SEA, SWALLOW ME, remus lupin

sia deug, the badger growls

The seekers knock into each other, twisting and turning like a cyclone around the rapid golden snitch. Their uniforms billow behind them in a spiralling fireworks display of muddied citrine and blood red. When the Hufflepuff seeker, Nolan Macmillan, has his fingertips stretching out to graze the molten gold ridges engraving the snitch, a calculated bludger goes swerving into his shoulder and sends him catapulting to the ground with a sickening crunch. Cove squeaks, covering her eyes in terror as a thud resounds over the heckling audience.

  She removes them warily when Mary informs her that he's been safely carted away, their alternate seeker taking flight and zipping away after the snitch with no time to waste. The quaffle is slowly being passed up the pitch towards their own hoops, Fallon steeling herself furiously against the oncoming competition. Pure joy shines in her eyes.

  Cove startles at the sight of someone new sitting down in the row a few down from them, wrapped up in a scarlet cardigan to brave the elements. He's vaguely hunched over without anything to straighten up his spine, curling into himself as if trying to shrink down to appear less intimidating for the smaller people around him. Barely healed scars raise along his face, wearing a supportive yet completely uninterested expression. It worries her how many marks he has gracing his skin, though they highlight his beauty in such a special way she could never find the right words to describe. She also notices that his usual rings are absent from where she's sat, probably because of the harsh bruises around each finger in their place.

  "Hold on, Mary," she says, wriggling out of her iron grip and handing over the half-full mug. "I'm going over to say hello to Remus. I'll be back before you know it."

  Mary is too distracted by Fallon launching the quaffle out of bounds to form a coherent response. They can even see splinters break off of her bat from the force. Merlin.

Cove dodges past a rowdy group of Ravenclaws that are gleefully revelling in the drama, then ducking under the arms of several overexcited sixth years that look as if they've snuck too much firewhisky in their tartan thermos. As she approaches him, something about his demeanour shifts. He sits up straighter, craning his neck a bit without completely turning to look over his shoulder. It's like he's completely aware of her walking through the intense crowd before she's even come into his line of sight. How odd.

  "Alright, Remus?" she chirps, settling down on the bench next to him. Up close and personal, she can even see a black eye developing, an array of concerning purples that fade into swollen red and yellow blotches — really displaying his house pride, she supposes. Cove hopes that he hasn't been getting into any fights. Then she'd have to worry about him even more furiously.

He raises his eyebrows. "Hi, Cove. What brings you over to enemy territory? Not that I'm unhappy to see you, of course."

"Came over to say hello," she explains. "I don't really believe in house rivalry, anyways. I think it's complicated and causes too many fights—" she pauses to look over her shoulder, "—but don't tell Fallon I said that. She'd drown me in the lake."

  He chuckles, threading his hands together absentmindedly. His eyes jump between players as the game escalates further, a bludger from Hufflepuff knocking square into James Potter's shoulder. Remus winces.

"I don't know why they love this game so much," he mutters. "Those two give me grey hairs, I'll tell you that much."

"Aw, Remus, you're a proper mother hen," Cove laughs, nudging him gently in the ribs. His expression contorts in an almost undetectable manner, a sharp hiss of air deflating through clenched teeth. She apologises frantically and he forgives her just as quickly. He can't really imagine himself being angry with her.