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Illya’s hands were beginning to shake—a cautionary sign that magic was beginning to spurt through his veins, hot and thick. He felt dizzy and disoriented. His throat burned too, like it had been scorched with a branding iron, although that could simply be the Firewhisky taking effect.
Napoleon was leaving. He was going to be in danger. And there was nothing Illya could do to stop it.
‘I hope you are both aware that neither of you will be able to contact Solo through magical means or otherwise,’ Waverly intoned. He levelled a grave look at Gaby and Illya. ‘If Grindelwald suspects that Solo did not seek him out of his own accord, and he is indeed a spy for the Ministry, then it could result in a very sticky end, both for Solo and the mission itself. I trust you both understand?’
Illya closed his eyes briefly and clenched his hands into tight fists, resting them on his knees.
‘Of course,’ Gaby replied calmly. She sat in the chair beside him, one pale leg crossed over the other. Her dark robes pooled at her feet. Her hands were primly folded in her lap. Steady, invulnerable, and controlled.
Napoleon lounged gracefully in his own chair, grasping a glass of Muggle scotch in a loose grip. Illya felt his stomach twinge. As always, Napoleon had spurned wizarding robes in favour of a Muggle men’s suit, knowing that the sleek cut of the jacket and vest transformed him into something mesmerising, all sharp edges and long dark lines that Illya could not help but itch to unravel. His black hair had been slicked back and Illya could taste the scent of the pomade on the back of his tongue. Illya loathed that pomade. The cloying scent of it was maddening.
‘Kuryakin?’
Curious blue eyes turned on him and Illya could feel heat brush against his neck. He had been caught staring again.
Illya nodded his head sharply in Waverly’s direction and fixed his gaze on his fists. The pale band of skin on his wrist caused regret to claw at his throat.
Waverly slid a slim parcel towards Napoleon, who plucked it from the desk and examined it idly.
‘Hold on to that tightly, Solo,’ Waverly said with a nod towards the folder. ‘You’ll find a Portkey inside. Try not to reach out to us unless you have particularly pertinent information, and remember—you are not to contact your partners under any circumstances. We want to maintain the appearance that you have severed all ties with the Ministry.’
Napoleon nodded and took a long sip of his scotch. He placed his now empty glass on the edge of Waverly’s desk. Waverly extracted his wand from his robes and flicked it in the direction of the glass, which catapulted through the air, spinning rapidly before landing with a soft clatter on the mental drinks tray in the corner of the office.
‘Grindelwald is notoriously tricky so you should be circumspect with everyone you meet,’ Waverly said. ‘Vigilance is essential to this mission, more than any other you have faced so far.’
‘I shall try to avoid mentioning that I’m an undercover Auror first thing,’ Napoleon replied lightly. ‘I would hate to spoil things so soon.’
Illya had always suspected that Waverly appreciated Napoleon’s particular brand of charming irreverence. Waverly had always been partial to those who could verbally spar with him, an area in which Napoleon had always excelled. Napoleon treated each conversation like an intricate dance, and by comparison Illya had always been clumsy and wrong footed.
Waverly’s lips twitched. ‘I’ll leave that to your discretion, Solo. But do try not to die. You know that I quite abhor dealing with the paperwork.’
‘As you wish, sir.’
‘Right then, I will leave you to say your goodbyes to Miss Teller and Mr Kuryakin. It might be some time before you see them again.’
Waverly slipped from the room and a thick silence engulfed the trio.
‘This is much more sombre than I anticipated,’ Napoleon said. ‘As you both know, I’m an extremely talented Auror. You needn’t look so concerned for my welfare. If I promise to avoid dying will you both stop looking quite so glum? Particularly you, Illya. You’ve been plotting my demise since we were children.’
‘I do not plot to kill you,’ Illya protested gruffly. ‘I never have.’
‘Have you forgotten that duel in fifth year? You jinxed me with a balding spell that took two weeks of hair growth potions to reverse.’
‘That does not count as trying to kill you, Cowboy.’
‘You tried to maim my good looks. It is very nearly the same thing,’ Napoleon countered.
Gaby heaved a deep sigh. ‘I do not get paid nearly enough for this,’ she muttered irritably. ‘I have been dealing with this nonsense since the age of thirteen. That is longer than the average sentence in Azkaban.’
She rose from her chair swiftly and bent to kiss Napoleon on the cheek. She reached out and perfunctorily wiped away the pink smear of lipstick she had left on the sharp ridge of Napoleon’s cheekbone.
‘Do as Waverly says, Napoleon, and try not to die,’ Gaby ordered sternly. ‘No doubt it would be peaceful, but I would miss you.’
‘Thank you, Gaby. I’m touched. Try not to forget me.’
Napoleon raised a hand to his heart in a parody of sorrow. Gaby huffed a laugh and rolled her eyes, before sailing from Waverly’s office without a backwards glance at either of them.
The door clicked shut and Illya was profoundly aware that he was alone with Napoleon who was watching him with a troubling, furtive gleam in his eyes.
‘Will you follow suit, Peril?’ Napoleon drawled. ‘Do I get a kiss from you too?’
Illya loathed the indifferent lilt to Napoleon’s words.
‘Would you like me to revisit balding jinx, Cowboy?’ Illya responded mildly. His heart pounded a painful staccato beat.
He stood abruptly, too quickly to appear natural, and stalked behind Waverly’s desk to stand before the window.
Waverly’s office boasted several quirks that were typical of wizarding architecture. The room was a peculiar hexagon shape and each wall was fitted with broad floor-length windows. Each pane of glass framed a view of a different city. If Illya turned in a circle he would be able to spy the glittering nightscape of Shanghai, the kinetic frenzy of New York, Sydney at daybreak, the languid outline of Paris, or the bright striped domes of St Basil's Cathedral. The sight of the latter still caused longing to pluck at Illya’s heartstrings, even after all this time.
Illya squared his shoulders and stared fixedly at the window placed directly behind Waverley’s desk.
The sky had been cloaked with a dense fog that morning but someone had enchanted the window to provide a continuously clear view of the London skyline. Illya spied the sharp outline of Big Ben, jutting up from the horizon like a spear, and the murky waters of the Thames, which trailed like a dark snake through the city, cleaving London in half.
Napoleon came to stand beside Illya and Illya could finally smell the faint traces of Napoleon’s cologne and the peculiar, faintly spicy scent of his skin. Illya disliked the way the Muggle pomade that Napoleon slicked through his hair veiled his natural fragrance. Illya held onto this thought, trying to keep it concealed but he had already felt the probing pulse, like a ripple in pond water. He felt the familiar spike of anxiety that always came when Napoleon tried to parse through his thoughts.
‘I didn’t know you disliked the pomade,’ Napoleon said, a touch of surprised wonder in his tone. ‘I would have stopped wearing it had I known.’
‘You know I hate it when you do that,’ Illya growled. He had been a victim of Napoleon’s inquisitive nature ever since Napoleon had first started training to be a Legilimens when they were fifteen.
‘Divine your thoughts? I know I promised to only use it when on missions but sometimes this is easier than stumbling through a conversation with you. You will never tell me what you are thinking otherwise.’
‘There is a reason for that. I would like you much more if you let me keep my thoughts to myself,’ Illya grumbled.
‘But I don’t want you to like me,’ Napoleon responded lightly. ‘I want you to adore me. I’ve been telling you for years, Illyusha.’
Illya scoffed and crossed his arms awkwardly, his shoulders hunching inwards. He pushed the flutter in his stomach down, out of fear that it would soar upwards and tangle around his susceptible heart. They had been playing this game for too long and Illya was growing weary.
‘I wish you would be serious.’
There was a protracted pause and not for the first time, Illya wished he could unstitch the inner workings of Napoleon’s mind. He hazarded a glance in Napoleon’s direction and was startled to see Napoleon evaluating him with a wary, defensive gaze.
Napoleon inhaled a brittle breath and closed his eyes. ‘Alright, Illya. How’s this for serious? I’m hopelessly, maddeningly, irredeemably in love with you. I have been for most of my life, in fact. I felt as though I shouldn’t walk into certain death without at least mentioning it once.’
Illya stared at Napoleon blankly. Was this a joke? Yet another instance where Illya was too humourless to understand the jest? He found himself floundering for a response. He opened his mouth, to say what he did not know, and then shut it again.
Napoleon flinched, his composure splintering like a hairline crack in the finest porcelain.
‘To think that I could have been a successful art thief,’ Napoleon muttered. He dragged a hand through his hair, creating finger shaped divots in the slick darkness. ‘I would have been good at it too. I only became a damned Auror so I could be close to you. I’ve spent most of my life trailing after you, Illya. You’re the smartest man I know. How could you not have seen?’
Illya could not help but stare the disorder Napoleon had made of his own hair. It reminded him of when they were still at Hogwarts and Napoleon’s hair would become damp with sweat after a Quidditch match, curls coiling across his forehead and spilling over his ears like a dark halo. His heart thumped an uncertain beat.
‘I did not know…’ Illya said feebly, the words dying in his throat before they could take flight.
He did not know how to respond. There were so many things that Illya was uncertain of—what to make of the wild tangle of joy and despair in his chest, what he was supposed to do in the face of something as fragile and rare as Napoleon Solo’s love.
He felt as if he had been building up to this moment since the first day he saw Napoleon when they were thirteen—brash and bold, and sauntering into the Great Hall as though he belonged there, like he would belong in any place he chose to be. Unlike Illya at thirteen, who was volatile and unrefined, terrified of his own magic and the way it sizzled beneath his skin.
Even when Illya desperately tried to wrangle his magic, to bend it to his will, he could not control it. It would burst from him with the destructive force of a natural disaster. Moderation was an impossible feat. Illya would try to levitate his goblet at breakfast and would instead shatter every window in the Great Hall, causing glittering shards of glass to rain down onto the banquet tables. His attempt to perform a basic lumos charm in first year had invoked a raging ball of fire that required the combined efforts of two professors to quench.
Napoleon had arrived in Illya’s third year, sweeping into Hogwarts on a high tide of continental glamour. Rumours clung to Napoleon just as they did to Illya, but they only served to gild Napoleon and transform him into something untouchable, while the whispers only left Illya cold and exposed. Giggling hoards of girls had spread tales in common rooms and swapped anecdotes in hallways. With jittery excitement, they spun stories about the American boy who had been expelled from Ilvermorny.
Napoleon had been caught absconding with the school’s heavily bejewelled shield. Even at such a young age, he had built up a black market enterprise selling Ilvermorny artefacts to members of New York’s criminal underbelly. ‘I was still too green to recognise the idiocy of stealing portraits that could inform on me,’ Napoleon had wryly remarked to Illya, years later, ‘Thievery was always easier in the no-maj world.’
Instead of being shunned from the magical community, Napoleon was immediately offered a place at Hogwarts by virtue of his talent and, Illya suspected, his audacity. Professors praised Napoleon’s creative spell work and marvelled at his natural ability. Napoleon’s magic flowed through him as serenely as a whisper on the wind, yet there was no denying the power that vibrated in the air around him. There was something intoxicating about Napoleon.
Illya had loathed him on sight, deeply envious of the casual ease with which he approached magic and people.
Napoleon had found perverse amusement in riling Illya, who seemed to be the only person in Hogwarts unimpressed by his flashy smile and carefree swagger. He delighted in unsettling Illya, constantly trying to find ways to crawl underneath his skin and pick at the seams of Illya’s studied composure.
Worse still, Napoleon would openly flirt with Illya in such a terrible, brazenly American way, just so he could watch Illya bluster and splutter like a dragon that was choking on its own fire. When Napoleon was around, Illya could feel his magic bubble to the surface, scorching his skin and infiltrating the air like a toxic miasma.
Illya could not breathe easily around Napoleon. He still could not.
It had been this way for years and years, decades of what Illya had seen as false advances and a slowly blossoming friendship. The early years had been filled with midnight duels, spiked cauldrons, and brutal Quidditch matches that frequently ended with at least one of them choking down Skele-Gro in the hospital wing. Napoleon had been the first muggleborn Slytherin Seeker in centuries, a fact that he still delighted in reminding Illya of on a regular basis.
But then the clumsy antagonism of childhood had morphed into fireside rounds of wizarding chess and weekly trips to Hogsmeade, all the while dragging a quietly amused Gaby along on all of their adventures. For the first time he could remember, Illya had had friends.
Illya thought of the way Napoleon had roared with laughter, gloriously stripped of his composure, the first time Illya sipped contraband Firewhisky and blandly observed, ‘This is it? It tastes like watered down vodka.’
Illya recalled how he had spent his fourth year at Hogwarts utterly convinced that Napoleon was lying about being muggleborn. How certain he had been that Napoleon was just trying to yield extra attention for himself. His fourteen year old self had suspected that Napoleon was secretly part Veela, because despite his raven dark hair, Napoleon captured attention the moment he entered a room. People flocked to his orbit in a way that had reminded Illya of what he had learned of magnets in his Muggle Studies class. And although Illya liked to imagine that he was impervious to such an effect, he had not been able to deny that the surrounding world was strangely dulled whenever he was in Napoleon’s vicinity.
Illya had spent most nights of his fourth year waking with damp sheets and an aching cock, with vivid images of blue eyes and wet, pink lips lingering from his dreams.
Illya recalled their sixth year potions class and how he thought that Napoleon must have practically marinated himself in his usual cologne, because the scent of it was so overwhelming that it completely neutralised the wafting silvery fumes of the Amortentia potion simmering at the front of the room.
He had mentioned it to Gaby while they walked to Defence Against the Dark Arts together. She had simply shaken her head and muttered something unintelligible under her breath, although Illya had clearly detected the word “idiots.”
In their fifth year, when he had been unable to sleep, Illya had stumbled across a pyjama-clad Napoleon sitting in front of a gilded mirror.
Illya had been unable to stop thinking of his father’s sentence, exiled to a compound rumoured to be worse than anything inflicted in Azkaban. Whenever he shut his eyes he dreamt of the frigid bite of Siberian wind. His thoughts would turn to his mother, who had gone into hiding after she had smuggled Illya out of Russia.
After the Imperial family were slaughtered, to be a pure blood in Russia was tantamount to a death sentence. Before his eleventh birthday, Illya’s mother smuggled him across mountains and through dense dark forests, too wary to use a Portkey or a broom, until they reached the sanctuary of the Scottish Highlands. He rarely heard from her, but Illya still thought of his mother when he could not sleep.
In an effort to distract himself, Illya had taken to wandering the castle every night, seeking out its secret places and darting between shadows. He had been doing this for weeks and exhaustion had wrapped itself in a tight knot around his bones. Then one night while wandering through the castle’s west wing, he had chanced upon Napoleon.
He was sitting cross-legged in front of a long, ornately gilded mirror. It was to be several months before their bristling antagonism thawed into friendship. Illya could not help but feel a spark of irritation at the sight of Napoleon gazing at his own reflection, clearly enthralled. He appeared especially young in his green striped pyjamas.
Napoleon had conjured a blue ball of fire to orbit around the room. It bobbed up and down gently as it circled around Napoleon and the mirror, casting an ethereal sheen over his skin and making his eyes seem unnaturally blue. Illya felt a sharp tug in his gut.
‘Is this why you always look so tired lately, Cowboy?’ Illya scoffed. ‘Because you spend all night staring at your own reflection in mirror?’
Napoleon startled at the sound of Illya’s voice, turning around to look at Illya and the long shadow his body made against the floor. There was something eerily vulnerable in his expression for a moment, before Napoleon’s usual composure settled on his features.
‘I’m hoping it will tell me that I’m the fairest of them all,’ Napoleon replied drily.
He turned back around to face the mirror. Illya frowned at Napoleon’s back.
‘It’s a No-maj, or a Muggle reference, Peril,’ Napoleon elaborated, meeting Illya’s perplexed gaze in the mirror. ‘All of my best quips are lost on you because you are woefully unversed in No-maj popular culture.’
Illya scowled at the back of Napoleon’s head and dropped onto the stone flagstones beside him. Napoleon simply raised an eyebrow and shifted his gaze to their joint reflections. The contrast between Illya’s blond hair and Napoleon’s dark curls was startling. Illya felt his stomach clench as he watched Napoleon watch him in the mirror. The blue cast of light made it seem as though Napoleon’s skin were emitting a faint glow.
‘Do you know the story of this mirror?’ Napoleon asked quietly.
‘What?’
‘It is called the Mirror of Erised,’ Napoleon murmured softly, as serious as Illya had ever seen him. ‘Apparently it reflects only the most fervent and desperate desires of a wizard’s heart. I come here sometimes to test a theory.’
‘What theory?’ Illya asked curtly. He had been carefully examining the way the light shifted across the planes of Napoleon’s face, caressing the bridge of his nose and the sharp crests of his cheekbones.
‘I can’t tell you that, Peril,’ Napoleon said cheerily, a glint of amusement in his tone, ‘or it might not come true. Like making a wish on a No-Maj birthday cake.’
Illya glared at Napoleon in the mirror. He hated being called Peril. He knew Napoleon only called him that as a mocking reminder of Illya’s tenuous control over his own magic. It would take Illya several more months to see the moniker as a mark of affection.
‘I am sorry to tell you this, Cowboy,’ Illya said coolly, ‘but your mirror is broken.’ He gestured towards their reflections with a dismissive wave of his hand. ‘All I can see is the two of us sitting here together.’
Napoleon’s expression did something complicated. Illya’s stomach dropped and the hair on the nape of his neck began to prickle.
‘Me too,’ Napoleon replied very quietly. He cleared his throat. ‘That’s all I can see too.’
They had sat there together for a long time until their shadows grew long and the blue orbs of light finally began to flicker weakly.
Illya had been so blind. How could he have not have seen what was standing directly in front of him? How could he have been so oblivious to his own heart? A lifetime of fear and a habit of merciless self-control had shielded him from seeing through Napoleon’s performative facade. Illya could not believe his own stupidity. He could not believe his luck.
‘Why are you telling me this, Cowboy?’
Napoleon’s mouth twisted harshly.
‘I’ve taken you to see Muggle movies, Peril. Don’t you know by now that declarations of true love are always best given before going into battle? Before certain death?’
‘You are not going to die,’ Illya said between gritted teeth. ‘Stop saying this. What is wrong with you?’
‘Nothing that I haven’t been afflicted with since we met fifteen years ago,’ Napoleon replied coolly. Illya hated it when Napoleon used that tone on him. Napoleon reached his hand into his suit pocket and extracted something glinting and small. ‘Here. Catch, Peril.’
Illya reflexively caught the object and turned over the familiar weight of his father’s watch in his hands. Most wizards carried elaborately engraved pocket watches, but in this once instance Illya had always been forced to wear his heart on his sleeve.
He glanced up at Napoleon who was eyeing him warily. Illya felt as though his heart was expanding inside his chest. He feared his ribs would crack under the pressure.
‘I hope we can put this unfortunate incident behind us, Peril. I can no longer pretend that I am not utterly bewitched by you, but that is my problem to shoulder. I promise that I will not make things difficult for you, if we ever see each other again.’
Napoleon’s tone was drenched in distance. He had unearthed Illya’s heart unexpectedly and yet he was already draping himself in his customary layers of cool composure, morphing himself into something untouchable once more. Rage flared in Illya’s chest at the sight.
‘Do not be so stupid, Cowboy,’ Illya growled. ‘You have been making things difficult for me since the day we met. Why should you stop now?’
Illya turned from the window and extracted his wand from his robes. He allowed his memories of Napoleon to rise to the surface of his mind—the gleaming, golden early days of their friendship; Napoleon cajoling Illya into swimming in the Great Lake, his dark curls wetly plastered to his forehead and rivulets of water dripping down his chest; the elation on Napoleon’s face after he trounced Illya during their first Quidditch match together; the first time Napoleon had smiled at Illya during Herbology, and Illya had realised with a sudden, terrible twist in his stomach that boys could be beautiful too; the tired, elated blue of Napoleon’s eyes after they had completed their first mission together as Aurors. Finally, Illya’s mind settled on the peculiar, vulnerable shift in Napoleon’s features after he confessed his feelings to Illya.
Illya could feel Napoleon sifting through each bright, timeworn memory that flitted through Illya’s mind. The presence no longer felt intrusive. Illya recognised it now for what it was. Something inevitable and vital to Illya’s wellbeing.
‘Expecto patronum.’
Silvery tendrils trailed from the tip of Illya’s wand and curled through the air like wafts of incandescent smoke. The wisps of light contorted into a sleek, glistening fox with blue eyes and bright striped markings around its ears. The fox darted forward and orbited Napoleon and Illya in a tight circle, twining them together with a trail of diaphanous light, before jolting forward and evaporating before it reached the door.
‘My Animagus form,’ Napoleon said to himself softly, his expression stunned. He inhaled sharply. ‘Illya, how long have you been keeping this to yourself?’
Illya forced himself to maintain Napoleon’s blue gaze. Breathing suddenly seemed to be a thing that required immense concentration.
‘I suppose as long as you have,’ Illya replied carefully. ‘You say you are bewitched, but you are not alone in this.’
Napoleon stared at Illya, possibly struck speechless for the first time in his life.
‘Napoleon, I—’
Illya opened his mouth to attempt to transfigure years of longing into something as restrictive as words, when his fumbling was cut off by the warm, miraculous pressure of Napoleon’s mouth moving against his own. Napoleon, Napoleon, Napoleon— the strength of his hands, the warmth of his skin, the spicy scent of him beneath the pomade, the silken slide of his tongue. Never had a kiss felt so good. Illya wanted the strange, delirious fire that Napoleon ignited in him to burn for the rest of his life.
Napoleon rested his forehead against Illya’s, his breath coming out in harsh bursts. He was unravelled and Illya had caused it. Victory soared in Illya’s chest.
‘Illyusha,’ Napoleon breathed. ‘What are you doing to me?’
Illya suspected the answer to his own transformation was as simple as love, but the reality felt much more complicated. It felt like the first time he had soared through the sky on a broom, glorious and free. It felt like the dark, dormant pulse of desire in his gut. It felt like lightning sparking through his veins and seizing his heart.
Illya raised his hands to cradle Napoleon’s jaw and kissed him again.
Quite simply, Illya thought, it felt like magic.