alittlemirror | wit beyond measure is man's greatest treasure

wit beyond measure is man's greatest treasure

To say Jade is displeased would be an understatement. It's not that he cares about this detention tarnishing his record, no. He doesn't really care about his record. What he does care about is how it cuts into his studying time. He had just come across a particularly fascinating snippet on the nature of death and the soul...

(And besides, those Hufflepuffs had started it with their incessant chattering. They're like a less annoying version of Saphir, and nobody had ever really objected when he hexed Saphir. And it's not like he used a serious hex; he just sealed and removed their mouths. Easily reversible, if they knew what they were doing - and knew how to use nonverbal spells.

After all, what kind of first-year doesn't know how to use nonverbal spells?)

But someone had taken offense to his hex, and now he finds himself trudging to Professor Rammsteiner's office, growing increasingly irritated at the loss of his study time. From what he's heard of detentions, they usually entail doing useless, mundane tasks easily accomplished with a little creative wandwork. He's thought about ignoring Professor Rammsteiner's orders more than once, but he's also been told that it would just lead to more detentions and thus a bigger waste of time.

Oh well. He's here now. With one last irritated sigh, he raises his hand to the door and knocks.

"Professor Rammsteiner? This is Jade Curtiss."

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Heine just sighs, rubbing his eyes and finally letting his own shield drop. He's not happy about this, no, but at least it isn't an actual emergency.

"Why aren't you out with the others?" But he's pretty sure he already knows the answer. Odd and often antagonistic as their student-teacher relationship is, Heine is at least aware of Jade's attitude towards others. It stands to reason he wouldn't be partying with the other students (whom... he should probably be chaperoning, but Heine figures they can have at least one free night here).

Jade dismisses his own shield as well, slipping his wand back up his sleeve. He probably won't have any more need of it tonight.

"Why aren't you there?" He retorts. "You're supposed to be supervising us."

He's still not entirely sure why Professor Rammsteiner was selected to be their supervising teacher. He can respect the Professor for his skill in wandless magic. But when it comes to dealing with his children, Professor Rammsteiner's approach can be somewhat lacking.

It's true, he should be there. First nights are usually the worst in a new place. But it's a big party with other students—and other professors.

"Legal drinking age here is lower," he mutters. "They can do what they want."

Lacking indeed. Heine rubs his eyes again and stretches his arms.

"What do you want to do, anyway?" The first task isn't for another week. If he wants to practice, that's good, but surely he could find somewhere else.

Jade looks at him, judgement in his eyes, but he doesn't say anything aloud.

"Wandless magic," he replies. His peers can live without Professor Rammsteiner for one night. Or maybe they'll drink themselves senseless and freeze in Durmstrang's endless grounds, but that's not his problem. "I want to practice."

Heine still really doesn't see why Jade can't practice on his own, or outside. Admittedly, today it's already late and the grounds are unfamiliar.

"Fine." He pulls on a robe—more of a bathrobe, not a uniform—and picks up his wand for security (or to make sure Jade won't try to take it again).

The process of helping Jade practice tends to be at least interesting. He's fully awake again after fifteen minutes, if only because he's getting frustrated.

"You were better last week." Having sat down again, he rests an elbow on his knee and his chin on his fist. "How'd you get worse?"

Heine isn't the only one frustrated. Jade had taken off his glasses, needing that additional boost to his abilities, but not even that had helped.

"I don't know," he says, then stops. No, he does know. Or he has an idea, at least. When he frowns, his expression is even darker than usual.

Professor Rammsteiner had sat down, so Jade interprets this lull in the practice as a break, and leans against the wall, folding his arms. Durmstrang really is cold. The stone is frigid under his body, rough-hewn and ungiving.

But despite the chill that surrounds him, he feels an odd (but not entirely unfamiliar) flush of heat under his collar.

Heine, for his part, is unaware of Jade's realization. He watches him lean against the wall, frowning.

"Maybe you should just go to bed. Get some sleep and come back tomorrow."

"Maybe." Maybe that would be enough to make it go away. Sometimes, it works. Too often, his sense of distraction comes back, stronger than ever.

But tonight is the worst night yet. He can't stop thinking, about the tournament, about his own goals, about Professor Rammsteiner. Try as he might, he can't achieve that crystal clear focus he needs for spellcasting.

He stays in place, deep in thought.

Heine waits a moment longer for Jade to say something. When he doesn't, he stands up and takes the short walk over to the window to look outside.

It's still the dead of night. There probably people still up, reveling in a new place and new experiences, but he doesn't doubt there are some asleep already. Heine glances back at Jade, moves a bit closer so he can talk without raising his voice across the room.

"What, are you moping about something?"

"No." The reply is automatic. He turns his head, looking straight at Professor Rammsteiner instead of at the ground. He doesn't even have to tilt his head to look at him - they're almost eye-to-eye with each other nowadays. He thinks he'll be taller than Professor Rammsteiner soon.

"I was thinking," he says, a little slower than usual. Inside the pocket of his robes, his fingers curl restlessly. He still feels hot, flushed with the same incessant heat that had plagued him for weeks now, and even the brush of his own robes against his body makes him straighten unconsciously, tension radiating from his frame.

Well, obviously he was thinking. Heine exhales inaudibly and crosses his arms over his chest.

"Thinking about what?" He is definitely not the person who should be trying to make someone feel better. But he asks, anyway. Maybe because Jade is still a child to him, even if he's not that much older himself. Maybe because the whole situation is just annoying him and he wants to get it over with. He couldn't say.

What he's about to do will probably change things between the two of them. Jade isn't afraid (he thinks), but there's a strange sort of tension building up in his chest, something like the excitement of trying out a new spell but not quite. He lets out a soft sigh, and focuses on answering the question. It's as good a lead-up to what he wants as any.

"I've been distracted lately," he admits. "I think the tournament made things worse."

If there's one thing he dislikes, it's not knowing. The task is meant to be a secret. He fully intends to find out what it is before the day of the task, but for now, he's in the dark.

"But that's not the main thing," he continues, an edge in his voice that's rarely there. Professor Rammsteiner had moved closer to him, and now Jade moves forward as well in precise, calculated steps, closing the distance between them. He reaches up, fisting his hand lightly into the front of Professor Rammsteiner's robes, looking at him with a hint of challenge in his eyes.

Of course the tournament would make things worse. Or at least it would for any normal student, but Heine's not surprised it's at least affecting Jade, too.

What he doesn't expect is for Jade to come up right in front of him and reach out. Heine doesn't flinch back because he can see it coming, but there's surprise and almost shock in his eyes all the same. A moment of eye contact and he quickly looks away, pulling back just enough to tug his clothes out of Jade's grip. At a safer distance, Heine turns his gaze to Jade once more.

"What's the main thing?" His voice is wary, but he wants an answer to the question. A real one, and not dodging around the subject.

He takes another step forward, unused to being so close to another person, but wanting it all the same.

"You," he says simply. Professor Rammsteiner is afraid of looking straight at him, and that feels strangely thrilling. "Well, not you, specifically. Just people in general."

He wants a warm body against his, pressing close. Wandering hands, maybe a kiss or two. For someone usually so adverse to intimacy, those are foreign desires. Jade would rather not navigate these treacherous paths with his peers - they're too loud, too full of gossip and pesky things like feelings.

Which left Professor Rammsteiner. He looks calmly at the older man, waiting for him to acknowledge him.

Foreign desires or not, Heine isn't ready to accommodate them. He chances quick looks at Jade, but someone standing so close is something he doesn't understand or want.

"Stop it," he mutters. Heine tries to make distance between them again, turning away and sitting down at the desk in the room like that'll help him. "Go find someone else."

"I don't want someone else," he says, like it's simple fact. When Professor Rammsteiner moves away he follows, robes whispering against the cold stone floor. It would be so, so easy to bind him to that chair and take what he wants.

Well, not exactly. He's not interested in forcing anyone. It's the only thing that stays his hand. He simply stands behind Heine's chair, a quiet, unrelenting shadow. "You're trying to run from me."

"You don't want me either," Heine points out. He focuses on the grain of the wood that makes up the desk, shoulders already slumped, aware of Jade standing behind him and uneasy with it. It doesn't matter if it seems like he's running. He just doesn't believe that this is the best thing for Jade.

(And why 'the best thing for Jade' matters to Heine is another matter altogether.)

"You don't know what you're doing anyway."

He shrugs, a light rustle of his robes. He doesn't deny Professor Rammsteiner's first point. Why should he? It's true. He doesn't want Professor Rammsteiner specifically, he just happens to be the best option he has.

The second point he does take issue with.

"I know enough." He may not have the experience, but he has the technical knowledge. His fingers brush experimentally over the back of Professor Rammsteiner's neck, along the collar of his robes, following the line of it to the clasp that holds his outer robes close.

I know enough does not mean that he knows what he's doing, to Heine. It's something a person says when they don't want to admit the lack of experience, and that bothers him. But it's the brush of skin over his neck, along his clothes, that makes him start upright in his seat and finally stand up again. Heine turns to lean against the desk, chair a barrier between them.

"...tell me what you want. Exactly."

Professor Rammsteiner isn't turning him down. If anything, this feels like encouragement - or maybe a test. Jade is reasonably sure that he'll be able to get what he wants if he plays his cards right.

"I want to stop feeling so distracted," he answers honestly. All this is a means to an end, and he isn't afraid of saying so.

But he knows that's not exactly what Professor Rammsteiner is asking. His next words are much, much less proper, but he speaks them in that same detached tone of his.

"And I want you to suck me off. Or just fuck me."

He doesn't even blink as he talks, entirely focused on Professor Rammsteiner. Saying those words out loud makes the heat in his body burn worse than ever, but he knows better than to show any weakness at this stage.

Though he doesn't quite flush, Heine's pupils dilate and he looks straight at Jade, for once, when he names his wants. The room is still dark enough, lit only by one lamp, that it could be a trick of the light. But Heine can feel that his own mouth is dry.

"You can get off by yourself," he eventually replies, voice quiet.

His eyes narrow. "If that had worked, do you think I would be here?"

Jade is no expert at reading people, but the way Professor Rammsteiner's voice had gone soft...that means something, he's sure. It's as if he's watching a pair of scales, precariously balanced. One nudge, and...

He steps forward, deftly skirting around the chair, coming to a stop right in front of Professor Rammsteiner. Like this, he has him all but backed into the desk.

Carefully, he reaches out to tug at Professor Rammsteiner's robes again. "The quicker we finish, the quicker we can get back to work."

It's wrong even if Jade initiates and Heine knows it, but all the same he can't seem to resist much more. There's clearly nothing there in terms of emotions. Jade knows what he wants.

Heine lets him open the front of the robe this time, just watching his hands. Despite the clothes underneath it he still feels oddly exposed.

"...then do it already." So they can go back to being professor and student, so that Heine can force the inevitable memories of this into a box that he'll try not to open ever again. There's a slightly heavier edge to his breathing than is usual, and he doesn't know where to look, but he doesn't move away again.

Ah. He was right.

An odd expression passes over his face, something that is almost a smile but not quite. He's...pleased, he thinks. He's filled with the satisfaction of a job well done, as if he had just figured out a particularly difficult spell.

Without a hint of hesitation, he tries to slip Professor Rammsteiner's robe off of his shoulders, noting the Muggle clothing he wore underneath, but not thinking much of it. He doesn't even bother trying to get Professor Rammsteiner's shirt off, just goes directly for his pants, slipping one hand past his waistband to grab for his cock.

"Do you want to do this here?" He asks, all business. "Or back on the bed?"

It's all business with Jade, clearly, and though the robe bunches up at his elbows, the real discomfort comes from a hand suddenly on his dick. Heine twitches almost violently, nearly sitting up on the desk to get away.

"Sit in the chair," he replies after a moment. His voice is strained, and he's definitely not feeling anything but discomfort and confusion at the moment. Not expecting a situation like this and in possession of a low sex drive, Heine's got nothing prepared. Not even himself, as it is, but he can make an effort.

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why do icons have to exist tbh

there really isn't a reason ig but IT'S TOO LATE TO CHANGE