Where It Isn't Always Cold

1.

8:04 and he was sliding gracelessly into his regular booth, bumping his hip against the table. He swore silently, biting his lip, and called out for a butterbeer, because he wasn't going to wait, because Marcus Flint really didn't wait for anybody.

8:17 and the scene was boring. A hag sitting by a grimy window that looked out onto nothing much was eating a steak with her hands, the same hands that she went on to grab her mug with, the same hands that she wiped over her lips to, what, clean them? A couple, late twenties maybe, were waving their arms around furiously, having just copped a silencio from the bartender who had done the joint a favour, cutting off their obnoxiously loud argument. Marcus' right foot was falling asleep.

8:23 and he scratched at his chin while trying to subtly check out a relatively fit witch who seemed lost, definitely lost, possibly foreign and lost, and definitely in the wrong place. He'd send a drink her way. He kept very consciously not looking at the door and he'd looked at the clock only once, maybe twice, because if he was honest, and he was trying the honesty thing, he didn't want to leave, and he didn't want his pride to force him into it. Marcus liked being honest: it was refreshing. "I don't mind being kept waiting," he muttered, lying only a little. Complacent and accommodating like a fucking Hufflepuff - but then that was, of course, a large part of the point.

8:30 and his third butterbeer because he didn't wait that much and Oliver, Oliver, never before has a boy made me so bloody homicidal - and that was far too many syllables but he ran it in his head anyway, looped. Who wrote that? Dickens? Marcus tapped his fingers along with the tune. O li-ver. O li-ver. Maybe Oliver had stayed back at practice because, oh, two years into his career he still wasn't captain, fancy that, but he could just apparate straight after so what a miserable excuse. Although if anyone could lose total track of time on the pitch it would be Oliver. There was always the possibility that he just wasn't coming - not like they'd ever said they'd be here, it's just that they usually were. Maybe the idiot had fallen off his broom or something stupid like that. Marcus shrugged mentally, physically.

8:34 and he got up to piss because he needed to, because if Oliver showed up it would serve him bloody right if he thought Marcus'd left because by all accounts he should have.

8:36 and he so expected Oliver to be there when he returned that when he wasn't, his blood just kind of tripped up in his veins because Merlin, what if something bad had happened?

8:39 and he had run over every possible gory scenario including unlikely troll invasions when Oliver appeared at the door looking positively terrible, eyebrows drawn together, face pale, eyes huge, and Marcus thought fuck because something worse than bad must have happened for Oliver to look like that, and this part of him that was so fucking huge was just so relieved that Oliver had come that his chest ached, and the rest of him kind of hated himself for it, but nowhere near enough.

2.

Marcus' neck was seizing up, like he'd been playing Quidditch for too long and had started searching for the snitch himself, because it was apparently invisible or too fast or fucking Malfoy was too busy mooning after Potter to search properly for it. His throat was dry even though his entire face was wet and just far too slick and his breath was kind of stammering thinly out of him. His tongue was tired and sore and he was losing any sense of rhythm because he could barely breathe and this was really becoming a problem.

He wanted desperately for it to be over so he redoubled his efforts, pushing blindly forward as she stumbled back and onto the bed, his eyes scrunching tighter. He thought of flying, of flicking past Blokov, of scoring, of winning, and he rolled onto the bed and onto his back as he pulled her over him, thinking vaguely but with focus on victory laps and smirks, on the Quidditch cup, on the quaffle that was one lunge one lick one thrust away but he wasn't getting anywhere and his jaw hurt. His knees hurt. His fingers were just kind of soaked and he jerked them stiltedly still inside her. He imagined them wrinkly and pale and how long had this been going? He wanted to pull them out and wipe them clean and leave and his cock was almost completely limp and it was horrible, just horrible, he was tired and he would rather be doing anything else and it felt like a fucking age had passed before she said he could stop now, and he did.

She pulled herself up and beside him. The rings under her eyes were deeper and darker than he'd realised; she looked as exhausted as he felt. He turned away from her.

"God, you're dedicated," she said.

Marcus wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, with the one he wasn't rubbing against the bedspread.

He didn't want to talk about it but he couldn't really not so he said, because it did bother him: "Why can't you come?" and then, "Ange?" because it had sounded too accusing.

"It's not a big deal," she said, "I hardly ever do." Goosebumps were breaking out along the outside of her thighs; he felt them against his calf. He wanted to brush his teeth.

"I don't see how it can not be a big deal," he said, not really talking to her, more to the wall, to the bed, so it surprised him that she replied, that she asked him what was wrong.

He rolled back towards her instead of answering. He looked up at her and tried to feel aroused by her breasts beneath her dark grey lace bra, by the curve of her arms, by the small belly that protruded as she sat cross legged with her shoulders hunched. "It's really not a big deal," she repeated. He nodded.

"It's always so cold in here," she said, and lay against him.

"Always," he said. He hesitated. "Do you think it would be very different if we were in one of the towers?"

"Yeah," she said, shivering. "Really different."

"The cold, or everything?" he asked, because he'd always meant to ask someone, to know if it were just him.

She frowned. "How do you mean?"

"It's nothing," he said quickly. "Nothing." It was unfair that he felt disappointed, because she'd be used to his habitual silence and was probably caught by surprise. He moved her long fringe out of her eyes with his fingertips, then put his hand on her waist. Her flesh was cold. He wanted her to leave.

"Thank you," she breathed against him, barely audible. He wondered if he was in a position to hurt this girl, and if he'd take the chance if he got it.

She fell asleep, and Marcus must have too, because when he woke up he was alone.

3.

Marcus was lying on his bed not thinking much at all when Pucey shoved open the door to the dorm and strode in. Marcus stared pointedly at the door while Pucey, who had opened his mouth to speak, stopped and, catching on, knocked quietly on the door frame, smiling a sheepish smile that was almost a grin. Marcus half-smiled back because he liked Pucey. He didn't question why too often, in case it went away, but he did, and it seemed to survive just about everything, including but not limited to constant disregard for knock-before-entering rules. "Flint, Blokov's got a message for you."

Wood took one step, into the room and into view. "Flint, McGonagall wants to speak to you." There was a heartbeat or a pause and then he added, tightly, "About booking the Quidditch pitch for practice."

Wood was looking deliberately somewhere above Marcus' head, then at the lit torch in the bracket on the wall, then at the stone bed base, and really anywhere but at Marcus. Wood hadn't looked him in the eye since, what, late fourth year, when Wood had learnt in captaincy and moderate humilitation that there were not and could not be such things as friendly matches, not between Slytherin and Gryffindor, not ever, because what in Merlin's name would Slytherin have to gain from matches that would help lift everyone's game, and this was so obvious that Wood deserved it. Wood, stubborn, loud Wood had ended up spitting out 'I hope you piss worms!' and Marcus had laughed and laughed and since then, yes, no eye-contact.

"Right," said Marcus, and realised Wood may never have seen a dungeon dorm room before, which may also have accounted for the shifty eyes. He tried to view the room from Wood's perspective, but his imagination failed him and it was his own first time he was recalling. Such a big school and brightness and this worn old hat saying the expected 'Slytherin!' and the knowing, wary looks from those of the other houses and firm cool pats on the back from those of his own, and as they approached the stairs something inside him dropped lower with each step, finally settling somewhere in the region of his lower gut as he saw the room he was to call home for the next few years - dark and damp and stone everywhere, and so, so fucking cold.

Marcus was thinking he was probably wanted immediately and when Wood said, "I mean, you're to come now," Marcus was getting up already.

Marcus followed Wood out of the dorm and down the corridor, through the common room and up the steps and Wood was dying to say something, Marcus could tell, because he was chewing his lip which he always did when he wanted to say something, which Marcus knew because observing Wood at Gryffindor practices had become a lot easier since the eye contact had stopped. Marcus wished Wood would just fucking say it although he didn't even want to hear it, because the silence was so annoying, and finally: "I guess they're a bit different to the tower dorms," said Marcus, surprising Wood and almost surprising himself.

"Oh," said Wood, "yeah. Yeah, ours are..." and he stopped and seemed to struggle briefly as though for a more tactful way of saying, "much nicer. I mean. They're brighter. I mean there are windows."

"Yeah," said Marcus, because he'd figured as much, and he stared at his feet as they trod up the steps which dipped, worn, in the middle. He cracked each of his knuckles individually.

"It doesn't seem very fair," said Wood, which probably made sense because Wood was always going around trying to be noble or whatever, demanding or expecting fairness in a fierce kind of way, but this was the first time he'd seen it extended to Slytherins.

Marcus found himself saying, in a rush, "No, it doesn't. I think about it, I think about it quite a lot, actually," and he was waiting, almost flinching, for the rebuff: 'Yeah, but you deserve it,' or, 'Wow, you think?' but to be fair Wood had never hassled him about repeating - though of course they hadn't been speaking anyway, and no eye contact.

"Aren't there any spells that could...?"

Marcus laughed, but it wasn't really a laugh. "Yeah, there are charms, but they don't last long. And we've never quite managed to reproduce natural light. It doesn't matter."

"But even the cold," Wood insisted. "There has to be something the professors could do?" And Wood, typically impatient, wanted to solve everything wrong with the Slytherin housing situation with the flick of a wand over his shoulder as he left it. Marcus laughed his non-laugh again, and wondered why he'd tried this conversation with Block-of-Wood, of all people, who had once asked a snickering Higgs, genuine and exasperated, "Why Blokov?"

"It's a Slytherin thing," he said.

"What is?"

"Not asking for help." This signalled the end of the conversation for a little while, and was also partly the truth, although Marcus mused over the other possible answer, which was cold. There was something about the way the fires didn't seem to warm as much as they should, and the way heating charms seemed to flounder and dissolve, as though attacked and conquered by the cold. He'd reasoned, at some point, that it must have to do with Salazar himself, overseeing the building of the dungeons and making the stones themselves as cold-blooded as he was. Some old, fundamental kind of magic.

Wood, Marcus knew, didn't mind confrontation, and wasn't the kind of person who would purposely make anyone wait for him to make a point if he had one to make, because things were simpler than that for him, which was why he was surprised it took so long for Wood to turn to him with: "Why did you overbook the pitch? You know we all need to practice," and again surprised that it wasn't an accusation.

"I don't know," said Marcus, lying.

"It was a bastard thing to do," said Wood, and Marcus thought, yes.

"But Quidditch is about as far away from the dungeons as possible, isn't it," said Wood, looking very serious and meaningful and it seemed for an instant that he meant it in all ways, physically and figuratively and emotionally and whatever other ways there could be, which Marcus thought was incredibly perceptive for someone so dense. By then they were at McGonagall's office so he didn't reply, and it hadn't been a question anyway.

Although he soon decided (about a minute into McGonagall's tight-lipped rant) that he'd probably misinterpreted what Wood meant, Marcus had the vague feeling that something important had shifted, and although he wasn't sure what it was, he had everyone calling Wood by his surname by the end of the year.

4.

Oliver's story came out in rushes and shakes and Marcus thought he would die trying to hold him together without touching him. "He's back, and it's bloody real, and everything is just..." He trailed off, and Marcus chewed his lip mindlessly, violently. "I just don't know how to deal with this, you know?" said Oliver.

"I know," said Marcus, quietly, and it was the first time he'd said anything, and it seemed to snap something in Oliver.

"Did you know about this?"

"No! No, of course I didn't. What we both knew."

"You didn't know anything?"

"I was, fucking... I didn't ever even listen, I never paid any attention to anything I just..."

Oliver was looking at him like he was some kind of criminal which was, really, unfair, because he'd never, never, not even once, and he hadn't even seen his mother's Dark Mark, in 21 years never, and yeah there were the usual whispers and huddles in corners when he visited but no, nothing more than what he'd been used to all his life, because he always refused to become involved, and both he and Oliver had shared the year of denial where Diggory was dead dead dead and Potter hadn't seemed crazy but what was the alternative? At any rate this was definitely, definitely out of line because-

"Sorry," said Oliver, "I'm sorry." As he should be, and Marcus forgave him immediately because this was fucking awful, definitely, to see Oliver like this.

Oliver was silent. Pacing. Back and forth down the side of the Hog's Head. Marcus could feel something like a headache coming on and he thought Oliver should stop before he drove him insane, so he grabbed his wrist to stop him, pulled on it, made Oliver sit down. He did it without the ease with which Oliver had grabbed his own wrist minutes earlier to pull him outside, when Oliver had led him out and around the pub. Oliver could do these things that he couldn't; Marcus was aware that this was the first time he'd purposely touched Oliver in years, since the firmer-than-firm handshakes that they had shared when they'd glared at each other on the Quidditch pitch, sneering, and Marcus couldn't not focus on how he couldn't control his fingers which were shaking a little. Oliver was shaking a lot. Marcus needed to remember what was important here, the reality, the Dark Lord, because it was so huge, so life altering, and touching Oliver really wasn't, but he couldn't seem to and on some level didn't want to.

"I don't even know why I'm here," said Oliver, which was a relief because Marcus realised immediately that he was wondering the same thing, and it was this combined with the sudden realisation of all the no-mores -Quidditch. Pubs. Quidditch - which made him feel like he was drowning somehow. And of course it was coming to an end, this almost-comfortable middle status, this oscillating from side to side with no particular commitments and no particular promises despite all the pressure and the occasional threats, because the sides were all blurry from thinking about it too much, and all he really wanted was to play, and nothing much else, because nearly everything else had always seemed sort of beside the point.

"I don't know anything," said Marcus, because Oliver was asking, even if he wasn't saying anything. I never have, he thought of adding.

"Nothing," said Oliver, and that was skeptical. Disbelief or distrust, a definite accusation: how could you let me go on as though nothing was wrong when Voldemort was coming back? and they were both guilty there, but it was Oliver who was balking. And it had all been, what, just talk. Two acquaintances in perfect idealistic youth engaging in pub politics, filled with alcohol-tinted ideas and ideals and ultimately inaction. Right. "Never trust a Slytherin," said Marcus finally, because it always came back to that.

"Fuck. I know," said Oliver, quickly. "It's not that. It's just... I don't know what to think. I'm sorry, mate." Oliver was all earnest wide eyes and he touched Marcus' shoulder, and Oliver hadn't called Marcus mate before, Marcus knew for certain. He forgave him again.

5.

Marcus was sitting at a booth at the Hog's Head when Wood walked in, in Puddlemere robes, and Marcus turned away as quickly and as casually as possible. He hadn't seen Wood in a year and a half, and some things never fade: just the idea of accidentally making eye contact and then having to half-nod and pretend he hadn't really seen Wood when he obviously had was exhausting. But Wood fucked it up by walking up beside him.

"What are you drinking?" Wood asked.

"I wasn't," said Marcus, because he wasn't sure where this was heading, and what was Wood doing here anyway?

"Only just got here, then?" said Wood, not noticing the empty mugs at Marcus' side, too thick or too polite. Marcus stared at him. Wood called out for two twisting tequilas and Marcus wondered, impressed, whether he'd done it to impress him, although he wondered why he would.

Wood sat opposite Marcus and they didn't say anything and Marcus watched as the bartender, who was equally gruff and smelly every time he saw him, poured the red-gold liquid into two shotglasses. Fine, if they were altered or poisoned in some way, they were both goners. Wood Accio'd the glasses, which wobbled violently through the air and thunked onto the table. Wood had apparently already been drinking.

Marcus inclined his shot slightly toward Wood, without looking at him, feeling rather than seeing his nod. They both took the shot at the same time, and Marcus closed his eyes at the revolution in his stomach, as a thousand tornados twisted through his belly and his bloodstream, making his neck tense and his eyes close without him telling them to. "Shit," said Wood weakly, trembling, and Marcus moved his mouth in what he figured could be interpreted as either a smile or a grimace, because he really had no idea what this was about.

"So," said Wood, regaining composure. "What's up?" Just like that, which was about the most bizarre thing Marcus had ever heard, ever, and he'd played on a team with Malfoy for a year. He stared at Wood and flexed his fingers before curling them into fists, and they fell into conversation, less stilted than he would have expected. Just like that.

They spoke about Quidditch, of course. Wood had seen Marcus' debut as a starter the week before against the notoriously vicious Falcons, and he wanted to know if it was weird playing against his "admittedly terrifying" former Slytherin teammates, and how he'd kept his temper when Higgs had fouled him thrice, and ten thousand other things: had he noticed the punch up in the Falcons' stands; did he realise his game had become near-faultlessly ambidextrous; was the double-spin chaser formation Marcus' idea because it seemed like the natural successor of the single-spin-feint formation that had worked so well in the school matches. He barked these questions so brusquely and stated his opinions so matter-of-factly that Marcus had to remind himself not to trust an inch of it. He was being probed for information so Puddlemere could train to beat them, he just knew it. It was entirely transparent and pretty stupid and came far too late in the season, but maybe all of Puddlemere were as thick as a bucketful of flobberworms, who knew.

But as Wood explained that for eighteen months he'd been in the hands of a talented but pushy captain, who thought he knew best, always - "And he doesn't!" - Marcus felt himself beginning to loosen up. None of the questions had been about strategy or weaknesses, and Wood was being completely forthcoming. Marcus wondered why Wood would think he'd care or be interested in his tales. Wood was still a reserve, which, his position being Keeper, wasn't unusual, but there was impatience in his every move, from taking shots to swilling butterbeer to edging the conversation pointedly and with distinct lack of subtlety towards: "But didn't the Falmouth Falcons offer you a position of chaser, straight up? Why'd you agree to start as a reserve for the Arrows?"

And Marcus faltered, because if that was what the whole conversation had been leading towards then that was... just odd, and because he didn't really know how to word his aversion to playing for the Falcons, a team so brutish and full of Slytherins and his former teammates and I was trying to convince myself that that wasn't me, but he realised, for the second time in his life, that Wood had somehow figured him out, because he was nodding as though Marcus had spoken and he definitely hadn't. It was terrifying.

Marcus didn't say anything, and this had apparently been what Wood wanted or expected, as he stood up comfortably and flexed his back, which must've been knotting like Marcus' did if he sat for too long after a Quidditch match or practice, and said "Look. Do you come here often?"

"Yeah, it's quiet," said Marcus, meaning, really, that it was so much better than the Three Broomsticks for a bit of relaxation although of course it came out wrong, all jagged and cutting and sideways, like he'd said, 'you're talking too much, fuck off.' Which was maybe what he'd meant, anyway. Wood, being Wood, didn't appear to notice.

"Because I might see you if you're here of a Thursday, I think I'll be coming after practice."

"Right," said Marcus, non-committally, and the whole thing had lasted maybe twenty minutes, and as Wood said goodbye and left, he found himself wondering what the fuck it had all been about.

6.

The more Marcus drank, the more lucid he felt. He was glowing, he was sure. He wasn't positively certain Oliver got absolutely everything he was talking about, but he got more than enough, pounding his fists in emphatic yeses and nodding furiously. Marcus was swimming in something bright and warm.

"No, not even alphabetical, it's got to be totally random. Nothing should matter. Kids could be put with their brothers and sisters, or they could not. They could be in the same house as one or both of their parents, or they could not. You know? Choose your favourite colour. Role a fucking dice." And that had come out so clearly and it was so easy to talk about this, somehow, when he could say 'kids' and it had nothing to do with him any more, but it was something he still definitely felt, and that Oliver felt too, and that in itself was wonderful, the hugest fucking load lifted from his mind.

"Yeah, you're right. Because we need houses still; kids need some structure to how they sleep and eat and take class and compete of course, but it shouldn't be based on a bloody mind reading hat, because, honestly, a mind reading fucking hat!" Oliver swilled his drink with something like indignance. "And who knows, really, when you're eleven, what you're going to grow up to be?"

Oliver was swaying a little, or maybe Marcus was, but someone was definitely swaying and this conversation was exactly the conversation Marcus had always wanted to have and that was mindblowing, and he almost couldn't believe that he used hardly to talk. And of course they'd had near identical conversations a bunch of times now but every time they found something new, a new angle, a new direction, a new - but then he had to stop thinking because his mouth was talking.

"Exactly. Exactly. And the house colours, they'll be different, not connected with the current houses at all, I mean, there shouldn't be any traces of the old system because then it'll take longer to get rid of it, right?" Oliver nodded, agreeing, and everything was kind of coming together in these brilliant flashes. "And the dungeons, they can just be fucking sealed off forever. Blast through the bottom of the lake and let them flood, and no one would have to spend these formative years of their lives stuck in some cold, windowless hole with people telling them, you can't be trusted, you're sly, you're slippery, you're a bad person," - and was this getting out of hand? but he couldn't stop, and he could laugh about it like it was funny - "till you stay at school longer because you believe their shit, because they've drilled it into you so you can't deal with the idea of not being there because how badly will you fuck everything and everyone up if you're out in the real world? When everyone expects you to grow up to be a bad person, what can you do?"

And that was probably the longest speech he'd ever given and definitely the most personal and that was, possibly, stupid, and had his voice gone shrill at the end? And he was suddenly unsure of his footing, embarrassed; he'd had too much to drink and should leave, probably, immediately, if not sooner.

"Yeah, it's got to change," said Oliver. He looked at Marcus right in the eyes and said after a moment's hesitation, "And you're not a bad person."

Marcus was glad he'd said it although he couldn't really believe it was true.

7.

If this were a Quidditch match all the players would have been focusing on the quaffle and bludgers and everyone would have missed the motherfucking point, the elusive little all-powerful thing that was there even when you couldn't see it, even when you were so driven toward something else that you forgot it was there, and then it flashed up suddenly and everyone realised that it wouldn't be over until it was caught, that life could never actually progress until that moment. And he wasn't a seeker so there was nothing he could do.

"And we had this perfect plan," said Oliver, and they did, and it fit, with Oliver so fanatical and precise and the fact that it had been driving Marcus crazy for years, and they had actually built, in their six months of something approximating friendship a pretty complete picture of how things could become at Hogwarts. They had debated and eventually decided on every aspect, from administration to education to basic structure, and they had almost convinced themselves that it only needed implementation, that it could actually have fucking worked, and it was about the only thing off the Quidditch pitch that Marcus had ever helped think of that could have.

"There's after," said Marcus, not believing it and knowing Oliver wouldn't either, because they'd both lost too much to Voldemort the first time around: Marcus a man that frowned from photographs and Oliver most of his mother's side of the family, and would there even be a Hogwarts to save?

Oliver ran his hands through his hair. "Maybe there's now," he said, but they'd discussed how the transformation would take ages to negotiate, a relatively short time to implement, and at least two full generations to become accepted, so no, but - "I mean, there's got to be something we can do." Oliver's voice took on his Quidditch captain tone, low and determined. "I mean I'm going to do whatever I can because maybe after, things could be different."

And suddenly Marcus was thinking about the dungeons, how he'd always wondered if anyone had ever seriously tried to lift the cold and how he was sure the answer was no. It was a Slytherin thing, a twisted sense of pride and loyalty that would see them let the cold thick their joints rather than make a serious effort to get rid of it. These mysteries grew ridiculously complex and started to seem inherently unsolvable but Marcus thought that really didn't have to be the way.

Maybe after, things could be different - yes, maybe, and he looked at Oliver and there was this sudden foreign feeling inside him, a bubble of something warm and beautiful, despite his anxiety and sadness and fear, and there was a huge flooding relief that swept through him from head to toe that came from knowing that it was finally time for decision, time for action.

Oliver stood up. "Are you coming?" he asked, and he was looking at Marcus solemnly and, yes, hopefully, and Marcus would have sacrificed a lot to see a smile.

He wasn't sure whether Oliver entirely trusted him, but that was all right. He wasn't sure where this left him in terms of his mother, and he wasn't sure what exactly, in practical terms, he was agreeing to, or whether it would go well, but all that was all right too. All right because he had made a decision, finally, a decision, and he knew that what he promised he meant, entirely, and that Oliver meant the same. All right because when he reached his hand out, Oliver's met his half way, warm and firm.

"Yeah," said Marcus, as Oliver pulled him up. "I'm coming."

He went.