Chapter Text
But the story is not over yet.
Aziraphale sat in the first row, calm and composed with Crowley by his side trying to catch his breath. The room wasn't very big and he felt that the walls were closing in on him.
"Relax, I got you," Aziraphale said with a wide smile, holding his hand.
Barty Crouch, the judge, was sitting at the bench with two people at his right and two others at his left. There were at least ten more people from the Ministry in the circular room and more outside, trying to peek inside or listen. Reporters weren’t the most empathetic people, not in the muggle world nor in the wizardly world.
Mr. Morningstar, Lucifer's father, and the Headmaster, Lucifer's mother, were seated at different sides of the room avoiding looking at each other.
Something in Crowley’s stomach twisted in discomfort. Usually the trials were held in elegant, bigger and brighter rooms, full of people from the Ministry. This courtroom was small and claustrophobic and far fewer people could fit in. This was one of the old courtrooms that still existed to this day, used only in special trials.
But it also looked and felt private. The lack of people around them seemed only to cement that Mr. Morningstar was probably aware of the verdict too, and decided to pull some strings to at least spare his son and himself the sour shame of being known to have committed such acts.
Crowley kept shifting nervously in the chair and Aziraphale squeezed his hand. "Are you all right, Crowley?" Aziraphale murmured. Crowley wasn't feeling all right. He didn't want to be there. He wanted to get out and breathe some fresh air.
"I–" The door opened and everyone in the room turned to look towards it.
Two Aurors entered the room walking one Lucifer Morningstar down the hall, handcuffed and braced by guards.
"This is… a kid,” said the judge. "Here says that..."
"Yes,” said one Auror, giving him a new paper with the boy’s name and other information. "Yes sir. Every word."
The judge looked at the young boy standing before him in the place where he had faced murderers and war criminals, among others. But never a child. He banged the gavel and proceeded to read with a clear voice.
"Morningstar, Lucifer... seventeen years old." He paused, looking again at the boy. "Seventh year Hogwarts student of Slytherin House. You are charged with the following crimes:
“Forming an illegal class to teach Dark Arts. Multiple usages of the Obliviate Spell. Multiple usages of the Imperius Curse. Multiple usages of the Cruciatus Curse. Use of the Avada Kedavra Curse." He paused again. A child, he thought. I convicted people for far less than this child has attempted. “Using the Petrification curse on four students, ranging from eleven to fourteen years of age and attempted murder of another, a fifteen-year-old boy. And… attempted first degree murder of Fell, Aziraphale twice, the first time by using the Imperius Curse to force another student to use a curse you designed, called Sectumsempra, and the second time by using the Death Curse yourself.” The judge closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He looked to his left and to his right where both parents were staring, expressionless. Then he looked at the chairs where two students were looking back at him.
“Do you have anything to say in your defence before we proceed to examine the evidence?"
Lucifer had bowed his head while the accusations were being read. He slowly raised it, too slowly, as if it was heavy. Trying to focus his vision, he examined the room carefully. Dizzy, he felt dizzy. He took a deep breath, as if he had forgotten to do it or so it seemed. Time marched differently in his current mental state.
"They haven't done anything."
"Who, Morningstar?"
"Whoever you charged along with me."
"Give us names."
"Why? You should already know."
"Is he okay?" asked the judge, seeing Lucifer swaying on his feet. The Aurors shrugged.
One of them spoke, "We gave him the same dose of Veritaserum as we give to everybody."
"This is a kid; you can't give him as much Veritaserum as an adult!" Lucifer’s father shouted.
"Silence,” the judge said. "Give him a chair. He is an unarmed and drugged boy, for Merlin's sake." Lucifer sat with the Aurors' help. Crowley looked at the Headmaster, sitting a couple of feet away from him. She was staring at Lucifer intensely with her jaw clenched.
Aziraphale watched Lucifer carefully. He moved with difficulty, slowly, breathing heavily. His eyes wandered around lazily until they met Aziraphale's. Sharp. Aziraphale was pierced for just a second with a look that was dangerously, impossibly sharp for a person who was supposedly this drugged.
Lucifer swallowed, trying to water his dry mouth.
"How do you plead, Mr. Morningstar?"
"To which crimes?"
"This is stupid." The judge said, "Gave me the wand."
The first Auror held out a long, rectangular box with a wand inside. The other Auror took it and aimed it at his own and said " reveal .” Green smoke came from the wand; in the air it formed a skull.
"Confirmed then," the Auror said. "The last spell used was the Death Curse."
"Is this your wand, Mr. Morningstar?"
"Yes."
“Can the parents confirm that this is not a trick and it’s in fact, the one you bought for him when he turned 11 years old?”
“Yes,” the Headmaster said, with her eyes closed. She said it quickly, like pulling a bandage off a still bleeding wound. The judge turned his head to the father.
“Yes,” he said reluctantly, glaring at his ex-wife with a sense of betrayal.
"Have you used the Death Curse against Aziraphale Fell, Lucifer?"
"Yes."
"When you attacked the Hufflepuff students was it a premeditated murder?"
"I didn't attack them."
"Who attacked them, then?"
"The Basilisk,” he said, smug as only he could be in this situation.
"Right,” the judge said, with an incredulous expression at the audacity of the kid. “Did you open the Chamber of Secrets and release the Basilisk?"
"I didn't."
Crowley shivered. It was impossible to distinguish if what he felt was rage, shame, or guilt. The very same lie. But it wasn't a lie. That's how Lucifer liked to play, that's how he toyed. Lucifer never lies. He just toys with you, deciding how much of the truth you deserve to know. And that's why Crowley was there.
"Raphael Crowley. To the stand, please," the judge said. Another child . He looked at the papers and read these horrible spells that Lucifer had used on Crowley: Imperius, Obliviate, and forcing him to attack his own friend. Poor child . He looked at the other one who was with him, the one who survived the Death Curse, who had been left bleeding on the floor, who was even younger than the other two. The judge wondered if at that age he would have survived what that kid endured.
"We are going to proceed to watch the memories you gave us as other evidence. Are you all right with this?"
"Yes."
The judge moved his wand and the room filled with faint blue images. Lucifer was everywhere, again and again, the ethereal figure who aimed the wand at the real Crowley and said Imperio and Crowley hissed. Imperio , and more hissing. Imperio, and the Chamber opened. Imperio. Imperio. Imperio. Again and again.
More images of a ghostly Lucifer appeared, from all directions, from different angles, all with the same hurtful expression. I'm sorry Starmaker, I love you Starmaker, I'm sorry, I'm really sorry, I love you. Obliviate. Obliviate. Obliviate.
Hundreds. Three years of the Imperius and Obliviate spells surrounded Crowley.
The image of Lucifer forcing Crowley to open the door of the Chamber to face the Basilisk appeared, and Lucifer ordering him : “Tell him to petrify kids from Hufflepuff." Five times.
“Start with a student from first year. Make Aziraphale nervous.” “Then another from second year. I want Fell to feel the fear.” “Next one from third year. Make sure he is struck down closer to the Hufflepuff Common Room, so Aziraphale feels the guilt.” “For the fourth-year student, make sure this one looks like he was attacked and not just petrified.” “As for the fifth-year student, make him bleed. You will need the blood. I want you to deliver a message for me.”
Then there were the images of Lucifer, raging and shouting, "because I want Aziraphale dead!" Then he disappeared just to appear again. "Imperio," he said again. "You are going to forget everything you saw here, Crowley," and now Aziraphale's ethereal figure was there too. "Use the spell I taught you. Leave him here to bleed and come with me, Starmaker." Then Crowley's voice: "Sectumsempra."
And then all the memories vanished as the smoke of which they were made cleared. The room returned to its usual dark aspect. The blue light disappeared.
"I think this is enough,” the judge said. Crowley returned to his seat alongside Aziraphale again, avoiding looking at the real Lucifer.
"Do you want to say something in your defense, before the verdict, Mr. Morningstar?" Lucifer was quiet, looking at the floor, completely gone. The judge let him have a moment, as dizzy as he was, to process everything.
"I'm not evil." It felt like a bucket of cold water dropped on Crowley’s head. "I just wanted to be better, to learn, to teach. I wanted to be better."
"Morningstar Lucifer, you’re sentenced to Azkaban."
It was done. It was final. It was the last time Crowley had to see him. He had avoided looking at Lucifer during the trial. As the Aurors took him out of the court under heavy guard, Crowley lifted his head, and he met the lilac eyes one last time. Crowley was expecting rage, hurt, revenge, emptiness, pity. Anything would be better than seeing Lucifer smiling at him empathetically.
Crowley shook, as Lucifer was taken away, saying peacefully, "I'll miss you, my Starmaker."
Aziraphale had to resist the urge to attack Lucifer right there. Crowley needed him more.
Crowley walked into the Headmaster’s office, empty as it always was when he needed it. The Cauldron was in place as it always was for him. But he didn’t need it today. He walked to the shelf where the Sorting hat rested. He pulled a chair and climbed onto it and took the hat from its comfortable place.
“I have a question.” Crowley said sitting on the Headmaster’s desk with the hat.
“It doesn’t surprise me,” the hat responded wearily but kindly. “Shoot, kid.”
“You offered me the choice between Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff. But you also said to me one time, ‘If only I had put you in Hufflepuff none of this would have happened.’’ ”
“Yes, I said that.”
“What does that mean?” Hats don’t have eyebrows, but the Sorting Hat lifted his non-existing eyebrows nonetheless.
“Explain yourself, boy.”
“I mean, did you put me in Ravenclaw just to keep me away from... him ?” Crowley asked. The Sorting Hat said nothing to that, it had been just weeks since the trial. One couldn’t blame the boy for not wanting to say his name. “Do you think I really have the heart of a Hufflepuff? Or…”
“ Or…? ”
The Basilisk’s voice came to his memories, it was a memory that kept playing in his mind. “Is he Salazar Slytherin’s heir?” His own voice said. “Would you like to be?” the Basilisk answered.
“Or I am a Slytherin?” Crowley’s voice came out odd, the Sorting Hat would have liked to have arms to put his hand on the child’s shoulders and comfort him. To be torn from something that forges the personality of children from such a young age, and everybody in the wizardly world thought as an absolute irrevocable truth, was difficult. To be caught for seven years between two different Houses, to try to act like one, to disguise. Crowley didn’t have one thing that other students had: a side to call his own. Sympathy grew in the Sorting Hat’s non-existent heart.
“ Look boy, did you know that your friend came every single day to this office during his Fifth and Sixth year? I’ve seen him every single one of those days. And I can swear to you that that boy is a Hufflepuff. But do you know why?” The Sorting Hat leaned towards Crowley, as if he were telling him a secret. “Because he wants to be one.”
“Being hardworking and persistent are some of the Hufflepuff’s main traits, but if he could, he would live his life drinking cocoa and eating cake with his nose in a book. But he is brave, he had looked death in the eye and came back and looked it straight in the eye again. He called death ‘dear’ to his own face just to provoke him. He was left bleeding on the floor to die and still came back. Godric Gryffindor would give him his sword without a second thought.
“Aziraphale is a clever boy, intelligent. But you already know that don’t you?” Crowley smiled, and nodded, not entirely sure of where the Sorting Hat was going with that. “And in case you didn’t know it, ambition is not a bad thing to have. And ambition is not about power or glory. It’s to set a goal and to strive to achieve it. He had a clear goal and worked for it. And yes, he is kind and he is earnest. He has all the traits of all the houses. But boy, it’s not the traits we have that define us, it’s what we choose, why we make the decisions we make. He is kind because he wants to be. And he is a Hufflepuff not because he is kind but because he chooses to be.
“Now, Crowley. You chose that name, didn’t you? You have great qualities, and to answer your question: yes, you could be a Slytherin. And yes, I still believe you could be an odd but very good Hufflepuff and you showed Hogwarts that you were an amazing Ravenclaw. And boy, you are brave, going into the mouth of the snake again and again, holding the hand of the demon of your nightmares. But it’s time for you to make your final decision: what is the trait that you value the most? ”
Crowley looked at the hat and processed everything in his mind. He lifted the Sorting Hat. It’s layers of old leather contorted into something that resembled a smile as Crowley placed it on his head.
“Hmmm, some excellent traits, boy, let’s see. Are you ready?” Crowley inhaled deeply, his heart beating fast. And his answer came not in words but in an object falling from the inside of the hat.
Confused, Crowley replaced the hat on the desk and put his hand on top of his head. “I thought you would like to have it,” said the Sorting Hat as Crowley regarded an old necklace he thought he would never see again. Crowley held it close to his chest, the necklace shining with strong blue and gold light against his heart.
“Then, what were you saying is the thing you treasure the most, Crowley?”
With five students petrified, one of them violently attacked and another student thrown in prison it wasn’t the best year to graduate from Hogwarts, but Crowley managed to do it anyway, and with honours. Raphael Anthony Crowley got top grades in all his classes and in the meantime had managed to teach Herbology, train snakes, forge his own spell, create stars, an invisibility cloak, a map, invisible ink and a pair of cool glasses. However he also joined a secret dark club, mastered some Dark Arts, opened the Chamber of Secrets, talked to a Basilisk, became an illegal Animagus and even survived a psychopathic ex-boyfriend who manipulated him into performing almost deadly acts and then wiped his memory of them. He assured Aziraphale that his postgraduate books were going to be phenomenal.
He also decided that he was going to dedicate all of them to Aziraphale.
It was his last day at Hogwarts and in a couple of hours they were going to take the Hogwarts Express. Meanwhile Aziraphale and Crowley decided that the best way to spend Crowley’s last night at the castle that saw him grow and play pranks and overcome the darkness that threatened him through the years was to have a picnic at 11 pm in the Astronomy Tower, under the light of thousands of golden and light-blue stars. He wouldn’t want to lose the habit of breaking some rules.
“A toast to you, top of your class, and for your future phenomenal books.” Something about hearing Aziraphale saying phenomenal was utterly adorable. “San Mungo will be a great place having you as a healer.”
“Yeah, about that Aziraphale. I changed my mind.” It was really a little bit too late to change his mind, but he had been talking to the Headmaster the past week and she was happy to see Crowley smiling again after all he had gone through under her nose, so helping him with his career decisions was the least she could do.
“Even if it was for a year, and with no memory, and in a Dark Club, nonetheless I enjoyed teaching. And after all what Lucifer did, I think I owe this school an apology,” he said petting the floor, Aziraphale giggled. “I was a problem child from my first day to my last. I mean, we are dining under my not-entirely-legal-yet stars at a not very legal hour either. But I wanted to do harmless mischief, not all of that ,” he said, gesturing vaguely, Aziraphale smiled at him empathetically, caressing his hand tenderly with his thumb. Even if Crowley looked a lot better now, the guilt, the remorse, the pain, were still there.
“I need to pay for the horrible things I let him do and I should have listened to you earlier. He was not right in his actions. But I think like him in some ways; I would encourage the students to ask, to learn. Maybe if I become a teacher, I could help students like Lucifer before they do something unforgivable. My hands are stained with blood. I can’t see it, but I feel it. I can’t let something like this happen again.” Aziraphale didn’t talk; he was looking at Crowley. He was the person Lucifer had hurt the most, and there he was, still wanting to help people like Lucifer. The Sorting Hat was right after all.
But Crowley wasn’t one for feelings, and grinned widely, “Also, Aziraphale I realized that one year without me was going to be boring as hell for you.” Aziraphale huffed but looked at him with a gaze too fond to be really annoyed. Crowley grinned. “So I asked the Headmaster to allow me to do my master’s degree work here at Hogwarts. I will be during further study in Herbology with Professor Sprout and probably become a headache to Professor Sinistra here in the Astronomy Tower. Maybe when I become a teacher I can show her my stars.” Aziraphale's laugh was loud and joyful. He was so fortunate to have Crowley in his life.
Seeing Aziraphale laughing and smiling by his side, Crowley couldn’t understand how, all this time, he could have considered Lucifer his best friend when Aziraphale was right there. It was time to finally leave Lucifer in the past. Aziraphale was his future and was standing right next to him, ready for him. He had waited for him for so long. “Do you think I would be a good teacher, angel?”
“Dearest, I think you will be the best one.”
Dearest sounded wonderful coming from Aziraphale’s lips. Everything Aziraphale’s lips did was wonderful. His sweet smile, his old-fashioned words that made him sound like a gay uncle who owned a bookshop, his laugh, the way he pronounced Crowley’s name. The way he said dearest . Everything about Aziraphale was wonderful.
They sat in silence now, but they couldn’t look away from each other. Crowley had been so blind all these years. With a soft careful motion Crowley caressed Aziraphale’s hand. Aziraphale smiled. It was a slow dance of fingers until Crowley finally took Aziraphale’s hand fully. Under the light of the stars Aziraphale’s eyes were bright blue, sparkling. Crowley remembered– oh, how he loved to remember –the night when he had gifted Aziraphale his first star and how close they were. He should have kissed him then and he wasn’t going to lose another opportunity.
It was a tender and soft first kiss, chaste and respectful and so long awaited. They laughed, pressing their foreheads together, timid, still holding hands.
“Whoa there, Aziraphale. You just kissed me? I would have never thought you had a crush on me,” Crowley joked, kissing Aziraphale’s hand softly, then he broke into a wide smile. Aziraphale just rolled his eyes, incapable of hiding his own smile.
“Oh for God’s sake, Crowley,” Aziraphale said, exasperated and playful. He reached for Crowley’s glasses, waited for his permission, and the other nodded. Melted gold, not human eyes, met Aziraphale’s bright blue ones. He smiled and now Crowley rolled his eyes. He could even taste the honey dripping from Aziraphale’s gaze as he held Crowley’s face between his warm hands.
“I love you so much, my dearest.” Crowley wanted to groan from how blatantly sweet and soft Aziraphale was but instead he just kissed him again.
It turned into a more romantic kiss, as if kissing each other was the most natural thing for them to do. It was modest and affectionate. They continued kissing under the starlight. Longing to touch, they hugged, precious and intimate. They couldn’t stop smiling between kisses; they were happy and together at last.
“I love you too, angel.”
Fin
Oh, wait, no, that wasn’t the end.
The two students looked quickly to the right, then to the left, then to the right again.
"Come on, we're going to be late."
"And whose fault is it, Adam?" the Slytherin asked. Adam dismissed him with a grin and huff, blowing a lock of his curly hair away from where it was resting over his nose.
After carefully looking back and forth Adam said, "Old Shadwell should be passing by in three, two..." and as he counted to one, Shadwell appeared, followed by a seventh-year Ravenclaw student.
“... because a good caretaker must have his eyes open, has to have all five senses sharp as a blade," Shadwell said as he walked past Adam and Warlock, unaware of them, as Newt spotted them and whispered "hurry" to the two boys.
"Ar' ya' listenin' boy?" He said.
"Yes Mr. Shadwell!"
And as quickly as they had come, they disappeared, turning to the right on the next hallway, taking with them the light from Newt's wand.
The corridor was now dark, illuminated only by the moonlight coming from the tinted windows, and silent, when Warlock said, "A race to Professor Crowley's office?" with a grin.
Adam spread his arms and shrugged, as if uninterested, "Oh no I don't know, Warlock," before a wide smile bloomed on his face, as he said, "See you there, loser," and started running with the Slytherin behind him.
One turn to the right, Adam in the lead.
Two turns to the left and Warlock was now in the lead.
One more turn to the left and Adam was just a couple of feet ahead of his friend, when he collided with a white figure.
There were rumours around the school about the ghost of a woman roaming the halls at night, fully dressed in white. Adam, who was a student who would roam the halls a night as much as he roamed during the day, had never seen the ghost, much less bumped into her.
But the woman was extremely solid for a ghost.
It wasn’t that the Headmaster was no longer in the castle, or that she had left her job. But since Lucifer, even after the students that he attacked had healed and long graduated and had left the school, she felt unable to meet with students individually, and returned to focusing on her principal job of attending to administration of the school and teachers.
Now that Crowley was a professor he was hard to get rid of. Schools from around the world were constantly offering him better jobs, but since he became a professor at Hogwarts no one could convince him to leave, not that she wanted him to go. Not to leave the school, not even leave her office when he has decided that she has been alone too many days. It was good to have him there.
He was good—not only good—but one of the best professors. He was strict but approachable, the students seemed to love him.
And to have Aziraphale. Not that she was going to say out loud that she liked it better when Aziraphale came to visit her with tea and cookies, and she could expect a night of calm chats, instead of Crowley bringing wine and asking (or sometimes explaining) a lot of weird things. She was still trying to fully understand their last conversation about dolphins and bananas.
The library had seen better days in terms of organisation but had never been more loved and filled with happy faces. As soon as people entered they could feel the love surrounding them. Students enjoyed being there, and that's a lot to say for a school library, and it was all due to Aziraphale, the new librarian after Miss Pince retired.
The headmaster knew that when her time to leave came, the school would be in good, capable and loving hands with those two taking care of it and its students.
"What are you up to being out of bed this late, boy?" She gave Adam a shrewd look; his hair impossibly untamed, an innocent expression that could fool someone less trained and less sharp-eyed than her. There were nights she had nightmares about eyes remarkably like these, and nights in which she missed those eyes with all her heart. "Surely not causing any trouble, I imagine,” she said, with a complicit smile.
"No, Miss. I would never." Adam said, shaking his head, trying to appear innocent.
The Headmaster pouted. "Shame. It has been a lot of time since this school saw a good troublemaker or..." She squinted her eyes, spotting Warlock hiding in the shadows, "two. What are your names?"
"Adam, Adam Young, from Gryffindor, Miss."
"Warlock Dowling, from Slytherin."
"Well, Adam, Warlock," a warm smile softening her face, "I think you were rather in a hurry. I wouldn’t want to keep you any longer, go ahead, and be careful."
And with that, she resumed her walk humming what sounded like “The Sound of Music,” and the two boys hurried to Crowley's office.
“You don’t usually smile like that,” the Sorting Hat said from his shelf. “What happened?”
The Headmaster looked at her desk, a young boy smiled at her from a picture. Sharp eyes and innocence, and impossibly untamed hair. She shook her head.
“I feel like I had the chance to see his eyes again.”
"You two are late!" Brian, from third year Hufflepuff, opened the door and rushed Warlock and Adam inside, "I’m glad that you are finally here; he is having a meltdown."
"I'M NOT!" Crowley’s leg was jumping up and down. He was sitting in the chair behind his desk and tap-tapping his fingers into his crossed arms while anxiety ran through his veins.
"You're ready!" Wensleydale said with a bright smile, admiring the braids he had woven into Crowley’s long red hair.
"You look very pretty; don’t be nervous." Pepper smiled from the corner of the room, laughing at Crowley sticking out his snake-like tongue at her.
"Okay, everybody remembers the plan?" Crowley stood up, wiping his hands on his trousers —wondering why his palms were suddenly so sweaty — and all his students nodded while leaving the office, surrounding him like pigeons around an old grandma feeding them cookie crumbs.
"Oh, fuck!" Crowley cursed, already out of the office. "Fuck, you didn’t hear me say fuck. Adam, can you go back to my office? I forgot the most important thing. It's in the first drawer on the right."
“Sure! Be right back.”
Adam rushed back to the office to retrieve the little cream-coloured velvet box from Crowley's desk when something else drew his attention.
Just under the little box was a piece of paper in the handwriting of someone who likes to mess it up for the sole purpose of complicating people's lives. After two years in Professor Crowley's classes you get good at reading it or you get good at asking for your classmate’s notes.
"I swear I am up to no good," Adam read out loud, squinting from the effort of trying to decipher the words.
Next to this, carefully displayed, was a folded parchment with big black letters. “Hello Adam, I hope you're ready to make some mischief. I have high hopes for you.... The Starmaker."
Adam grinned, picking up the map and the little box before rushing outside and reaching his friends and professor.
"Come on, come on, let's go, I don't know how much more time Anathema will manage to keep Aziraphale there!"
It turned out that Anathema had no problem keeping Aziraphale in the library. They both sat silently, reading on couches Aziraphale had brought the first week he was officially in charge of the library. A whole section was dedicated for students to get cozy while reading, that he also often used at night when no one else was there.
"Crowley should be here at any moment now," Anathema said, finishing her tea, putting her mug on the little table between her and Professor Fell.
Without lifting his eyes the book Aziraphale asked, "Should I be worried, dear girl?"
"No, but it would be cool if you could feign surprise."
He hummed, marked the page and left the book alongside Anathema's mug.
"What about this?" he said, forming a perfect O with his mouth, fully exaggerating it, lifting a hand to his cheek. William Snakespeare, Crowley’s long-time companion, hissed at being awakened from his rest around Aziraphale’s neck.
At the same moment, Anathema snorted, the front door of the library opened very, very slightly, only wide enough children to enter, or maybe a snake.
"Hello my darlings, what are you doing at such a late hour?" Aziraphale said as Warlock, Adam and the rest of the Them sat down around him on the floor with legs crossed.
"We're here as an emotional support squad," said Warlock and the rest chimed in. Anathema nodded, watching Aziraphale expectantly.
“And Newton says hi.”
"So?" Aziraphale asked, lifting a refined brow.
"So…” they all answered, and the lights slowly dimmed, and the library was filled with a pleasant bubble of warmth. The students' smiles widened even more. Brian giggled.
Aziraphale looked around him. Ivy started to grow and bloom on the walls. Little forget-me-nots climbed labyrinth-like in-between big angel-wings leaves, sprawling across the wall.
He smiled at the scene, his expression softening with the love blossoming inside him.
Crowley slithered in through the door and resumed his human form. Aziraphale’s necklace pushed against his clothes, trying to open itself. Aziraphale took it off slowly, reverently. "May I ask what this is about, dearest?” He opened it, and the two stars rose to the ceiling, meeting the other two that Crowley had released from his own necklace. Golden and blue joined over his head in a slow dance. Aziraphale tried to keep his composure, but his eyes started to blur.
"I always have been a pain in the ass when it comes to asking questions, don't you think?" Crowley said, perching on the arm of Aziraphale's couch and putting an arm around his shoulders. William Snakespeare hissed again as he lazily left Aziraphale’s neck. Crowley stuck his tongue out at him.
Aziraphale leaned against him, burying his head in Crowley's neck, one hand resting on his leg, the other on Crowley's back.
"It’s not exactly the expression I would use dearest," he said, and Crowley laughed.
"Course not, you're too nice to use that kind of language, but don't think I can't hear that silent ‘but’ there, angel." Brushing his nose against Aziraphale's forehead he left a little kiss there and extended his hand to Adam.
Adam instantly rose from the floor, rushing to give Crowley the little velvet box. Aziraphale inhaled sharply, looking confusedly at him and then at Crowley.
"Hopefully, you won't mind that I pop another question, angel. The big question."
" Crowley ," Aziraphale stopped breathing when Crowley.
"Aziraphale, I love you more than I ever thought I could love someone. And every single day that passes I find myself loving you even more. Even when I had forgotten who you were, you were there for me, and I want to be there for you for as long as you’ll let me. You have been with me through it all, through all the problems and the waiting and..." Crowley paused, inhaled deeply, gulped loudly, swallowing the knot in his throat. He took Aziraphale's hand between his and raised it to his mouth, leaving a chaste kiss on the back. "and the blood an-"
"Crowley, dear," Aziraphale cut off his spiral of unpleasant thoughts from his blood-stained youth. He carefully caressed a lock of long red hair that covered his face, lifted it off and kissed him lovingly . "Crowley, I said once that I wanted to be with you no matter what, and that I would be at your side for as long as you let me. Would you do me the honour of popping the question so I can say yes and see your smile every day for the rest of our lives? Because I’ve been taking it slow for you, but if you don’t do it, I’ll take that ring from you and ask you myself,” he said with a smile.
"Angel, that is the most disgustingly cheesy thing you ever said in your life— and I’ve heard you say a lot of cheesy things—I think I just got a cavity in my tooth. You're ruining the mood." Crowley said with fond amusement hiding behind his wide grin.
"Oh for Merlin's sake, Crowley," said Aziraphale, rolling his eyes, but the adoring tone of his voice betrayed him.
"Angel," Crowley murmured, nuzzling his nose against Aziraphale’s hand, " my angel. "
"Yes Crowley?" Aziraphale giggled, leaning forward so their noses touched.
"Would you marry me?"
"It was about damn time for you to ask, dearest." He said playfully and Crowley made an exaggerated noise at hearing Aziraphale curse. "Of course yes, you foul snake."
Aziraphale giggled and stood up, offering his hand, the other doing a poor job covering his joyful smile and the full blush that colored his face and neck and extended under his bowtie. Crowley rose with him, placed the ring where it belonged, and he where he belonged, embraced by Aziraphale in a tight hug.
"I love you," he said, depositing quick little kisses around Aziraphale's face, making him giggle a lot more.
"I love you too, dearest."
"Good, you better do, because there are no refunds. You're stuck with me now, angel."