“We definitely got the best first years this batch,” Kim Junsu, with his hair dyed a brilliant shade of crimson red this year, chatters excitedly, tapping his fingertips against the palm of his opposite hand as though he were a regal figure celebrating a tournament win of some sort, “the house cup will be ours again this year, I can already tell.”  

The sorting ceremony is all but over, there are two first years left. A scrawny girl with mousy brown hair and a slightly less scrawny boy with warm olive skin. Neither of them looks too impressive to Yunho, so his eyes do not linger, sweeping away from the fidgeting eleven year olds to the stretch of their table that was still empty. He is bored now; he has been bored since the children had been marched into the great hall in long nervous lines.   

First years wouldn’t help them win anything, not really. At worst they might be the reason they lose points, being young and eager and generally not knowing a whole hell of a lot yet.   

The girl’s name is Zyla or something and she ends up in Hufflepuff to the surprise of probably nobody ever, she looks like a Hufflepuff and with a name like Zyla? No question.   

“Finally,” Yunho grumbles, he is distinctively starving, and the knowing smile from Junsu and the more subdued smirk on Shim Changmin’s face cause him to scowl.  

“I told you, you should have had a snack with us, Jung,” the taller student teases, elbowing him, none too gently either, in the ribs, “But no. Mister ‘I am not a child, I don’t snack’, look at you now. You’re a disaster.”  

He wonders, not rarely, why he is even friends with Kim Junsu and Shim Changmin. They are both difficult in their own rights. Junsu, who seems to stay more on top of gossip than his studies, and Changmin who mocks him constantly are hardly the sort of people who constantly attempt to align themselves with Yunho.  

The boys are contrary and often rude to him and Junsu steals and copies his homework entirely too often and Changmin always forces him to pay for everything when they visit Hogsmeade... but in the end, that is probably the point.  

Jung Yunho wants for nothing, he doesn’t struggle at anything and nobody ever denies him whatever he asks. That sort of power extends to the professors as well, but to be fair Yunho never asks them for anything unreasonable; dropping off an assignment early, or on a blue moon an hour or two late because of Quidditch practice. His grades last year were virtually perfect, he had only missed three points in his Herbology final, but that nearly didn’t count because nobody in his year had gotten it perfect.   

The point is, he doesn’t bother or demand from the professors because that isn’t the order of things, he isn’t supposed to and doesn’t need to and they have no reason to seek him out, not like the students do.  

Girls and boys alike approach him, eager to be friends, to partner up in joint classes or to date. They’re fake, the lot of them, smiling widely and twisting and turning in an effort to be his complete mirror like that will ensure they get on perfectly.  

Yunho has always heard the rumors that cause people to gravitate to him, he was friends with the gossip column, after all. With the success of his family, ties to Jung Yunho promise prosperity and security of all kinds.  

Of course, some of them just like his face or body for the sake of vanity, and the rest of them seem to like the mask of personality he keeps on within a crowd. The permanent, polite smile and impeccable manners. They would hate him, if they truly knew anything about him, if they got close, they always did.  

His rule exceptions? His insufferable best friends, they have no choice but to deal with him, really. Changmin, Junsu and he have all been acquainted since they were three. Yunho hadn’t considered the lot of them friends until he was about nine, but he had never really bothered to let them know- he was pretty sure they did anyway.  

“The students are sorted, I just don’t see why dinner hasn’t been served yet,” Yunho practically snarls, glaring over at Changmin, though he pointedly keeps his own limbs to himself.    

“Someone is going to sugar binge,” Junsu pipes in from across the table, “Will anybody like you anymore when your teeth are as rotten as your personality, Yunho-hyung?”  

“About as much as they will like you when they discover you roaming the halls as a ghost missing a few of your limbs,” Yunho returns, voice practically a purr as he smiles, the first genuine one of the day.  

Junsu has the sense to be offended, gasping and clutching at the front of his robes.  

“Ladies and Gentleman,” professor McGonagall interrupts the quiet hum of confused chatter that has been sweeping through the Great Hall since the last of the first years had only just scrambled to their new tables.  

Gryffindor’s house head had not moved from where she stood centerstage beside a low stool, one hand resting gingerly on the brim of the sorting hat where it rests on a crushed velvet cushion. The new activity does wonders at quieting the students down, the whole of the hall still and silent but very much alive and alert, something was happening.  

“We have a new transfer student this year,” McGonagall finally announces, “He will be joining our fifth years... Kim Jaejoong?”  

Yunho would have been rolling his eyes if people were not watching. A transfer student, really? That was the delay? It was preposterous, they should have tended to him first, shuffled him in along with the new students and nobody would have cared. To delay everyone like this? He would have assumed to boy was kin to one of the professors themselves, but...  

Kim Jaejoong? From Korea then, or of Korean descent at least, nothing unfamiliar to Yunho, nothing special in general. The magical schools in Asian were impressive in their own right he imagined, although his own family had migrated to England when he was just two, so he didn’t have practical knowledge.  

Still, a transfer student, international or not was hardly anything to starve a room full of teenagers for.   

The doors of the great hall push open suddenly though, and it might just be a trick of his eyes but the light seems to flicker ominously for a second, like all of the candles floating around the grand space had been snuffed out and then immediately set alight again. Realistically, he really is just starving and in a mood because of it, a serious mood that has his senses playing tricks on him.  

Yunho looks anyway, and so does everyone else.   

Standing at the edge of the great hall, lingering in the door way is a boy, tall in his own right, but not more so than himself, Changmin or some of the older students, with skin so pale he almost seems translucent, radiating light like the moon up in the sky. Yunho is not pleased to note the pitch of his hair, dark and shiny as obsidian, or the slight disarray of his robes that seem to match the stifling air of displeasure that seems to radiate from the boy. For some reason, the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, Remus Lupin, lingers a few paces behind the boy, as though herding him into compliance.   

“Woah,” Changmin and Junsu say together, which is never a good sign.  

In the sweeping silence, he can practically hear the boy’s footsteps, he is practically stomping and yet it looks as though he is gliding across the floor, sweeping through the space like a dementor.  

A sour expression is fixed to Kim Jaejoong’s face as he turns and sits down beside McGonagall, his robes flutter and sweep out in a matter that looks extremely violent and graceful at the same time. Yunho for one isn’t even the least bit surprised that the sorting hat doesn’t even seem to make contract with the transfer students head before it is shouting “Slytherin!” like it is being burned.  

Not a full two minutes later, the boy with obsidian hair is sliding into a seat at a table on the opposite side of the hall and Yunho forgets about him entirely. Dumbledore has risen from his seat, murmurs and claps his hands in a pleasant welcome. The table is full of food and Yunho finds himself reaching immediately for a chocolate frog or three.  

If his best friends have anything snide to say like ‘I told you so’ they do not actually say the words out loud. 

----- 

Kim Jaejoong does not show his face anywhere for a week. 

Yunho doesn’t particularly care at all, if the strange student wants to transfer into Hogwarts and promptly slack off and fail, disgrace himself and his family? So be it. How Slytherin of him. 

That isn’t necessarily true he knows, the snakes are proud and cunning but they’re also rottener than the rest of them, in his opinion.  They’re Slytherin, he’s Gryffindor, they aren’t supposed to get along anyway and that suits Yunho just fine. 

He doesn’t care at all about the new student who had appeared one day, sweeping through the Great Hall like an evil spirit and then disappearing the next. It is a good way to function through life and school- to mind one’s own business, focus on one’s own studies. 

Unfortunately... 

“They say he’s a descendent of Salazar,” Junsu gossips eagerly, pressing his hands together as they settle down at the end of their table in the library, “Taylor H., from Ravenclaw, says he saw Kim Jaejoong chatting up a snake with Professor Snape-” 

“What kind of snake are people saying it was again?” Changmin cuts in, deadpan as though Junsu had completely missed the point. 

A point Yunho picks up on immediately with a grimace, what a vile accusation. 

“It was... oh gross. Dude, you don’t think- Snape is like-” 

“Professor Snape is an honorable, fair man. Mind your tongues if you hope to keep them,” Yunho interrupts, scowling, “You have more pressing things to focus on, don’t you think so?” 

Professor Snape is one of his favorite professors, it doesn’t help that he has been the ace of potions in his year- oh since the day he had stepped into Hogwarts at eleven. It isn’t arrogance, he has every right to brag about his natural talent at his favorite subject. He’s a Gryffindor and still Snape’s favorite student and that says enough without Yunho having to preen about it too much. 

“Well... whatever,” Junsu’s tone is bright after a grim pause, like he hasn’t been threatened at all, “If he isn’t a parselmouth, where the hell is he? None of the professors have said anything- Ravenclaw are all up in arms because they lost points last year when someone ditched class and now the snakes have a missing student. I mean... that is kind of unfair.” 

“Unless the professors and headmaster are aware. They probably excused him,” seriously, Yunho needs new friends, “Kim Jaejoong is a transfer student. South Korea doesn’t even have a wizarding school, if you remember? He probably attended Mahoutokoro and that school is tiny compared to Hogwarts.” 

“Oh! Do you think he speaks Japanese?” 

“Do you think he knows how to make real Korean food?” is what Changmin seems more interested in, and Yunho doesn’t even bother to pretend he doesn’t roll his eyes. 

If he were... something else. One of them, Gryffindor he might understand- even if he were Hufflepuff. Kim Jaejoong is not, and he cannot really grasp what is going on when his friends are losing their marbles over a stranger they do not and will never really know. 

“Why don’t you ask his housemates, then?” Yunho’s tone is even, but he is snapping at them all the same, sliding a book out of the pile on the center of the table so he can flip through the pages, “we have potions with Slytherin tomorrow morning.” 

That, that is what gets both Junsu and Changmin to shut up. He thinks they’ve finally opened their books to begin studying until he glances up to see the pair gaping at him like he is a three headed dog. 

He has Quidditch practice in an hour and a half, thank goodness, plenty of time to get away from the both of them. Days like these are the ones that make Yunho regret passing up on being a beater in order to play keeper instead, he would love to hit something. 

Surely, he will win this staring contest though, through Junsu who withers as he narrows his eyes just barely. The exuberant boy flinches and then bounces in his seat, roughly elbows Changmin who winces and therefore concedes as well with a huff. 

Accepting his loss, Junsu fumbles, “have you gone mad?” 

Has he- has he gone mad? Has Jung Yunho gone mad??? 

Perhaps, because he can practically feel the vein in his neck twitch in agitation as he grits his teeth. 

Junsu is looking at Changmin for help, the youngest of their trio caves- weak, “why would we ask the snakes about Kim Jaejoong?” 

The question doesn’t sound any less stupid from Changmin’s mouth than it would have from Junsu’s. 

“You’ve been talking about him since you heard his name...” 

“Half of our year is talking about him,” is the way Junsu defends himself, “I’m just curious, okay? Does he speak Korea? Japanese? Can he speak three languages? Does he know how to make bulgogi?” 

“Why do you even care?” is what Yunho doesn’t understand. 

“Because I haven’t been to Korea since I was a little kid to visit one of my aunts!” Junsu is much too loud for the library. 

That, he supposes, he can almost understand. They’re all about the same. Their families are settled around in England and have been for a long time, it’s been a while since Yunho has been exposed to Korean culture that wasn’t some seemingly old person tradition his parents held onto. Kim Jaejoong was their age- he probably spoke the language, something they could all do too, but it was fumbling, sort of, edged by a British accent. 

He can almost accept this, even if it doesn’t make the near obsession less strange. 

“So, you both... want to be friends with Kim Jaejoong?” Yunho asks slowly, brow furrowing. 

That was... new, unexpected wasn’t it? Actually, that was something he could respect, maybe admire. 

If Junsu looked less like he had been slapped by a dead fish, eyes wide and mouth opening and closing. 

Changmin recovers first, with a rude snort, “oh please. Like we would want anything to do with one of those awful snakes. Junsu’s got the IQ of a toddler but he isn’t actually stupid. It’s more like watching a new specimen in a cage?” 

Something slams, not too far away. Yunho can’t tell if it is the sound of a book snapping shut or if it is said book being throwing to the floor or shoved into a shelf, but it is loud, louder than their voices and so close by. 

The colour drains from Changmin’s face rapidly, and Junsu looks like he is having another run in with Myrtle, and Yunho tells himself to shrug because he doesn’t care. He doesn’t, care that is, and yet he turns around slowly all the same. 

Kim Jaejoong is standing just paces away, having stepped out from behind a bookshelf. The boy with obsidian hair looks absolutely strange, his robes are open, hanging lose from his form and underneath he is wearing tight fitting red jeans with all sorts of tears littering the fabric with a light grey t-shirt, it is all wrong and improper. Even the girls in their skirts don’t show off that much of their thighs. 

The Slytherin doesn’t say a word, but he does scoff, rolling his eyes as he storms out of the library. 

Belatedly, he realizes Jaejoong might have looked... something beyond pissed. Hurt- upset? He wasn’t looking at his face too much though, because he had no respect for their dress code, turning up like that... 

“I think he heard you,” Yunho supplies a little snidely as he pivots his head back to stare at his friends, they’re idiots indeed. 

Yunho might almost feel bad for the boy who heard them gossiping so rudely- but as soon as he has the thought it passes, finding he is completely indifferent to the feelings of the stranger. 

----- 

They see him, the next morning, for the first time. Sort of. 

Of course, it isn’t the actual first time they see him, but Kim Jaejoong is settled in the potions room the morning following the library incident. He arrived early, it seems, extremely early. 

Yunho, Changmin and Junsu are almost always the first to arrive into the learning space, it’s been that way since a few weeks into their first year, since Yunho had realized how satisfying potion work was. Over the years he had bonded, sort of, with Professor Snape and though it didn’t award any practical advantage when it came to class work, he already has a pre-emptive invitation to study to become a potions master under the man if he can keep serious interest until he graduates.  

He intends to, because he would be insane not to, and because he isn’t really interested in following his families career path and becoming an auror. Of course, he has tentative offers there too, as a fifth year which would be brag worthy... if Yunho wanted to be an auror, or if Yunho was foolish enough not to realize the too early offer only existed because of his family. He has no interest in riding his family’s coattails...  

So, potions master it is, naturally.  

It is only slightly bothersome, the Slytherin student who had so carelessly skipped a week of classes was now the first to arrive, like some kind of weird teacher’s pet. That was a title Yunho would have, if he was a snake. Since he resides in Gryffindor, despite being Snape’s favorite, nobody seriously considers that he is in fact a teacher’s pet. It is all willful ignorance, if nobody talks about Slyherin’s house head favoring Gryffindor’s golden boy in year five it simply isn’t a thing.  

Kim Jaejoong is tucked into the back of the room though, like he is trying to hide away and go unnoticed, by arriving nearly twenty minutes early to class was hardly tactical social invisibility... Well, not immediately. Once more students began to file in it would be clever, but the timing wasn’t great. 

Yunho doesn’t open his mouth, he doesn’t greet or comment and neither do his friends, but they do converse quietly amongst themselves before breaking off into their seats as class draws closer to its actual time slot and more students begin to filter in.  

He is partnered with Junsu, like he always is.  

Kim Jaejoong remains seated alone when the last students finally filter in. Gryffindor and Slytherin’s numbers had been perfectly even for year five until the transfer student appeared. 

They’ve had the same year mates for five years; it makes sense everyone remains settled in their respective pairs and friend groups instead of venturing off toward the new kid. Kim Jaejoong could be popular, he’s got the face for it and being fresh new talent from another school he would expect some of the Slytherin to snatch him up. 

The students from Mahoutokoro are famous for their potion skills, seeing as they won the Wizarding Schools Potions Championship the last three times it has been held... The school went from not even attending to dominating. The next championship will be next year, Yunho intends to win it.  

Luckily he has time, and if it weren’t for Kim Jaejoong being a snake, he might have been interested in approaching the boy to see what it was that had made the Japanese school so dominant, so special at potions recently. 

Halfway through their class, about fifty minutes in specifically, all thoughts of asking the transfer student about potions at Mahoutokoro goes up in smoke. Literally. 

There is a sudden crackle and then something explodes. There is a collective gasp and silence falls, interrupted only by the sound of twenty-eight bodies turning in near perfect unison to look at the back of the room. 

“Kim Jaejoong,” Snape is the first to speak up, rushing from his spot by his desk toward the boy.  

The professor’s tone is his usual indifference, but there is just the faintest tick of concern that shows around the slight frown of his mouth and the worry that furrows his brow.  

Only then does Yunho actually look. The Slytherin is only halfway on his feet, stool overturned from where he scrambled away, the only reason he isn’t on the floor is because of the wall he has himself plastered against. Pale shaking fingertips are clutching at dark robes, but he doesn’t look harmed, maybe just a little... singed, the smell of burnt fabric is heavy in the air, along with the smoke and something positively rotten that smells a bit like decaying flesh.  It is hard to tell though, because it looks like the snake is attempting to completely curl up and hide in his robes. 

Was Jaejoong even trying to make the same potion they were? What an idiot. 

“Let me see,” the professor demands. 

They’re all watching, and the boy with obsidian hair knows it, nervous eyes sweeping across the room before returning to Snape. His eyes are big and round and dark, looking too large for his face and a lot like those of a mooncalf. The way the Slytherin shakes his head is almost undetectable, but Yunho notices, and so does their professor. 

A complete and utter moron. If the fool has managed to maim or injure himself, he shouldn’t hide it, that will just get the school into trouble when his parents complain. What an move- 

Just as much of an move at the professor curling his fingers around one of Kim Jaejoong’s wrists and squeezing, the pained gasp is instant and then fabric is rustling, pushed up a pale forearm. 

Yunho doesn’t rise from his seat or scramble to get a look, but most of their class does. From where he is sitting he can see the splatter pattern of burns that paint Jaejoong’s skin with a wince. His arms wont spontaneously melt off or anything but that certain isn’t pleasant. 

“Don’t ing touch me,” the boy snarls, defiant as he jerks his arm free. 

Some of the Gryffindors gasp, and the Slytherins glare. 

“Very well, mister Kim,” Snape drones, turning away from the boy, “That will be thirty points from Slytherin. Ten for your reckless behavior and twenty for your foul language. I’ll see you for detention as well for the remainder of this week.” 

The Slytherin students are the ones gasping now, the agitation is practically thrumming in the air, vibrating to life.  So early into the school year, thirty points hurts and the look on Kim Jaejoong’s face says it all; like he doesn’t care about house points. At all. 

Still, for Slytherin’s house head to be so harsh, well it is expected and not. Of course, he favors his house, not to a point of ignoring bad behavior but the penalty usually isn’t so harsh. Then again, Jaejoong hasn’t had five years of training to learn to avoid pissing off the potions master. 

“Jung Yunho,” he’s alert at the sound of his name, squaring his shoulders as he turns to face forward in his seat, chin inclined slightly. 

“Yes professor?” he recites politely. 

“Please Kim Jaejoong to the hospital wing.” 

Well that... he supposes he should have seen that coming. One of his housemates would be the better, but there is a lot of animosity on the other side of the room. 

His potion is just about done, Junsu is perfectly capable to oversee it to completion. 

“Of course, professor,” he wants to protest, but he won’t. 

Sliding his things into his bag, just in case, Yunho straightens up and glanced toward the back of the room. Luckily Jaejoong is also gathering his things, albeit slowly. 

---- 

Jaejoong doesn’t speak to him the entire trip to the infirmary. The boy doesn’t so much as look at him. 

When Yunho tells him to be more careful after they arrive the Slytherin looks him up and down, lips curling and brow furrowing like he is the most repulsive thing the other boy has ever had the displeasure of look at him. 

“Go yourself,” is what he sneers. 

Yunho is startled by the reaction for only a moment before fury flickers to life within him. 

He is Jung Yunho.  

Nobody talks to him that way. 

Even the other Slytherins don’t bother him, he ignores them and they ignore him. 

He winds up storming out of the infirmary like a child. 

He does not like Kim Jaejoong. 

----- 

As it turns out, nobody liked Jaejoong.  

Even the Slytherin house seemed to have turned a cold shoulder to the boy. 

Honestly, Yunho can see why, he is sort of a disaster all around. 

From what he’s heard, despite his efforts not to, Kim Jaejoong single-handedly embarrassed the whole of Ravenclaw’s fifth year in transfiguration. The house had held the top three slots of the year, so far, in the class. They now held second and third. 

Slytherin and Ravenclaw’s joint charms class was about as disastrous for the Ravenclaws, though they hadn’t held the top slots for the year, they had been knocked out of third by Kim Jaejoong. 

Hufflepuff didn’t have as much outright animosity toward the boy, being Hufflepuff that wasn’t a surprise, but the boy was apparently icy and crude which was enough to unsettle the rather kind house that they were. Being an unfriendly snake wasn’t a surprise, though. 

The natural balance of dislike between Gryffindor and Slytherin really couldn’t get any worse, he was pretty sure. 

Sure, he personally disliked Kim Jaejoong, but he was, dare Yunho think, the most popular Slytherin among his house. 

It wasn’t because they liked him, of course. 

Gryffindor ‘liked’ Kim Jaejoong for the same reasons Slytherin hated him. 

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