9. Chapter 9

It's Rey's first kiss.

There are so many things wrong with it.

The fact that it's her professor she's kissing. The fact that they're caught in a storm in the middle of the woods.

The fact that there's a Class XXXXX beast lying dead only a few feet away, ripped apart by the Dark spell that they'd both cast.

Everything about this is wrong.

And yet—

She can't stop. Can't bring herself to pull away from him. Solo's lips are the softest thing she's ever felt but how they bruise, taking and taking, the warmest spot in all this rain.

No, more than warm— he is an inferno, devouring her whole.

It's such an angry kiss, too. It's almost like he's punishing her, and that in itself makes her squirm. She'd have toppled over without the yew tree at her back. He licks at the seam of her lips and they part in surprise and he gives her no quarter, advancing ruthlessly, and just like that Professor Solo's tongue is in her mouth. Doing absolutely filthy things inside it that she doesn't have the words to describe.

Rolling, pulsing, flicking motions.

He's tasting her.

Rey doesn't know what to do with her hands, so she clutches at those sinewy forearms of his that are bracketing her throat, her blunt nails digging into wet sleeves and the rock-solid muscle underneath. She doesn't know what to do with her lips and her tongue, so she tries, desperately, to mimic his actions. And it's when she starts to respond that she hears his strangled groan.

Feels him push closer.

God, he's so tall. And big.

Maybe she'll get over it one day, but the chances are slim.

His tongue slides against hers in a rough caress at the same time that he wedges his knee between her thighs. The friction is— shocking. A rush to the head. She whines, grinding down in response to some age-old instinct. Her arms wind around his neck and he sinks his teeth into her bottom lip and, oh, she hadn't known that people could bite when they kiss, it's so sad that she's gone so long without knowing. His knee presses up harder against her and she's full-on gyrating now, her breath emerging in short, ragged bursts that he swallows up with his mouth, greedily, over and over again—

Rey comes.

It's a small orgasm. Fleeting. A tremor before an earthquake. A ripple of white heat blossoming in the depths of this stormy night. Professor Solo freezes as she writhes with it, slumping against the yew trunk, a sound caught between a whimper and a sigh bubbling up from her parted mouth.

He pulls away to stare at her. His jaw slack as a bead of rainwater drips off its sharp edge, his eyes dark and glittering. "Did you just..."

She nods, biting her lip. A slow flush heats her cheeks even as she holds his gaze with a touch of defiance. She wonders if he's going to laugh. Make fun of the sound she'd made, make fun of her shamelessness—

But then his control breaks further. It's fascinating to watch, the lingering stern bent to his shadow-stained features collapsing like a dislodged pile of bricks. He looks just as awed as when he found out she'd successfully warded the tree.

"Fuck," he mutters, raspy and low, and it's not long before he's leaning in close again, hiding his face in her neck. "Dirty girl." He rocks against her, something hard and thick rubbing at her abdomen— her mind blanks as she realizes he has an erection. Her knees all but give way. "Dirty, dirty girl."

Although the words are muffled into her skin, it's not difficult to tell that he sounds just as dazed as she feels. Just as drugged. His every syllable resonates down her nerve endings. Her eyes flutter shut as he starts kissing her neck, the sensation akin to a gliding sort of static shock at each point of contact. The tiny release he'd elicited has left her far from sated— she needs more, she needs to burst, to lose herself—

Solo's hands slip between their bodies. His large fingers fumble blindly with the buttons of her wet white blouse. Rey tugs at his drenched hair, urging him to make quicker work of it, shuddering every time he grazes the outline of her nipples that have hardened into little peaks. The rain has slowed to a drizzle, it's no longer beating on their forms like drums, no longer drowning out all the other more far-off noises...

That's why the pitiful feline cry that emanates from the yew branches overhead is so loud and jarring. It pierces the moment like a needle popping a balloon.

They stop.

Reality doesn't come back in bits and pieces. Instead, it hits with all the forcefulness of an icepick, the world growing cold.

I'm going to kill that sodding cat, is the first coherent thought that Rey can muster.

Solo's gone as still as a statue, his breath shallow against her neck, his fingers frozen around the third button of her blouse.

There's another cry from up the tree. More insistent, this time. Something inside Rey's chest shatters into a million splinters as Solo wrenches himself away from her, not meeting her eyes.

His voice, when he finally speaks, is gravelly, but also too loud in the sudden calm that rings through the forest in the wake of the storm. "Fix your..." He clears his throat, waving vaguely in her general direction. "Your blouse."

Rey's in autopilot mode. Her brain has switched to that in order for her to preserve what dignity she has left. She redoes her buttons clumsily, numb and hollow all the way to the tips of her fingers.

Solo squints up at the branches, then shoots off a nonverbal spell with unerring precision.

It's the Full Body-Bind. Limbs locked together, every single strand of fur frozen in place, yellow eyes narrowed in an unblinking, murderous glare, Mr. Pancakes drops down from the yew tree. He would have hit the ground with a thud if Solo hadn't caught him in a cloth sack conjured at the last possible second.

"We should head back to the castle," he tells Rey, slinging the sack none too gently over one shoulder.

He is distant, detached. His mask back on. She is ruined, inwardly reeling from having been so vulnerable one moment and then so inexorably pushed away the next.

She lets him lead the way to the path. She says nothing, and neither does he. The moon has emerged from behind the clouds and it spills down in nets of silver as they leave the yew grove and the manticore's corpse behind.

✨✨✨

It's the oddest thing, but she very nearly doesn't recognize Hogwarts castle when she sees it. The towering structure that looms in the distance, torchlight shining gold from its many windows beneath a dusting of stars, is at once alien and familiar. Like she's seeing it through new eyes.

The world has changed. She has changed— and the thing is, she can't tell whether she hates or welcomes it. Her stomach is all twisted up into knots as she and Professor Solo traipse across the grounds.

Without the trees to act as a buffer, the autumn wind rakes icy claws through her damp clothes. Her teeth start chattering.

Solo doesn't so much as glance at her even as his blackthorn wand flicks in her direction. A gray coat appears from out of nowhere, settling over her shoulders, and she hurriedly slips her arms into the sleeves.

It's his cloak, teleported from his wardrobe instead of simply being conjured. It's too big for her, she's practically swimming in it, but she clutches it tightly around her body, grateful for the warmth it provides.

It smells like him.

They stop walking and he turns to face her just outside the main doors of the castle. He takes in the sight of her and she knows she looks like a mess, her hair wet and disheveled, her lips bruised, his coat hanging all the way down to her bare shins, the cuffs of it dangling well past her wrists. His jaw clenches and his eyes dart to a point above her shoulder.

"Miss Niima." His tone is perfectly cool and composed, giving not even the faintest indication that he'd been calling her Rey earlier, that he'd muttered that she was a dirty girl as he kissed her neck while pinning her up against a tree. "Dark magic is very— it overwhelms the senses. The use of it clouds the mind. I am sure we can agree that what transpired in the forest was an aberration. It was severely inappropriate and unethical, and it was entirely my fault. I apologize. I promise you that it won't happen again. But..." He pauses long enough for her to glimpse the trace of resignation dancing beneath the surface of the mask. "Should you wish to report it to the headmaster, I will understand. We can go to him now and I'll accept the consequences."

Rey's dumbstruck. She hasn't even fully processed the whole thing yet and he's telling her to get him fired.

Solo mistakes her hesitation for something else. "You are blameless in this. I was the one who took advantage of your stress and your fear and your untrained response to the Dark Arts. There will be no sanctions for you, I will ensure that. There's no need to be afraid—"

"What if I want it to happen again?" she blurts out.

Putting her foot in her mouth as always.

His eyes flash. She holds her breath, thighs pressing together beneath his coat, beneath her skirt. Dangerous. He is so dangerous.

Then his full mouth presses into a hard line. "It cannot happen again, Miss Niima," he declares firmly. "It will not. You are my student."

And it's either the sudden flare of resentment makes her bold or she really must have a death wish, because—

"Thought I was your dirty girl," she grumbles, staring at her feet.

It's because her gaze is trained low that she sees his hand start to jerk towards her. Before he catches himself and balls it into a fist at his side.

She thinks about the echoes of spells that had shimmered to life in the D.A.D.A. classroom. Calming. Dulling the senses. Occlumency. She thinks about the way he sometimes falters when he's around her. The way he'd kissed her.

A man losing control.

There's a rich, sinuous thrill coursing through her system. He's using Occlumency to keep her out of his thoughts. He's using magic to stop himself from being affected by her.

Whatever she feels for him, he feels it, too.

He must not have had the time to build up his walls before rushing to her aid. Which would explain that angry, heated kiss. She's hardly the type to inspire a man to frenzies of lust, but if he's... attracted to her, suppressing it with magic would cause that feeling to pour out in a rush once the magic was no longer in place.

It must have been like a dam breaking.

Guilt is swift to follow Rey's delight. It's relatively harmless to be a student crushing on a teacher. But for a teacher to reciprocate, to act on it...

He's friends with Obi-Wan. He's the son of the MACUSA president.

She's quite capable of destroying his life, Muggleborn nobody that she is.

"I'm sorry." Rey lifts her chin so he can see her face. So he can see that she means it. "I shouldn't have said that."

"You shouldn't have," Solo agrees. He looks away again. The flickering torches cast strange shadows on his face. He seems... tired. Almost haunted.

"We don't have to tell anyone," she says. "We can just pretend it never happened." Her heart sinks at her own words, but she knows it's the right thing to do.

Brow wrinkling, he opens his mouth as if to protest, but she wastes no time in cutting him off. "Truth is, I don't really need the drama. I just want to get through seventh year in one piece. And you did save my life— I don't think you should be punished for that."

And I don't want you to have to go away.

The additional, unspoken sentiment pierces her with such bittersweet clarity. If he leaves now, he'll return to America and she'll never see him again. The prospect is unbearable.

Solo mulls it over for what seems like ages. At last, he offers a stiff nod. "If you're sure."

"I am."

"Very well." He pushes the door open, the ancient wood creaking. "After you, Miss Niima."

✨✨✨

They go to the hospital wing.

First things first, though, he drops the sack onto the stone tiles of the Entrance Hall and cancels the Full Body-Bind Curse on Mr. Pancakes, who immediately scurries off, unleashing a litany of complaints in the form of disgruntled meows all the while. Rey can still hear him even after he's vanished down the corridor.

"Stupid cat," Solo says under his breath.

Had the circumstances been any different, Rey would have smirked at this. As it is, however, her features seem to have frozen in on themselves. She's putting on a show of being okay.

Solo takes her to Madame Kalonia. Ever the workaholic, the healer's doing inventory at her desk while snacking on a plateful of carrot cake, pumpkin pasties, and caramel-coated apple slices that she must have brought back from the Great Hall. At the sight of the food, Rey's stomach grumbles.

She's missing the feast.

Her last ever Halloween at school, and she'd spent it pursued by a manticore and snogging her teacher in the Forbidden Forest.

"Professor Solo!" Madame Kalonia looks up from rolls of parchment. "You weren't at dinner—" Her eyes widen at the sight of the soaked-through and bedraggled new arrivals. "Miss Niima! Morgana's veil, what has happened?"

"We had a run-in with the manticore," Solo bluntly replies. "It's dead."

Madame Kalonia could not have looked more shocked had someone told her that Armitage Hux volunteered at soup kitchens in his spare time. "You killed the manticore? Just— just you two?"

"There was no time to call for reinforcements." Solo's head jerks in Rey's direction. "Miss Niima requires patching up. She was scratched."

"By the manticore?" Madame Kalonia leaps to her feet. "How is she not dripping blood everywhere—"

"No." Solo's lips twist in the mildest acknowledgement of the grim humor of the situation. "By Unkar Plutt's cat."

Tutting and shaking her head, Madame Kalonia summons a house-elf to send word to Obi-Wan. She then ushers Rey to a vacant bed and draws the curtains shut around them. Hidden from Solo's view, Rey perches on the edge of the mattress and is stripped of the coat and her blouse; she spends the next few minutes trying not to cry out loud from the sting of the dittany tincture that Madame Kalonia applies to the wounds on her arms and shoulders.

Professor Solo serves as a useful distraction in this regard. The fact that he's on the other side of the curtain renders the pain secondary; Rey can't help but stare at the shadow he casts on the white sheet of fabric, turned to her in profile, crisp in the bright golden light. She's practically half-naked and he's only a few feet away...

"Eurydice, dear, you're awfully flushed," Madame Kalonia remarks, pressing the back of her hand to Rey's forehead. "If the scratches are infected, the dittany will take care of that, but I should give you something for fever, just in case. You're so very red."

The Adam's apple of Solo's silhouette bobs in his throat. Rey sucks in a slow, shuddering hiss of breath, and it's not because of the dittany.

Obi-Wan, Mothma, and Hux arrive on the scene once Rey's been bandaged and redressed, and right as Madame Kalonia is pulling back the curtains.

"You just left it there?" Hux rounds on Solo. It's quite possibly the saddest that Rey's ever seen the Potions master look. "Manticore venom needs to be extracted within thirty minutes after death. Do you have any idea how valuable that ingredient is, how rare—"

"I do have some idea," Solo retorts, "given that you seem to be more concerned about it compared to a student's well-being."

"Miss Niima's fine." Hux's arctic gaze flickers to Rey with all the significance of an afterthought. "Aren't you fine?"

"Peachy keen, sir," Rey deadpans. "Thanks for asking."

Mothma's not the sort to fuss, but she goes over to Rey and inspects her closely before nodding, satisfied that her charge is apparently not missing any limbs or internal organs. "Start from the beginning, Eurydice," the head of Gryffindor House instructs, and Rey takes that as her cue to launch into a recap of the night's events.

Omitting certain parts, of course.

Solo finds the far wall to be of great interest while Madame Kalonia and the other teachers listen to Rey's tale with varying degrees of amazement. She explains that Solo had been the teacher she thought to call because they'd had a lesson on the Patronus Charm— a lie she comes up with on the spot, so plausible that she inwardly congratulates herself.

"And then we went back to the castle," she finishes, doing her utmost to make sure that her gaze doesn't stray to Professor Solo in the slightest. They've done something illicit together and they're keeping it a secret from everyone else.

They're conspirators now.

"I don't believe I'm familiar with the spell you used," Obi-Wan remarks. His tone is casual but his eyes are searching.

"You wouldn't be," Solo says tersely. "I invented it."

Rey gives a start in the chill that ensues. That curse had inflicted lacerations and hemorrhages on a powerful creature highly resistant to most forms of magic. What could it do to a human being?

What does it say about the person who'd made it?

"Well." Mothma sniffs, breaking the silence. "This has been enough excitement for one night, and poor Miss Niima hasn't been able to attend the feast. Come with me, Eurydice, we'll get you sorted with some leftovers and then it's off to bed with you."

It's not as though Rey can refuse. She follows Mothma out of the hospital wing, and it takes every ounce of her willpower to not look back at Professor Solo.

To stay with him, somehow.

✨✨✨

The solemn, white-robed Transfiguration instructor seems to have a lot on her mind as she sits across from Rey while the latter tackles heaping slices of roast beef, baked pumpkin, fried sausages, and jacket potatoes. The house-elves bustle around them, washing dishes and magically preserving and storing what's left of the food.

"Professor Solo... he's all right?" Mothma suddenly asks. "He treats all of you well? No— no funny business?"

Rey chokes on a potato.

Mothma levitates a goblet of pumpkin juice over to her and Rey hurriedly gulps it down.

"No," she manages to gasp out at last. "No funny business. Why do you ask, professor?"

Although Mothma hesitates for only the briefest of seconds, hers is still a carefully considered answer nonetheless. "There was some discussion regarding his suitability for the job. It's his first teaching post, and he is rather young."

"He's brilliant," Rey says before she can help it, offended on Solo's behalf. Furiously kissing her up against a tree and all that aside, he's— "He pushes us to be at our best and he's taught us loads of useful spells..." She trails off, belatedly noticing that Mothma's eying her with some surprise.

Rey supposes she might've sounded overly passionate. She ducks her head and shovels more food into her mouth before she ends up embarrassing herself further.

"As I told Headmaster Kenobi before the start of term, I trust his judgment," Mothma says. "And if Ben Solo is as good an instructor as you have avowed, then I suppose there's no reason to worry." She changes the subject, shooting Rey one of her rare looks of approval. "Well done with the manticore, by the way. You kept your head and held your own long before a more experienced wizard arrived. You really transfigured earth into quicksand?"

Rey nods. "I think that's what slowed it down long enough for me to hide in the yew grove."

She's so startled by the sight of Mon Mothma outrightly beaming that she almost chokes on her food again.

"I look forward to what you'll be up to after graduation, Miss Niima," the older woman says proudly. "I shall be following your career with great interest. Encountering a Dark creature hasn't turned you off from being an Auror, has it?"

Rey mulls it over. Back when she and her classmates had been consulting with their advisors regarding post-Hogwarts trajectories, joining the Ministry's Auror program had been at the top of a good number of lists. It's one of the most glamorous jobs in the wizarding world. However, the entry requirements are steep, the training rigorous, and the risk of injury or worse easily the highest. Even if they managed to qualify, a lot of young hopefuls would be disillusioned once they were out on the field, the professors had warned.

But now Rey has had firsthand experience with combat. She remembers how her mind had been quick to focus and do what was needed. She remembers the thrill she got every time one of her strategies worked.

"No, it hasn't turned me off at all," she says, answering Mothma's question. Her heart racing slightly with the rush that only a sudden certainty— a feeling of absolute rightness— can bring. "I want to be an Auror."

✨✨✨

Mothma escorts Rey to Gryffindor Tower, stopping at the portrait of the Fat Lady. "Oh, I nearly forgot," she says when Rey has one foot inside the entrance. "Naturally I'll have to dock ten points from Gryffindor because you wandered out of bounds. But," she adds just as Rey starts to deflate, "you did kill the manticore that's been plaguing our campus, so take fifty points, Miss Niima. Forty in all."

Rey's smiling a little as she bids Mothma good night. She steps into the common room, the portrait swinging shut behind her.

And she is met by the wide-eyed stares of Finn, Tallie, Jannah, and Jess who have frozen in the middle of a late-night game of Exploding Snap.

"You killed a manticore?" Finn bellows at about the same time that Rey realizes she's still wearing Professor Solo's coat.