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Hogwarts castle had a long and complicated history, filled with ups and downs. With headmasters as great as Neville Longbottom and as horrible as… well.
“It’s taunting me,” a Hufflepuff boy with black curly hair said, staring at the tomb near the lake.
“Leave it alone, Aramis,” said his companion, green and silver tie loose around his neck and tone exhausted.
“I dunno, I think he’s gotta point,” said one of the Gryffindors while the other simply looked confused.
The four boys of various houses and ages were lying on the grass outside their beloved school, most of them focused on a single point. The White Tomb. Untouched for… well, years anyway. None of them were actually sure how long it had been there. Waiting.
“Professor Treville is going to expel you if you mess with that thing,” the youngest of their group pointed out.
The Hufflepuff shrugged, not taking his eyes away from his target. “Even without taking my NEWTs, the only person more impatient to get their hands on me than St. Mungo’s is Porthos.” Porthos nodded his agreement.
“Not Athos?”
Aramis looked pointedly down at his lap where Athos was resting his head. “You can’t see his hands, young Gryffindor, and should be thankful for that.”
“Should I be jealous?” Porthos asked with a bright grin.
“Probably,” Aramis responded. “However, I will love you more than him if you agree to help me do unspeakable things to a school monument.”
“That is not how this relationship is supposed to work,” Athos pointed out. Aramis responded by petting his head absently and asking Porthos and d’Artagnan about color changing charms.
X
“Uh. Porthos?”
“Busy, d’Artagnan.”
“I can see that. Kind of what I want to talk to you about.”
“And it can’t wait?”
“Um. No.”
Porthos sighed heavily and rolled off of the half clothed body under him. “What?”
“How do you keep sneaking him in here?” Porthos glared at the intruder, a not-very-subtle signal to get to the point or get out.
“Oh please,” Aramis replied, sitting upright and straightening the yellow and black tie around his neck, seemingly not bothered that his shirt was missing. “I’ve been getting in here on my own since fourth year.”
“How?” d’Artagnan asked, then shook his head rapidly. “I don’t care. Why? Why do you have to be in the dorms?”
“Room of Requirement is in use, the Quidditch pitch is too windy this time of year, and Professor Treville said he’d expel us if we even thought about the Great Hall,” Aramis explained patiently.
d’Artagnan blinked at them owlishly, and Porthos mentally debated making a joke about delivering mail, but decided that the sooner the fifth year left the room the better. “What’s the Room of—No. The Great Hall?”
“A story for another time,” Porthos said pointedly with a nod towards the door. “As I said, we’re busy.”
“Etienne sent me! He said that if you two didn’t get downstairs he’d deduct points from both our houses.”
Porthos groaned and flopped back on the mattress, though landing mostly on Aramis who yelped his disapproval. “Why did I make friends with a prefect if he wasn’t going to give me special treatment?”
“You almost sound like a Slytherin,” Aramis laughed as he hauled himself off the bed and began the search for his missing clothing. “Athos must be rubbing off on you, and I am horribly jealous.”
d’Artagnan cleared his throat loudly to cut off whatever reply Porthos would have made. “We’re finally ahead of Ravenclaw, come on.”
X
Something was horribly, horribly wrong. Porthos could feel it in every inch of his body. There was no way for him to know what was wrong, or even how he knew it. His grades in Divination were… best not thought about, to be honest, but this? This sense of how somewhere nearby a catastrophe were about to happen? There was no doubting that feeling.
He crept down the deserted hallway, wand drawn against all reason, and eyes peeled for any sign of lurking danger. Creeping past the tapestry of trolls attempting to do ballet, he quickly scanned his surroundings just to be sure he hadn’t been followed.
Finding nothing, he quickly opened the door that appeared and slammed it shut behind him.
He should have run the other way.
“Porthos?!”
“Why are yo—PORTHOS!”
“Constance?!”
“Get out!”
“Godric’s beard I’m going!”
“If you tell Aramis—”
“Please don’t tell Aramis!”
“I’m handling this, d’Artagnan.”
“I’m leaving!”
He slammed the door shut behind him once again, mentally preparing the long and angry speech he was about to give Athos.
I’m worried about Constance! He said. Haven’t seen her in hours and I need her help , he’d said. Can you check the Room of Requirement, please?
Porthos muttered curses to himself all the way back to the Slytherin common room.
X
“Ten more points to Hufflepuff!” d’Artagnan’s magically magnified voice rang out in excitement. “Bringing the score to an astounding 170 to 20. Even if Ravenclaw manages to catch the Snitch, there’s still a chance they’ll lose this match.
“de Herblay has the Quaffle again in record time. I have not seen him miss a shot all season, and if his plans be a Healer don’t pan out, then I can think of a few professional teams that would love to have him. So far only Athos de la Fere of Slytherin has been able to block his shots and even that was called into suspect. We all know the two are incapable of having a match without—oh. Right. Sorry, Professor.
“Uh. Ooooh! Aramis takes a Bludger to the arm! And… Porthos get off the field!”
X
The poor first year girl looked horribly confused and Athos knew that as a Prefect he should probably offer her some help or… something. At the very least direct her towards someone who was capable of caring about a stranger’s problems this early in the morning.
Sighing to himself, he embraced his inner Gryffinpuff and leaned across the couch to the poor child. “Are you okay?” Courage enough to start a conversation, and that sounded vaguely supportive. He was going soft.
“My older brother is in Ravenclaw,” the first year whispered to him. Athos could not, for the life of him, figure out why the kid was whispering or what he should do with this information, but he nodded anyway. To his relief she continued, “But I’m now allowed into his common room and he can’t visit me here.”
Ah. Homesick, then? “Yeah, that’s the rule. Can’t have other houses in the common rooms and all that.”
The girl nodded at him, but still looked horribly confused. She glanced around the (mostly empty, it was painfully early) room and then back to him. “But… there was a boy in here yesterday.” To his horror, her face began to turn red and he knew instantly where this conversation was going. “He was from Hufflepuff, I know it. And he just walked in here and started flirting with this girl! How come he can come visit his girlfriend but I can’t see my brother?!”
This time, Athos sighed on the outside. “That wasn’t his girlfriend,” he said automatically. “His name is Aramis, and we can’t keep him out. We’ve tried.”
“I’ve heard he sneaks into all the houses,” someone else interrupted. A third year, Athos thought, but couldn’t remember the boy’s name. “Someone told me that he seduced the portrait that guards Gryffindor Tower.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Athos groaned. “He seduced a student into giving him the password, and then flirted with the portrait until she let him in.”
“I heard that he’ll sleep with anyone in the school, unless they’re in his house,” a cool voice said. Athos flinched on reflex. “He’s got something against other Hufflepuffs, and they hate him for it, so he’s forced to sleep outside their little badger den.”
“Winters.”
“de la Fere.”
The two younger students looked back and forth between the two Sixth Years, soaking up what was bound to be a lot of gossip.
“If he had something against dating other Hufflepuffs, then fourth year would have been a lot easier.” Anne and Louis hadn’t stopped yelling at each other for weeks, and Aramis’s sulking had been unbearable.
“Isn’t it true he tried to blow up Dumledore’s shrine?” the third year asked.
“He almost got expelled for that one,” Winters said with a smile. “I’m not sure how he talked Professor Treville out of it… though I did hear that maybe it wasn’t talking—”
“I wasn’t trying to blow it up, Milady,” Aramis himself interrupted as he strolled into the common room as if he belonged there. “I was trying to turn it green.”
“You’re not supposed to be in here,” the first year said, eyes wide. “He’s a prefect and he could kick you out!”
Aramis eyed the girl and then Athos. “Are you going to ask me to leave, almighty prefect?”
“Would you listen to me if I did?”
In response, Aramis dropped onto his lap and placed a smacking kiss on his mouth. The first year’s mouth dropped open and Athos considered docking points for scandalizing the youth.
Or maybe for not giving him a proper kiss.
X
“Where’s Porthos?” Aramis asked in a whine from his spot on the floor of Gryffindor Tower. No one paid him any mind but d’Artagnan, though he did so with some reluctance.
“He’s… um. Not here?” he tried lamely. “I’m almost offended that you never come here to see me. I thought we were friends.”
“You’re the little brother I never knew I wanted,” Aramis said in a deadpan worthy of Athos. “However, I miss my boyfriend. Where is he?”
“Athos is—”
“Why would I be looking for Athos here? I know he’s on patrol. I also know that Quidditch practice isn’t for another two hours and that Porthos should be here.”
D’Artagnan sighed, giving up. “He’s in the library.”
“Why are you so reluctant to tell me that?”
“He’s being tutored in Potions.”
Aramis slowly sat up, his face very carefully blank. D’Artagnan briefly wondered if he could make an escape before—“I tutor Porthos in Potions.” No, too late. “I’ve always helped him in Potions and he helps me in Transfig. Since first year.”
“Do you? I must have heard him wrong or—“
“Is he with that Ravenclaw girl?”
“Her name is Alice?”
Aramis was already out the door, pout firmly in place.
X
“They’ve locked us out, Porthos.”
“It seems they have, Aramis.”
“There’s only one way to respond to this.”
“Indeed there is.”
Taking twin deep breaths, the two bravely faced the blank brick wall that was the entrance to the Slytherin Common Room. “ATHOS!” they both yelled in unison. When no one had answered by the count of fifteen they looked at each other and nodded. No words were needed. Not for this.
The last time the Slytherins had locked them out of their space for reasons like “school rules” and “abuse of power” and “act like a Hufflepuff already”; they’d spent four days vanishing the ink off of every essay that the snakes had tried to turn in. Fifth and seventh years had looked ready to perform more than one Unforgiveable, and within the week they’d had access granted once again.
This time it was personal.
“What’s better, do you think?” Porthos asked, faux casually. “The look Athos gets when you bite his neck, or the growly thing he does when you tie his hands together?”
“Neither,” Aramis said, after pretending to consider the options. “The best is when you grab him by his tiny little waist, and shove him up against something. His knees go out every time, but only when you do it.”
Porthos looked thoughtful for a minute before snapping his fingers and grinning, “But he does that same thing when you grab him by the front of his robes and get in his face before—”
“There are first years listening to you two!”
“Athos, my love!”
“We were sure you were gonna miss our date.”
X
“Does it sometimes worry you that our ex-girlfriends are all friends?” Porthos asked out of nowhere.
Aramis followed Porthos’s gaze until he saw the table filled with a truly terrifying amount of beautiful witches. Ninon, Head Girl badge pinned proudly to her robes and blue scarf hanging around her neck, was whispering something to Flea that caused her to laugh loudly and earn a glare from the librarian.
“Constance is over there and she isn’t my ex,” d’Artagnan pointed out.
“This week,” Athos muttered.
“Anne is missing from their table,” Aramis said.
“She’s not actually your ex,” Porthos argued. “But it looks like Flea and Adèle are about ready to plot world domination.”
“That would explain why Winters looks so interested in their conversation,” Aramis conceded.
“It’s a shame Marsac graduated,” Athos said, refusing to look up from his textbook. “He would have fit right in.”
“I despise you sometimes.”
“Love you too.”
X
“Episkey!” Constance said with more force than strictly necessary.
“Constance,” Athos said through gritted teeth. “You are practically my sister, and I love you more than words. But for the Salazar’s sake, find Aramis.”
“I can do it!” she insisted stubbornly. “It’s barely even broken!”
“How about we test that theory when my hand isn’t turning blue?”
“That’s probably from the jinx and not the blood flow, stop being a baby.”
X
Porthos sighed at the sight of his bed. While he was far more used to seeing other people in it than he probably should be, it was usually a very specific two people and neither of them were actually in his house.
He wasn’t sure how d’Artagnan had become such a huge role in his life, it was like the kid just appeared out of nowhere with a minor case of hero worship for Athos and a shocking ability to make Aramis not have every other sentence be innuendo. And Constance adored the little shit, so he must be a great guy.
Okay, so maybe Porthos had actually called him “little brother” last week when they’d gotten ahold of a very nice bottle of Ogden’s, but still.
Nothing gave the kid the right to take a nap in his bed after he’d spent the past two hours at Quidditch practice. His arm was sore, and he’d taken a Bludger to the leg when he was at the wrong angle to deflect the blasted thing.
He looked like a puppy.
Porthos let him sleep.
X
The Hogwarts Express would be leaving in a few hours for Christmas break, and most of the castle would be gone with it.
As was a long standing tradition, Athos, Porthos and Aramis were staying behind. Athos for reasons he wouldn’t talk about under any circumstances, Porthos because of a lack of any real family, and Aramis because his decidedly Muggle family were… less than thrilled about his entire life.
They’d eventually accepted the magic, as long as it was never mentioned, but there were other complications.
The three waved goodbye to d’Artagnan and Constance and turned back towards the staircase.
“Dorms or the Room of Requirement?” Aramis asked as they walked.
“We haven’t come up with weird answers for the riddles that Ravenclaw comes up with all year,” Porthos answered.
“Because Ninon said she would hide our bodies in the Forbidden Forest if we broke their door again,” Athos pointed out. His companions shrugged, and without another word they made their way towards (probably not literally) certain death. Porthos’s arm around Aramis’s shoulders, as he held onto one of Athos’s hands.