Author's Note:
Well, I'm finally updating this thing after over a year! I'm so sorry to keep you all waiting, but life has kept me very busy this past year. I do hope my old readers return to finish the tale! Since I'm just about to begin my summer break, I should have plenty of time to keep posting chapters for the next few months, so I won't leave you all hanging again!
This chapter isn't the most thrilling, but some of the dialogue between Az and Crowley in the second half is important, so I hope you enjoy—and with any luck, I'll have another chapter uploaded sometime in this coming week!
Also, important note: If you're an older reader returning to this fic and don't quite remember what was going on in it, but don't have the time/inclination to read through the first eight chapters again, allow me to provide a link to a chapter-by-chapter synopsis of all that is going on up to this point:
(since this website is obstinately refusing to let me post a link, you'll have to do this the hard way) Go to tumblr and search for the hashtag #ineffable incantations chapter synopsis
The only post that should come up will be the synopsis!
Loud, booming barks resounded behind Hagrid as he let the four students in. The source of the racket was an enormous boarhound, who came bounding from the bed in the corner to greet the newcomers. Adam, even in his exhausted state, whooped with delight at the sight of the dog.
"Tha's Fang," Hagrid told the first-year. "Feel free ter pet 'im, he won' bite."
Adam didn't need to be told twice. He opened his arms to receive the dog and was nearly bowled over, as Fang was almost twice his size.
"Lemme put some tea on," Hagrid told them after he had settled them down at the table, Fang slobbering into Adam's lap. He began bustling around in the kitchen area, pulling mugs out of a cabinet and stirring the fire.
"Actually, do you have any cocoa, Hagrid?" Aziraphale inquired. Crowley looked at him quizzically; he knew the Ravenclaw was very fond of cocoa, but he was never one to turn down a nice steaming cup of tea. Then Crowley recalled how much better he'd felt after consuming chocolate on the train: it was a natural remedy against the ill effects of the dementors. Cocoa likely wouldn't be quite so effective as a chocolate bar, but it was something.
"Sure I do," Hagrid said, and if he wondered at the question he didn't show it. A few minutes passed, quiet but for the sound of Hagrid preparing their drinks and Fang's pleased grunts as Adam and Pepper petted him. Crowley, with nothing else to do, looked idly around.
It was hard not to feel at home inside Hagrid's hut. Its single room was warmed by a crackling fire that cast soft shadows across the furniture, and though the rafters were laden with hams and pheasants* and the massive bed with its gaudy patchwork quilt took up a sizable portion of the limited floor space, it produced no claustrophobic feeling; rather, its crowdedness had an overall cozy effect. Moreover, the presence of the crossbow leaning in the corner was reassuring, not ominous. The dementors seemed like a bad fairytale, like shadowy figures from an old nightmare, when thought about from within the safe confines of Hagrid's hut.
"Now then, I 'spect you lot can give me a good excuse for bein' out so late," Hagrid said at last as he carried the bucket-sized mugs over to the table.
Crowley was glad the two first years were too distracted by hot chocolate and Fang to join in on the conversation, and Aziraphale kept true to his word not to mention the dementors. Together, they told as much of the truth as they could. They weren't lying, exactly, Crowley thought to himself; they were simply leaving out certain portions of the truth. They admitted to having snuck out to visit the hippogriffs, and when it came time to recount Adam's magical explosion, Crowley described it in a way that made it sound as if the boy had simply gotten overexcited by the hippogriffs.
"Not ter say I advocate sneakin' out pas' curfew—I don't," Hagrid said sternly as Crowley and Aziraphale finished their account. Then his voice softened a bit. "But I can hardly blame yeh for wantin' ter see the hippogriffs." Hagrid turned to Adam. "An' yeh're feelin' better now, eh?" he asked kindly.
"Oh, yeah, I'm good now," Adam said distractedly, too busy scratching Fang behind the ears to put much focus into his response.
Aziraphale nudged Crowley and mimed sipping; Crowley realized he'd yet to drink his cocoa. He put the mug to his lips and took a large swig of the now-lukewarm liquid.
The effect was instantaneous. Warmth flowed down his throat and settled cozily in his stomach, where it proceeded to blossom out, until even his fingers and toes had thawed from that terrible, all-pervading cold that only dementors could cause.
"Thanks," he murmured to Aziraphale, but the Ravenclaw was not paying attention to him; rather, he was eyeing their host with worry on his face.
"Hagrid, are you doing all right?" Aziraphale asked.
Crowley focused on the Hagrid's ruddy face and realized that it looked quite haggard behind its wild beard.
Hagrid waved the question away with one massive hand and did his best to maintain his cheery tone: "'Course I am, 'course I am! Do any of yeh wan' more cocoa?"
For the first time since entering the hut, Adam's attention had moved from the dog drooling all over his robes to gaze at Hagrid. His head tilted slightly to one side, he stated, "No, you're not all right, you're sad. You're real sad 'bout one of the hippogriffs."
The hut got quiet, but for the crackling of the flames and Fang's rhythmic breathing, as everyone stared at the little Gryffindor with the bright, almost unnervingly piercing eyes.
"It's Buckbeak," Hagrid finally huffed out in a hoarse voice. "I dunno if yeh've heard, bu' he attacked a student yesterday—didn' mean ter hurt him, but 'e scratched 'im up a bit. I'm worried it'll get 'im in a righ' spot o' trouble, an'…an'…" here Hagrid's composure slipped completely and he pulled a massive handkerchief from a pocket to dab at his suddenly teary eyes. "Buckbeak jus' don' deserve that, yeh know? He's a good boy, really. Bu' folks jus' don' see that, when it comes to big ol' creatures like 'im, they jus' don' see…"
Aziraphale, who was closest to the now blubbering groundskeeper, extended his hand to pat his gigantic, shaking shoulder. "There, there, Hagrid," he said awkwardly, "it'll be all right."
"Maybe everything will turn out just fine—Dumbledore should be able to help smooth things out, after all," Crowley chimed in, fishing for something reassuring to say. "You don't know yet that charges are even going to be pressed, do you?"
"No, no, yer right," Hagrid sniffed, looking up. "Nothin's bin done yet, 's pointless to get all emotional 'bout it before anythin' bad has even happened, yeah?" He offered them all a watery grin, and gave a gargantuan sniff. "Bet you lot think I'm downrigh' silly, eh?"
"We don't think you're silly!" Pepper piped up, and Adam nodded earnestly beside her.
"All righ', well, I bes' get yeh back ter the castle, anyhow," Hagrid said, wiping his eyes one last time. "I'll walk yeh—it's dangerous to be out after dark these days, yeh know." Crowley and Aziraphale exchanged looks; if they hadn't known before tonight, they certainly did now.
"Can Fang walk with us too?" Adam asked eagerly, throwing his arms around the hound's neck.
"O' course," Hagrid replied.
Aziraphale admitted to Hagrid that they'd actually used a passage near the greenhouses to get outside, so they set off towards the greenhouses instead of the castle. As soon as they'd left the warmth of the hut for the cool night air, Fang bounded on ahead, and Adam and Pepper raced after him, laughing. The running eleven-year-olds soon left Crowley and Aziraphale a good ways behind. Hagrid walked a short distance behind the fifth-year pair, his crossbow slung casually across his shoulder. The rhythmic thud of his huge boots hitting the earth was strangely comforting to Crowley. Still somewhat on edge from their encounter with the dementors, he'd have been uneasy about having his back to the Forbidden Forest without the solid presence of the groundskeeper behind him.
Adam kept nearly tripping on his own robes as he ran, Crowley noticed with a grin. It always took the muggleborn first-years, accustomed to the trousers of the muggle world, a few weeks to get used to all the extra fabric billowing around their ankles.
Aziraphale looked in the direction that Crowley was smiling, and also took in the sight of Adam tripping over the hem of his robes. "Nice to see him acting like a normal child after all his, er, strangeness this evening, isn't it?" the Ravenclaw noted.
"Yeah," Crowley agreed. "There's something eerie about that kid. He doesn't mean to be, but something about him is just so…"
"Uncanny?" Aziraphale supplied.
"Exactly."
"It had occurred to me that possibly…no, never mind…"
"No, Angel, what?" Crowley prompted.
Aziraphale glanced behind his shoulder at Hagrid; the groundskeeper was gazing up at the stars as he walked, paying the students no mind. "Well, perhaps this was just me," Aziraphale said in muted tones, "but I almost felt like I could…feel Adam's happiness, back with the hippogriffs, like waves—no, that sounds silly, I'm sure I was just imagining it."
"No, I know what you mean, I felt it too," Crowley quickly agreed. When Adam had approached his hippogriff, the little Gryffindor's exuberance had seemed to radiate off him in waves, imbuing Crowley with more excitement than he'd already been feeling. "What about it?"
"Well, since dementors feed off happiness, I was wondering if possibly they'd felt it? And that's what tempted them onto Hogwarts grounds?"
Crowley considered this. "It's as good a theory as any," he concluded. He studied Adam, who along with Pepper had caught up with Fang near the greenhouses; they were rolling around with the boarhound in the grass. At the moment, he looked like any eleven-year-old.
The two walked on quietly for a moment, Hagrid's weighty footfalls resounding behind them and the laughter of the two children growing louder as they neared them.
"Hey, Angel," Crowley said suddenly, thinking of something, "if it was Adam's happiness that drew the dementors in, that means they're not likely to just, come back on the grounds again for no reason, right?"
Aziraphale thought this over for a moment. "Right…"
"So it really is senseless to go telling Dumbledore or anyone about what happened, right? It was an isolated incident, it won't happen to anyone else," Crowley reasoned. "We just tell Adam he's got to stay inside after curfew and everything'll be fine!"
"…Yes, I suppose you're right." Aziraphale heaved a sigh. "You said it before, we would get into quite a lot of trouble if we were to tell anyone. So if we can just keep tabs on Adam instead…"
"Brilliant," Crowley said as they reached to Adam and Pepper at last. Aziraphale had promised earlier not to bring news of the incident to a professor until they'd discussed it further, and that had suited Crowley well; he'd been confident in his own ability to think of some argument to keep the Ravenclaw from telling. And now it was all settled.
"The passage is right over there, Hagrid," Aziraphale said, pointing. "Thank you for walking us."
"Not at all," Hagrid replied; "but yeh all need to promise me yeh won' be sneakin' out like that again, all righ'?" he added sternly.
"We promise," said Adam and Pepper solemnly, and the two elder students hurried to follow suit.
"Good," Hagrid said. "Now no more trouble tonigh'—get on back to bed."
Adam and Pepper bade Fang a teary farewell. Then, as Hagrid made his way back across the grounds, a wide, sturdy silhouette with a narrow, canine one trotting beside it, the four students slipped one by one through the trapdoor of the passage.
"Lumos," Aziraphale and Crowley muttered as one.
"Lumos," the two first-years echoed back at them, so that two beams of steady white light brightened into four.
Being back in the dim, narrow tunnel winding its way back into the castle reminded Crowley of the comment he'd made when he'd hoisted his friend through the trapdoor some hours earlier.
"Hey Az, I don't know if you remember my comment for earlier, when I was helping you get through the trapdoor…"
"Oh, you mean when you told me, and I quote, to 'lay off the pumpkin pasties'?"
"…Yeah. That." Pepper and Adam giggled, and Crowley felt his face heat up. "Uh, sorry about that."
"Well, it's hardly the first time you've made a joke about my weight," Aziraphale said frostily, "and you've never seen a reason to apologize before now."
"Yeah, well…it's not very nice, I guess, so…" Crowley trailed off, his face decidedly hot now.
Aziraphale stopped walking, so that Crowley nearly bumped into him in the narrow passage. The Ravenclaw was giving him a searching look, prompting Crowley to cross his arms and defensively ask, "What?"
"Since when has being nice meant two knuts to you?"
Crowley could feel his ears burning. "I just wanted to let you know there's nothing wrong with your weight is all," he said gruffly, and shouldered past his friend to catch up to Adam and Pepper, who had paused to wait for the two older students. "Go on, keep moving," he told them, ignoring their quizzical looks.
Once they'd made it to the end of the tunnel and reemerged in a castle corridor, they had to keep quiet. A glance at the Marauder's Map while shielding themselves behind the statue of Gregory the Smarmy showed them that neither Filch nor Peeves was anywhere near them.
"That's a spot of luck, at least," Aziraphale sighed, and no one spoke again as they made their way along the corridors to the portrait of the Fat Lady.
She was fast asleep in her frame, hair curlers fastened to the painted swirls of her ringlets**, and Crowley had to repeat the password several times before she stirred.
"Out late, I see," she sniffed groggily, but she swung open to let them in.
"On you get," Crowley said to Pepper and Adam, who scampered through the frame and into the common room. "Right to bed, you two." Pepper turned to stick her tongue out at him before heading towards the dormitory tower, but she meant it good-naturedly, as far as Crowley could tell.
"Well, good night, Crowley," Aziraphale said, stifling a yawn. "Thanks for nearly getting us expelled for—how many times has it been now?"
"At least twenty, I'd say," Crowley answered with a smirk. "Anyways, don't say good night yet, I'm going to walk you to the Ravenclaw tower—without the map, you could run into Filch or someone, after all."
For the second time this evening, Aziraphale fixed his friend with a searching stare. "Really? You're finally deciding to fulfill the 'chivalrous' aspect of being a Gryffindor, are you?"
"Look," Crowley began, annoyed, "if you want to get caught by Filch then go on ahead alone—"
"No," Aziraphale interrupted, "I'd…not mind the company. It's just rather odd, from you, you know."
"I don't see why you think it's so odd," Crowley grumbled, face heating up yet again; "We are friends after all, angel—"
"That's another thing," Aziraphale exclaimed, loudly enough for the Fat Lady, who had swung back closed and was trying to sleep again, to shush him. In lower tones, he continued, "You're calling me 'angel' again, you haven't done that since third year—"
"Okay, y'know what? If I'm going to be interrogated the whole time I walk you back, I change my mind," Crowley snapped. "You take this," he shoved the map into the Ravenclaw's arms, "and get yourself back to Ravenclaw tower, all right? I'm going to bed, Ang—Anchell." Redder than ever at almost using the old nickname again, he caught himself just in time and switched to Aziraphale's surname.
"Really dear, there's no need to get so worked up, I was simply asking—"
"Fortuna major."
"I—what?"
"Fortuna major," Crowley repeated a little louder, and the Fat Lady's portrait swung open for a second time as she grumbled sleepily. He climbed in to the Gryffindor common room, throwing a quick "See you around, Aziraphale" over his shoulder. Just as the frame swung shut, he caught a glimpse of the hurt look on the Ravenclaw's face, and had to suppress a pang of guilt. Eh, well, he'd make it up to Aziraphale tomorrow. For now, burning with embarrassment and exasperated with himself, it was best to simply call it a night.
Git, he reproached himself as he climbed the winding stairs of his dormitory tower. He was acting strange enough around Aziraphale that it was obvious even to the normally-oblivious Ravenclaw that something was off, which meant that Crowley could no longer pretend to himself that he didn't have a problem. He did, undeniably, fancy Aziraphale—and he had to put a stop to it.
He needed rules for himself. All right: no more calling him "angel," that was a good start. And no more being uncharacteristically nice, Crowley decided; he had to treat Aziraphale like he always had. Apparently late-night strolls through secluded corridors was not something the old Crowley—the devil-may-care, uninfatuated Crowley—would suggest, so none of that either.
He opened the door to the fifth-year boys' dormitory as quietly as he could and slipped inside. One of his peers was still awake, the scarcely-visible beam of a candle glowing through the thick curtains of one of the four-poster beds. Crowley could hear the gentle scratch of a quill on parchment, which stopped as Lee Jordan's head peeped out from behind the curtains.
"Oy, Crowley!" Lee said in way of greeting, his voice hushed so as not to wake the other members of the room. "Out a bit late, aren't you? Where were you?"
"Why, I don't know what you could mean," Crowley responded innocently; "I was in the common room this whole time. What, are you accusing me of stepping out past curfew?"
Lee smirked at him. "Oh no, not goody-two-shoes Crowley," he joked. "Don't tell me where you were then, we're all entitled to our secrets—but if I hear that any mischief took place last night at breakfast, I'm gonna know it was you." He winked, and with a shake of his dreadlocks retreated back behind his four-poster's hangings.
Crowley kicked his shoes off beside his own bed and stripped from his robe; too tired to bother undressing completely, however, he slid into bed with his trousers and shirt still on. He was suddenly feeling very drained.
His last thoughts as he slowly drifted off were of his friend, making his way back to Ravenclaw tower on his own. Nip this bloody infatuation in the bud, that's what he had to do, Crowley though to himself drowsily. Then all could be like normal.
Notes:
*Some of the hams and pheasants dangled down low enough from the rafters to pose quite a risk for their very tall owner; just after letting the four students in, for instance, Hagrid had taken a particularly low-hanging ham to the face.
**No one was quite sure where the Fat Lady had acquired said curlers – the artist certainly hadn't painted them on her – or even why painted-on ringlets would need curlers to keep their curl, but every evening she could be seen to be wearing them without fail.
