks are surprisingly good. Firewhiskey remains the best, but vodka and liqueurs suit your taste as well. You wanted to indulge yourself a little, and knowing that Quirinus has been a curious lover of Muggle culture since childhood, you hope he'll like it.

You find him in the sitting room in an old armchair that's fraying at the bottom. Staring out of the door that leads to the garden, he barely blinks and seems to have become a sort of statue. An occasional twitch of his left eye betrays that fact that he's nervous, strung up.

"I'm back," you say and grimace at its unhelpfulness.

Quirinus snaps his head around to face you. "Oh. Yes, I heard when you came in." He frowns. He doesn't stutter audibly, which is rare.

Every moment is taut with tension now. You hate that you're left to the mercy of his occupant, who can manipulate him and change him at will. You tried to bind him somehow, to wrest control of him and weaken him, but even the strongest spells failed to work and only left Quirinus weaker than ever and on the verge of a penultimate breakdown. But more and more, you had glimpsed another Quirinus emerge, and he frightened you more than the spirit of Voldemort did.

He changed, sometimes. He seemed unwilling to free himself, lashing out in defense, threatening you. And sometimes it was something as subtle as a look in his eyes that was cold and empty, like the dark black shaft of a well. But at the bottom of the darkness there was life, something shapeless and malevolent, that strived to take on a form and crawl out of its hibernation.

Dumbledore had agreed to meet you in Diagon Alley at your request one afternoon in April.

"I've not seen you since you left Hogwarts," he remarked jovially when you shook hands with him. You had been provided a room above Ollivander's shop by its owner, whom Dumbledore trusted. It seemed to be a sort of study, and you both took your seats in armchairs that stood by the window.

"It seems so long ago," you said. "Tempus fugit, am I right, Professor?" It was a quote that he had introduced you to in your sixth year.

Dumbledore chuckled. "You're quite right." He produced his glasses and his expression became grave. "You wanted to see me for a specific reason, I think?" he asked quietly.

You swallowed and nodded. "Quirinus - He's teaching this year."

"That's right."

"Albus, he's - he's found him," you said. You tore a strip of skin from your thumb and a drop of blood welled up.

"I don't think I understand - Quirinus has found whom, exactly?" said Dumbledore. He leaned forward.

You dragged a finger over the dark circles beneath your eyes. "The Dark Lord."

Dumbledore's expression changed. "Voldemort? Quirinus has found his spirit, then?" He removed his glasses and folded them slowly, deep in thought. Then: "By God, so that was the object of his...sabbatical." He shook his head and looked to you. "Tell me- " he said. "When was this? And where? I gathered that he travelled eastwards after his first year as a professor, and I have heard from Severus that there are rumours he journeyed to Albania..."

"I...went with him, to Albania." You felt your face become warm. It was the first time that you admitted the existence of a relationship between Quirinus and yourself and suddenly you felt self-conscious.

"Indeed." Dumbledore smiled a knowing smile. "Do you know," he said, in a tone that was almost musing, "I dare say I think it is good that he...well, has you - he is fond of solitude, I know...but in truth, a fellow witch or wizard who he is close to might do him more good than you realise."

"Oh, I - yes. Yes, I suppose." You blushed and looked out of the window at the relatively empty alley.

"So the rumours were true...tell me, Y/N, when was this?"

"Last summer. August, I think." You preferred not to think about that August, but it was necessary to now.

Dumbledore nodded slowly. "Yes..." he murmured. "The roads all lead there, some way or another."

You watched him, heart beating fast. You hoped desperately that he would find a way.

"And Voldemort's spirit...has - let us say - latched itself onto him?" asked Dumbledore eventually.

"I suppose that it's the best way to describe it."

"Since he will be at Hogwarts in a few month's time, I will notify the necessary individuals, bodies...and I will ask Severus to keep an eye on him." Dumbledore sighed, appearing older than he had minutes ago.

You frowned. Severus? The name served to bring back memories of your time at Hogwarts that was interwoven with bitter memories, among them of Severus Snape and Quirinus. You had never been sure which side you were on, or if you were even on a side. Blurred lines of loyalty and isolation, and in the end, fighting and splintered friendships. Rumours of Death Eaters, of He Who Must Not Be Named, lies and plots. You and your fellow students had left with rifts between you that still existed today, even after the deaths of Lily and James and Sirius' incarceration in Azkaban.

"Can you not trust him, after all these years?" asked Dumbledore. He sounded tired.

"I- " You closed your mouth.

"He is not the same any more. You were all young...he has proved himself since."

"No, I trust him." It was true, in a way. Snape would be suited to that role, seeing as he had always harboured a dislike of Quirinus.

Dumbledore rose to his feet. "Very well. I thank you for coming...and if anything is amiss, or awry, you must not hesitate to write."

You returned home by Muggle transport to garner some time to think, to be met at the door by Quirinus, who dragged you inside forcibly and threw you against the mantelpiece with a strength that was not his.

Shocked, you failed to find any words, and before you could compose yourself, he had you by the throat and was speaking to you softly, like a snake. "Where were you?" he asked. "Answer me...answer me now."

Choking, you tried to loosen his hold, but he was frighteningly strong and you were pushed back further, your feet almost hovering above the flagstones.

"Answer me...where were you?"

"Quirinus, I saw Albus," you gasped.

There was a silence that was heavy with malice.

"It was for you, I didn't know what else to- "

You screamed as he pulled your hair back harshly and tightened his grip on your throat.

In a hissing tone that you were sure was better suited to a legilimens, he whispered in your ear: "If you slip away one more time...he will die..."

With a sudden movement, he released you, and you fell to the floor with a cry of pain. You were afraid now, afraid for his life. "For your whore mother to have never birthed you," you spat at his feet.

Quirinus began laughing in a horrible, deranged manner that turned abruptly into cries of agony as he dragged his fingernails over his face and clutched at his head. "No, no, stop, please stop!" he groaned. Then his expression changed, and his hands dropped to his sides. "M-master," he whispered. "Forgive me, master." There was that cold, abysmal look in his eyes.

You turned away, still sprawled on the cold slate floor, looking up at him. You wanted to flee, but you couldn't, not now, not ever, because there was still hope. You were afraid of him and of the thing that lived inside him, but that wasn't the real Quirinus. God, you couldn't stomach the thought of running away, no matter how appealing it seemed at first glance. You closed your eyes tightly as the tears spilled over and dripped onto the floor in unsightly black stains. Holding yourself, you curled up in a foetal position and shook with sobs while the man standing in front of you stared out into the garden.

"Y/N, won't you sit down?" says Quirinus. He's calm, docile, his old self.

You bring a threadbare cushion from the on the opposite side of the room and throw it down by the armchair. "I'll sit here," you say and settle yourself between his bony knees. He gently runs his fingers over your hair and the sensation makes you shiver.

"I brought you a bottle of Hill's," you say, feeling a little awkward.

Quirinus weaves his fingers through yours. "I've not tasted that in - in years." A short laugh.

Relief washes over you. The sound of his laugh, quiet and nervous, is like water to your thirst. You laugh, too. "This evening?" you say.

"Of course." He tugs at your hands with a small smile. "I've been wanting to go for a walk..." he says, looking down at you, his eyes asking you a question.

"I'll come," you reply.

You both dress in Muggle garb when you go out, you in your green muslin dress and wool jumper and Quirinus in the old combination of worn trousers and shirt he's had since Hogwarts. The Muggle coat is the only relatively new thing he owns and it hangs from him limply like the coat of a scarecrow. He's lost too much weight, you think. Quirinus barely eats any more, and he seems to be wasting away by the day. You play with the idea of bringing Dumbledore here to do something, but what? How?

"Y/N, aren't you coming?"

You shake your head to clear your mind and kiss him on the jaw, making him blush. He takes your hand in his and smiles abashedly.

The afternoon is warmer than the morning and the sun is out. You take the path that runs along the side of the field behind the house that also leads through the hazel copse. A hare bounds through the green stalks of rape that are already beginning to bloom with bright yellow flowers and a kestrel beats its wings overhead.

Quirinus, casting small spells with his mind, makes the clouds that are scudding across the sky take on shapes like a Chinese Fireball or the Whomping Willow. "I hope the Muggles don't see," he grins, though tentatively.

At one point, one small cloud at the edge of your vision begins to look like a skull with the tongue of a snake and you feel a trickle of looming dread. You blink, and it's gone. Was it the remains of the Dark Lord again, playing with its host's mind and will? Your mind circles around and around the words death eater as you follow behind Quirinus. Death eater...the cloud...you convince yourself that it's simply your paranoia toying with you again.

In the copse you harvest a few branches of hazel together to carve into charms or use in potions. "I promised Hooch that I'd - that I'd, well, make her a little something," confesses Quirinus to you as you both walk home afterwards.

You raise your eyebrows. "What will Severus say?" You imagine Snape's fury on discovering that his metier has been practised and perfected by another, this intruder also being the very man he despises and envies over his possession of the title Professor of Defense against the Dark Arts.

"I'm- well, I'm rather hoping that Severus won't find out. Rolanda entrusted me with it because she doesn't like him." Quirinus looks guilty and touches his hand to yours when you say "Fingers crossed, then."

The sun is burnt gold when Quirinus holds the front door open for you. Inside the house it's cool, unlike the warmth of the air outside. The light enters the hallway and is reflected by the glass covering the pressed flowers. You shield your eyes, slipping your shoes off, and when you blink afterwards Quirinus is in front of you with a glass of absinthe. "Here," he says. "Drink it."

You take it from him with a glance from beneath your lashes.

"I'm going to use the bathroom for a minute," you say after draining it contrary to drinking etiquette. "Can I have some more?"

"Of - of course you can." Quirinus watches you climb the stairs for a moment before returning to the kitchen. He pushes the hair back from his temples with an impatient gesture and rolls up his sleeves. His hair is thinning and greying rapidly and the bones of his face have stretched his pale white skin taut. With a sigh that sounds more like a groan, he clutches the edge of the countertop and rests his forehead against the cupboard above it.

You reach the top of the stairs. The house is old-fashioned - almost everything is still the way it was when his mother died years ago, when he was in his fourth year at Hogwarts. His father followed her to her grave soon afterwards. You remember Quirinus confiding to you one evening as you both sat at the end of the Ravenclaw table in the Great Hall, your plates untouched and a jug of pumpkin juice in front of you. I haven't - I haven't talked to my father since - well, since Mother d-died. He had recently received a letter from him and hadn't known how to respond, lingering in the Hall long after the last students had all left to go to their classes.

From the Slytherin table, you heard loud whispering and even heckling, making you instinctively turn around and prepare to defend yourself against defamation. Oi, L/N, what're you doing with the Ravenclaws? called Regulus, beckoning to you.

Fuck off, you hissed. You were treading a thin line between disloyalty to your house - your family - and the attitude of a mere rebel.

You do know that you - that you don't need to do all this, don't you? said Quirinus, rising to his feet and gathering his black robes to avoid tripping. He nervously tucked a strand of lank brown hair behind his ear.

What...do you mean? you asked, puzzled. Had you done something wrong? You wished the flagstones would open up and swallow you. Hurting those around you without even knowing you had hurt them was your greatest fear, and now it seemed it had happened. Feverishly, you thought back to all the conversations and fleeting glances you had shared over the past weeks, months, even the past year. Where could you have gone wrong? Had you missed something?

Quirinus glanced at the rows of Slytherin benches whose occupants were all watching what he'd do next. He turned away, straightening his shoulders. It's - it's nothing, he said. His tone was apologetic. Well - I'll see you tomorrow, I s-suppose. With a cursory smile, he walked away, through the doors of the Great Hall, and out of your sight.

You frowned, heart beating hard, and dejectedly made your way over to your house.

You saw Severus smirk ever so slightly before raising his goblet to his lips. Lucius ignored you and Regulus clapped you on the back, guffawing. See, L/N, he said, in a mockingly confidential manner, He's a soft fool - you needn't waste your time on him. The silver and onyx ring on his right index finger flashed in the candlelight as he raised a toast to you.

I said, fuck off. You slapped his hand away and looked down at the tabletop, head in your hands.

In Quirinus' bathroom, you sit down on the edge of the bathtub and prop your chin on your hands. You feel slightly nauseous, and you know it's because of the fear. You have little idea what will become of Quirinus. The lack of knowledge makes you nervous beyond words. In the past days, you've been shutting yourself in rooms to think on your own, but it only serves to dwindle all hope you might have had previously. With nightfall comes the panic, and whenever you look at Quirinus' sleeping face, you can't seem to stifle the rising sensation of being observed. Not by him, but by the thing he shares his form with. Often, with drink, he is weakened enough to resist the insidious grip of Voldemort's whisperings, but he's still there.

You stand up and go to the cabinet above the sink. A mirror has been attached to the left door. Your reflection stares back at you and you step back in some shock at the dark circles beneath your eyes. When did you last sleep without dreaming? With the dreams came the horrors that your mind conjured and you almost always ended up awake, staring wide-eyed at the wall, seeing the Dark Mark in each movement of the shadows and hearing serpentine voices in the wind outside the windows.

Splashing cold water on your face helps you calm yourself. You close your eyes for long moment. When you open them, you see yourself in the mirror with droplets of water hanging from the tips of your eyelashes. They tremble as you blink and theh roll down your cheeks, into the crevice of your mouth and down your jaw to your neck. You open the cabinet, wondering on a whim as to what exactly might be in it. Your own things are downstairs in the guest's bathroom.

Nothing much, you think. A razor blade, a comb, shaving cream and a brown glass bottle of what looks like perfume - possibly the scent of incense? The cabinet is tall and you stand on your toes to reach the topmost shelf. Your fingers brush a small bottle and you lift it down to see.

It has no label on it, and the glass is dark blue, almost black, making the liquid within it look like blood. The lid unscrews without any difficulty. It has no distinct smell, but when you pour a droplet onto your finger, you blanch and almost let the bottle fall and shatter.

It is blood after all. You examine it more closely. It gleams wine-red, almost brown, and depending on the light it also almost looks oily.

After a while, you recognise what it is, and you feel cold all of a sudden. The blood in the bottle is from a unicorn, and you suspect Quirinus to be drinking from it.

Youth. Vitality. Immortality. So that must be the reason. You frown and quickly return the bottle to its shelf. At the same moment, there is a knock on the door.

"I'm coming, wait," you call. Closing the cabinet silently, you unlock the door and step into the hallway.

"Are you - are you all right?" asks Quirinus. He looks at you strangely.

You swallow. "Of course."

"Here." Quirinus hands you the whole bottle of Hill's.

"What- "

"Wait," he says and takes your hand. "Come."

He leads you to his room, where he opens the window and lets in the last rays of sunlight. A blackbird calls to its mate from the neighbouring roof on the other side of the rotting garden fence. "We can - we can watch the sun set," says Quirinus.

The gesture is so intimate that you feel tears spring to your eyes. Embarassed, you hide your face until you're sure that they're gone.

Quirinus stands by the open window and stares at the sky. He seems deep in thought, somewhere far away, but the expression on his face betrays nothing else.

You leave the Hill's on the covers and join him, lacing your fingers through his, resting your head on his shoulder. "What are you watching?" you whisper.

Quirinus turns and smiles elusively. "Just the sky," he replies. He bends his head to yours and kisses your temple fleetingly.

"Quirinus," you say. He turns to you, a question in his eyes, but you shake your head and kiss him. He tastes of absinthe and smoke and something you can't quite recognise. The image of the unicorn blood rises in your mind and slowly floats in front of your mind's eye. It makes you retch momentarily.

Quirinus backs away immediately, panic in his face. "Did I - did I do something wrong?" he whispers. His fingers brush your shoulders. They're almost all mere bones, now, cold and white and thin.

You shake your head. You wish desperately that you could push everything frightening down, to a place within you that you could ignore for as long as you please. "I just- " you start, but bite your lip in time. "No, it wasn't you, it was me." You wrap your arms around his waist and and bury your face in his chest. The ridges of his ribcage press against the flesh of your cheek and you breathe him in.

"I - I can't do this," says Quirinus after a while. He gently pushes you away.

You stare at him.

He looks uncomfortable, rolling the cuff of his sleeve between his fingertips and avoiding your gaze. At last he mutters: "I - I don't w-want to harm you."

You shake your head. You refuse to think about it, because you're afraid, because you also feel the pain, and because you've grown desperate in the last months. You know that he's fading, the distance between you is growing by the day, and it makes you suffer a misery that you've never suffered before.

"I don't care."

Quirinus looks up. "I don't think y-you understand." Then he lowers his voice and says: "I don't know - I don't know who I am at times. It's - well, it's all becoming blurred... I think I - I'm losing myself to him." His voice trails away and he tries to steady his shaking hands.

Shocked to find yourself crying, you wipe your tears away with the heel of your palm. "I'm scared that - that one day I won't be able to reach you, Quirinus," you whisper. "You're already so far away." You take his wrist and pull him towards you, and he doesn't say anything. "Talk to me. Please talk to me."

"I don't know - I don't know what to say..."

You smile, the tears still wet on your cheeks. "Can you kiss me?" you say quietly. The words are fragile, like glass, and you feel as though you could see them floating in the air between you, and now the ball is in his court, he has the choice of either shattering them or taking them and caring for them, embracing their vulnerability.

Quirinus sighs. Bending down, he closes the distance between your lips and his, and he lets you lean into him. His arms are around you, and he's stroking your hair very slowly, and the last teardrops fall from the corners of your eyes, the salt merging on your intertwining tongues.

A pigeon coos outside the window, somewhere down in the garden.

You break apart very softly. His eyes meet yours and this time, you're looking into clear pools of rain, steel blue with flecks of brown - and not malevolent wells of darkness.

Everything is gentle, as though to him, you're made of smoke that could blow away, out of shape, at the tiniest indication of rough movement. Quirinus is reverential, almost, in the way he brushes a fingertip over stiffening nipples that subtly stretch the thin muslin of your dress over the swell of your breasts. Still standing by the window, illuminated in gold and blue and purple by the setting sun, he presses his mouth to yours again gently. "Am I hurting you?" he murmurs against you and you shake your head and kiss him harder.

He's terribly tentative, his movements slow and careful. He follows you to his bed and lets you place your legs around him as he sits on the edge of it. You're filled with the sort of happiness that makes you smile, and you bury your face in the curve between his neck and shoulder to hide it while Quirinus very gently pushes your dress up your torso, cold fingers bumping into your skin and making you arch your back slightly.

I love you, you want to say, but the words are snuffed out before they can leave your mouth because the dress is slipping over your head and falling to the floor and his hands are at your back, unclasping your bra and laying it aside. The friction of your now bare nipples against his shirt makes you breathe in sharply in pleasure.

#everyone hold your horses this is a WIP #that I posted by accident #quirinus quirrell #harry potter #professor quirrell #harry potter and the philosopher's stone #quirinus quirrell x reader #harry potter x reader

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