It was the first week of February, and the castle felt like it had grown tired of its own stones. The wind clawed at the windows, dragging snow across the towers in brittle flurries, and even the portraits had begun to mutter about the cold. Most students had taken to rushing between classes wrapped in scarves like shields, heads down, footsteps fast. But the night corridors remained unchanged—quiet, heavy with old drafts and the hush of things unsaid.
Mizar walked them without hurry, boots soft on the stone, his wand casting a low, steady light. Beside him, Akemi Watanabe matched his pace precisely, her black hair pinned back with silver combs, her green-trimmed cloak immaculate as ever. They made a striking pair: two Slytherin prefects walking through the heart of winter like they belonged to it.
It had been a long month. Mizar had spent most of January buried in grimoires, sacred texts, and dangerous theory—alone, unspoken, unreadable to even those closest to him. He'd found fragments, whispers, dead ends. Nothing yet that would break that curse. But he kept digging. He kept hoping the right book, the right page, the right idea would reveal itself before the end of the year. Before time ran out.
Tonight, none of that showed on his face.
"You know," Akemi said, breaking the quiet without breaking her rhythm, "I used to think these rounds were a waste of time."
Mizar glanced at her. "And now?"
She gave a small shrug. "Now I think they're still a waste of time. But at least the company's improved."
He smirked. "High praise. I'll try not to let it go to my head."
They turned a corner near the Astronomy Tower's lower stair, and the charm hit Mizar like a ripple in the air—a slight shimmer, a patch of warmth in a hallway that should have been cold.
He raised a hand. "Concealment charm. Weak."
Akemi nodded, drawing her wand with a little flick. "Left alcove. Let's ruin someone's night."
They stepped forward in sync, and as the charm peeled back, the enchantment shuddered and dissolved with a soft sigh. A fifth-year Hufflepuff boy and a Ravenclaw girl leapt apart like they'd been cursed, faces red, breath caught mid-excuse.
"Names," Akemi said crisply, folding her arms.
The boy stammered. "Andrew Greaves. I—I didn't mean—"
"Violation of curfew," Mizar said, voice smooth but not unkind. "Improper concealment spell. Excessive perfume charm."
The girl turned even redder. "Sorry. It was my idea."
Akemi raised a brow but didn't reply.
Mizar gave a small, diplomatic sigh. "Five points each. And try not to be sloppy next time you decide to sneak out to snog."
They scurried off without protest, whispering apologies. The silence that followed felt a little colder.
Akemi didn't look over. "You'd be a terrifying professor."
Mizar gave a low hum. "Only if I had to teach etiquette."
They resumed their rounds in silence, the sound of their footfalls oddly comforting in the echoing corridors.
After a while, she said, "You've been quiet lately."
"Have I?"
"I know you're shagging Lydia Clearwater," she said, as casually as if commenting on the weather.
That stopped him short—only for a second, but she noticed. Of all the secrets he carried like splinters under skin, he'd thought that one had stayed buried.
He didn't respond immediately, and Akemi's smile was faint, razor-thin.
"Relax, lover boy. I only caught it once. Before the holidays. Overheard you in the library." She adjusted her gloves without looking at him. "Good trick, by the way—dropping your quill by her table to signal when to meet."
He didn't confirm or deny it. Didn't need to. Akemi was sharp; she rarely said anything she wasn't already sure of.
Lydia would become Penelope Clearwater's mother. A single mother by choice and half-blood Ravenclaw witch. They weren't dating by any means. They simply met up to take the edge of things.
"Didn't think you were the type," Akemi said after a beat.
"What type is that?" he asked, voice even.
"To sleep with a half-blood."
"Those things don't matter to me," he admitted.
"So I've noticed." Then she added, "I also didn't think you would let someone close enough to see behind the mirror."
"She doesn't want to see behind anything," Mizar replied, tone almost absent. "That's the point."
Akemi was quiet again, but it was a different kind of silence. Less observational. More… curious.
"I'm not judging," she said eventually. "It's just—interesting."
He arched a brow. "You mean disappointing."
"No," she said, glancing at him for the first time in several minutes. "I mean human."
That caught him off guard. Not enough to show it—but enough to blink.
They turned another corner. The corridor narrowed here, and the torchlight flickered unevenly on the stone. Mizar ran a thumb along his wand's length, grounding himself.
"Do you want to talk about it?" she asked, not teasing this time.
"No," he said simply.
"Fair enough."
More silence followed, heavier now but not unfriendly. Outside, the wind howled again, rattling an old windowpane behind a tapestry.
After a moment, Akemi said, "She's not the reason you've been distracted, though."
Mizar didn't answer. He didn't have to. The silence spoke for him.
"Alright," she said, drawing her cloak tighter around her shoulders. "I won't press."
They kept walking, the castle pressing in around them like a secret waiting to be told. Every corridor felt like a held breath. Every flicker of flame a question.
Eventually, as they reached the upper landing that overlooked the central staircase, Akemi paused and leaned against the banister, looking down at the vast, shadowed space below.
"You ever think about what it's going to look like after we leave?" she asked.
Mizar stepped beside her, eyes following the curves of the staircases spiraling below them. "All the time."
"And?"
"I think," he said slowly, "that some people will try to set the world on fire. And others will just quietly walk into it."
Akemi looked over at him, eyes unreadable. "And you?"
His answer was soft, certain. "I'm building something fire can't reach."
"There's been talk," she said, not quite looking at him.
Mizar didn't respond, but something in his posture sharpened.
"Mulciber. Avery. Malfoy." She said the names like ticking pieces in a puzzle. "Their parents hosted someone for dinner over the holidays. They've been quiet about it, but… different. Focused."
Mizar kept his voice even. "Focused how?"
Akemi's mouth pressed into a line. "Ambitious. Sharper. They talk like something's coming. Like there's a plan they don't fully understand but want to be near when it happens."
"Do they say who this dinner guest was?"
"No name," she said. "Just that he made them feel important. That he talked about restoring… pride. Glory. A return to tradition."
Mizar exhaled slowly through his nose. Of course. He knew Bellatrix and the Lestrange brothers were already in the ranks, it was only natural that now the Hogwarts students were about to be recruited.
"They're looking for someone to follow," Akemi said, almost to herself. "They don't even care who, as long as they get to feel powerful."
He turned his head slightly, studying her expression. She wasn't afraid. Not exactly. But she was watching the horizon with a soldier's eyes, and she didn't like the shape of what was rising.
"You're not the type to repeat corridor gossip," Mizar said.
"I'm not," she agreed. "But this isn't gossip. It's movement. Quiet. Organized."
A pause.
"And I thought," she said, turning to face him fully now, "if there's going to be a Lord to follow… it should be the right one."
That made him still. Entirely. Not a breath wasted.
"You think that's me?"
Akemi didn't hesitate. "You're not ruled by your name. You're not chasing glory. You walk like someone who already knows where he's going—and why he has to get there alone."
He didn't speak.
"I don't know what you're planning," she added. "But if others are whispering about power, I want to see what you do with yours first."
Her words weren't flattery. They were something closer to a declaration. Not submission. Not worship. But a choice. A calculation.
The torches behind them flickered. The castle creaked around them, ancient and listening.
"I'd rather follow you," she said, quieter now. "Than anyone they're whispering about."
And with that, she turned and walked towards the entrance to the Slytherin common room. The stone wall slid open after she voiced the password, torchlight brushing the edge of her sleeve before it swallowed her whole.
Mizar stood alone in the hall, the quiet pressing in. He didn't move for a while. Just stared at the place where she had disappeared.
Days later he would be doing exactly what those younger students had been doing but under better Disillusionment charms.
Lydia Clearwater had one hand braced against his chest, the other tangled lightly in his collar. Her kiss was warm, practiced, and deliberate. Not tender, not careless—just real. She knew what this was. She didn't ask for more. That's why it worked.
They broke apart slowly, breath mingling in the dim pocket of air between them.
"You've been buried in spellbooks again," she murmured.
Mizar blinked, not expecting the shift in tone. "Have I."
"You didn't even flinch when Filch knocked over a bucket two corridors down." Her voice was quiet, but not unkind. "Your mind's in whatever mad theory you're hunting. Not here."
He hesitated, then admitted, "I'm studying counter-curses. Not the flashy kind. Deep bindings. Ancient spells. Legacy magic."
She pulled back slightly, studying him with something that looked less like curiosity and more like a quiet sort of concern. "You looking to unbind something?"
Mizar didn't answer. Not directly. Just let the silence hold.
"You know," she said, brushing a loose strand of hair from her face, "my father used to work with Gringotts. Curse-Breaker division. Did a lot of unsanctioned field work—desert vaults, ruined dynasties, buried rituals."
He watched her more closely now.
"There was one author he swore by," she continued. "Name was Aasim Jalil. Not published in the usual circles. Too niche. Too controversial. But he wrote about curses the way alchemists write about transformation—method, philosophy, risk. One book, especially—Dust and Oath: On the Breaking of Bound Threads. My father said it nearly got him killed, but it worked."
That caught Mizar like a hook in the chest. He filed the title instantly into memory.
"Why didn't you mention it sooner?" he asked.
"Because I figured you'd already devoured every banned book from here to Mahoutokoro," she said with a faint smirk. "Didn't realise you'd missed this one."
He exhaled through his nose. "Thank you."
"I wasn't trying to help," she said dryly. "I was trying to get you to pay attention."
Before he could answer, the air shimmered.
A soft ripple of magic parted the disillusionment. A sleek silver thoroughbred—Marwan's Patronus—stepped into the alcove like it belonged there. Lydia startled slightly, but didn't step back.
The fox sat, luminous eyes fixed on Mizar, and Marwan's voice emerged, cool and clipped:
"Shipment arrived. Five tomes. Rare. One sealed in desert wax—do not melt it. The last may be what you're looking for. More soon. Love, your uncle."
The Patronus vanished in a flicker of fading silver.
"Family drama?" Lydia asked.
"More like research support."
She was already pulling her cloak closed, adjusting her hair with deft fingers. "Go on then. Go chase whatever curse you're hoping to break."
Mizar reached for her wrist before she could step fully back.
"I'm not leaving," he said.
Lydia arched a brow, only half-smiling. "No? Thought you had a curse to chase."
"I do." His fingers slipped from her wrist to her waist, slow, assured. "But I'm not in a rush to outrun it this evening. Furthermore, it's bad form to abandon a lady."
She didn't argue.
His hands slid beneath the edges of her cloak, and her breath caught against his throat as he kissed her again—this time less precise, more searching. The kind of kiss that asked for something wordless and answered in the same tongue.
She responded with the same clarity she always had. No softness. No lies. Just need.
The corridor remained untouched. Still and unseen. Only the slow thud of blood and breath between them marked time as her cloak and their clothes fell back onto the stones and the charm pressed close, muffling sound and sight. Her mouth found the base of his neck. His hands braced at her hips, grounding both of them in something unspoken.
They moved together like people who didn't owe each other promises—but understood the weight of privacy. When she arched, it was with purpose. When he whispered her name, it was without possession. And when it was over, neither of them spoke for a long while. Their silence wasn't uncomfortable. Just full.
She lay curled against him, still half-buttoning her shirt, hair mussed for once.
Lydia broke the quiet first. "If you die chasing whatever this is, I'm going to tell everyone you screamed like a girl."
Mizar huffed a laugh. "I'll leave instructions for the portrait to deny it."
"Smart." She sat up and twisted her hair into a loose knot.
Without speaking, Mizar reached for his cloak and pulled a small vial from the inner lining—a faintly silver potion in a dark-glass bottle. He held it out.
She took it without comment, her fingers brushing his. "You always make it yourself?"
He nodded once. "I don't trust the commercial ones."
Lydia gave a quiet, amused breath. "Of course you don't." She uncorked it and drank in a single practiced tilt of the wrist, then handed it back.
He vanished the empty bottle with a flick of his wand. Nothing lingered between them but silence and residual warmth.
Out of respect, he always hugged her afterwards. She leaned into the hug like she always did—arms folding loosely around his waist, barely reaching past his sternum. It wasn't tender, not exactly, but it wasn't empty either. Just quiet. Known. No pretending. No illusions. Respectful.
For a few seconds, neither of them moved.
Then she pulled back with a small sigh. "Alright. I have an essay to not write and a friend to lie to about where I've been."
He arched a brow. "You could just say you were with me."
She smirked. "That's exactly why I won't. Now go write to your mystery uncle before I lose patience with your charm-induced broodiness."
He watched her go, slipping back into the corridor like fog through cracks in the stone. When the last of her steps faded, Mizar let out a slow breath, rolled his shoulders back, and straightened his collar.
The alcove still smelled faintly of her perfume—something cool and herbal, like rosemary steeped in smoke. But it was already fading. Like most things.
He didn't linger.
The owlery was nearly deserted when he arrived. Snow filtered in through the arched, open windows, catching on the wind and scattering across the stone floor. Tammuz was already waiting on one of the higher perches, watching him descend the spiral steps with the kind of expression only old owls could manage—equal parts patience and reproach.
Mizar held up his hand. "Don't give me that look."
"Uncle,
New lead: Dust and Oath: On the Breaking of Bound Threads by Aasim Jalil. Recommended via an old Curse-Breaker contact. Apparently not Ministry-approved. Niche distribution, likely Goblin-affiliated. If it exists—I need it.
Name alone suggests ritual methodology. Anything you can find. I'll cover any cost.
—M."
He tied the note to Tammuz's leg with steady hands. The owl hooted once, gave him a look as if to say finally, and vanished into the snowy dark without a sound.
Mizar watched him go, hands still gloved, breath misting in front of him.
He could still feel Lydia's warmth lingering on his skin, but already his mind had shifted. Shifted back to the thread he was trying to pull from history's teeth.
Break the curse. Before September.