It was noon time when the last classes ended. Of course some students preferred to just sleep or play in their common room after their terrible days, it was a good choice, but not so little students decided to study in school’s library, more precisely the 5th years probably to prepare for their incoming O.W.L test, or the 7th years struggling for their N.E.W.T.s, poor thing. But certainly one particular 4th year Gryffindor prefect give no to his miserable seniors though.

Sehun was running like a madman, he needed to visit the serpentine corridor at 3rd floor to check Zitao’s wand which possibly stayed there. The rest of the students who passed by Sehun in the halls or grand staircases only stared weirdly, the boy was making a scene with his funny way of running while shouting ‘coming through!’ repeatedly. Some of the girls only squealed, Sehun was quite popular yes, he was Gryffindor’s Quidditch star after all. Not like Sehun cared though—well, if he wasn’t in such a hurry he would probably greeted the girls but right now, priorities.

“OH SEHUN, NO RUNNING IN THE HALLS!!”

Well, curse his luck meeting Kim Joonmyeon right now.

“SAVE IT FOR LATER HYUNG, I GOT SOMETHING IMPORTANT TO DO”, Sehun kept running to third floor, and of course, to avoid getting caught by Joonmyeon.

“DON’T YOU DARE RUN FROM ME! EVERY STEPS YOU TAKE FURTHER WILL BE HOUSE POINTS TAKEN! HEY—FIVE POINTS! TEN POINTS! TWENTY— YAH!!”

Sehun could only laugh whole heartedly while running, making the calm and gentle Joonmyeon angry was one of his favorite things to do. Joonmyeon was a 6th year Gryffindor headboy who was now competing against Kris to the real “Headboy” title for next year. That explained why the older took his job almost too seriously, which according to both Sehun and Chanyeol, was hilarious.

As he was running, at the end of the halls’ turning, he bumped into someone and fall on his . Sehun groaned and ready to apologized to whoever he was bumping into when he saw a dark haired boy he knew so well.

“Zitao!!!”

Sehun quickly tackled Zitao to the ground and Zitao fall on his back, with Sehun on top of him, hugging him almost too tightly.

“S—Sehun I— I can’t breathe!” ,The boy wheezed.

“Ah, sorry..” Sehun quickly let go of the poor boy and smiled sheepishly, helping the Slytherin prefect to stood on his feet.

“Are you okay? Are you hurt? Why were you skipping classes? Where were you? What happened?” Sehun checked Zitao’s face like a mother he was, making Zitao rolled his eyes because of his friend’s ridiculous gesture.

“I’m fine, really. I think I just continously fell asleep and woke up late.”

“Did Kris do something to you? Did he threaten to kill you??” Sehun gasped.

“No, why would he kill me?” Zitao frowned.

“Last night when he took you back, I’m sure he was ready to kill me. So I thought maybe after you’ve woken up, he’d kill you too.”

It took a moment of silence before Zitao snapped and stared in horror,

“He saw you?! Kris?! Took me back?! Huh?! Wasn’t it Luhan?” Zitao shouted while stared his friend dumbly.

“No, it was Kris though.” Sehun said as if it was the most common thing in the world.

“Oh Sehun, I’m so dead you hear me?” Zitao sighed.

“Yeah yeah I’ll prepare your funeral later but now we need to go to serpentine corridor.”

“Why?”

“Lost wands.”

Without explaining any further, Sehun dragged along his friend quickly, not wanting Joonmyeon to catch up sooner.

---

“I can’t believe we actually forgot the Lost wands.”

“Yeah, it makes us look like dumb and dumber.” Sehun mumbled.

The two were standing in the middle of the ‘lost and found’ room, looking for a certain dark haired boy’s wand that had been lost for a week. Zitao hoped he could find his beloved wand, something he would give anything to get it back or else he would have to use a temporary and judging by the seniors experiences with their temporary ones, was a great disadvantage in charms and spells classes, something like could lower their grades for the incompability with their wands. Or Zitao had other option, such as buying a new one in Ollivanders, which unfortunately something he couldn’t afford at the moment.

The lost and found room at serpentine corridor was a narrow, small room, basically students at hogwarts look for their lost things here. There was nobody there except for Zitao and Sehun, but the room was cramped enough mainly because the mountains of lost things stacked up all together, and both prefects thought this could take some times.

“What was your wand stats again?”

“Acacia wood, phoenix feather core, thirteen inches.”

“Right.”

They continued their search, sure there were lots of lost things though the wands were dominating, from nine inches until thirteen or fifteen inches, they were all there. There were also childish love letters, scarfs, even books from library that probably had not been returned, personal pink diaries from ladies, Zitao thought, and scattered papers of bizzare doodles probably from student’s boring lessons.

“Woah, look at this! It’s Chanyeol’s ridiculous beanie hat from last year’s christmas!” Sehun exclaimed.

“And this is Jongin’s Quidditch socks from whatever centuries ago...” Zitao cringed.

“Man, this is not a lost and found place, this is literally garbage dump.” Sehun sighed. They both spent their twenty minutes looking for Zitao’s wand but in vain. It was as if the cue for Zitao to gave up and start using a temporary wand instead, though Zitao promised himself to look for his wand until he found it. His wand was one of his precious possession after all.

“I guess it’s best for me to use a temporary wand for the time being.” Zitao mumbled.

“Yeah, it’s better than nothing.”

“But then, it comes the worst part.”

“What?”

“You know the first thing you gotta do before you get your temporary wand?”

“What?”

“Talk to your head house.”

“And which part of that is the worst?”, Sehun eyed his friend, not understanding the situation, how could talking to your head house could possibly be the worst part? Sehun talked to McGonagall few times when he had hard times, and that helped so much. Zitao could only sighed at his friend’s expression.

“Hello? Slytherin? Snape?”

“.....Uh..oh......”

Sehun promised himself to prepare for his friend’s funeral tonight.

---

“As you can see, our next game will be a big match against Gryffindor. Now, that house is nothing like Hufflepuff. I will not tolerate any mistakes, especially beaters, no cheating and play fairly, do you understand?” Kris shouted. It was the time when Slytherin finally had the schedule to use the Quidditch field for practice after their first match against Hufflepuff last week, which they won over of course.

“Yes captain.”

“Good, now divide into two teams."

It was no secret that Quidditch was one of the most popular sport in wizarding world. It took a special talent in flying with broomsticks and great concentration to participate in this game, not all wizards were gifted for such ability of course, and that probably makes the game even more popular. Hogwarts was no exception, students and professors tend to wait for the next inter-house Quidditch game as half the population at school really enjoyed sitting on the benches and seeing their Quidditch stars continuosly snatched the quaffle against each other, and fortunately, on the first November in the cold weather, they held another Quidditch Inter-house cup.

“Jongin, do you think you can actually look for the snitch for the first fifteen minutes?”

Kris asked the younger, more like ordered just before he started the practice. Jongin was a marvelous seeker no doubt, the boy had proved it several times from previous Slytherin’s victories, but Kris wasn’t going to risked anything later as they were going to compete against their biggest house rival because Jongin tend to had this bad habit as letting his pride took over whenever he flew with his broomstick and wasting their first ten or fifteen minutes waving or sending kisses to the audiences, what a brat. And everytime it was Slytherin against Gryffindor, all the school population would loose their minds as both houses were competitive and good, so Kris made sure all of his team members were mentally prepared for the pressure. Sure the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff weren’t bad either, but both house were just better.

“Puh—lease, do you think I will loose to that stinky Gryffindor seeker?” Jongin mocked.

“I will not have you waste your first fifteen minutes time ogling at the audiences or I will beat you with the budglers myself, you hear me?” Kris glared.

“You’re not a beater though..” Jongin mumbled which the older replied with a flick to his forehead.

“Alright, let’s get moving!” Kris clapped his hands and flew with his broomstick next to the Quidditch goal as he was Slytherin’s keeper. The team was divided into two teams with seven members each. One keeper, three chasers, two beaters and one seeker with both Kris and Jongin on the same team. The other members groaned and sending the neverending ‘no fairs’  to the captain as Kris and Jongin were known for being Slytherin’s Quidditch stars but Kris wasn’t buying any complains and they quickly shut their mouth when they saw their captain’s infamous glare.

The practice started with Kris’ team goaling the very first score, and second, and third which the opposing team continuosly struggled to get scores with Kris’ magnificent defence. Some of the other Slytherin students and other houses such as Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs watched their practice match, mainly the ladies, and screamed in delight whenever Kris repulsed his opponent’s quaffle gracefully with his beautiful silver locks sticking to his face thanks to his sweat and according to the girls, was y enough to send even the giants swooning. 

“Gosh, the girls are noisy.” Choi Minho, one of Slytherin’s chasers mocked while he saw the audiences continuosly screaming for Kris’ name. “You’re just jealous you don’t have someone screaming your name.” The boy next to him chuckled while sending small kicks to Minho.

“Let’s see when I you in girl’s lavatory tonight, who’s going to scream who’s name.” He smirked and sending suggestive brows to the boy next to him.

“YOU’RE SO GROSS!!!”

“CHOI MINHO, LEE TAEMIN! KEEP YOUR HEAD’S IN THE GAME OR I’LL HAVE JONGDAE JINX YOUR BROOMS.” Kris shouted from across the field, and both chasers stumbled on their broomsticks due to shock from their captain’s booming voice.

“YES CAPTAIN!” Taemin kicked minho harshly this time and flew away chasing the quaffle, leaving Minho laughing and pleased from his friend’s embarassment.

The whole practice was harder than before, they could feel it. It was constant glares and shouts from Kris though they made only small mistakes such as Yongguk accidently dropped his bat, Taemin stumbled on his broomstick thanks to Minho, or the time when Jongin took fourteen minutes looking for the golden snitch. They had been practicing for four hours straight, even the audiences had left as the sky turned dark and it was almost dinner time when the whole team was exhausted and demanded the practice to end, the cold weather in November also didn’t help at all. Kris was reluctant at first, saying they were just bunch of weaklings because of the cold weather and how Gryffindor would whoop their asses but they were too tired to argue back and just silently accepting the criticims their captain spitted.

“Fine, practice’s over. Dismissed.”

The teams quickly flew back to the castle, silently cheering and ready to take showers as their stomach were grumbling with hunger.

Kris was in the middle of the field, undressing his chestgear and protective head also arranging the balls into the chest. He ran his hand through his silver hair, probably the most exhausted and sighed deeply. He was being too hard to his team, well, not like he wasn’t hard with previous practices, he had always been a strict captain but today undoubtly he was being an extra and he felt sorry for them. He couldn’t help but felt extremely annoyed and vented it to his teammates, though he knew exactly the reason why.

“Enough with the shouting, captain?” Jongin flew from the air towards Kris and gave him the golden snitch he just caught earlier.

“I thought you went back with the guys already.”

“I’m here to help you, you should be grateful having my help.” Jongin smirked which Kris replied with a low chuckle. “We both know you’re a natural , but today you’re exceptionally being an extra. Now, care to explain captain?”

“Shut up, .”

“Woah, that explains a lot. This must’ve got something to do with Huang.”

Kris shot a glare to the young seeker who smirked triumphantly because he knew he just hit the jackpot. “Now, what did he do this time?”

“None of your business.”

“Fine. I’ll take it as Huang refused to be ed by you then.” Jongin shrugged.

“You and your damaged brain…” Kris sighed. He knew telling Jongin his problems was a suicide mission, but Jongin was Zitao’s roommates after all so maybe telling the seeker wouldn’t hurt, and maybe, Kris could dig just small informations from the young seeker.

“He lied to me.”

“What?”

“Zitao. Earlier, just before the practice, he lied to me.” Kris frowned.

Jongin stared at Kris dumbly and giving judging stares which made the older uncomfortable because being stared by Jongin, was in fact, creepy.

“What are you, his father?” Jongin mocked. “Of course he would lie to you once in a while, .”

“But he never lied to me before. Not for the past four years, but lately I knew he has been lying to me.”

“And which particular lie did he tell that makes you so worked up with?”

“I asked did he know any Gryffindor prefect and he answered no. I knew he was lying because last night when he fainted, he was resting on that Gryffindor’s lap.” Kris frowned recalling the event.

“What, you mean Oh Sehun?”

Kris blinked and stayed silent for about two minutes.

“You know him?”

“Goddammit Kris, he IS Gryffindor’s seeker duh, of course I know him! And YOU were supposed to know too since we practically played against him several times, you dense motherer.” Jongin pointed to the older with accusing finger which Kris replied with a  slap to the younger’s head after calling him ‘motherer’.  

“And how come they know each other?” Kris furrowed his brows.

“Dude, we’re like 4th years in the same classes. They’re pretty close.”

“And you’re not stopping them?” Kris glared the younger.

“I was planning to, to be honest. But I’ve never seen Zitao so happy in such a long time, so I let them.” Jongin shrugged and ready his position to fly with his broomstick before stopping himself. “You know, if you’re too jealous that your future boyfriend is being too close with someone else, maybe you should confess sooner or later.”

“First of all, I’m not jealous. Second, he’s not my future boyfriend, and I don’t like Zitao.” Kris scoffed.

Jongin snorted, “Keep telling yourself that Kris, but if you don’t act quickly someone might snatch him away from you.”

And before Kris could spat another word, Jongin flew back to the castle, leaving Kris with a heavy feeling.

---

It was raining heavily at night with thunderous noises, and students gathered in the great hall to eat their dinner. Hot chicken soup and grilled turkeys as cold night main menus were everyone’s favorite but Sehun didn’t feel the appetite kicked him as Zitao had not been seen since the boy decided to talk to Snape. They had agreed to meet at the library  after dinner before 8 pm along with Yixing and Luhan to do their usual night shift, and Zitao had told Sehun before that he had some important information to share. Sehun boringly fiddled with his food, mashed potatoes and some vegetables as side dishes and he watched in disgust when Chanyeol who sat in front of him ate like a barbaric maniac.

“Chan, please eat silently when munching your food, you’re making a scene here.” Baekhyun sighed as he wiped his boyfriend’s dirty mouth and the curly haired giant only grinned in response.

“grogrrlgrogryfghgrufghorggood!” Chanyeol later incoherently spoke with mouth full and spitting his foods, getting a more disgusted response from Sehun and the other Gryffindors.

“Please swallow your food, Park ing Chanyeol.” Sehun cringed and Joonmyeon who sat beside him quickly slapped his head.

“Yah, language.”

While Sehun was sending internal curses to Joonmyeon, he saw Zitao came in from the main door and went to the Slytherin’s table. Sehun sighed in relief when he finally saw his friend in one piece, after the “talk-to-Snape” plan who he thought was a dangerous mission.

“Who are you staring at?” Joonmyeon raised his brow.

“What? Who? No one.”

Joonmyeon scoffed and glanced to the direction Sehun was staring at. There sat a dark haired boy awkwardly eating his mashed potatoe in Slytherin table silently. “That’s Kris’ little sidekick right? Why are you staring at him?”

“Nothing hyung.” Sehun mumbled and Joonmyeon just shrugged in response.

“You better not mess with him Oh Sehun, or you’ll face with the dragon’s wrath.”

---

Zitao entered the great hall and quickly sat next to Jongin, just across Jongdae. He just had a talk with professor Snape and thankfully, the head house wasn’t that angry to him and promised to keep his mouth shut about Zitao’s lost wand. It was a hard tension talking to the stoic and gloomy professor, but everything eventually went well. Just a few derisions like ‘you little clumsy imbecile’  but that wasn’t as worse as when Jongin accidently blasted a potion during their 2^nd year. Zitao got his temporary wand, a nine inches long, dragon heartstring core and he hoped the wand could cooperate well as he didn’t want to embarrass himself any further in charm classes, courtesy of his disastrous event when he once stupid enough to stole Jongin’s wand. He was about to take a spoon of his mashed potatoes when suddenly his spoon flicked in the air and threw the food to his robes.

“Haha! Look! That idiot Huang couldn’t even eat properly without staining his robes!”

A 3^rd year boy shouted while pointing at Zitao and eventually other Slytherins laughed along. Zitao only rolled his eyes and cleaned his stained robes with a wet towel from the table, damn kids these days had no respects. Obviously the brat jinxed Zitao’s spoon, It was a simple oppugno jinx, assaulting it’s target with directed object, Zitao knew it very well, he had been seeing Jongdae and Jongin used it for million times, but the brat just had to be all superior. Just because the boy was probably pureblood, doesn’t mean he could pick up on Zitao. But again, Zitao was a muggle-born so there was nothing he could do. The boy was still pointing at him while imitating Zitao’s shriek with an exaggerated high-pitched voice when suddenly his plate flew, splattering the food directly to his face and stained his whole robes.

“Oh look! Little imbecile couldn’t even laugh properly without splattering his food like drunken Mandrakes!” Jongin mocked the boy who was now shrunk in embarrassment and the whole Slytherin table then laughed even louder, mainly Jongdae’s hideous ones. Zitao glanced to his side and saw Jongin quickly hid his wand inside his robes. Zitao smiled in response, because he knew, even though Jongin was such a troublemaker, the boy was kind hearted and sometimes stood up to Zitao in his own weird ways. Jongin just didn’t like to show it because you know, pride.

“Thanks..” Zitao whispered.

“I wasn’t doing it for you.” Jongin mumbled and glanced anywhere but Zitao.

“Right.” Zitao laughed and brushed it off before realizing something. “Where’s Kris? You guys finished practicing hours ago right?”

Kris was nowhere to be seen. Yongguk was eating silently next to Zelo, Minho and Taemin seemed to be bickering about something. The Quidditch members were eating in the great hall, all of them but the captain himself. Even Jongdae seemed to be forgetting his dinner and continuosly mocking the poor boy earlier.

“Last time he said to me, he was going to take a bathe in prefect’s bathroom.”

“And he hasn’t been back until now?” Zitao’s eyes widened because it had been 2 hours after their last practice. Jongin only shrugged and proceed on eating his chicken soup when he glanced to the main door.

“Speak of the devil..”

Kris came in and his usually perfect-styled silver hair was wet and messy, drips of water fell to his uniform. He didn’t use his robes, and two buttons undone which kind of exposing his “wet” collar bones. The headboy was such a scene that students couldn’t help but stare at the unlikely living Greek god that quickly sat to the empty space next to Zitao.

“Woah dude, what happened?” Jongin eyed the headboy curiously.  

“Bathe.”

“For two hours long?”

“So?” Kris spat. Jongin could only scowled and the headboy continued to eat his dinner silently. Zitao felt awkward being sandwiched between Jongin and Kris though, mainly Kris after what happened that afternoon. The boy was afraid of being near Kris as he thought the older could sense something wrong and he couldn’t help but being uneasy, not after Sehun had told him Kris saw Zitao was lying on the Gryffindor’s lap.

“Um..I think I’m done eating..” Zitao scratched the back of his neck and slowly getting up to go to the library and meet Sehun there, when suddenly Kris grabbed his arm so Zitao quickly stopped his tracks.

“Where are you going?” Kris was still eating his food and not even once glancing at Zitao, but his hand didn’t seem to letting go of Zitao’s arm and the boy felt a thousand times nervous than before.

“T—the library…?”

Kris stopped his eating session and finally glancing at Zitao with his sharp eyes and thick brows, forcing Zitao to stare into those dark orbs, fierce yet beautiful. Zitao’s heart raced so fast and he felt his face heated up with no apparent reason, but the boy assured himself that it was because he was afraid of Kris and nothing else.

“You’re going with me.”

“W—what?”

 Zitao blinked in surprise and wriggled his arm to free himself but Kris didn’t bother that. Kris didn’t let go of Zitao’s arm and instead, the older moved closer, killing their gap until his lips was inches apart from Zitao’s ear and the boy was nearly fainting due to their closeness. Kris’ body scent was so strong and longing, his wet locks smelled like his usual shampoo which Zitao noticed from the famous occamy egg yolks scented mixed with Kris’ personal scent. Kris didn’t seem to notice that the younger was fighting the urge to ran his free hand and touch the beautiful silver locks in front of him, and the older proceed on telling the younger what he had been thinking instead.  

“You’re going to do the night shift with me.”

Boy, that sounded sooo wrong in so many ways, Kris! ahahaha *suggestive winks*

Finally, Jongin and Zitao’s blooming friendship! ehehe

I really enjoyed writing this chapter to be honest, and couldn’t wait till we get to the Quidditch match! Just to tell you, some dramas are coming for the next chapters and as usual, thank you for sticking up with my messy writings!!

Love, author<3