Official Courtship Rituals for the Pureblood Wizard

Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at http://archiveofourown.org/works/28084098.

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Category: M/M
Fandom: 방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS
Relationship: Jeon Jungkook/Kim Taehyung | V, Min Yoongi | Suga/Park Jimin
Character: Jeon Jungkook, Kim Taehyung | V, Jung Hoseok | J-Hope, Min Yoongi
| Suga, Park Jimin (BTS), Kim Namjoon | RM, Kim Seokjin | Jin
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, Alternate Universe - Harry Potter
Setting, Slytherin Kim Taehyung | V, Gryffindor Jeon Jungkook,
Slytherin Jimin, Slytherin Yoongi, gryffindor hoseok, Gryffindor
Namjoon, Misunderstandings, Miscommunication, Humor, Fluff, Light
Angst, Protective Kim Taehyung | V, Smitten Kim Taehyung | V, Idiots
in Love, idiots to lovers, Kim Taehyung | V is Whipped
Language: English
Stats: Published: 2020-12-15 Completed: 2021-08-11 Chapters: 5/5 Words:
25878

Official Courtship Rituals for the Pureblood Wizard

by cblaire

Summary

The Hogwarts AU where Taehyung’s a pureblooded Slytherin who falls for Jungkook, a
muggleborn Gryffindor. When Taehyung gifts him a dark artifact as part of pureblood
courting rituals, Jungkook, who knows nothing of pureblood culture, thinks Taehyung is
out to curse him. Needless to say, he's terrified. Oops.

Now a series of independent one-shots, in the same verse!

Notes

I just distributed the members between Gryffindor and Slytherin, even though I think some
would suit other houses better (ex: Namjoon as a Ravenclaw), because logistically it’s just
easier (ex: Great Hall lunch scenes) oops.

See the end of the work for more notes

 verdant gemini of lazarus & le fey's compendium
Chapter Notes

See the end of the chapter for notes

Here’s what happens, when Kim Taehyung - infamous pureblooded prince of Slytherin house -
gets hit by a stray bludger to the back of his head, and subsequently knocked out, sprawled
inelegantly across the bleachers from where he’d been watching his friend practice with the
Gryffindor team:

Most people gasp in horror.

Jung Hoseok, said friend and captain of the Gryffindor quidditch team, laughs.

Jeon Jungkook, 5th year star beater of the Gryffindor quidditch team, panics. "Fuck. Fuck, oh god,
shit, is he dead-? Tell me he’s not dead— someone tell me I didn’t just murder Kim—"

———

Kim Taehyung is in the infirmary.

Kim Taehyung: as pureblooded as they come, heralding from a dynasty of aristocratic Slytherins
for as long as anyone can ever remember, and heir apparent to the Kim family fortune. 6th year
prefect, and, as many say, likely to become head boy next year once Kim Namjoon graduates.
(They’re cousins, though Taehyung’s branch of the family is the notorious one; or the sinfully
wealthy one, as Jimin likes to say.)

For the past seven years, Kim Taehyung has accumulated a reputation that, by now, mostly
precedes him. That is, they say he’s one of the most skilled Defense Against the Dark Arts students
since Potter; the most prolific and infamous prankster since the Weasley twins; and, most of all,
the prestige of the Kim name is sufficient to rival even that of the Malfoys - before their nasty faux
pas of aligning themselves with a homicidal madman, that is.

That being said, when Taehyung ends up in the infirmary, everyone knows within less than an
hour. Within the hour after that, bets have been placed and raised, as to the impending fate (doom)
of one Jeon Jungkook.

Jeon Jungkook: a muggleborn Gryffindor 5th year, whose parents are humble, non-magical doctors
from Busan, South Korea. The apple of Madame Hooch’s eye, given the prodigious flying skills
that landed him a spot on the Gryffindor quidditch team’s roster his first year, enough that some
have speculated his eventual career as a professional. (Those few who are closer to him, though,
know that he’s also particularly skilled in Charms, and keenly interested in pursuing a path as a
Healer post-graduation.)

Jeon Jungkook, who, in having knocked the Kim heir "firmly off his ass and out cold" (quote, one
Jung Hoseok), is now the Hogwarts student likely at the top of Kim’s hit list. If there ever was
such a thing.

By the time Jungkook makes it to the infirmary after he’s finished his classes for the day, an
overwhelming plethora of get-well gift baskets, cards and balloons have already filled the infirmary
to the point where there’s little space to move around. As it is, Jungkook nearly knocks over a life-
sized teddy bear plushie on his way to Kim Taehyung’s cot, and only just barely manages to avoid
a deathly soft collision.

He slips behind the curtain where Taehyung is laid up, and takes a seat to wait.

———

Taehyung wakes up to a pounding headache and the distinct feeling that part of his bones have
turned to mush. In a manner of speaking.

The last thing he remembers registering, is one hyena-like snicker from Jung Hoseok; and as
consciousness slowly floats back to him, Taehyung swears he’s going to strangle him. Come watch
us practice, that asshole said.

Jung Hoseok, he thinks, blearily blinking his eyes open though the haze of throbbing pain, I’m
going to hex you into the next century—

He opens his eyes, and sees the most beautiful boy he’s ever seen sitting by his bedside.

Jungkook stares at him, moving his lips to speak words Taehyung isn’t quite registering, concern
clearly reflected in his eyes as he hovers over Taehyung.

Taehyung opens his mouth. "Did you use the Aveda Kedavra curse on me?" He rasps.

Jungkook’s eyes widen in horror. Before he can reply, Taehyung continues, "Because you’re drop-
dead gorgeous."

Silence.

And then, a vaguely strangled noise makes its way out of Jungkook’s throat, as his face explodes a
bright, crimson red.

———

"What did you do to him?" Jimin’s voice is a mixture of curiosity and admiration.

From beside him at the Slytherin table, Taehyung, who’s been staring intently across the Great
Hall at a particular seat at the Gryffindor table, sighs wistfully. The person at whom he’s staring -
a one Jeon Jungkook - has yet to stop stuttering and resembling a tomato, ever since he entered the
Hall for dinner and caught sight of Taehyung, eyeing him like a particularly delicious treacle tart.

"He’s so cute," Taehyung says, watching the way Jungkook stuffs so much pumpkin pie into his
mouth that he resembles a chipmunk storing nuts in its cheeks for the winter.

Yoongi snorts into his goblet.

"How could you not tell me about him, all this time?!" Taehyung rounds on his two friends, both of
whom are on the Slytherin quidditch team, and therefore must have been aware of that angel’s
existence.

Yoongi rolls his eyes. Jimin eyes him flatly. "Taehyung, everyone knows Jeon. Pretty sure half the
people at this school think he’s the best thing to happen to quidditch since Oliver Wood."

"I didn’t know about him, until I woke up - without you around, might I add - in the infirmary to
see that gorgeous angel standing over me!" Taehyung sighs. "Thank goodness he knocked me out
with that bludger. Can you imagine? If he hadn’t, I might have never known about him."

Yoongi chokes on a piece of chicken. "Can’t say I’ve ever heard someone be thankful they got
bludger’ed in the head," he mutters. Then again, Yoongi thinks; he’s always thought Taehyung
vaguely behaved as if he’d just been blunger’ed in the head, anyway, even before Jeon had
accidentally sent a stray bludger into his skull.

"You guys talking about how Taehyung broke Jungkook when the first words out of his mouth
when he woke up from being knocked out was, ‘Did you AK me, because you’re drop-dead
gorgeous’?" Hoseok’s amused voice cuts in, standing somewhere above their heads.

Yoongi chokes again.

Jimin shrieks with laughter. "Kim Taehyung," he crows, slapping his friend heartily on the back.
"You did not."

"Hoseok," Taehyung grabs the Gryffindor’s arm and yanks him to sit beside them. "You, and Jimin
and Yoongi are all traitors - to have kept that cutie from me all these years!"

Hoseok looks infinitely amused. "It’s not our fault you were too busy sucking face with Chaeyoung
for the past four years to notice anyone else," he replies, and Taehyung makes a dismissive motion
with his hand.

His ex-girlfriend - she-banshee who shall not be named - is of no relevance to the current matter.

"Tell me," Taehyung urges Hoseok, his eyes still fixed on Jungkook, who’s been glancing back
every few minutes and blushing anew every time he realizes that, yes, Taehyung is still very much
staring at him. "What family is he from?"

Taehyung’s fairly certain he would most definitely have noticed Jeon Jungkook at at least one of
the society functions he’s been mandated to repeatedly attend since he turned of age. It’s still mind-
boggling to him, how he could have possibly gone nearly five years without knowing of of the boy.

"Uhh, the Jeons?"

Taehyung frowns. "The Jeons? Are they a branch family of another? I’ve never heard of them-"

"Taehyung," Hoseok laughs. "Jungkook’s not a pureblood."

"Oh." Well, no matter. A face that gorgeous - honestly, it even makes sense to Taehyung, that he
wouldn’t be pureblooded. Given the whole dubiousness of the concept of keeping blood pure
without having disastrous genetic consequences (re: Bellatrix Lestrange), a face like Jungkook’s
likely couldn’t have come from purebloods, anyway. "Then which school did he attend before?
Was he-"

"He’s muggleborn, Tae. He was at a muggle school before Hogwarts."

Taehyung gapes.

"There’s no way," he says seriously, completely unaware that Jungkook has now begun to make
his way over to the table behind them. "Jeon Jungkook can’t be a muggleborn—"

Jungkook, who’s arrived at the Gryffindor table just in time to hear Kim blatantly speak down on
his blood status, flinches.

"—that boy most definitely must have Veela blood, have you seen his cheeks, it’s impossible for
him to be muggleborn-"

A strangled choke.

Taehyung turns around.

Jimin shrieks with laughter into his hand, face down on the table. Hoseok’s slamming the table
with his fist to try to rein in his guffaws. Yoongi wants desperately to be anywhere but here with
this disaster of a child they call Taehyung.

"Hello, beautiful," Taehyung says smoothly, a winning smile on his lips. "I was just about to come
over to speak with you!"

Jungkook fishmouths. "Um. I- No, I wasn’t- Just- Hoseok-hyung," he finally blurts, sending a
vaguely panicked look towards Hoseok, who’s practically in stitches at this point.

Taehyung frowns. "No, my name is Taehyung," he corrects.

Jungkook looks like he’s struggling to breathe. "N-No, I mean- I- I’m here for Hoseok-hyung.
He’s- he’s supposed to help me with an essay."

Taehyung sends said person a look of utter betrayal, before twirling back around to face Jungkook.
"I can help you!"

Jungkook stares, thunderstruck. Taehyung promptly shoots to his feet, curling a hand firmly around
Jungkook’s forearm. "Come, I got Os in all my O.W.L.s last year, you know," he says as he pulls a
dazed and vaguely stricken Jungkook down the aisle towards the doors.

Jungkook knows. Everyone knows that Kim got Os on all his O.W.L.s; he’s at the top of his class.
Intelligence runs in the Kim house, even a muggleborn like him knows that.

Still, he shoots Hoseok a terrified look over his shoulder, one that clearly spells SOS.

Hoseok grins and gives him a thumbs up.

"So, Jungkook," Taehyung chatters. "I’ve always found muggles incredibly fascinating - is it true
you have a rubber contraption in the form of a duck for baths?"

———

Here’s the thing, about being a muggleborn student at Hogwarts with a coveted and admired spot
on the Quidditch team, on top of the clear favor of the Charms professor: sometimes, not everyone
is as kind as Kim Taehyung.
Sometimes, all it does, is breed resentment, in the same kinds of people who still harbor the same
bigoted ideas as the homicidal madman who’d been defeated years ago. And, even if said ideas are
backwards and wholly wrong, there are still people who think them.

For these people, someone like Jeon Jungkook - a boy born to two muggles, who manages to land a
spot on the Gryffindor team his first year and seems to excel at the magic arts despite his non-
magical background - is a thorn in their sides.

So Jungkook’s used to it, by now.

He’s not bullied, per se; the vast majority of his peers aren’t bigoted assholes. Still, he’s not
unacquainted with the handful of close-minded idiots that have somehow gained acceptance to
Hogwarts and seem to harbor a grudge against him simply for doing well despite coming from a
muggle household.

Most of them, unfortunately, are in Slytherin.

That isn’t at all to say that Slytherins are generally of this foul property, but it also cannot be
denied that pureblood tend to flock to the house more than to others.

Given all this, it really doesn’t come as a surprise when, the Monday following the week he’d
accidentally bludger’ed Kim Taehyung - practical idol of Slytherin, their pride and joy - he finds
himself cornered by a trio of such backwards, angry bigots.

"I bet you did on purpose, Jeon," one of them sneers.

Jungkook, cornered against the brick wall in an empty hallway that he’d been using as a shortcut to
get back to the doors after a late practice, sighs. He’s tired. He doesn’t have the patience for the
three idiot musketeers. Haven’t they learned, from Malfoy and his two henchmen during their time
in Hogwarts, that skulking around in thuggish trio sets is obviously the setup for an ill fate?

"Finally showing your true colors, you muggle trash, eh?"

Apparently not.

Jungkook turns his eyes heavenwards.

Honestly, given the way that Kim Taehyung’s been showing a sudden and enthusiastic interest in
him, Jungkook thinks it’s safe to assume that the said prince of Slytherin is not personally that
aggrieved over Jungkook’s accident. (Of course, that still leaves the question of why the most
egregiously handsome boy in school is suddenly sending Jungkook into constant heart attacks with
his attention, but Jungkook assumes it’s just a natural curiosity - a pureblood like Taehyung,
probably finds his muggleborn status fascinating in a ‘oh, that’s new’ sort of way.)

And, Jungkook’s already apologized. Profusely. Repeatedly. Had even offered Taehyung, that day
in the infirmary, to make it up to him somehow, once he’d gotten over his strangled consternation
at the other boy’s random pickup line. Taehyung had declined, and said, "All I need is your name,
angel." Which. Jungkook is still processing that one.

"It’s high time for you to learn your place, Jeon; been getting on my nerves, strutting around here,
like you own the place, when you’re nothing but a dirty muggle," the first one - Dumb #1, as
Jungkook’s taken to calling him in his mind - says.

Jungkook just barely resists the urge to roll his eyes. Yeah, he’s sure been strutting around school.
"Maybe a good Bat-Bogey Hex," Dumb #2 says eagerly.

Dumb #1 scowls. "Shut it, Peter, that’s fucking stupid," he snaps.

Jungkook eyes them, unimpressed. So they’re dicks to each other, too. Swell.

"I was thinking more like…the Deterioration Hex, maybe." Dumb #3, who’s apparently as sinister
as he is dumb, says, twirling his wand. Jungkook’s stomach coils.

Shit. That one isn’t as simply harmless as the Bat-Bogey.

Jungkook’s hand curls around his wand. He’s definitely not good enough to take all three of them,
but he wonders if he’ll be able to fire off a spell to maybe tangle them up for long enough to
escape. He’s not sure.

He’s a good student, sure, but he’s also pretty sure Dumb #1-3 are seventh years; they’ve likely
learned spells beyond his present capability. That, and DADA’s been his weak spot for years. He
just hadn’t really seen the need to try to improve much on a subject he already sucked at, given that
the snake-faced psychopath had been dead for years, and Jungkook couldn’t foresee any other use
for DADA.

It’s not like he’s going to be an auror (thank goodness).

Now, though, he’s sorely regretting not taking up Namjoon’s offer to tutor him in the subject.

He could really use it right about now.

Dumb #3 raises his wand with a sickening grin.

Jungkook inwardly sighs. Well, he thinks; at least, as long as they don’t manage to kill him off
completely, Pomfrey should hopefully be able to patch up whatever idiocy they impart on him—

"What the fuck," a low, deep voice snarls, brimming with enough fury that it sends a shiver down
Jungkook’s spine. "Do you think you’re doing, Bailey?"

Kim Taehyung descends upon them like Jungkook’s very own avenging angel, eyes dark and
pitched with unbridled rage, stalking forward like a lion in a savannah.

Dumb #1-3 jolt.

Jungkook gapes.

"Kim," Dumb #1 greets, a nervous smile stretching too wide on his face. "We were just- we were
just trying to teach this mudblood here a lesson-"

Wrong thing to say.

Taehyung’s eyes, if at all possible, grow even angrier, his mouth curling into a threatening growl.
"What," he hisses. Jungkook can swear there’s a crackle in the air, emanating from the sheer
magical energy Taehyung is expelling. "Did you just call him?"

He doesn't even give them a chance to answer. He lifts his wand. "Expuls-"

"No!" Jungkook exclaims, one hand lurching up as if to stop him.

Taehyung freezes. He turns incredulous eyes towards Jungkook.

"Don’t- you don’t have to," Jungkook stammers. "Don’t hurt them."

Taehyung’s gaze grows bewildered.

Jungkook bites his lip. "Don’t do something that’s gonna get you in trouble over this, it’s really not
worth it."

Taehyung stares at him for a long, long time, an unreadable expression on his features. Dumb #1-3
decide that this is their chance, because the next thing Jungkook knows, they’re booking it down
the hall.

"Petrificus Totalus," Taehyung snaps, whip-fast, flicking his wand behind him without even
looking their way, his eyes still fixed on Jungkook’s.

The three idiots yelp as their bodies freeze up, and, like a series of dominos, go down in a
thumping heap on the floor.

Taehyung doesn’t spare them a glance, instead striding immediately up to Jungkook. "I didn’t hurt
them," he mutters, at the shellshocked expression Jungkook is still wearing. And then, he seems to
burst into motion, grasping both of Jungkook’s shoulders and raking a frantic gaze all over him.

"Did they do anything else? I only got here at the end, I didn’t see if they-"

"No, nothing else happened," Jungkook says quietly, still staring at Taehyung with a vaguely
stupefied expression.

Taehyung exhales. He closes his eyes for a few seconds, gathering himself. "Okay," he murmurs,
more to himself than to Jungkook. He nods. "Okay, good."

Jungkook glances at the three bodies, laying prone on the floor, eyes wide and very much still
apparently conscious. "Taehyung," he starts slowly.

Taehyung stiffens. "They were going to hex you," he snaps. "I wasn’t going to just let them run
off."

Jungkook looks down, a flush on his cheeks. He shuffles his feet. "Thank you," he says.

Taehyung looks at him with wide eyes, before bursting into a happy smile. "Always," he replies.

———

When Jungkook wakes up that weekend and finds a package on his desk - an elegant, square-
shaped parcel, wrapped meticulously in a shiny silver wrapping - he stares. When he sees the small
tag, labeled with a gorgeous cursive, ‘To Jungkook, from Taehyung,’ his heart skips a beat.

He opens it almost reverently, careful not to tear the wrapping.

He stiffens.

And then, with a shriek of terror, he bolts out of the room.

 ———

"Hyung!"

Jung Hoseok is going to kill that kid, he swears, as he’s violently woken up by 160 lbs of shrieking
idiot leaping onto his bed, knocking the wind out of him. "What the fuck-"

"Hyung, Hoseok-hyung, wake up, wake up—"

Hoseok sits up through bleary eyes. Jungkook had better thank the stars for the silencing charm he
puts up around his bed, else he’d have found himself the recipient of several stinging hexes from
all of his roommates.

"What," Hoseok huffs, blinking through sleepy eyes.

That’s when he notices Jungkook’s expression, wide-eyed and terror visible in their depths. He sits
up a little more, growing more alert by the second. "Jungkook," Hoseok prompts, entirely awake
now. "What is it, what happened-"

"Kim Taehyung is going to kill me!" He shouts, straight into Hoseok’s face.

Hoseok blinks.

"What."

Jungkook is practically shaking with fear. "Hyung, he- I think he cursed me, I think I’m cursed, oh,
fuck, fuck, can curses even be healed? Can I still play in the game this Friday-"

"Jungkook," Hoseok snaps. "What the fuck do you mean, Kim cursed you?"

Jungkook gulps. "He- he sent me a cursed item," he says, trembling. His eyes are wide with fear.
"Hyung, shit, I knew it, it’s because I knocked a bludger in his head, I’m going to die, what do I do-
"

Hoseok holds up a hand. Jungkook shuts up.

Hoseok closes his eyes, breathes, and reopens his eyes. "Let’s see this thing."

———

Hoseok stares at what is, quite possibly, the most horrifying book to ever exist.

It’s…vile. It’s practically radiating threatening energy, and Hoseok at this point isn’t even entirely
sure if it’s an actual magical signature being emitted, or simply from the sheer…terror-inducing
aesthetic of the book in question.

Book is even a stretch.

Loosely defined, it’s a book, given the general rectangular shape and the pages in between a leather
binding. But it’s a very, very loose definition, given that the entirety of the front is taken up by a
protruding, gaping skull, with a cavernous mouth that appears to stretch on for eternity, and a pair
of glittering, sinister emerald jewels inlaid as eyes.

Hoseok can swear he saw the skull just smirk.

Jesus fuck.

"What- what the fuck is that," he says, staring down at the "book." It’s like a train wreck. It’s so
horrifying he can’t look away.

Jungkook, cowering behind him, shrugs hysterically. "How the hell would I know," he hisses. "It’s
obviously a dark artifact of some sort!"

Yeah, Hoseok can’t argue with that.

The skull sneezes, and the book flies a few inches up off the desk before plopping back down.

Hoseok and Jungkook, staring at each other with terrified expressions, scream. And then, together,
they run out of the room.

———

In the Great Hall, Kim Taehyung sits at the Slytherin table, an excited grin clearly on his lips, as he
watches the door with an intense focus.

"-so, did you do it?" Jimin asks, as he arrives at the table.

Taehyung’s grin widens. Jimin squeals.

"And? What did he say? Does he like it?"

Taehyung shrugs, eyes flitting back to the entrance. "I don’t know yet, I put it in his room last
night," he says. "I haven’t seen him this morning yet."

Yoongi, already decimating a bowl of cereal, shoots him a wry look. "I can’t believe you’re
actually sticking with the old custom," he snorts into his food. "It’s so much work."

Jimin gives him an unimpressed look. "Well, I think it’s romantic," he says pointedly at his
boyfriend. Yoongi blinks. "He’s going to love it, Tae," he turns back to his friend with an equally
excited smile.

That’s when the double doors open, and Taehyung perks up like a dog wagging its tail, as
Jungkook and Hoseok come through the entrance.

Jungkook spots Taehyung, and freezes in place.

Taehyung smiles at him and waves.

Jungkook, looking- utterly stricken, tugs frantically at Hoseok’s sleeve. He leans in to whisper
something to Hoseok, eyes still darting to Taehyung all the while, before practically booking it out
of the Great Hall. Taehyung watches him go, a lost expression on his face.
Did Jungkook not like the gift?

Hoseok begins to approach their table now, a look of outrage on his features. "Hey, Kim," he
barks, as he nears the table.

"Did Jungkook get the gift?" He blurts, before Hoseok can finish his sentence.

Hoseok falters. A look of confusion passes over his face. "The…gift?"

Taehyung nods anxiously, glancing back at the door again. "The Declaration of Intent," he says
distractedly, eyes still pinned on the entrance, as if he could see where Jungkook had gone if he
stares hard enough.

Hoseok stops. Pauses, head cocked to the side. Something about that phrase tugs at his memory-

…The Declaration of Intent.

The Declaration of Intent.

Pureblood Wizarding society, for better or for worse, runs by its own set of highly arbitrary,
entirely inane traditions and practices that, altogether, form an entirely separate world of bizarre
customs. One of said practices, is the very specific, very stringent, and very traditional courting
rituals - the process by which one wizard courts another, almost always with the intention of
marrying, though also simply for the sake of pursuing a romantic relationship.

The first step - the initiation - is the Declaration of Intent: to commence the courting process, a
pureblood wizard is to present his partner of choice with a gift representative of his family, as to
symbolize the projected and desired union between the two houses. Often, this gift takes the form
of a family heirloom that holds some sort of practical use or significance for his intended.

Hoseok isn’t a pureblood himself, but his parents are both Hogwarts graduates, and he’s lived in
Wizarding society since he was born. He is, therefore, at least generally acquainted with the bigger
aspects of pureblood culture.

Hoseok’s jaw drops open.

"You- what?" He splutters. "Are you talking about- that- that "book"?"

Taehyung nods eagerly, though it’s tempered by the pause afterwards. "Why are you using air
quotes when you say book?" He huffs, denoting the fact that Hoseok had lifted his hands to curl
two fingers in the air when saying the word.

Hoseok scratches his head. "Uh."

Taehyung stands up without giving him a chance to answer. "I’m gonna go find Jungkook," he
announces decisively, and briskly exits the room.

Hoseok watches him go with dawning realization.

Jungkook, who thinks Taehyung is out to get his revenge on him, for the bludger incident.
Taehyung, who thinks he’s courting Jungkook. Taehyung, the idiot pureblood who doesn’t realize
that Jungkook, a muggleborn, is completely unaware of pureblood courting customs. Merlin, those
two idiots deserve each other.
 ———

"Jungkook!"

Jungkook freezes. He’d been so close. He eyes the painting that leads to the Gryffindor common
room with desperate yearning. Maybe if he runs for it, he can reach it before-

-Taehyung clamps a hand on his shoulder, and he stumbles around with a yelp.

"Sorry, sorry," Taehyung says, breathless. He’d practically sprinted all the way here, to catch
Jungkook before he got too far. "Hi, how are you?" He asks, straightening up.

Jungkook stares at him with a deer-in-headlights look. He clutches his book bag to his chest like a
shield. "I’m. I’m good," he says, voice small.

Taehyung smiles. "Great! I, uh. I was wondering, if you got the…the package, this morning?"

Jungkook stiffens. He gulps. "Y-Yes…?"

"Wonderful!" Jungkook stares with trepidation at the bright, bright smile on the older boy’s
features. Dear god, a Kim Taehyung with a vengeance is terrifying, doling out threats with the most
disarming smile. "And- do you accept?"

He sounds almost bashful.

Jungkook stares, stupefied. Does he accept? Is this- is this some sort of thinly veiled threat?

Does he mean if Jungkook accepts the threat for what it is? Maybe some sort of, ‘fuck with me
again, and this book is going to consume your life force, so you’d better watch yourself.’

Hurriedly, more frightened than he’s ever been in his life, Jungkook nods, so rapidly his neck
almost snaps.

Taehyung beams. Jungkook is just about a second away from shitting bricks.

"Would you like to go to Hogsmeade with me tomorrow?"

Oh, god. Is Hogsmeade code for ‘the site of your death’? Has Kim Taehyung chosen Hogsmeade as
the appropriate burial grounds for where he’s going to AK Jungkook into oblivion? Was the book a
declaration of war, then?

Or is it some sort of- some sort of servitude thing? Maybe in exchange for his offense, Jungkook is
now to be one of Kim’s henchmen, or something.

Maybe the book is, like, a symbol of servitude.

Hesitantly, Jungkook nods, his face drained of all color.

Taehyung grins, and leans in to - Jungkook is going to have a heart attack, he swears - hug him.
Jungkook lets him, standing completely, and utterly still.

Taehyung pulls away, and with a jubilant wave, rushes off back towards the Great Hall. Jungkook,
his knees finally buckling and unable to hold up his weight any longer, slides to the floor, breathing
heavily.
He’s so dead.

———

The next morning, Jungkook waits at the Hogwarts gates as instructed, back stiff as a board, an
expression not unlike one who’s walking to his own execution. Via guillotine.

When Taehyung just appears beside him, like he’s just popped up out of thin air, Jungkook - he’s
not proud to admit it, but he does - screams. He’s a little on edge, okay? Just last night, while
Hoseok had laughed at him, he’d very painstakingly written out his will.

Hoseok had told him that Kim isn’t going to murder him, but he’s not the one who’s received a
death threat in the form of a cursed-skull-book-thing.

"Oh, shit," Taehyung hurries to help him to his feet, and Jungkook scrambles up on his own before
Taehyung has a chance to reach down.

"S-Sorry," he apologizes.

Taehyung looks at him with a worried expression. "No, no, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have surprised
you like that, I just always do it to Jimin so I didn’t think of how alarming it can be."

Jungkook swallows.

Taehyung lifts his lips in an encouraging smile, and offers Jungkook his elbow. "Shall we?"

Jungkook stares at the elbow like its the gleaming blade by which he’s to be executed. Is this- is
this how purebloods carry out their threats? By leading their victims personally to the site of
execution?

Jungkook should’ve run away in the middle of the night yesterday, Hoseok’s placating be damned.
He knew it. He knew it.

Hand shaking ever so slightly, he places it on the offered elbow, and smiles - though it looks sickly
and nauseous - back at the bright smile Taehyung sends him.

———

"Do you wanna get some butterbeer?" Taehyung asks him, when they’re in eyesight of the Three
Broomsticks.

Jungkook’s stomach drops.

It’s his last meal. Kim is being merciful enough to give him a drink before he offs him, like when
enemy soldiers are given the mercy of a last cigarette before being shot, execution style.

Lips trembling, he nods silently.

Taehyung pulls him into the warm cottage with a grin.

———

Jungkook wishes he could say he was brave enough to take his drink with dignity. He’s seen lots of
(muggle) movies growing up, where the captured soldier inhales his last cigarette with all the cool,
blasé attitude of a man who couldn’t care less that he’s about to have a bullet put through his head.

But Jungkook is only sixteen, okay, he’s not ready to die.

As it is, he can barely swallow even a few sips of the drink in front of him, sitting ramrod straight
in the booth across from Taehyung. The few sips he does manage, he doesn’t even taste. He’s too
preoccupied by the terrifying sight of Taehyung, happily sitting across from him and chattering
about some new DADA spell he’s learning in class.

Jungkook wonders if it’s his way of subtly taunting Jungkook for his sheer pathetic-ness at the
subject; a ‘if only you were better at DADA, you could’ve had a better chance at surviving this.’

Jungkook’s eyes burn.

"So, where do you wanna go? I was thinking maybe Honeydukes, but then I thought the Shrieking
Shack might be kind of cool to check out, it-"

The Shrieking Shack.

Jungkook is going to die in the Shrieking Shack - a dilapidated, dank old shack, where no one
would even hear him scream; where they wouldn't even find his body. His parents might not even
ever know how he died.

That’s about as much stress as Jungkook can handle, because in the next moment-

-he bursts into tears.

He’s embarrassed about it, and wishes he could face his fate with a stoicism that would be much
more dignified, but he’s been in unadulterated terror for nearly twenty four continuous hours, now,
and he’s hit his breaking point.

He doesn’t want to die in the Shrieking Shack.

Tears spring from his eyes, trailing hotly down his cold cheeks, his nose - already red from the
cold - growing even redder as his cheeks grow splotchy. It’s not a quiet, solemn cry, either - it’s
quickly growing hysterical, with the force of his sobs shaking his shoulders and making it hard to
breathe.

"-kook, Jungkook? What is it, what’s wrong- are you hurt somewhere?"

Taehyung, eyes panicked and terrified, rove all over Jungkook back and forth, trying to figure out if
the other boy has some sort of injury he hadn’t noticed. His heart is hammering so hard in his chest
that for the first time in his life, he’s at a complete loss for what to do; watching Jungkook cry -
sudden and unbidden, too - is just about the most awful, heart-rending experience Taehyung’s ever
had.
He gets up to bustle into Jungkook’s side of the booth, leaning in close to stroke a hopefully
calming arm down his arm, except.

The boy only cries harder at that, and Taehyung pulls back, stricken.

"Jungkook, what’s going on, please, please don’t cry, I can fix it, I promise, are you hurting
somewhere? We can go to Madame Pomfrey-"

Jungkook opens his mouth, intending on apologizing. He’s already apologized a thousand times for
accidentally bludger’ing Taehyung, but he can try again, maybe grovel. He’s going to promise
never to bother Taehyung again. He’s going to plead for his life, that he’s so very sorry, he didn’t
mean to hit that bludger his way. What comes out of his mouth, is:

"I don’t want to die in the Shrieking Shack!" He wails.

Of course.

Taehyung stares, stupefied. He flounders for a few seconds, hands fluttering helplessly at his side,
as he tries his best to convey Jungkook that no, they don’t have to go to the Shrieking Shack if he’s
afraid, it’d been a dumb suggestion. "I'm sorry, Jungkook," he babbles. "I wasn’t going to force us
to go if you don’t want to, I promise, please don’t cry, angel, I just thought it might be fun but not
if you don’t want to go, we can just go to Honeydukes-"

Jungkook lets out a mournful cry, and Taehyung makes a panicked noise in his throat. "I don’t
wanna die at Honeydukes either," Jungkook blubbers through his tears. "I love Honeydukes, I don’
wanna ruin them by dying there-!"

And.

Now, Taehyung is just confused.

Why would…why would Jungkook die at Honeydukes?

The Shrieking Shack, he’d thought Jungkook was just afraid of, the way one would a haunted
house. After all, that’s precisely the reason Taehyung had wanted to go check it out, at all - he
thought it’d be fun.

But…Honeydukes?

"Jungkook," he coos, frenetic with worry. He tries to signal the barkeep to bring them a glass of
water, growing increasingly concerned at the way Jungkook is now coughing occasionally with the
force of his tears. "Jungkook, why would you die at Honeydukes? There’s no danger there," he
soothes. "Maybe you’d get a really shitty Bertie Bott’s flavor, but-"

"I’m, I’m s-sorry," Jungkook cries, sniffling and not at all calmed. "I- I d-didn’t mean to hi-hit you
with the b-bludger, I s-swear, I’m so sorry, p-please don’t-"

Taehyung gapes, eyes growing wider and wider, horror curling in his gut, as Jungkook weeps, "-k-
k-kill me-!"

"What?"

Jungkook curls in on himself, and Taehyung hurries to lower his voice, though he can’t do anything
about the aghast expression on his face and horror in his voice. "What- what are you talking about?
Why would I…why would I kill you?"
Jungkook sniffles, looking up at Taehyung through teary eyes. "I- B-Because I hit you with the b-
bludger."

"…What? No, that- I already told you, it’s completely fine, I’m not even upset about the bludger-"

"Then w-why’d you send me that t-threat," Jungkook wails, hysterical all over again.

Taehyung.

Taehyung is so lost.

"…What? What threat?" At this point, his own anxiety at being presented with a crying Jungkook,
in conjunction with the highly concerning things he’s been saying, has spiraled Taehyung into his
own brand of hysteria. "Someone- you were threatened? By whom?"

Taehyung’s eyes grow dark and dangerous as fury swells up inside of him like a raging storm, at
the idea that someone had dared to threaten Jungkook. "Was it Bailey and those assholes? I swear,
I’ll-"

Now it’s Jungkook’s turn to be confused.

Though his eyes are still damp and his cheeks tear-stricken, the continued sobbing has mostly
subsided, save for an occasional sniffle. He looks at Taehyung with tentative confusion. "W-What?
No," he says. "Y-You did."

Taehyung jolts like someone’s shocked him. "What?" He yelps, leaning back. "When did I threaten
you?"

Jungkook blinks, eyes round. "The-…didn’t you send me that book? Was that not you?"

"That book was from me, but when did I threaten you?"

"…Was the book not a threat?"

Taehyung’s eyes nearly bug out of his head as he splutters. "What?" He can’t stop saying what;
he’s never been so confounded in his life. "Why would my Declaration of Intent be a threat?"

Jungkook hunches his shoulders. "Declaration?" He sniffs. "Like- like a declaration of war?"

Taehyung chokes. "What are you saying?!"

Jungkook, the immediate terror of death by pureblood now subsided, straightens up. "Then why
would you send me that?" He cries, defensive.

"As a declaration of my intent for the courting, what are you talking about?!"

Jungkook freezes.

He squeaks.

"C-courting?!"

"Yes, courting, why would you take it as a death threat?!"

"The book has a gaping skull on it!" Jungkook shrieks right back. "It sneezed! It- it- I thought it was
going to suck out my life-force!"
"What the fuck is a life-force!" Taehyung shouts.

Silence.

The two of them stare at each other, panting heavily, eyes wide.

After several minutes, Jungkook speaks. "Wait- so…you’re- you’re courting me?"

Taehyung slumps. "Well, apparently not," he grumbles.

Jungkook’s face falls, heartbreaking and devastated. Taehyung, alarmed, hurries to say, "No- wait,
I mean, yes, I am, if you- if you accept!"

Jungkook blinks.

"I- I’d asked you, before, if you accept it. You said yes," Taehyung says, tentatively. "But now I
realize that you didn’t realize what it meant. So."

He shifts, and clears his throat nervously. "So…will you accept? The gift. For courting."

Jungkook fish mouths for a few moments, clearly floored. And then, to Taehyung’s entranced
delight, a bright red flush slowly spreads across his cheeks, and he ducks his head to stare shyly at
the table. He nods.

Taehyung lets out an ecstatic shout, throwing his arms around Jungkook for a hug. "Thank you," he
breathes, his hands coming down to grasp both of Jungkook’s hand as he leans back. "I’ll work
really hard on it, I promise," he says, so earnestly that Jungkook’s blush intensifies.

"You- that- you don’t have to do all that," Jungkook mumbles to their joined hands. "I don’t even
know what any of that stuff is."

"Of course I do," Taehyung insists. "You deserve to be courted, and to have it done perfectly. I’ll
have you know, that the Kim vaults have some of the best courting materials."

Jungkook’s blush spreads to the tips of his ears.

He bites his lip. "Um- can I, can I ask what…what that book is?"

Taehyung blinks. "You don’t know?"

Jungkook pouts. Taehyung, utterly enchanted, gently wipes the lingering tears from his cheeks
with a sweet smile. "It’s Le Fey’s Compendium For Cures, Potions and Counter-Curses For All
Arts Dark," he explains. And, with a smug grin, adds, "First edition. The Ministry of Magic
Archives have been trying to get their hands on it for years."

He snorts. "As if. Much better use in your hands, I’d say."

Jungkook stares, pretty eyes wide and lips parted.

"Wait. You are trying to be a healer, right? That’s what I heard from Jimin, but-"

Jungkook surges forward and shuts him up with a kiss. Taehyung is only all too happy to comply.

———
 On Monday, Kim Taehyung sits at the Slytherin table in the Great Hall, an excited grin clearly on
his lips, as he watches the door with an intense focus.

When the double doors open, Taehyung perks up like a dog wagging its tail, as Jungkook and
Hoseok come through the entrance.

Jungkook spots Taehyung, and freezes in place.

Taehyung smiles at him and waves.

Jungkook’s expression bursts into a wide, happy smile right back, and he tugs Hoseok by the
sleeve over to the Gryffindor table, where Taehyung’s already waiting, swiveled around on the
bench to face outwards

"Morning, beautiful," Taehyung greets.

Jungkook comes to stand in between the V of Taehyung’s knees with a shy - but pleased - giggle
that sends jubilant symphonies trumpeting across Taehyung’s chest. "Morning, Tae."

Taehyung raises a hand to gently tap the small, star-shaped emeralds dangling from Jungkook’s
ears. "They suit you," he complements. Jungkook flushes pink and delighted.

"Thanks," he hums bashfully. "They’re a courting gift."

Taehyung’s lips quirk into a sly little smirk. "Oh yeah? Pretty impressive guy, if he managed to get
his hands on that."

Jungkook laughs and Taehyung never wants it to end.

Hoseok, upon hearing that, squints at Jungkook’s earrings with suspicious eyes. "Wait," he says,
rearing back. "Is that- are those—"

Yoongi glances up, and upon seeing the jewelry in question, chortles. "Only Taehyung," he shakes
his head.

Jungkook is entirely oblivious to the fanfare over the earrings dangling innocuously from his ears.

Hoseok, meanwhile, has grown an alarming shade of purple. "Don’t- are those the- is that the
Verdant Gemini of Lazarus—"

Taehyung leans in to peck Jungkook’s nose, setting the boy into another fit of giggles. "Only the
best for my boy," he says simply, as though the fact that he’d had a pair of ancient, highly-sought
after jewels (in the same league as, say, the Sorcerer’s Stone) fashioned into a pair of fucking
earrings.

Jungkook hums happily, completely - as usual - unaware.

Chapter End Notes

LMAO honestly my weakest writing area is writing trash talk, I just can’t do it,
someone help me learn how to write dialogue that doesn’t sound like a pathetic
attempt at enmity

I think I might continue this universe as like, a series of oneshots?? Tell me if you're
interested in it!

-
 cloak of invisibility
Chapter Summary

Termination - the Declaration of Intent.

For Annie, who deals with my incessant questions and inane hypothetical prompts.
Stay hydrated, and I love you!

Chapter Notes

I've now decided to make this a series of one-shots, in the same universe as the first
chapter! It may or may not follow in chronological order, though I'll be sure to clarify
in the notes.

See the end of the chapter for more notes

A month into their relationship - or, as Taehyung insists on calling it, their courtship - and
Jungkook is, safe to say, very, very happy.

How could he not be?

He’d always thought Taehyung to be inordinately attractive, in that polished, otherworldly sort of
way, in a way that seemed entirely out of reach for someone like him. Even when he’d known that
Hoseok-hyung was friends with him, Jungkook had always regarded him as someone to simply
admire from afar.

And when Taehyung had rescued him from Dumb #1-3 that day in the hallway, he hadn’t been
able to help but fall a little bit more, for this person who, on top of his sparkling looks and
incredible charisma, was also gallant on top of that. Who knew?

Taehyung courting him, therefore, had seemed - and still does, a bit - like a dream.

As it turns out, Taehyung - the real Taehyung, the Taehyung that Jungkook actually knows, now,
from the past month of learning about him - is nothing like the perfect, flawless facade Jungkook
had thought of him.

Taehyung is charming, yes. Gallant? Most definitely. (Jungkook still remembers the time he’d
fallen off his broom during practice. It’d only been a couple of feet, no more than a sprained wrist,
but Taehyung had, in typical fashion, swept him off in a bridal carry all the way to the infirmary,
and then proceeded to "nurse him back to health" for the next three days.)
But he’s also clumsy, and a little forgetful, constantly leaving a small trail of personal belongings
everywhere he goes, always running around trying to find the things he’s lost somewhere.
(Hogwarts will never forget the day he’d run up and down the halls, frantic, because he claims he
lost Jungkook. Jungkook had simply been waiting, in the library, in the same seat Taehyung had
accidentally left him in while he wandered looking for books when the urge to eat struck him.)

He can be pouty, and moody, prone to changing his mood at the drop of a hat, so quickly it gives
Jungkook whiplash, sometimes. (But he always apologizes for it afterwards, as if having had a dull
mood in the morning were something he needs to say sorry for; and he does it so sincerely, by
gifting Jungkook pretty little packages from Hogsmeade tied up in silver ribbons.)

And for all his forgetfulness, he’s also somehow - inexplicably - incredibly thoughtful. The day
after Jungkook had pouted about accidentally smearing the still-drying ink on his potions essay,
he’d found a glamorous, decadent blue-green bottle of ink shimmering on his desk, the attached tag
proclaiming instant drying and robust longevity. When Jungkook had sprained his wrist in practice,
Taehyung had visited all of his professors in the scant time he was getting his wrist bandaged up,
and collected all of his assignments for him for the day - and then proceeded to procure him a self-
writing quill, given that Jungkook’s wrist was out of commission.

It’s very difficult, Jungkook finds, not to grow increasingly enamored - or, as Hoseok likes to tease
- besotted with Taehyung, especially when he thinks that Taehyung might, perhaps, feel the same
way towards him.

It’d just been a crush, before, but now—

—now, Jungkook finds himself looking forward to seeing Taehyung like it’s the highlight of his
day; finds himself searching for Taehyung’s face in the crowd, every time he makes a particularly
impressive maneuver on the Quidditch pitch; finds his stomach filling with butterflies every time
Taehyung smiles at him, wide and boxy and bright.

It’s the reason he’s heading over to the Charms classroom, where Taehyung had told him the
prefects would be wrapping up a meeting soon. It’s about time for Taehyung to finish, and
Jungkook figures he can surprise his boyfriend, and possibly convince him to coax the kitchen
elves into letting Jungkook swipe some more treacle tarts before bed. The kitchen elves are very
smitten with Taehyung, and forgive him anything; Jungkook understands that feeling.

He’s nearing the classroom and finds the door open, when he hears a low, murmured conversation
from inside, one of them in Taehyung’s distinct voice.

"—courting Jeon? For real? Like, are you actually serious?"

Jungkook’s heart skips a beat, a shy and pleased smile spreading on his lips. The next words he
hears, though, are enough to freeze his insides over.

"Of course not," Taehyung laughs, disarmingly brightly. "Obviously I’m not doing it seriously,
that’s ridiculous. It’s just, more for fun—"

Jungkook’s smile falls and shatters on the floor.

He pivots and walks down the hall, right back where he’d just come from, hardly able to see past
the tears blurring his vision.

———
The prefects’ meeting to divide up hall monitor hours drag on - in particular, for Taehyung, who’d
hoped that it might let out early so he could try to charm one of the kitchen elves into giving him a
treacle tart to surprise Jungkook with. Jungkook insists it’s because of Taehyung that they’re so
nice, but his adorable boyfriend seems oblivious to the fact that the only times the elves so freely
handed out treats outside of mealtimes, are when Taehyung specifically mentions it’s for
Jungkook.

The thought of Jungkook brings a smile, dopey and a little dazed, to his lips unconsciously.

"Yo, Kim, meeting’s over," a laugh startles Taehyung into looking up. It’s Gibbons, the Hufflepuff
sixth year prefect, peering down at him with a raised brow. He’d grown up with Gibbons, as their
parents ran in the same pureblood circles, meeting up every once in a while at a particularly boring
Ministry function or other.

"By the way, I’ve been meaning to talk to you," Gibbons says, seating himself on Taehyung’s desk.
"My parents asked me if you’re getting engaged? Word is, you’re courting Jeon? For real? Like,
are you actually serious?"

In pureblood circles, the process of courtship is often done to precede a formal engagement - and
generally, arranged beforehand by the families.

"Of course not," Taehyung laughs, disarmingly brightly. "Obviously I’m not doing it seriously,
that’s ridiculous. It’s just, more for fun—" His laugh peters out into a smile, soft and fond. "—I
just think Jungkook deserves to be courted, even if it’s just for dating."

Gibbons makes a teasing coo.

A pause, and then, almost shyly, Taehyung adds, "And, who knows? Maybe, in a few years, who’s
to say it won’t eventually develop into a possible engagement…?"

Gibbons whoops, thumping Taehyung enthusiastically on the back. "My man, you’re in it deep,"
he laughs. "Look at you, being all romantic and shit."

Taehyung laughs and pushes his hand away. "Knock it off," he rolls his eyes, smiling tugging at
his lips. "I just. I like him quite a lot."

"Yeah, Kim," Gibbons snorts. "We all figured, when Jeon showed up with the damned Verdant
Gemini of Lazarus dangling on his ears- fucking ridiculous, you Kims."

———

Jungkook is in his room, trying very, very hard not to cry like a sad, pathetic little thing, when
there’s a knock on the door.

When he opens it, his heart leaps into his throat.

Standing in front of him, is no other than the very person he’d been trying incredibly hard not to
think about, lest he dissolve into another fit of tears. It doesn’t help, either, that the boy in question
is looking particularly dashing today, his tie loosened and hanging haphazardly around in neck,
holding what looks to be Jungkook’s favorite pastry in his outstretched palms with a winning
smile.

"Hi, beautiful," he greets him customarily, dashing in to peck his cheek and place the tart carefully
in Jungkook’s hand. "I brought you a little treat from the kitchens."

Jungkook stares at the treacle tart in his hand. For whatever odd reason, it feels a lot like he’s just
been handed back the jagged remnant of his heart that he’d left with Taehyung.

Treacle tart, fragment of his heart, whatever, it’s all the same.

Jungkook is aware, dimly somewhere in the back of his mind, how ridiculous he’s being. It’s just a
stupid treacle tart. (But he can’t help it, the way even now, he wants Taehyung to wrap him up in
one of his bear hugs, even if it’s Taehyung who’s making him hurt.)

"Thank you," he finally manages to say.

Taehyung pauses, taking in the sight of his boyfriend, who’s currently staring down at a treacle tart
like it’s the most fascinating object in the world that can grant him the answers to the hidden
universe. He frowns.

"Jungkook?" He calls gently, leaning forward to slide the palm of his hand against Jungkook’s
cheek.

Jungkook jerks back.

Taehyung freezes.

For a moment, the two can only stare at one another, each startled and, perhaps, a little frightened.

Jungkook breaks first.

He looks away, hurrying to place the treacle tart with slow, almost reverent care, on his desk.
There’s something flickering at the edge of Taehyung’s mind, something that - ridiculously enough
- thinks, like it’s the last time he’s ever going to get a treacle tart. "Uh, sorry," Jungkook
apologizes, for something Taehyung isn’t quite sure of. "I’m just. Tired, you know. And. I have,
uh, practice early tomorrow so, I, uh. I have to go to sleep. Now."

Taehyung blinks.

And then, smiling despite the disappointment slowly starting to curl in his stomach, nods. "Yes, of
course," he says. "Hopefully we can spend some time together tomorrow?"

Jungkook looks stricken, and Taehyung doesn’t know what’s happening.

Eventually, Jungkook nods, still looking at everywhere but at Taehyung.

Taehyung leaves, feeling like there’s something he’s just missed.

———

Taehyung shouldn’t have left it like that.

He absolutely should not have just left as easily as he did.

Because that’s the last time he actually manages to get a glimpse of his boyfriend, for the next
week and a half.

It takes him a few days to put the pieces together, given that at first, Jungkook does a great job of
making it all seem like coincidence. Increased practice because of an upcoming game, needing to
work on a particularly difficult charms essay, needing Hoseok to bring him food to his room
instead of coming to the Great Hall for dinner because he’s trying to figure out a Transfiguration
assignment.

It’s somewhere around day three - specifically, when Taehyung manages to run into Jungkook in
the hallway, and begins to smile, only to watch as his boyfriend literally pivots mid-step to
practically bolt the other way - that Taehyung realizes, with a sinking stomach, that Jungkook is
avoiding him.

———

A folded piece of parchment drops with a light thwack on Jungkook’s open textbook where he’s
hunched over on his desk. He looks at it, and recognizes the painfully familiar scrawl of
Taehyung’s handwriting across the front. He swallows.

He looks up into Hoseok’s disapproving eyes where he’s standing over Jungkook, with his arms
crossed and lips pressed together.

"Jungkook," Hoseok says. "Kim’s starting to look a lot like a kicked puppy every time he asks, and
I have to tell him I don’t have a reply from you for him, after the seventeen notes I’ve passed on to
you so far."

Taehyung had tried, initially, to come visit Jungkook himself. But after around the fourth time
Jungkook didn’t answer the door, he’d stopped trying, having realized that Jungkook didn’t want to
see him. If nothing else, Taehyung is at least respectful towards his wishes.

Jungkook bites his lip.

Hoseok sighs. "What’s going on, Jungkook? It’s been almost two weeks, why’re you suddenly
avoiding your own boyfriend like he’s the plague?"

Jungkook flinches at the word boyfriend. "Just for fun," Taehyung had said.

Jungkook’s had a lot of time, in his recent self-imposed solitude, to mull that over.

He supposes, in some way, it’s no one’s fault but his own, for having been stupid enough to fall for
it. He thinks that anyone else should’ve been smart enough to wise up, and realize that someone
like Kim Taehyung - the prestigious, crown jewel among purebloods - could never take someone
like Jungkook, a muggleborn who hadn’t even known about magic until he was thirteen, seriously.
Let alone court him, with their traditional courtship methods.

But just because his brain realizes now, how foolish he’d been, doesn’t mean that his heart has
quite caught up.
Jungkook’s been spending the past ten days, trying to work up the courage to do what he needs to.
To find the sense of self, to break things off officially with Taehyung, before he really gets made a
fool of. Possibly publicly. And, Merlin, that would actually destroy Jungkook, if Taehyung broke it
off in a public manner.

But Taehyung isn’t cruel. He knows that.

He knows that none of this had been intentionally cruel.

Taehyung just probably thought it’d be harmless fun. He couldn’t have anticipated that Jungkook
would be stupid enough to take it as seriously as he did. Jungkook should have known better,
really.

He’s just pathetic enough, that he hasn’t yet found the bravery to let go of Taehyung, even though
his mind tells him that it really is for the best.

Hogwarts taught him how to brew wolfsbane and cast levitating charms and care for mandrakes,
but it never quite taught him how to have the strength to let go of someone who doesn't want him
back; how to endure the odd rush of loneliness that he shouldn’t be feeling, over someone he never
really had, anyway.

"-kook, are you- are you crying?" Hoseok sounds incredibly concerned, and a gentle hand grasps
his shoulder. "What is it- did Kim do something? I’ll kick his ass for you, just say the word."

Jungkook shakes his head, biting on his tongue to swallow a sob.

He just likes Taehyung so much.

"Hyung," he finally gasps, shoulders trembling from the force of withholding his cries. "I’m so-
I’m so stupid."

Hoseok kneels down to peer up at him, face creased with care. "Jungkook, you’re the last thing
from stupid, what happened with Kim?"

Jungkook needs another few minutes before he can speak again.

"Can you," he breathes slowly. "Can you teach me what you need to do, to break- to end a
courtship?"

How laughable, it must have been, that him, a muggleborn who doesn’t even know anything about
the courtship procedures, could have possibly thought Kim Taehyung was serious about courting
him.

Hoseok takes a sharp breath.

Jungkook stares resolutely at his desk.

———

Should a witch or wizard ever want to terminate the courtship, the process is much the same as the
initiation: with a Declaration of Intent. Unlike the Declaration to initiate a courtship, however, the
termination must be done in a manner that announces, to society at large, that the parties are
terminating the courtship. This is in order to ensure that society is made aware of the availability of
said witch or wizard, for further offers of courtship anew.

———

When Hoseok had told him the traditional step by which one terminates a courtship, Jungkook had
been suitably horrified. What is wrong with purebloods? A public termination? That’s awful.

Hoseok had smiled wryly at him, and said not really, given that most courtships are family-
arranged, anyway, and more like a business transaction than with real feelings involved. Still.
Jungkook doesn’t- he doesn’t want to humiliate Taehyung, his own heartbreak notwithstanding.

So instead, he’d sent him a note.

It’s a cowardly thing to do, and Jungkook knows how awful it is, but he rationalizes it by telling
himself that it’s not like Taehyung had been serious about it, anyway. Perhaps Taehyung would be
a little disappointed, over the loss of something he’d found entertaining for a while, but. He’ll be
fine.

Jungkook will be fine.

That’s what he tells himself, after he’d sent off the note with Hoseok’s borrowed owl, shortly
before breakfast in the Great Hall began. He’ll just eat in his room for the next few days, and
everything will be fine.

Except, not half an hour later, there’s a sudden and unmitigated pounding outside his door.

He freezes, huddled on his bed, staring with wide eyes at the door. He barely has the sense of mind
to utter a quick locking charm on it.

"-kook, Jungkook? Are you in there? Please, can we talk?" Taehyung’s voice, despite the repeated
banging on the wooden door, sounds plaintive and pleading.

"Jungkook, I’m sorry if I did something you didn’t like- was it the chocolates? I didn’t know you
were allergic to Macademia, please, I didn’t mean to make you sick, I’m so sorry, please talk to me
—"

Jungkook’s eyes burn.

He buries his head under the covers, despite the fact it does nothing to actually block out the
sounds of Taehyung’s voice, wavering and growing increasingly desperate. (It’s awful, how
Taehyung doesn’t even sound angry at him - just upset, and apologetic. And though Jungkook
supposes that it is his fault, in a roundabout way, it isn’t anything like this. It’d just been Jungkook,
who’d been silly enough to take it too seriously.)

"Jungkook, please, come on, just- just let me see your face, please, can’t we talk about this-"

"Kim," Jungkook listens, shivering, as Hoseok’s voice cuts through Taehyung’s. It’s quieter than
Taehyung’s frantic begging, and therefore harder to hear. Jungkook has to concentrate. "Knock it
off, before someone calls a professor - you're not even supposed to be in here, its the Gryffindor
dorms."
"Jung," Taehyung says, sounding out of breath and frantic. "Jung, did you know? What- what is it,
what did I do? Please, just let me talk to him, I- what did I do?"

Taehyung sounds almost hysterical.

Jungkook’s heart breaks a little more, and he closes his eyes against the onslaught of tears that
dampen his pillow.

"Come on, Kim," Hoseok says gently. "I’ll try to talk to him, okay? But for now, you really need to
get out of here."

A few minutes later, after some muffled shuffling sounds, Jungkook hears Hoseok’s voice call out
to him. "Kook? It’s just hyung, can you- will you open the door? Please?"

Eyes clenched shut, he casts the opening charm.

Hoseok approaches his bed carefully and sets a plate down on his bedside table. Jungkook sobs.
"Oh, Jungkook," Hoseok sighs. "Why are you breaking your own heart like this?"

———

Jungkook vehemently does not tell Hoseok. Hoseok is, at worst, like a raging kangaroo with all the
fury of a mother who’s already lost a child once, for whatever reason. His protective instincts are
what Jungkook will often describe as "excessive." At best, he’s like an overbearing, overprotective
sibling, ready to fly off the handle at even the slightest perceived threat.

He’s not going to tell said overprotective, raging bear, that he’d stupidly fallen too deep for a boy
who was just courting him for fun.

He didn’t want Taehyung dead.

So Jungkook resolutely spends the next two weeks, ducking into alcoves and sprinting down
random staircases, trying his hardest to avoid Taehyung, without breathing a word of it to anyone.

And Taehyung seems to have, mostly, gotten the hint. He’d continued to try, for the first week, to
try to get Jungkook to talk to him; but by the second week, he’d tried less, and less, until not at all.

Jungkook doesn’t know which one broke his heart more.

———

Here’s the thing about Slytherins, that Gryffindors like Jungkook are too naive to realize: they
don’t give up, on the things that they want. They simply find other tactics and plan accordingly, to
get to the same destination, should one path prove unsuccessful.

And Taehyung, in backing off, hadn’t been Taehyung, giving up.

The phrase doesn’t really exist, in the Slytherins’ definition of the world.
So Jungkook is, of course, entirely unprepared when, as he’s wrapping up a potions assignment
he’d stayed behind to finish, the door to the classroom suddenly shuts and locks itself. He jumps.
When he spins around, he comes face to face with the heart-stopping terror that is Park Jimin,
standing in front of him with a casual smile on his heart-shaped face, twirling his wand between his
fingers.

"Hi, Jungkook," he greets.

Jungkook hasn’t talked to Jimin in weeks. He grimaces. "Hi, hyung," he says quietly.

"Do you have some time to talk?" Jimin asks, as if he hadn’t just bolted the heavy iron door behind
them, and Jungkook has some sort of option.

Jungkook shifts his weight.

Jimin’s face softens at the clear nervousness on Jungkook’s features. "I’m not going to hurt you,"
he says. "I just want to talk."

"Yeah, okay," Jungkook says, sinking back down into his chair.

"Obviously, you know what this is about," Jimin says.

"Um. About Quidditch?"

Jimin narrows his eyes. Jungkook looks down.

"Tae- I just want to know why," Jimin says, as kindly as he can. "It’s completely your valid choice
to break things off with Taehyung, but, I was just wondering why. Is it because he did something
wrong?"

Jungkook shakes his head.

"Is it the macadamia thing?"

Something thumps, off to the side. Jungkook jumps. Jimin clears his throat, looking at Jungkook
expectantly.

Jungkook shakes his head.

"Then what—"

"I just," Jungkook starts, his voice already trembling dangerously, much to his dismay. "I just.
Like- liked him, a lot."

Jimin’s eyes soften, despite the confusion brimming from them. "Then what’s the issue?"

Jungkook shrugs and looks away. "I mean- it- it had to end eventually anyway, didn’t it? So, like.
Better sooner than later."

Jimin looks at him like he’s grown a second head. "What do you mean? Why did it have to end?"

"Because. I don’t know. It’s not like…it’s not like this was serious, for him," Jungkook says, his
voice breaking on the word serious.

He hates that word, now.

Jimin rears back. "What’s that supposed to mean?"

"I don’t know, he. He was just, like. Bored, you know? And I- I didn’t want to, like, freak him out
by suddenly getting like, too serious about it when he was just-"

Jimin has begun to shake his head, eyes wide, but Jungkook can’t stop. "-having fun."

He hates that word now, too.

"You think I wasn’t serious about you?"

Jungkook screams. He pitches backwards, and hits the stone floor with a thump in a frenzied flail.

Kim Taehyung - from where he’d literally just popped into existence, flies to his side in panicked
concern. "Jungkook, oh, shit, are you okay?" He crashes to his knees beside him, gently - but
firmly - pulling him into a seated position.

Jungkook, upon confirming once more that yes, it is Taehyung who is now, inexplicably, somehow
in the room despite the door not having opened, yelps and goes toppling backwards again.

This time, though, given that Taehyung had been holding on to him, he ends up pulling Taehyung
down with him, and the two of them go crashing into the floor.

"For fuck’s sakes," Jimin’s voice says, sounding entirely exasperated. "You two are such disasters.
I’m done here." He unlocks the door, and swishes out without a backwards glance.

It leaves Taehyung, hovering over Jungkook with his hands on either side of his head, looking
down at him with the most sorrowful, forlorn expression Jungkook has ever seen. "Jungkook," he
says, frowning. "You thought I was just having fun with you?"

He sounds hurt.

Jungkook doesn’t understand.

He looks away, eyes burning.

"Jungkook, answer me, please."

"I heard you," Jungkook says quietly, trying to blink back the tears. "In the Charms classroom."

Taehyung tilts his head to the side.

"You said…you said that you- you weren’t serious about courting me." About, as Taehyung likes
to use courtship and relationship interchangeably, their relationship. "You said you were just
having fun," he coughs wetly.

Taehyung looks utterly horrified.

"No, Jungkook, that’s not what I-"

Jungkook shoves back at Taehyung so that he can sit up, bringing his knees to his chest and curling
his arms around them. "I heard you," Jungkook says, wiping roughly at his eyes. "I- And I get it,
I’m just, like. A muggleborn, or whatever. And that I’m, I don’t know any of the pureblood stuff,
and-"

Jungkook sniffs, resting his chin atop his knees. His eyes are dull and resigned. "-and that’s, that’s
fine, I was just, I was stupid and I thought-" He closes his eyes and presses them into his knees,
tears slipping down his cheeks anyway.

Taehyung makes a pained sound in his chest, and scrambles to pull at Jungkook’s arms.
"Jungkook, no, you- I didn’t mean it that way! I just meant that we weren’t getting engaged!"

Jungkook stiffens.

"Purebloods usually court when their families have arranged a betrothal for them," Taehyung
hurries to babble, bringing one of Jungkook’s hands to clutch against his chest. "I just meant, that,
that this wasn’t like that. But I am serious about you, we’re dating, you’re my boyfriend, I love
you-"

Jungkook squeaks.

Taehyung freezes.

With alarmed, panicked eyes, Taehyung gapes dumbly at Jungkook, a slow flush creeping over his
cheeks and down his neck.

And then, in that determined, dauntless way of his that Jungkook has always found incredibly
attractive, Taehyung straightens up. In for a penny, in for a pound. "I love you, you berk,"
Taehyung says, clutching tighter at Jungkook’s hand. "Of course I’m serious about you - the
courtship and whatever else is irrelevant. I’m only doing that because."

Taehyung swallows, looking embarrassed and sheepish and so handsome, to Jungkook. "I just.
Wanted to spoil you, and do right by you."

Do right by you, he says, like he’s some medieval knight.

Jungkook feels his eyes water again. And then, after a brave second of holding it at bay, his face
collapses into a fit of tears.

Taehyung panics all over again. "I’m sorry, Jungkook, I didn’t mean to make you cry, I can leave
you alone if you want, I-"

"No," Jungkook cries, reaching out with his other hand feebly towards Taehyung, who instantly
pulls him into a deathly tight hug. "I love you too, you stupid idiot."

Taehyung sighs, the tension in his shoulders leaving after two long weeks.

Until Jungkook stiffens, and abruptly pulls back. With tear tracks still shimmering down his
cheeks, he looks up at Taehyung suspiciously. "Wait," he says. "How the hell did you get in here?"

Taehyung squirms.

Jungkook narrows his eyes.

"I, uh. I’ve been in here the whole time…?"

"What?"

Taehyung scratches the back of his head sheepishly. "I, um. I…may or may not have an invisibility
cloak."

Jungkook’s jaw drops open.

 Of course this asshole has an invisibility cloak, too.

"You- you’re- you’re so annoying," he scowls.

Taehyung, with a sweet smile, pulls him back in to press a kiss between his eyes. "But what’s mine
is yours, baby, so isn’t it nice that you get an invisibility cloak?"

Jungkook pauses. Perks up, eyes brightening. "Are you serious?"

Taehyung laughs.

Jungkook pouts, poking harshly at his collarbone, ignoring his boyfriend’s yelp. "Taehyung,
answer me, are you being serious? Can I really—"

Chapter End Notes

Let me know if there are any scenes you'd like to see in this series in particular! :D
 madame rockette's knockout kneazles
Chapter Notes

Thank you all for your lovely responses to the last chapter! I got quite a few asks for
another one here and on CC, so I decided to write another installment. Let me know if
you like it~

See the end of the chapter for more notes

Two months into their relationship, Taehyung presents him with the Token of Remembrance: a gift
intended to represent the giver, that the recipient can carry with them as a constant token of their
courter. Jungkook figures, in muggle-speak, it must be the equivalent of a kind of, "You can always
carry a piece of me with you" sentiment.

Ordinarily, Jimin (with whom he’d become fast friends through Taehyung, bonding over their
shared love of quidditch) says, the Token of Remembrance is some sort of small jewelry, or a nice
quill, etcetera. Small, everyday items, that in some way represents the giver.

Except, it wouldn’t be Kim Taehyung if the gift wasn’t extraordinarily lavish.

That being, that one morning, Jungkook wakes up not to his usual alarm, but to a very loud, very
fanged, meow.

Put another way, when Jungkook wakes up one morning, and blearily opens his eyes, he finds a
small, furred bundle, standing on four paws astride his chest, staring directly down at him with
gleaming blue eyes.

As is quickly becoming a trend with Taehyung’s courtship gifts, Jungkook screams.

"Mreow!"

Jungkook falls off his bed and to the floor with a heavy thump.

The curtains surrounding his bed swish open, then, revealing Hoseok, who-

"Jungkook, what- wait, is that a kneazle? Since when did you have a kneazle, Kook?"

Jungkook looks up at him with a bewildered expression, arms akimbo on the floor still. "I don’t
have a kneazle," he says. "I just woke up with that thing meowing at me from on top of me!"

Hoseok stares at the feline creature - now sitting patiently on the bed, its eyes still fixed on
Jungkook - before cocking his head to the side. His eyes zero in on the glittering silver bow the
kneazle has tied around his neck, and realization dawns in his expression. He laughs, shaking his
head.

"Fucking Kim," he says, reaching over to pluck a small tag, previously unnoticed, dangling from
the bow. He reads it over. With a snort, he tosses it at Jungkook, rolling his eyes and leaving the
room. "Whatever, I’m gonna head down for breakfast. Hurry up and come down when you’re
dressed- and bring your new present with you!" He calls, already halfway down the hall.
Jungkook blinks, entirely confused.

He picks up the note.

Good morning, beautiful! This is my Token of Remembrance to you; she’s a kneazle (obviously),
and was procured from the most well-respected breeder in the wizarding world, so she is very
highly trained and of impeccable breeding. I hope you’ll join me for breakfast today. Yours, KTH

Jungkook’s eyes grow round like saucers as he takes in the creature anew.

Sitting on his bed is a gorgeous, snow-white kneazle, covered entirely in dark grey spots, giving
her an appearance of an exotic snow leopard cub; on her head sit two massive, delicately pointed
ears, and a pair of gorgeous, clear blue eyes.

And this is- a kneazle? It seems highly doubtful to Jungkook, given that he’s never seen a kneazle
that looks like this before; the ones he’s seen around school all look almost identical to standard
house cats, typically in shades of grey, black or tabby.

Not- not this, this beautiful, dark spotted white fur.

Hesitantly, he reaches out with a hand. The kneazle nuzzles into it immediately, purring. As it is,
she must be quite young - she’s small enough that he can cup her in his two hands.

Jungkook is in love.

(With the kneazle, of course.)

"I should name you, shouldn’t I?" Jungkook murmurs, giggling when the kneazle comes in to paw
gently at his cheek. His heart swells with an affection he doesn’t know how to express, and not just
for the kneazle, either.

Ordinarily, Jungkook tries to protest at least a little bit, to Taehyung’s more lavish presents. (In
particular, the motherfucking one-of-a-kind, fabled pair of gems his boyfriend had turned into
earrings—) But this one, Jungkook doesn’t have think he can even pretend to protest.

With a wide, giddy smile, he hurries to get changed. He wants to see Taehyung.

———

Taehyung’s carefully cutting his pancake into bite-sized squares, when a weight knocks into him
from behind, and a pair of arms come up to circle his shoulders. "Tae," he hears the familiar sound
of his boyfriend’s voice, and he whirls around with an equally giddy smile.

"Kook-ah!" He greets, and his grin doubles in size when he sees his boyfriend:

Standing in front of him, eyes bright like starbursts, still with his uncombed bedhead sticking out in
adorable little tufts, cradling a tiny, snow white kneazle in his arms like it’s the most precious
cargo he’s ever held. He has to bite on his lip to tamp down an honest-to-god squeal.

"I see you got my gift," Taehyung says, laughing when Jungkook beams at him, still clutching the
kneazle to his chest like it’s the world’s most valuable treasure. The kneazle seems more than
content where she is, purring occasionally and batting gently at Jungkook’s chest like she wants
him to look at her. (Taehyung understands that feeling.)

"I still can’t believe you got him a kneazle," Hoseok says, coming up behind Jungkook.

Jimin coos, equally charmed by the image of a red-cheeked and excited Jungkook, holding a
squirming, fluffy kneazle. "What are you going to name it, Jungkook?"

Jungkook blinks down at the creature, before grinning. "V."

Yoongi snorts into his goblet.

"Magnificent," Taehyung praises, completely, utterly serious. "You have the most creative mind,
beautiful, I don’t know how you do it-"

"Yo," Hoseok says drily. "It’s a fuckin’ letter."

"And how undeniably groundbreaking it is, to name a kneazle by a letter!" Taehyung snaps back.
"It’s the best name, Jungkook," Taehyung declares (gushes). "The best kneazle name I’ve ever
heard, in my entire life."

"…It’s a letter," Hoseok says again, disbelieving, but Taehyung is far too absorbed by the sight
that Jungkook makes, giggling as the kneazle nibbles on his finger.

"Why’s it colored like that," Jimin points out, peering curiously at the kneazle. "That looks a lot
like that spread I saw in Witch Weekly last week-"

Taehyung smiles proudly. Jimin makes a startled noise in his throat.

"Kim Taehyung," he gasps. "Is that-"

"One of Madame Knockette’s Knockout Kneazles?" Taehyung chirps, unbearably smug. "Of
course. Only the best for my boy," he says, as he lifts a finger to flick gently under Jungkook’s
chin.

Jungkook gives a half-distracted giggle, eyes still fixed on the purring bundle in his arms.

"Only the best for my boy," Hoseok mimics, rolling his eyes. "Kim Taehyung’s new theme song,
everyone."

Jimin eyes the kneazle with newfound interest, tugging on Yoongi’s sleeve with a pout. "Babe,
why can’t you get me one of those kneazles?"

Yoongi eyes him drily. "Isn’t that the thing with a four year waitlist? Pretty sure even Hagrid’s
been waiting for a year now."

As per usual, the entire conversation is lost on Jungkook, who’s busy laughing at the way the
kitten-like creature gnaws on his thumb.

"Do you like it?" Taehyung asks.

Jungkook looks up from the kneazle at long last, eyes still glittering with unrestrained joy, his
cheeks ruddy with delight and grin stretching his entire face. "I love her," he breathes, sounding
awed. He cuddles the kneazle closer, where she licks at his chin with a scratchy tongue, eliciting
another giggle.

(Taehyung would procure a hundred Kneazles for hm, if it meant he got to witness this forever.)
Jungkook, still cradling the kneazle in his arms, slides into Taehyung’s lap to kiss him soundly.
Taehyung is altogether very pleased with the turn of events, and can’t even find it in himself to be
annoyed when the kneazle interrupts with a paw batting at each of their faces, when Jungkook’s
laugh is like the sound of pure glee.

———

And so, V becomes a permanent fixture to the individual known as Jeon Jungkook.

At any time in the day, wherever Jungkook is, V can be found tagging along, usually perched on
her preferred seat of his right shoulder, curled like a soft scarf along his neck. At times, on top of
his head, if she’s feeling particularly mischievous, and rarely, trotting along beside him, keen blue
eyes taking in every detail of the sights around her like an alert sentry.

Although pets are permitted on Hogwarts grounds, and though there aren’t strictly any rules
forbidding their presence in classes, the general trend has been that students rarely bring their pets
to class, barring some particular reason. Jungkook, however, finds himself unable to part ways with
V, especially not for entire stretches of the day while he sits in class.

V, therefore, becomes a very familiar sight in all the classes, and it’s rumored that Professor
Flitwick is so taken with the animal, that he procured her a little cushion upon which to sit in the
back of the class, from where she keeps a watchful eye over her master during his lessons.

There are, of course, a great many students who come up to Jungkook on a regular basis, asking
(very politely) if they can see his new pet. Madame Knockette, after all, is a very famous, very
highly sought-after breeder of kneazles, and V’s unique coloring is a magnificent shade that’s
nearly unheard-of, even for such a respected breeder as Madame Knockette.

Indeed, her pristine white fur, spotted with dark grey, reminds Jungkook of those exotic snow
leopards in the muggle world.

She’s gorgeous.

Her personality is even more so, given that she is the sweetest, most loyal - and, at times, sassy -
little ma’am that ever strutted the halls of Hogwarts. The right side of Jungkook’s bed is now
clearly designated as V’s (despite the fact that Taehyung had, of course, provided all necessary pet
supplies, including a plushly lined kneazle bed). So much so, that even Taehyung is unable to climb
onto Jungkook’s bed, without respectfully requesting permission from V, first.

Rather than be annoyed, Taehyung seems to delight in all the eccentricities of V’s personality.

Once, Jungkook had left the two in his room to go fetch something from the common room, and
upon returning, had overheard his boyfriend having a very serious, very earnest heart-to-heart
conversation with V.

"Listen, V. We both love Jungkook very much- no, don’t make that face at me, I love him just as
much as you do, you know. So listen. When I’m not around, it’s your job to protect him, you
understand? Do we have an agreement? Good. Pleasure doing business with you, miss V."

Which.
Jungkook had just barely managed to hold in his laughter at the complete sincerity in Taehyung’s
tone (his silly, overprotective, big bad Slytherin).

Besides, he’d thought. How funny - V, protect Jungkook?

V, even as she’d been growing, hardly stood more than 20 inches tall.

So he’d thought.

———

Ever since Taehyung had formally declared his intent to court Jungkook - made very obvious, very
quickly, by the supposedly valuable green stars he now almost always wears on his ears - he hasn’t
really seen much of the Dumb trio.

Even before, they’d never bothered him much, aside from a side remark or two if they happened to
cross paths in a particularly foul mood.

So Jungkook had entirely forgotten, three months down the line after the incident, that they’d even
attended Hogwarts at all. (He also suspects, on some level, that Taehyung may or may not have
threatened them to steer clear of his presence, given that even when Jungkook visits Taehyung in
the Slytherin dorms, he’s never seen a single one of them.)

Except.

He’s making his way back to the dorms late one night from the library after having stayed late to
work on some Charms homework, using a rarely used set of hallways to try to make it back in time
before curfew.

Almost like deja vu, he suddenly finds himself surrounded by Dumb 1, 2 and 3, each one somehow
uglier than the last time he’d seen them.

Jungkook sighs. "Again?" He says, scowling. "Don’t you guys have anything better to do?"

"Shut up," Dumb #1 hisses.

"Because of you, we’ve become persona non grata in our own house," Dumb #2 says, and it sounds
like they really, truly believe it’s somehow Jungkook’s fault that they’re so foul their own
housemates don’t want to interact with them.

"Are you sure it’s not your unbearable charming selves that took care of that for you?" Jungkook
drawls, and it enrages Dumb #3 enough that he jabs the pointy end of his wand into Jungkook’s
shoulder.

On his other shoulder, V hisses - a low, menacing sound that Jungkook’s never heard from her
before. Dumb #3, however, ignores it, in favor of sneering at him. "It’s your fucking fault, you
mudblood-"

V hisses again, as if she somehow understands the slur.

"-it’s because of you that Kim-"

"Shut up, Bailey," Dumb #2 growls.

Ah, Jungkook thinks. So he’d been right, after all. Taehyung had done something.

"You shut up, Peter, what makes you think you’re so-"

Oh, for fuck’s sakes.

Jungkook doesn’t have time for this, he has curfew.

"Listen, maybe you can privately bitch it out, settle it amongst yourselves, then come back and find
me once you’ve decided on a direction?" He says primly.

Taehyung always did say his mouth would get him in trouble one day.

Dumb #1 snarls, and raises his wand-

-only to shriek and stumble back, because a jet of bright blue fire has suddenly appeared, streaming
towards his face. Dumb #1 just barely manages to trip over his own feet in time, and Jungkook can
smell the acrid scent of burnt hair, as a lock of his hair gets caught in the stream.

"What- what the fuck," Dumb #2 curses, staring at Jungkook’s right shoulder like he’s seen a
ghost.

Jungkook realizes, then, where the fire had come from.

V leaps soundly off his shoulder, coming to a predatory crouch in front of him, hissing and
snarling, her fur standing up in hackles. "Mreow!" She lets out a bloody, ear-splitting screech,
before opening her jaws, and-

-releasing another jet of fire, this time, catching Dumb #3’s sleeve.

All three of them scream, before bolting, cursing and yelling disbelieving shouts, glancing back at
Jungkook the entire time as if terrified that he’s giving chase.

For a while, all Jungkook can hear is the thump of his own heart, pounding like a war drum inside
of his chest.

His eyes are blown wide, chest heaving for air, as he stares at his kneazle.

Kneazles…kneazles can’t breathe fire.

They can’t.

That’s-

That’s absurd.

"…What the fuck," he whispers, gaping.

V simply strolls back to him, and butts her pretty head daintily against his leg, purring
affectionately.

"…What the fuck."

 ———

The next morning at breakfast, Taehyung is neatly arranging an egg on top of his avocado toast,
when he finds a white-and-black fur ball unceremoniously dumped into his lap.

"Good morning, beautiful," he greets sunnily, looking up with a smile-

-only to freeze, at the sight of his gorgeous boyfriend, wearing a solemn expression of a man on a
witch-hunt. Jungkook is standing in front of him, eyes dark and frightening, mouth set in a firm
downwards curl, his arms crossed in front of his chest.

"Looks like he found out," Yoongi mutters quietly into his bowl.

Jungkook chooses not to engage, given that he’s already very upset as it is.

"Kim Taehyung," he grounds out.

Taehyung gulps. "Yes, darling?"

"Do you want to tell me why," Jungkook says sweetly, but in an altogether frightening manner. "V,
the sweet, cute, innocent little kneazle you got me-" Jungkook’s smile twitches. "-breathed fire
yesterday?"

Yoongi chokes on a bite of his cereal.

Jimin’s spoon clatters on the table.

Taehyung smiles awkwardly. "…Because she’s the product of my love for you, which burns with
the devotion of a thousand fires…?"

Jungkook’s expression grows truly terrifying.

"Taehyung," Jimin shrieks, holding V up to the light, as if seeing her in a new light. "You didn’t
tell me you got one of the special ones!"

"I didn’t even know fire-breathing was an option," Hoseok mutters.

"Pretty sure it’s slightly illegal," Yoongi snorts.

"Options?" Jungkook demands.

So, Madame Rockette, in addition to being a well-lauded and celebrated kneazle breeder, is also
one of the foremost researchers in the field of magizoology genetic engineering. The same field
that, primarily, is known for its endeavors to produce a less untamable and deadly breed of
dragons, for example.

Madame Rockette, for a small fee (small, meaning more like, the sum of a small cottage in a very
affluent neighborhood), also offers a selection of very rare, very unique (one of a kind, that is)
kneazles, with an array of special abilities.

Usually, said "abilities" range somewhere between "can change fur color" to "has small wings
without actual flight capabilities."

Never before has it been heard of (publicly, at least), of a kneazle with the ability to breathe fire.
Presumably, likely because the knowledge of such creatures, would have therefore placed said
creatures on the restricted dangerous creatures list that such beasts as dragons are listed on, and
definitely not permitted on Hogwarts grounds as pets.

"Taehyung," Jungkook hisses, eyes wide. "Tell me you didn’t get me some- some top secret
government lab experiment!"

Taehyung pauses.

Jungkook’s expression grows enraged.

Taehyung hurries to placate him with a cajoling kiss, and nervous laughter. "No, honey, of course
not. It was all legal, I assure you." (Legal, meaning, generally, if one has enough galleons, anything
can be made legal in the eyes of the Wizengamot. But his darling doesn’t have to know that. It’s
not like he’s one of the Lovingtons, who are not-so-secretly procuring a dragon for their exotic pet
collection, like the deluded madmen they are.) "I just, wanted to get you something one of a kind.
Just like you."

Jungkook softens, just a little.

Hoseok rolls his eyes. "You can’t tell me you’re falling for that-"

Taehyung kisses Jungkook on the nose, smiling indulgently when he goes a little cross eyed at it.
"V was just the sweetest, most darling girl there, and I couldn’t help but to pick her for you,
because you’re both the sweetest angels, and-"

Jimin makes a disbelieving, retching noise.

"-besides, I figured, it wouldn’t hurt to have a little extra protection, you know?"

Yoongi splutters. "You got Jungkook a fucking miraculously engineered kneazle that I’m pretty
sure would normally be classed as an XXXXX level dangerous magical creature, for "protection"?
Inside of Hogwarts?"

"What would he even need it for? What, you got some inside news on the revival of a homicidal
madman that the rest of us don’t know about, or…" Hosoek drawls.

Taehyung tsks at them, like they’re being ridiculous.

"Well, then tell me why V had to use her little trick to begin with," Taehyung asks.

Trick he says, as though V had done the equivalent of learning how to sit on command. Jungkook
hesitates.

Taehyung’s expression grows abruptly grim. "Jungkook," he says lowly.

Jungkook fidgets.

Unconsciously, his eyes dart to the end of the long table, where Dumb 1, 2 and 3 are shoveling
food in their mouths with their heads resolutely facing downwards, as if afraid to even glance up in
the hall. (More likely, they’re terrified of coming into eye contact with either Jungkook, his
terrifying fire-breathing beast, or his equally terrifying boyfriend. Or all three.)

Taehyung smiles, perfectly pleasant and dark enough it sends a chill down Jungkook’s back. "I
see," he murmurs, somehow managing to convey a promise for a wretched death in only two
 words. He leans over, and nudges at V’s nose with a finger.

"Good girl."

Chapter End Notes

* Here, I made up a breeder for plot purposes, but in real life, I highly encourage
adoption as an alternative to acquiring pets from breeders! It’s a wonderful option, and
gives animals much-needed homes. I adopted my own dog a few years ago, and it’s
been a lovely time, so I highly recommend it!

[1] Kneazle - "A cat-like creature with a lion-like mane and tail, spotted, speckled or
flecked fur and long ears. Intelligent and independent but may bond with a wizard or
witch and can be a good pet. Also known to be able to detect untrustworthy people."

[2] we’re pretending that boyfriends lowkey share common room passwords with each
other and sneak in all the time oops (let’s be real, you can’t tell me there’s a school full
of 13-18 year olds intermingling constantly, and they somehow manage to
ACTUALLY keep the secrecy of house passwords to themselves)

[3] for the matter of genetic engineering, I’m going to say that in this verse, all such
projects are done magically, (kind of like charms or transfigurations), and held to the
highest code of ethics and not conducted in a manner that imparts cruelty to
animals/magical creatures!
 ruby of rowana
Chapter Summary

The Token of Intended's Choice.

Chapter Notes

Ahhh, so this chapter is to thank you all for this fic reaching 1K kudos!! This fic was
really just intended to be a dumb crack one-shot, hahahaha, but I've fallen in love with
this universe; I hope you like the following addition!

See the end of the chapter for more notes

Four months into their relationship, and Taehyung greets Jungkook with an enthusiastic kiss the
moment the younger boy approaches him at the Slytherin table in the Great Hall. Yoongi, across
from them, drops his spoon into his bowl of cereal with a loud clatter. "I’m trying to eat," he huffs,
and from beside him, Jimin coos.

"Morning, Tae," Jungkook giggles, and Taehyung kisses him again.

Hoseok makes a retching noise.

"So, listen," Taehyung says, excitement visibly brimming from every inch of his expression. "I was
thinking, this weekend, we could head out - but not to Hogsmeade. To Diagon Alley."

Jungkook blinks.

"Um," he says. "I mean, sure- what did you need all the way in Diagon Alley?"

Taehyung beams. It’s almost too bright to look at. As it is, Jungkook can’t help the way he shuffles
closer, as if drawn in subconsciously. Taehyung clasps his hands behind Jungkook’s back, securing
his boyfriend to him. "I wanted to go to Gringotts," Taehyung murmurs, gazing down at Jungkook
with- this impossibly fond look in his eyes.

Jungkook, heart thumping all over again in his chest, can’t help the confusion that rises at the way
that Taehyung says Gringotts like it means something. Something other than simply a wizarding
bank, that is. "Uhh- did you, like, need money for something?" Jungkook tilts his head to the side.
"I could give you some, if you ran out, so that we wouldn’t have to go all the way-"

Hoseok snorts. "Jungkook," he says, laughing - but not at all unkindly. "The Kims are like…the
wizarding equivalent of nobility. Somehow, I think money problems aren’t the issue here."

Jungkook pouts. "I was just trying to help," he mumbles, more to Taehyung’s tie than anything
else.

Taehyung looks at him with soft eyes, smile tugging helplessly at his lips. "You’d give me money
if I asked?" He asks, sounding awed and touched.
Jimin rolls his eyes. "Your family could buy Gringotts-"

Taehyung ignores him, in favor of staring at Jungkook as though he’s the most wonderful thing in
the world. Jungkook, cheeks flushed, shrugs. "I mean, obviously I don’t have, like, millions, but
whatever I have I would, yeah-"

Yoongi, across from them, drops his spoon into his bowl of cereal with a loud clatter. "I’m trying
to eat," he huffs, and from beside him, Jimin coos.

Taehyung melts.

"Baby," he sighs, and Jungkook smiles at him.

"Do you two shits not see me?" Yoongi demands. "I haven’t been able to have a single meal in
peace in months, I’m practically skin and bones-"

There’s no indication either of them have heard. "So, Saturday?" Taehyung confirms.

Jungkook nods. Taehyung flicks him under the chin, grinning. "Come on, I cut up some pancakes
for you."

"Can’t you two desecrate the Gryffindor table for once, please," Yoongi isn’t above begging. He
really, really isn’t.

It’s Jimin who solves the mystery for him.

"It’s probably the Token of Intended’s Choice," he shrugs, as the two of them lay recovering on the
grass from their small Quidditch session.

Jungkook sits up, bits of grass sticking to his back and decorating his hair. "What’s that?" He asks.
"Is that another courting thing?"

Jimin nods. "It’s the one where the recipient gets to choose their gift."

"Wait, what? Like, I get to pick my own Christmas present, sort of thing?"

Jimin hums. "Kind of," he says. "Usually, the giver will pre-select a set of choices, around three to
five objects; and from there, the recipient can select one. They’re usually things that are related to
the giver’s family."

Ah, Jungkook thinks. The usual Pureblood obsession with family and tradition. He’s starting to
realize, that much of the official pureblood courtship rituals seem to have less to do with, say,
courting, than they are simply a lavish and ceremonial means of flaunting one’s family name and
wealth.

"But why Gringotts?" Jungkook says dubiously. "I mean- Taehyung isn’t trying to, like. Give me
galleons or something, right?"
(Somehow, the idea of his boyfriend presenting him with an unholy amount of literal gold, is not at
all something that would surprise him. That’s why it’s so terrifying.)

Jimin laughs, loudly. "Of course not," he says.

Jungkook relaxes.

"As if Taehyung needs a special occasion to give you galleons," Jimin snorts.

Jungkook splutters. "Taehyung doesn’t give me money!" He pushes Jimin’s shoulder. "I’m not-
I’m not like, his- his sugar baby, or something!"

"Sugar baby?" Jimin wrinkles his nose. "What’s a sugar baby?"

Jungkook forgets, sometimes, that Jimin is from the same pureblood circles as Taehyung. He sighs.
Wizards.

"It’s a muggle thing, nevermind." He doesn't want one of Jimin’s first introductions to muggle
culture to be that of the phenomenon that is a sugar daddy. (He shudders to even think of what
someone like Jimin would do, with such knowledge.)

"Anyways," Jimin shrugs. "Taehyung doesn’t need to give you galleons, he’d just buy you
whatever you wanted, anyway."

Jungkook stutters.

In the end, he fails to come up with a coherent response, cheeks flush with mortification as Jimin
cackles.

"I hear Kim’s taking you to the famous Kim vaults this weekend," Hoseok greets without any
preamble.

Jungkook startles from his bed, where he’d been attempting to get through a passage of assigned
reading on the history of Hogwarts. He’s somewhere in the middle of reading on Headless Nick’s
torrid affair the Fat Lady, that had apparently resulted in unmitigated chaos around the Gryffindor
common rooms, until the then-headmaster managed to put an end to the nonsense.

"Famous?" Jungkook hardly manages to say, before his two roommates have practically leaped
onto his bed with wild shouts.

"The Kim Vaults?!" One of them - Michaels - shouts, and Jungkook startles with a yelp.

"What the-"

"Jungkook," the other one - Colbin - says very solemnly, placing a hand on Jungkook’s knee. "Can
I come with? Please?"
Jungkook looks at all three of them as if they’ve lost their minds. "What? No, it’s not like- this isn’t
some sort of hangout, you can’t just tag along-"

It’s a date, he wants to say huffily. One that he and Taehyung haven’t had time to go on much
recently, given that Jungkook’s been busy with Quidditch and school, and Taehyung with his
prefect duties.

He’s not going to let his weird, nosy roommates tag along the one time they manage to have a date
outside of Hogwarts.

"But Jungkook," Colbin begs. "Please, I’ve wanted to see it just once in my life, ever since I was a
little boy-"

Jungkook splutters. "A little boy- What kind of- Let go of me, you’re being weird-"

"Jungkook," Michaels assaults him next. "You must choose the Ruby of Rowana, if it is one of the
choices."

"The Ruby of what-"

"No," Colbin argues heatedly. "I heard the Kim vaults have the Arthurian Sword, and you’re going
to tell him to choose the stupid Ruby? That’s an amateur move."

The Arthurian Sword? Are these wizards talking about Excalibur? That’s- real?-

Wait, no. That isn’t what Jungkook should be focusing on right now.

"Will you two stop," Jungkook huffs. "This isn’t some- museum, what are you even saying-"

"Well," Hoseok says, and Jungkook looks up at him. "The Kim Vaults are kind of like a museum.
If said museum had the most valuable collection of artifacts that the Ministry’s been salivating to
get its hands on, for at least twelve generations…?"

Jungkook gapes.

"…What?"

"When I was younger, I heard a rumor they’ve even got the Sorcerer’s Stone in there," Michaels
whispers, completely, terrifyingly, serious.

Jungkook wheezes.

The fact that his roommates are - entirely sincerely - talking about how they’d talked about his
boyfriend’s family bank vaults at a young age, as though it were some sort of public monument,
is…bewildering.

"Shut up," Jungkook says weakly. "You’re making this up."

"We’re really not," Hoseok says. "But I’ve never even heard of someone being taken to the entire
vaults for the Gift of Intended’s Choice," he says speculatively. "Usually you’re just given a choice
of three or four things."

So Jimin had said.

"Maybe he just needs to pick up some more money," Jungkook says. It sounds stupid, even to his
own ears.
Hoseok eyes him flatly. "What, because he ran out of the galleons to buy chocolate frogs?" He
deadpans.

Jungkook pouts. "Well, maybe. It’s possible."

"Okay, Jung, hold on. Jungkook," Colbin seizes his shoulder. "If you’ve ever thought of me as a
friend, you’re going to take pictures for me while you’re there, please-"

Jungkook really, desperately hopes his boyfriend just ran out of money and needs to pick up some
more for the next Hogsmeade trip, or something.

A third year on the team ran up to him at practice the other day, and asked if he was going to pick
the Mirror of the Erised.

Just what in Merlin’s beard did this crazy people think his boyfriend’s family has, hidden away in
those vaults?

That would be-

-ridiculous.

There’s no way the Kims’ vaults actually contain that kind of rare, legendary object.

…Right?

When Jungkook asks Taehyung later that night, curled up against his boyfriend in the Gryffindor
common room’s sofa, he laughs. Hard. So hard, that the force of his laughter shakes Jungkook
half-off of him, much to his pouting irritation.

"Wait," Taehyung laughs. "Jungkook, come back."

"No," Jungkook scowls. "You’re laughing at me-"

"I’m not laughing at you, baby, I’m laughing with you. Now come back."

Jungkook should never have taught him the muggle terms of endearment. Now, every time he
hears Taehyung says baby in that low, deep voice of his, Jungkook can feel himself melting into a
puddle.
As it is, he’s entirely weak when Taehyung pulls him back into the circle of his arms, like the easy,
easy boy that he’s rapidly becoming.

"So," Taehyung explains, as their cart rolls closer and closer to the designated vault in question.
Seated in front of them is one of Gringott’s excellent goblin employees, dressed in a sharper suit
than Jungkook thinks he’s even seen muggle models wear, holding what has got to be the largest,
most aggressive golden key Jungkook’s ever imagined. "This isn’t my family’s vaults, but my
personal one."

Jungkook startles. "You have your own vault?"

Taehyung smiles sheepishly. "Well, of course. We Kims are taught how to invest from a young
age, so we all get our own vaults and a small sum with which to practice."

Small sum, Jungkook thinks drily. Somehow, he doubts Taehyung’s definition of "small" is
anywhere near what a normal person’s would be.

"So, as you’ve probably figured out by now," Taehyung plays with Jungkook’s fingers, looking
almost shy. Jungkook is smitten with the expression on his boyfriend’s features. "I wanted to
present you with the Gift of Intended’s Choice."

Jungkook nods, smiling sweetly.

From beside them, he thinks he saw the goblin smile.

"So I went and picked a few things out from the family vaults, and added to the items already in my
own vault-"

The cart rattles to a stop.

Taehyung, with an exaggerated flourish, leaps out of the cart with a breathtaking grace that does
not make Jungkook swoon, nope, and helps his boyfriend out of the cart. The goblin waddles over
to the massive doors, and with Taehyung, unlocks it.

"I will be waiting outside," he informs them. "Please don’t hesitate to knock if you require my
assistance with anything, sire."

Jungkook eyes him. He’d been to Gringotts before, with Hoseok.

The goblins were nowhere near as nice, ever.

Just what did the Kims have in these vaults, to have even the infamous goblins treating them with
such courtesy?

Jungkook doesn’t get a chance to ask, given that he’s led into the vault by the hand in that moment.

The door closes behind them, but Jungkook doesn’t even notice.
He’s too busy trying to catch his breath.

Jungkook stares, dumbstruck, at the sheer riches, gleaming at him from every corner of the room.
Piles and piles and piles of gold coins, some piled in towers as high as his own head, some even
taller, reaching toward the ceiling in gilded spires.

There’s a well organized series of jewels scattered throughout the spacious room; piles of
diamonds and lapis lazuli and emeralds, sparkling a rainbow hue under the bright ceiling lights.
Paintings - no doubt equally as priceless as the jewels - hang from each of the walls, an artful
curation that seems like it was hand-selected by Taehyung’s own taste.

(Jungkook very, very resolutely chooses not to linger on the hilt of a broadsword he definitely sees
sticking out of a pile of gold, somewhere in the back corner. Nope. No, not today.)

He’s still trying to pick his jaw up from the floor, when Taehyung shyly steps into the center of his
vision, hands clasped behind his back. "So?"

Jungkook stares dumbly. "Um. Y-Yes?"

"Do you see anything satisfactory?" Taehyung asks, gesturing to the room around them.

Jungkook chokes. "W-what?"

Taehyung can’t mean that his choice is from the room at large, can he?

Taehyung, entirely oblivious to the way that Jungkook’s brain is currently collapsing in on itself,
bites his lip anxiously. "Well, this is just- a small selection of things available, of course, if you
don’t like anything here, I also have the key to my family’s larger vault, and you could pick
something from there- or, really, if you had a particular item in mind and we don’t have it in our
possession, if you’re willing to give me some time, I could definitely procure it-"

"Taehyung," Jungkook wheezes.

Air.

What is air?

Taehyung shuts up. He looks at Jungkook nervously, as if he somehow genuinely thinks that
Jungkook could find this unsatisfactory.

"Taehyung, what- this- this is too much," Jungkook finally manages to say, gaping around the
room.

Taehyung relaxes. "Oh. Nonsense, I hand-selected a lot of these in accordance with what I thought
you might like!"

Taehyung pulls him over to one such auspicious pile of gold and jewels, and picks up something
that looks a lot like a rolled up tapestry, or something. "Here, this is a rug that permits broom-less
flight."

Jungkook freezes. "I'm sorry, what?"

Taehyung, with a mischievous grin, simply unfurls it on the ground with a flourish. "Here, I’ll
show you."

And Jungkook watches, with hysteria rising in his throat, as his boyfriend unrolls what seems to be
the goddamned flying magic carpet from Disney’s fucking Aladdin.

Jungkook doesn’t pick anything that day. He refuses, adamantly standing his ground with his arms
tucked in across his chest, as though he fears Taehyung might try to forcibly wrangle some
devastatingly priceless artifact into his arms. (He does. Taehyung would.)

It lasts, until finally, with a pout, Taehyung acquiesces, strolling out with an airy, "That’s alright,
I’m sure you want some time to think your choice over."

Jungkook snorts. As if.

But Taehyung won’t let it go.

At least several times, each time they meet, Taehyung asks him whether Jungkook’s chosen yet.
And each time Jungkook says no, Taehyung pulls up the information of yet another irreplaceable
jewel or magical stone or other that he’s acquired, and offers, as if he thinks the reason Jungkook
had refused is because none of said irreplaceable artifacts were good enough.

(Seriously, what is wrong with purebloods?)

It doesn’t help, that he’s been hounded constantly by fellow students, who clamor around him with
questions, as though Jungkook were some sort of famous survivor who’d gotten a glimpse into
Area-51, or something.

It’s ridiculous.

It persists, all the way until Jimin tells him one day during their private Quidditch games: "It’s
honestly a little hurtful, you know."

Jungkook freezes. "What do you mean?"

Jimin smiles patiently. "Jungkook, part of the courtship rituals is about the pureblood wizard
demonstrating to his desired partner, that they have the capability of providing for them."

Jungkook rears back. "What? Provide for me? I’m not- I’m not some damsel 1950s housewife-"

Jimin narrows his eyes. "I don’t know what any of that means."
Jungkook slumps. Purebloods.

"In any case, you refusing all of Taehyung’s gifts, is like telling him that none of them are good
enough. That he’s not good enough."

Jungkook frowns. "That’s- stupid. Of course that’s not it."

"I know that, but Taehyung’s stupid when it comes to you. You know that." Jimin shrugs. "Just
pick the most painless one you can stand to have, and put the poor kid out of his misery, will you? I
heard him trying to discreetly fire-call the dragon conservatory in Romania the other day."

Jungkook blanches. "What?"

Jimin sighs. "He…may or may not be trying to get his hands on a dragon egg-"

Jungkook.

Jungkook is going to strangle his idiotic (lovely) boyfriend.

Jungkook goes to visit the Slytherin dorms that very night. (He needs to put an end to this,
immediately, before his ridiculous boyfriend somehow manages to get a smuggled dragon egg into
the castle. It isn’t at all beyond Taehyung’s realm of possibilities, which, again. Is terrifying.)

He pushes right past Taehyung into his boyfriend’s room, noting mercifully that none of his
roommates seem to be around in that moment. "Tae," he says firmly. "I’ve picked a gift."

Taehyung’s expression transforms into the brightest smile Jungkook has ever seen. "Oh, perfect!"
He pauses. "Though, I am working on something new right now, if you want to wait just a week, I
think you might like this one-"

"No!" Jungkook’s panicked shout startles Taehyung. Jungkook clears his throat. "I mean. I, uh.
I’m- I’m really set on the one I already picked."

Taehyung blinks, but nods. "If you’re sure."

"I’m definitely sure."

Taehyung perks up again with a smile. "So, which one is it?"

Jungkook looks around the room with a mildly panicked expression, before his eyes settle on the
soft, dark green knit sweater draped over the back of Taehyung’s desk chair; it’s one of his
favorites, as Taehyung wears it often and its cashmere material is the best for Jungkook to rub his
cheek against.

With far more triumphant glee than is at all warranted, Jungkook seizes the sweater in his hands,
brandishing it like a weapon. "This."
Taehyung stares.

Jungkook falters, and clutches the sweater to his chest. "This is the one I want. Um- if it’s- okay."

Taehyung…continues to stare, stupefied.

Jungkook fidgets. "Unless- unless it’s, you know, important to you, in which case- if it’s from your
grandma or something, then of course I wouldn’t want to-"

"Jungkook."

Jungkook shuts up.

"You…want my raggedy old sweater. For the Token of Intended’s Choice." Taehyung sounds
vaguely strangled.

Jungkook, still clutching the sweater to his chest, nods uneasily. "Um. If- if that’s okay."

"Jungkook, that’s not- it isn’t that I don’t want to give the sweater away, it’s-"

Jungkook beams. "Then it’s settled! This is the gift I want."

Taehyung fish mouths at him. "Jungkook," he finally bursts, splaying his hands wide. "Of all the
things in that vault, what you want is my sweater?"

Jungkook pouts. "It’s a nice sweater."

Taehyung pinches the bridge of his nose. "This isn’t about the sweater, it’s-"

"In muggle culture," Jungkook says, staring down at the soft material in his hands. "It’s, um. It’s
kind of like, a thing. To wear your boyfriend’s clothes." There’s a bright, scarlet flush on his
cheeks as he says this, expression mildly embarrassed.

Taehyung stares, for approximately an entire minute, before promptly dragging Jungkook into a
searing kiss by the lapel of his shirt collar. When he releases him, Taehyung’s eyes are bright
pinpricks of stars, boring into his with an unbridled sort of fervor.

"Okay," Taehyung says, and Jungkook smiles. "But let me at least wrap it nicely for you."

The next morning, there’s a small, veritable crowd around Jungkook as he sits at the Gryffindor
table, trying to eat his breakfast in peace.

Somehow, the news had gotten out, that Jeon Jungkook had indeed made his selection at long last.
Inevitably, the entirety of the Hogwarts student body (and not a small number of professors), have
become far too invested in what Jungkook’s choice had been.

Kim Taehyung enters the Great Hall, then, a small, shimmering silver package tucked under his
arm.

There’s a hushed silence that descends over the entire hall, as practically all eyes remain pinned on
the Slytherin while he walks, entirely unperturbed by the scope of attention on him, down the
rows. When he arrives where Jungkook is currently trying to find a way to turn himself invisible,
Taehyung greets him with a kiss to the top of his head, and places the package in his lap with a
flourish.

"I, Kim Taehyung, present to you, Jeon Jungkook," Taehyung declares, far more loudly than
Jungkook deems it at all necessary.

Someone at the Hufflepuff table fucking swoons. Jungkook just barely manages to refrain from
rolling his eyes.

"The Token-" here, he pauses dramatically, and Jungkook is really, quite done with his boyfriend.
"-of Intended’s Choice."

There’s an honest-to-god round of oohs around him.

Jungkook should have asked for the cloak of invisibility.

"Well?" Colbin says eagerly. "Open it!"

Jungkook bites his lip. Taehyung stands, waiting, behind him. There’s a shit-eating grin on his
face, and Jungkook is going to break up with him, he swears.

"Hurry up, Jeon," another fellow Gryffindor shouts, several seats down.

"Even I want to see," Hoseok adds, leaning over the table for a better look.

Gritting his teeth, Jungkook opens the box.

There’s a deafening silence that falls over the table.

"Is that…" Michaels’ voice sounds distantly from down the table. "Is that a sweater?"

"Is it, like…Godric Gryffindor’s sweater or something?" Another voice asks, not at all hushed.

"Isn’t that the sweater Kim always wears?" A third voice enters the fray.

And then, all at once, the Great Hall explodes into murmurs, no doubt gossiping about the fact that
Jungkook had received an unassuming, dark green, knit sweater for the Token of Intended’s
Choice.

"…Jungkook," Hoseok says, staring at the sweater now in Jungkook’s lap. "…Is that Kim’s old
sweater?"

Jungkook flushes. "It’s a nice sweater!" He snaps, defensively.

"…Merlin’s tits," Hoseok sighs. "Jungkook. Jungkook. You- you had your pick, of hundreds of
thousands of galleons’ worth of magical artifacts, and what you chose was…this fucking sweater?"

Taehyung is shaking with the force of his suppressed laughs.

Jungkook is going to break up with him, he really will.

 "It’s a nice sweater," Jungkook repeats, scowling through his furious blush.

Hoseok muffles a despairing noise into his hands.

Taehyung finally bursts out laughing, unable to contain it anymore.

Jungkook sinks lower into his seat.

It is roughly three weeks down the line, that Jungkook discovers - when V has a small, fire-
breathing accident while he’s wearing the sweater - that it’s fucking immune to fire.

Taehyung, beaming, informs him cheerfully that he’s had the sweater "improved" with a "small
number of spells."

Said improvements, incomprehensibly, range from inflammability, to a permanent drying charm, to

- Jungkook chokes when he finds out - being bulletproof.

"What the fuck," Jungkook wheezes. "How the fuck do you even know what bullets are-"

"When you made me watch that spy movie," Taehyung says primly.

"It works," Jimin chimes in, utterly unhelpful. "We tested it out."

Jungkook- can’t breathe. "What do you mean, you tested it out."

"We got a gun, and we shot it," Jimin explains in a duh sort of tone, as if Jungkook is being
particularly daft.

Jungkook stares down, aghast, at the unassuming green sweater he’s currently wearing.

And then.

"Where the hell did you get a gun-?!"

Chapter End Notes

As always, I love to hear what you all think! Also: So I don’t think you could actually
go to Diagon Alley during the school year, but for this fic, I’m going to say that going
to Diagon Alley is an option as much as Hogsmeade is :’)

-
Come stay updated on this/my other works, and interact with me, at my twitter!
 formidable foes of whack-a-mole
Chapter Notes

for rain and lil, two of my most absolute favorite people (and writers) in the world.
here's your slytherin bf, and i'm sorry about the wait. (if you want two more
tremendous writers to read on ao3, search lilacdale and vantebun) <3

+ the anon who, once upon a time, all those years ago (lol) sent me the CC requesting
a hogwarts chapter on the time jungkook brings taehyung to the muggle world

See the end of the chapter for more notes

Jungkook and Taehyung are going on a date.

Well.

Kind of.

To be more specific: they’re going on a date, in the muggle world, to be accompanied by a

childhood friend of Jungkook’s.

Jungkook’s been planning it for a while, as he’d been long overdue to catch up with his best friend.
He’d submitted all the requisite paperwork for the international portkey and had been in the middle
of discussing it with Hoseok, when Taehyung had overheard.

Of course Taehyung had asked to tag along.

Of course Jungkook had agreed, awed and shyly pleased that Taehyung would want to come along
to the muggle world with him.

Of course this exchange had devolved into Taehyung, wide-eyed, breathlessly gasping “Of course
I want to go with you, I want to go anywhere with you,” and Jungkook, being breathless right back,
and Yoongi and Hoseok, being generally, disgusted.

“You really want to go to Busan with me?” Jungkook breathes, not unlike the way one might say,
you’d traverse oceans and galaxies for me?, eyes wide.

“You’re literally just going to Busan, not like, the ends of the earth,” Hoseok rolls his eyes.

Taehyung takes Jungkook’s hands in his, nodding fiercely. “I’d go to Azkaban for you,” he says
solemnly.

“It’s Busan,” Hoseok splutters.

Jungkook swoons. Neither of them pay Hoseok a single mind. “I’d go to Azkaban for you, too,” he
says, and then it’s Taehyung’s turn to swoon.

“Literally no one is telling either of you to go to Azkaban, the fuck,” Yoongi mutters.
This all leads up to Saturday morning, Jungkook getting dressed with a nervous, frenetic sort of
energy that has Hoseok raising a brow. “You good?” he asks, slumped on the couch from where
he’s watching Jungkook buzz around the room.

Jungkook freezes in the middle of the room. Looks at Taehyung, with a deer in the headlights
expression. “Yeah,” he says, nodding jerkily. Hoseok stares him down.

Jungkook busies his hands with doing nothing in particular, wrangling with the hem of his plain,
oversized tee shirt. “Um. I mean.” He digs the toe of his Timberlands into the floor, scuffing it.
“I’m just. A little nervous.”

Hoseok leans forward. “Why?”

Jungkook gulps. “I mean. Taehyung’s like, a pureblood.”

“...Yeah?”

Jungkook stares harder at the floor. “I just. I’m just nervous, what if. What if he doesn’t like it
today?”

Hoseok snorts.

Jungkook gives him a dirty look.

“Listen, you could take Taehyung to an abandoned alleyway dumpster, and he’d still think it’s the
greatest thing he’s ever seen,” Hoseok says drily.

Jungkook blushes. “Shut up,” he mutters, but there’s a small, pleased little smile on his lips.

Hoseok rolls his eyes.

In the early light of morning, Jimin watches Taehyung meticulously pack a small bag for his trip to
the muggle world from his bed. Behind him, Yoongi snores away softly, clutching Jimin’s pillow
to his chest like he thinks it’s his boyfriend in his unconscious state.

Taehyung’s been packing for over an hour now, carefully curating a collection of items to take
with him according to some incomprehensible reason that Jimin can’t surmise.

“Taehyung,” Jimin laughs, quietly enough not to wake Yoongi. “What in Merlin’s fucking tit is
that?”

Taehyung looks up from where he’s reverently cradling - of all things - a rubber duck to his chest.
“What?”

“Why are you packing that strange little duck thing for your trip to the muggle world?”

Taehyung rolls his eyes, like Jimin’s question is ridiculous. “Because,” he says. “This duck made
of rubber is a muggle contraption, Chim.” Taehyung preens. “I am bringing it along, to show the
muggles that I come in peace, and that I am a respectful fan of their culture.”

Jimin eyes the rubber duck dubiously. “I don’t know,” he says slowly. “Seems weird to me.”

Taehyung huffs. He clutches the duck to his chest. “You’re just uninformed about muggle
customs,” he sniffs.

“Uh huh.”

That’s when, with a muffled groan, Yoongi wakes up.

He rolls over, hair an atrocious mess that makes Jimin huff fondly, and squints through bleary eyes
at Taehyung. With his chin propped against Jimin’s knee, Jimin running a soft hand through his
hair, Yoongi snorts. “Why’s Taehyung holding a fuckin’ rubber duck?”

Jimin cackles.

Taehyung scowls.

The first place Jungkook takes Taehyung to is...McDonalds.

Taehyung’s eyes are as wide as saucers, as he drinks in the sight of the golden arches. He clutches
his rubber duck to his chest with one hand. “Woah,” he breathes, his hand squeezing Jungkook’s so
tight it nearly cuts off his blood circulation. “Is this place a museum?”

Jungkook chokes.

“Uh. Not quite.”

Taehyung’s eyes are sparkling. “McDonalds,” he reads, eyes still glued on the giant, gleaming,
curved M. “Is it like the muggle version of the Ministry, then?”

Jungkook wheezes. “No,” he says, voice faint. “No no, nothing like that, it’s-”

“Surely,” Taehyung says, looking at the golden arches as though he were looking at a particularly
magnificent piece of art. “It must be an important landmark of some kind.”

Jungkook can’t breathe.

“It’s a fast food place,” he finally says, trying to contain his laughter. “You eat here.”

Taehyung’s jaw drops. “A restaurant?” He looks at the building with renewed focus. “Muggles
are so enterprising! To think: such grandeur, just to eat in-”

Jungkook, trembling with laughter, tugs Taehyung in through the doors before his boyfriend can
start waxing poetic about McDonalds. He chooses not to tell Taehyung that there’s just about one
per every neighborhood, lest Taehyung’s brain implode with the “grandeur” of it.

These purebloods are going to be the death of him.

Earlier, Taehyung had shown up to their meeting point, with a goddamned rubber duck strapped
proudly to his chest by means of a sticking charm. Jungkook had almost broken down in that very
moment.

The speed with which their food arrives, as it turns out, is yet another source for marvel.

When Jungkook brings back the food on the customary plastic trays, Taehyung gapes. “Jungkook,”
he asks. “Is this place run by wizards?”

Jungkook looks around wildly, shushing him. “Taehyung,” he hisses. “Stop saying muggles and
wizards so loudly!”

Taehyung leans in, lowering his voice to a whisper. “Is this place run by, you know?”

Jungkook doesn’t think that verbiage is any better, but he sighs; he’ll take it. “No,” he answers,
sliding the tray before Taehyung.

“They must be!” Taehyung insists, opening one of the boxes and revealing a gorgeously gleaming
burger. “How else could they produce such immaculate dishes, in so short a time!”

Jungkook shushes him once more. There is a grandmother sat not ten feet away from them who’s
begun to give Taehyung mildly concerned looks, as though she suspects he may be a bit touched in
the head.

Jungkook is really, truly sure, that the bright yellow rubber duck sitting innocuously on the table in
front of Taehyung doesn’t help.

Jungkook couldn’t pry that thing away from Taehyung, no matter how much he pleaded and
begged.

“I promise you, it isn’t,” Jungkook assures.

He doesn’t even know how he might go about describing the “muggle marvel” that is the corporate
world and consumerism; of an entire franchise of establishments, taking over the world of fast
food, one golden arch at a time.

That’s when Taehyung takes a bite of a fry.

He freezes.
His eyes slowly grow wider, and wider, until he gapes up at Jungkook, eyes practically sparkling.
“Jungkook,” he breathes. “Jungkook, what is this divine creation?”

Jungkook stares at the outstretched half-fry. “Taehyung,” he says. “You know what a fry is.”

Taehyung clutches the fry to his chest. “This is no ordinary fry,” he says solemnly. The
grandmother glances at Taehyung with not a small amount of concern. Jungkook is caught between
crying and laughing. “Jungkook, you are wrong. This establishment is run by-”

Jungkook, very keenly aware of the grandmother listening in on their conversation, hurriedly
shoves a fry into Taehyung’s mouth before he can say wizards.

“Taehyung,” he laughs, watching fondly as Taehyung obediently chews on the fry with a delighted
expression. “I promise, it isn’t. Really.”

At the end of the meal, Taehyung tries to insist on meeting personally with the “head chef.” He
must, he cites to Jungkook, get the recipe, so that the chefs who work for his family could make it.

Jungkook tries not to laugh. Says, as kindly as he can, that he doesn’t think that’s possible. (He also
fears what mutiny Taehyung might raise, if he finds out that the muggle version of fast food often
comes in vacuum-dried pellets that are more preservatives than actual food.) “It’s...trade secrets,”
Jungkook finally says. “They can’t just give it out, you know?”

Taehyung looks crestfallen.

And then, he grows determined. Jungkook grows afraid. He’s seen that expression on Taehyung’s
face before.

Usually, it precipitates something just shy of catastrophic.

“Jungkook,” he says, grinning mischievously. “We can simply return with my cloak of invi-”

Jungkook throws a fry at his face. It hits Taehyung between the eyes. “No,” he says, very
seriously. “Stop it.”

Taehyung pouts. “But Jungkook-”

“No.”

“But-”

“Kook!”

Jungkook looks up with a bright smile at the voice.

A boy bounds up to their table in the next moment, wrapping Jungkook up in a tight hug with
enthusiasm. “Yugyeom!” Jungkook exclaims, hugging him right back.
Taehyung watches, the fry he’d been about to eat long forgotten on the tray in front of him.

His eyes bore into the way Yugyeom’s arm is still draped loosely around Jungkook’s waist, as they
pull back. At the infectiously bright cheer Jungkook has, hanging on his beaming smile.

“You look good,” Yugyeom laughs, throwing his head back. “Looks like that posh boarding
school of yours has been kind, yeah?”

Yugyeom, Taehyung notes with dismay, is handsome.

Jungkook hadn’t mentioned his childhood best friend is so handsome.

The only thing Taehyung had been told about ‘Yugyeom’ is that he’s Jungkook’s friend from
elementary school, and that he’s a muggle. Jungkook had instructed Taehyung strictly on the need
to keep the whole magic school aspect under wraps, but had failed to tell him that Yugyeom,
apparently, is a looker.

The far more important detail, in Taehyung’s opinion.

That’s when Yugyeom seems to notice Taehyung at last, where the boy is drilling holes into the
side of his face. “Oh?” he says, smiling at Taehyung.

Taehyung gives a cool, perfunctory smile back; the one that’s earned him the moniker of the
Prince of Slytherin, back in his first year.

“This is Taehyung,” Jungkook introduces, still smiling brightly, utterly unaware of the tension
emanating from Taehyung at the way Yugyeom’s hand is still on Jungkook’s waist. “My
boyfriend.”

Yugyeom finally, finally takes his hand off Jungkook’s waist to outstretch it towards Taehyung
instead. “So you’re the famous boyfriend,” Yugyeom says, and Taehyung takes the hand with a
polite smile.

“Yes,” he says. He is Jungkook’s boyfriend.

Yugyeom blinks.

Jungkook’s brow furrows in confusion.

With a forced laugh, Yugyeom turns to Jungkook. “So, we still on to go to the arcade?” he asks.

Taehyung wishes, with a burning passion, that he understood what arcade means. As it is, all he
can do is watch, lost, as Jungkook nods excitedly.

What is an arcade?

Why does he not know of it, if it makes Jungkook so clearly excited?

Suddenly, Taehyung feels entirely betrayed by his illustrious academic journey at Hogwarts, for it
has clearly failed him if it hasn’t taught him what this arcade is, that makes Jungkook’s smile
glimmer like stars.
Taehyung’s mood lifts momentarily, however, when they arrive.

Yugyeom slips away to the bathroom the second they do, leaving Taehyung to gape openly and
freely at the magic happening all around him, as Jungkook giggles affectionately.

It’s a wondrous spectacle of flashing neon lights and colors and sounds and shrieks of laughter
from the patrons, and Taehyung is overwhelmed in the absolute best way. “Jungkook,” he breathes,
clutching at both his rubber duck and Jungkook’s hand.

(Yugyeom had raised a brow at Taehyung’s rubber duck, and Jungkook had hurriedly babbled
some explanation or another, about it being a novel sensation among the posh upper circles.
Yugyeom had blinked, but haltingly accepted it with a, “Okay, I guess.”)

“Jungkook, this place is marvelous,” Taehyung gasps, eyes dazed and fixed on the mesmerizing,
hypnotic whirl of blinking lights affixed onto the headboard of a game.

Jungkook beams.

It’s just. He’d worried, a bit, that the muggle world might be too... mundane, for Taehyung. That
he’d find it drab and dull and unappealing, and that, perhaps, he’d find Jungkook to be the same.

“Jungkook,” Taehyung gasps loudly. “Jungkook, oh, you didn’t tell me this place is for wizards!”

Jungkook hushes him.

Turns to stare, where Taehyung is pointing excitedly at an employee wearing a bear costume,
dancing along to the electronic music blaring on the speakers. “No,” Jungkook laughs. “Tae, that’s
not-”

“Sure it is,” Taehyung insists. “It’s clearly an animation charm on a toy-”

Jungkook slaps his hand down where Taehyung is still pointing, kissing Taehyung’s pout off his
lips. “I promise,” Jungkook says, smiling. “It’s just someone in a costume. Like a disguise!”

Taehyung nods gravely. “Polyjuice potion.”

Jungkook gives up.

Instead, he decides to lead Taehyung over to one of the simplest, most basic arcade games of all, to
try to gently introduce Taehyung to the muggle marvel of arcades. “These are all games,” he
explains, as they come to stand in front of a whack-a-mole. “You put coins - muggle money - into
here,” he demonstrates by inserting a few quarters into the coin slot.

“And ta-da!”

The game whirls to life.

Taehyung gives a little shriek and jumps ten feet into the air when the first mole pops out of one of
the holes.

Jungkook hurries to slam the hammer over the head of the mole, sending it safely down into the
compartment. “It’s just a game, see,” he hurries to say. “That’s- the point. You whack the moles on
the head, like this-”

Whack.

Taehyung’s eyes are round where he gapes at the game. “But why are you whacking them with this
strange tiny hammer?” he demands, wearing a disapproving frown.

Jungkook whacks another mole when it pops up, and Taehyung clutches at his chest, as though
scandalized. “Are these dangerous creatures?” Taehyung asks urgently, drawing Jungkook in
towards him. “Is that why we must defeat these mighty-” Taehyung looks to Jungkook for
confirmation on his verbiage, “-moles?”

Jungkook wheezes.

Taehyung seems to take it as confirmation, because the next time a mole pops up, Taehyung’s
whipped his wand out of his sleeve, and cast a protego spell on Jungkook. “Get behind me,
Jungkook,” Taehyung says firmly, wand pointed at the whack-a-mole game console. “I shall defeat
these unsavory monsters.”

“Taehyung!” Jungkook shrieks, torn between crying of laughter and crying of horror. “Will you
stop- whipping that out everywhere!” Jungkook snatches Taehyung’s wand and hurriedly pushes it
back into his sleeve before anyone can notice. “You’re going to get in real trouble if you keep
casting spells in front of people!”

“My wand is always at the ready,” Taehyung huffs, and Jungkook chokes a little at that, too.

Somewhere, someone is appreciating the euphemism of it all.

“Taehyung,” Jungkook sighs, a little fond despite it all at the way his boyfriend’s first instinct had
been to try to push Jungkook behind himself. (It’s laughable, though, the way Taehyung thinks that
Jungkook would allow Taehyung to face down monsters on his own if this were a situation with
any real danger).

Jungkook’s dashing hero, stumbling his blind way through the hazards of the muggle world.

Jungkook decides Taehyung’s earned a kiss on the cheek for that, and he can’t help the laugh that
bubbles up again at the pleasantly surprised expression that lights up Taehyung’s features.

“These aren’t monsters, it’s literally a fun game that even small children can play. They’re just
like...dolls. You’re supposed to try to hit them all when they pop up.”

Taehyung glances at the game again.

Jungkook hands the hammer over to him with an encouraging smile. “Try it! It’s fun.”

Taehyung stares apprehensively at the mole game, holding the hammer delicately in one
outstretched hand. Jungkook begins to wonder what he’d been thinking, bringing wizarding
society’s most eligible pureblooded elite to a muggle arcade. Inwardly, he despairs - how crude
and uncouth this must all seem to Taehyung, he thinks, watching the way Taehyung wrinkles his
nose at a plastic mole-

“Oh, whack-a-mole!”

They turn.
It’s Yugyeom, who’s returned from the bathroom, a bright grin beaming on his lips as he plucks
the hammer from Taehyung’s hold to effortlessly whack three moles in a row. “Awesome,” he
crows. “We used to love this game when we were kids, huh, Kook?”

Kook.

Even Taehyung doesn’t call him Kook.

Such nicknames were considered undignified in his world.

But the way Yugyeom says it, laced with such affection and history, makes something in
Taehyung’s chest feel tight. Makes the corners of his lips curl, ever so slightly, downwards.

Jungkook watches the frown dawn on Taehyung’s features, and bites his lip.

The next disaster is when they go to the hoops game.

This time, Taehyung is determined to impress Jungkook with his finesse and prowess, after
Yugyeom had utterly destroyed the moles on his own (and what a formidable opponent, this
muggle Yugyeom is turning out to be).

He watches the other people playing the game carefully for a few minutes, before shrugging and
stepping up to the console. Brings his wand out, and easily casts a series of Wingardium Leviosa’s -
this is child’s play, hardly a first year level spell.

He watches with satisfaction as the round objects go sailing neatly into the hoops, one by one,
before turning to beam at Jungkook. “Jungkook, darling, come quick,” he calls, where Jungkook is
now walking up with Yugyeom. “I’m making these strangely-colored quaffle goals for you!”

Jungkook wheezes upon catching sigh of the ten basketballs Taehyung has levitated and enchanted
into looping through the basketball nets, on looped repeat.

Yugyeom begins to turn, and Jungkook hurriedly seizes him by the arm.

“Of course,” Taehyung says, waltzing up to them with a pleased smile, “They are nothing on your
Quidditch skills, of course, but-”

“Taehyung!” Jungkook hisses. “Cut it out-”

“Quidditch?” Yugyeom blinks. “What the hell is Quidditch-”

Jungkook desperately tries to find a way to slip his own wand out to end Taehyung’s spell before
someone notices, whilst also keeping his iron grip on Yugyeom to prevent him from turning
around and seeing the veritable circus of basketballs floating on their own through the air.

“You don’t know what Quidditch is?” Taehyung hums, looking entirely too smug and satisfied.
“How could you not know, when Jungkook is the youngest, most prodigious seeker in
generations-”

This distracts Yugyeom long enough - who’s now staring at Taehyung like he’s grown a second
head - for Jungkook to fire off a finite incantatum spell in the direction of the floating basketballs,
and tuck his wand back into his sleeve.

Just in time, Yugyeom turns, and his expression lights up when he catches sight of the hoops.
“Kook!” he crows, tugging Jungkook along by the arm to the game. “We used to dominate at this
game, remember? We’d come after school and we’d crack all the records!”

Jungkook laughs.

Yugyeom cajoles him into a round of ‘friendly competition’, and it spurs Jungkook into enough
excitement that the competitive gleam is back in his eyes as he swipes at the basketballs.

As the two of them shoot the balls smoothly into the hoops, Taehyung watches from a few paces
behind, lips pressed tightly together.

After they get back from their trip to the muggle world, Taehyung is...weird.

Well.

Perhaps weird isn’t the right word, so much as... distant.

Jungkook doesn’t notice it immediately, at first.

At first, everything is alright. At first, they return via their late night portkey, and they stumble into
bed together in Jungkook’s Gryffindor dorm room as always, Taehyung’s arms wrapped tightly
around Jungkook as they huddle under a too-small blanket, the way they prefer.

But when Jungkook wakes up in the morning, he’s alone.

And when he shuffles sleepily into the Great Hall, where he’d been sure he’d find Taehyung -
perhaps preparing Jungkook a plate of waffles just the way he likes it, or cutting strawberries into
the precise little halves that Jungkook prefers them in - Taehyung is nowhere to be found.

And just as Jungkook sits down, confused, Taehyung stumbles in through the double doors in the
last twenty minutes of breakfast before class.

Jungkook waves at him with a bright smile that dims when Taehyung gives him a little wave in
return, only to turn around and beeline for the Slytherin table instead of joining Jungkook.

Jungkook blinks.

“Taehyung isn’t joining us today?” Hoseok asks, half-distracted by the Charms homework he’s
finishing up.
“No,” Jungkook murmurs, voice trailing off. “I guess not.”

Jungkook doesn’t catch Taehyung for a meal for the next three days after that.

Which is strange and a little lonely, given that with their differing grades and Houses, mealtimes
were one of the few instances where they could actually spend time together.

But each time Jungkook tries to find him, he finds that Taehyung is either not in the Great Hall at
all, or stumbling in last minute and heading to sit with his own House instead of joining Jungkook.
(And sure, Jungkook’s joined Taehyung in sitting at the Slytherin table plenty of times before, but
something about this feels strange and like he can’t just get up and walk over to the Slytherin table.
Not when Taehyung had had a choice of joining Jungkook, and clearly not taken it; not when
Jungkook isn’t entirely sure, anymore, if Taehyung wants to sit with Jungkook for the meal.)

The time that Jungkook does still get with Taehyung, though, is at night, when they fall into their
usual habit of crawling into each other’s bed.

It’s not even necessarily sexual, what with the fact that most times they’re surrounded by
roommates (a silencing spell only does so much). But it’s a comfort thing - the matter of falling
asleep in the warmth of the person you adore most, curled up together in the softest, most
vulnerable state.

Except there’s one night, when Jungkook is laughing at something on his phone, and Taehyung
nudges closer, more curious than he usually is about what he deems “Jungkook’s muggle
contraptions.”

“What are you doing?” Taehyung asks.

“Texting Yugyeom,” Jungkook replies, still laughing a little at the meme Yugyeom had sent.

Taehyung stills. “Yugyeom?” His brows furrow. “What is texting?”

Jungkook tries his best to explain it, and he thinks Taehyung understands, in the contemplative tilt
of his head. “So you...are communicating with Yugyeom.” Taehyung stares down at the phone
with an unreadable look in his eyes. “With this muggle device you call a ‘phone’.”

“Yeah?” Jungkook sits up, eyeing Taehyung carefully; in particular, the strange line to his lips, the
distant look in his eyes that has something in Jungkook’s heart squeezing painfully. “Tae?”

Tae smiles at him, and it looks colder than anything Taehyung has ever directed at Jungkook
before. Emptier, and devoid of that customary adoration Taehyung’s always had.

“What a curious little invention, muggles have made,” Taehyung hums lightly.

Jungkook’s heart droops.

After that, Taehyung sleeps with Jungkook less and less, until they go from every night, to just
once or twice a week. And when Jungkook asks, hesitance on his features and trepidation in his
heart, if maybe he should go down to the dungeons tonight if Taehyung prefers, because he’s
happy to sleep in Taehyung’s dorm-

And Taehyung gives him this tired little smile - he’s tired, he’s tired of what, perhaps he’s just
tired of Jungkook, now - and says something about how he’s too exhausted and will probably
accidentally kick Jungkook in his sleep, all Jungkook can do is muster a smile to paste on and nod.

Jungkook goes to sleep in his single bed that, after having grown used to bearing the weight of two
people inextricably intertwined, now feels unbearably empty and cold.

At least, he thinks, he has V, curled up at the nape of his neck like a spot of warmth.

Taehyung is working on his Potions essay in the library, when Jungkook comes rushing up to him.
He’s wearing this smile that edges on the side of too-bright, like he’s trying too hard to maintain it,
frayed around the edges with something a lot like anxiety. But before Taehyung can read more into
it, Jungkook is producing a small box from behind him, and lifting it up to Taehyung.

“Jungkook?” Taehyung blinks at it.

“Hi,” Jungkook breathes, breathless in having evidently run over. “I got you a gift.”

Taehyung’s expression lights up, his hands coming up to wrap warmly around Jungkook’s. “You
did?” he sounds touched, eyes fond where they look up at him. “Why?”

Jungkook bites his lip and nudges the box into Taehyung’s hands in lieu of an answer. “Open it!”

Taehyung does. Jungkook watches him with bated breath, eyes wide, as Taehyung... stares.

Jungkook’s heart stills.

Falls, somewhere to the pit of his stomach, when all Taehyung continues to do is stare blankly at
the object in his hand.
“It’s, um,” Jungkook rushes to say, hoping to salvage this somehow. “It’s a phone. You know, like
the one Yugyeom and I have.”

Taehyung’s expression grows unreadable and stoic. “Yes,” he says, sounding faint. “A phone.”

Jungkook’s hands tremble as he fights to keep the tremble in his heart from spilling past his lips. “I
thought- I thought maybe, maybe it’d be cool, if we could, like, text each other and stuff- and
there’s this thing called Snapchat, and we could send each other pictures, and- well- you’re just so
busy these days that I just, I don’t know, I thought it could be nice if we-”

Taehyung looks up at him and smiles.

Jungkook’s heart cracks in his ribcage.

Because this smile, this smile is the one that belongs to Taehyung, heir of house Kim and prince of
Slytherin; not Taehyung, Jungkook’s boyfriend who smiles at him like his face is too small to
contain his enormous joy whenever he sees Jungkook. And since when had Taehyung needed to
force a smile when he’s with Jungkook, as though one didn’t come naturally?

It’s such a blow, heavy and dreadful, that Jungkook can’t help the way he stumbles half a step
back, hands clutched painfully in front of him.

“Thank you, this is wonderful, Jungkook,” Taehyung says, and gets this strange expression on his
face when he says Jungkook. Jungkook’s eyes sting. He doesn’t understand.

Taehyung smoothly sweeps his belongings into his bag - including the phone Jungkook had just
gifted him, bought with his own hard-saved money - and fixes Jungkook with another perfunctorily
polite smile that Jungkook hates. “I just remembered I have a Prefects meeting, but- thank you
again for the present, Jungkook, I love it.”

He whirls off as Jungkook watches, lower lip trembling.

He didn’t even ask me how to use it, Jungkook can’t help but think.

Jungkook thinks he knows, now, what’s going on.

It’s a thought that’s been building all this time, from the very first moment he’d ever met
Taehyung, the untouchable prince of honorable Slytherin; that had taken root and grown roots,
twisting deep into his heart to take hold. That had, in the past two weeks, grown to imbed itself into
the very center of his chest, such that he isn’t sure how to extricate it without hurting himself,
anymore.

The idea - the knowledge - that Taehyung is, at the end of the day, a pureblood.

That, sure, the era of prejudice against muggle-borns is mostly gone, and that of all people,
Taehyung would have the most open and kindest heart of all - too open and kind to ever fall prey to
such toxic things as bias or stigma on the status of one’s blood.
But.

It’s also the idea that, well.

Taehyung is... Taehyung.

Hailing as the heir to one of the most prestigious and noble families in pureblood Wizarding
society, whose traditions and status are unparalleled in this magical world. Who grew up with
flying train sets and photographs that move, who lives in a manor straight out of Jungkook’s
childhood fairytale books and whose peerless magical abilities had manifested at such a young age
they’d called him a prodigy as a child.

The muggle world - and, in extension, a muggle-born like Jungkook - must seem so...plain, in
comparison.

Dull.

Lackluster, devoid of all the wondrous charm and breathless enchantment that the magical world
holds.

And for whatever reason, Taehyung had nonetheless found an interest in Jungkook, anyway.

But Jungkook had to go and take Taehyung to the muggle world, as though it weren’t clear enough
that there is a chasm of difference in the worlds they come from. Had to introduce Taehyung to
something so plebeian as muggle fast food, had to take him to a muggle arcade, of all places.

No wonder Taehyung seems so averse to spending time with him, anymore.

Jungkook suspects that he’d finally realized, after all this time, how incompatible they are. After all
- Jungkook had even gone so far as to try to present Taehyung with a phone.

As if they didn’t have Patronus spells and fire-calls and two-way mirrors to accomplish
communication, Jungkook had gone and tried to gift him something as silly as a Muggle gadget;
how dull and uninspired and- and- stupid, it must have all seemed to magical, spectacular
Taehyung.

And it’s with this thought that Jungkook falls asleep that night, clutching V to his chest and trying
to stem the flow of absolute hurt threatening to twist his heart.

Jungkook contemplates staying quiet.

He considers that perhaps if just a little more time passes, things might return to normal. (There’s a
darker, sillier part of him that he’s not proud of, that thinks- if he just has a little more time, perhaps
he can win Taehyung’s affections back.)

That’s why Thursday night finds him sneaking out of the Gryffindor dorms using Taehyung’s
invisibility cloak - the one Taehyung had warmly draped around his shoulders one cold morning in
their little spot on the astronomy tower, apropos of nothing, with a kiss and a “Whatever’s mine is
yours” - to head towards the dungeons. He has a box of Taehyung’s favorite decadent fine
chocolates, the ones that Honeydukes only carries once a month, tucked under his arm.

Given how terribly his last gift went over, he can’t help but feel a strange need to get Taehyung
something good, this time. Something he’ll actually like. (It doesn’t help that all this time, he’s
been receiving one breathtaking present after another from Taehyung as part of the pureblood
courtship rituals).

He’s slipped past the portrait and intends on climbing up the stairs to Taehyung’s room, when he
sees Taehyung actually right in front of him - chatting with Jimin in low tones by the fireplace, as
the only two still awake in the common room.

“You should tell him,” Jimin says.

“I can’t.”

Jungkook stills.

“You’re being so stupid about this,” Jimin groans, throwing himself back into the sofa. “You can’t
avoid Jungkook forever, he’s going to find out at some point-”

“I know,” Taehyung huffs. “The other day he tracked me down in the library, right when I was
supposed to be meeting up with-”

Jungkook can’t listen to anymore of it.

Somewhere, in the distant past, Jungkook might have slipped away unknown, to hide and bury his
hurt in secret. He might have turned around still under the safe cover of the cloak, and muffled his
tears under a silencing charm where no one could hear his heart break.

But this is Taehyung.

Taehyung, who’d - once - looked at Jungkook like he’d personally hung every star in the sky.
Taehyung, who’d fussed after Jungkook more than his own mother the one time he got sick, who’d
spent hours researching a muggle recipe for chicken noodle soup to try to make for him.
Taehyung, who’d taught Jungkook what it means to have someone whose hand fits in yours
perfectly, whose smile feels like home even in an entirely unfamiliar world.

Something about it, then, makes Jungkook do the opposite.

Makes him stand straighter than before, makes him lower the cloak around his shoulders to reveal
himself to Taehyung and Jimin.

“Merlin’s fucking balls,” Jimin curses.

Taehyung looks like he’s seen a ghost.

“You were avoiding me?” Jungkook says quietly.

“Salazar’s dick,” Jimin mutters.

“Jungkook,” Taehyung breathes, standing up, expression contrite. “No, I-”

“Why?” Jungkook blurts, and then, with far more bravery than he actually feels, he ends up saying,
“Are you- do you want to break up?”
“Dumbledore’s--” Jimin starts.

“Do not,” Taehyung hisses, turning to Jimin. “Finish that sentence, Jimin, Merlin, just go to your
room.”

Jimin glances at each of them for a second, before shrugging and traipsing upstairs. By the time
Taehyung turns back around, Jungkook’s looking down, fiddling with the hem of the cloak.

“Jungkook,” Taehyung says, already sounding immensely apologetic, and Jungkook thinks- he
doesn’t think he can bear to hear Taehyung’s ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ speech.

“Is it because of the muggle thing?” Jungkook blurts, keeping his eyes fixed on the corner of the
cloak clutched in his hands.

Taehyung blinks. “What? You knew?”

Jungkook’s heart gives a quick, painful jerk. He presses his lips together as though it’ll help keep
the sharp lance of hurt racing through his veins. “It is?” he ends up saying, voice small, shoulders
hunching.

“Jungkook, I- I’m sorry, it’s dumb, I know, but-”

Jungkook swallows the bile rising in his throat.

And then, somehow, somewhere, the sadness turns into something a lot like indignance, peppered
with hurt. Something fragile and defensive and- “I’m sorry that- that you don’t like it,” Jungkook
huffs, eyes rimmed red but remaining valiantly dry, arms crossing in front of himself like it’ll
physically ward off a blow. “But. I’m a muggleborn.”

Taehyung’s face falls.

It makes Jungkook even more indignant.

“And. And, I’m sorry that- that you don’t like that, but. But that’s who I am, and it’s not going to
change, and I’m not going to feel bad because- because I use phones, and I like going to the
arcades, because it might feel dumb to you but I think they’re fun, and-”

“Wait, what?” Taehyung says, sounding bewildered and baffled. Jungkook steamrolls on.

“-and if it’s too much for you, and you can’t see past the muggle thing and you- you just don’t-”
Jungkook’s voice cracks, despite his bravado, his arms crossing tighter. “-then that’s fine, but just-
just tell me, don’t, don’t go around running away from me and- and acting like-”

Jungkook’s face scrunches up, in that telltale way of his when he’s trying not to cry. Taehyung
swears, then, that he can hear the sound of something precious and fragile shattering in his ears.
He’s shaking his head in sheer, abject horror at the words Jungkook is saying, but Jungkook is too
caught up in his own words tos ee.

“-like I’m some awful thing, I- you don’t have to- you could just- just break up with me, why
would you-”

“Jungkook!” Taehyung finally bursts, hurrying forward to grasp him by the arms - his hands
twitching, as though aching to pull Jungkook forward into his chest the way he always does, but
unsure if he’s allowed. “Jungkook, what are you saying, why would you-”
Jungkook grits his teeth to fight back the tears. Stares stubbornly - petulantly - at the ground, lower
lip jutted in a way that makes Taehyung want to sweep his thumb along it. “You. You’ve been so-
weird,” he says, still glaring at his shoes.

“You hated the whole time we were at the arcade, and- and I could tell, it was probably too dumb
for you, all that muggle electronic stuff, and-”

“No, Jungkook, I-”

“-and- and you got so weird when I was showing you my phone, and, and I thought maybe- maybe
if you had one, you’d see it’s kind of cool, but- but you didn’t even like it, and I was so dumb to
think that, that you’d like it, but-”

“Baby,” Taehyung gasps.

Jungkook takes a deep, shuddering breath, looking anywhere but at Taehyung, because he’s certain
if he looks at his face he’ll break. “-and now I know you’ve been avoiding me, and that’s- that’s
stupid, just tell me you want to break up, I-”

“I don’t want to break up!” Taehyung half-shrieks, voice pitching hysterically.

Jungkook scowls at the floor. “But I’m. I’m not going to, to stop being a muggleborn, I’m not
going to feel sorry about my muggle stuff, I like it, I like arcades and I like basketball and I like my
phone, so-” Here, the indignance reaches a fever pitch and makes Jungkook finally, finally look up,
scowling at Taehyung with damp eyes. “-if it’s so unpalatable to you, then we should break up-”

“I was embarrassed!” Taehyung shouts.

Jungkook’s mouth snaps shut. He stares, eyes wide, at Taehyung, who looks away with a muttered
curse, cheeks flushed red. Jungkook’s never seen Taehyung blush, not like this.

“What?” Jungkook says.

“I was.” Taehyung stops to bite his lip, clicking his tongue in frustration. “I was. Embarrassed.
And.”

Taehyung mutters, more to his own shoes than Jungkook, “I was being dumb, and. Insecure, and
just-”

“What do you have to be insecure about?” Jungkook splutters.

Taehyung gives him a glare. “Oh, I don’t know,” he huffs. “Maybe the unfairly attractive guy who
just happens to be your childhood friend, and can play those muggle games perfectly with you, and
knows how to use a phone-”

Jungkook chokes, at the way Taehyung sounds jealous of the phrase ‘knows how to use a phone.’
Like it’s some great, admirable trait, like it’s something to be envious of.

“What are you even saying?” he wheezes.

Taehyung scowls. “Because!” he throws his hands up, suddenly in animated motion, gesticulating
wildly. “You- you have this, this whole other world that I know nothing about, and, and that whole
day, I kept messing up, and I was doing everything wrong-”

“You didn’t do anything wrong-”

“Yes, I did!” Taehyung snaps. “I didn’t know how to play that game with those formidable
creatures-”

The whack-a-mole, Jungkook thinks faintly.

“-I didn’t know how to play that thing with the brown quaffles, I didn’t know anything, and you-”
Taehyung’s shoulders slump, all the fight leaving him in one fell swoop. “You and Yugyeom- you
were having so much fun together.”

Taehyung’s voice pitches into a lost, bitter thing, the likes of which Jungkook’s never heard on
self-assured, charming Taehyung. “I know that I’m. I’m this dumb pureblood,” Taehyung mutters.
“And that I don’t know anything about your muggle culture, and that Yugyeom probably
understands you better than I do, but.”

Jungkook gapes.

Taehyung lifts his chin, then, defiant and proud. “But I can learn! I have been learning, I’ve been
taking lessons-”

“Lessons in what?” Jungkook is so, so lost.

“In muggle culture!” Taehyung shouts back, cheeks red again. “I, I attend weekly meetings with a
group of muggleborn students, and they’ve been teaching me things, like- like about cars!”

Taehyung seizes Jungkook’s arm with an unholy glint in his eyes, as though somehow the
knowledge of cars is something significant. “Jungkook, I learned all about cars, and, and I’m going
to learn how to ‘drive’, so-”

Jungkook splutters. Leans back, so he can look into Taehyung’s face. “Taehyung, what the hell are
you even talking about- and- wait.” Jungkook’s eyes bug out of his face. “Did you just say you
started a club about. About muggle culture?”

Taehyung’s cheeks explode red.

“It’s not a club!” he says. “It’s just. I’m just. I-”

Taehyung scowls. “And so what if I founded a club! I’m learning, I’m telling you, that I can learn
everything about your world, that-”

“You’ve been studying muggle culture for me?” Jungkook whispers, eyes damp now for an
entirely different reason.

Taehyung, his beautiful, proud, magical boyfriend, who’d been sitting here, all this time, feeling
inadequate for his lack of knowledge on non-magical things. Who’d been studying in his free time
about muggle things, all for Jungkook.

(Jungkook’s so stupidly in love with this idiot.)

Taehyung bites his lip. Looks unsure, in a way that Jungkook hates, so Jungkook takes a step
closer to curl his hand into the hem of Taehyung’s shirt.

“Yeah,” Taehyung says. “And I’ve been learning how to throw those brown quaffles into that net,
too, I-”

Jungkook blinks.
Narrows his eyes. “You’ve been learning how to play basketball from someone else?”

Taehyung swallows. “Um. The thing with the brown quaffles, yes? Which- I mean- yes, I just
wanted to get good enough before I showed you how skilled I am, so-”

“You cheated on me?” Jungkook accuses, a sharp finger digging into Taehyung’s chest.

“What?” Taehyung yelps. “Of course not, I-”

“Taehyung,” Jungkook hisses. “Basketball is my sport, how could you go and learn it from
someone else?”

“Baby,” Taehyung says. “I just wanted to impress you, is all-”

“Cheater,” Jungkook snarls.

“Jungkook-”

Later, much later, after Taehyung’s convinced Jungkook that the only person he’ll ever learn
basketball from again, ever, is Jungkook; when they’re curled up in Taehyung’s bed, practically
burrito-wrapped in Taehyung’s plush silk duvet, Jungkook pauses.

“So,” he says, pressing his face into Taehyung’s chest. “Why’d you. Why’d you get so- strange,
when you. Said my name.”

Taehyung freezes.

Jungkook peers up at him with eyes still edging on hesitant, and that, more than anything, makes
Taehyung sigh. Makes him bring his hands up to cover his face as though in mortification, enough
to make Jungkook curious and look up.

“Iwasbeingjls,” Taehyung mumbles into his hands.

“What?”

“Iwasbeingjels,” Taehyung mutters again.

Jungkook sits up, then, and tugs Taehyung’s hands away from his face. “What are you saying-”

“I was being jealous,” Taehyung heaves.

“What.”

Taehyung looks away, scowling deeply, looking vehemently displeased. Jungkook gapes.

“Your friend, Yugyeom-”

“He’s my friend, Taehyung-”

“He’s a very handsome friend-”

“Taehyung!”

Taehyung glares at him balefully. “Your very handsome friend, Jungkook, kept calling you Kook.”

Jungkook stares at him.

Taehyung, cheeks flushing, looks away again. “I don’t call you Kook,” he mutters.

“Taehyung,” Jungkook says, eyes closing against the sheer stupidity of his boyfriend. “You
literally call me baby.”

Taehyung huffs.

“Why would you be jealous of Kook, when you get to call me baby?”

Taehyung’s frown loosens, somewhat. Grows a tad contemplative.

Jungkook seizes the chance to cuddle up to him, pressing a kiss against his collarbone. “And
darling.”

“Because you are darling,” Taehyung says.

“And sweetheart.”

“You are very sweet,” Taehyung says pragmatically.

“Taehyung,” Jungkook laughs, pressing a finger into Taehyung’s side and making him yelp. “I’m
your baby, what could you possibly have to be jealous about?”

At that, Taehyung’s smile returns - the real one, Jungkook’s smile, the one that splits his face into
two with how bright and adoring it is - as he presses a flurry of kisses to every inch of Jungkook’s
face, ignoring Jungkook’s squawks of protest.

“That’s true,” Taehyung says, sounding far too smug and pleased. “You are my baby.”

Jungkook rolls his eyes, only to be met with a kiss to the tip of his nose

“Only my baby,” Taehyung says.

“Oh my god,” Jungkook mutters.

“Mine,” Taehyung repeats, for good measure.

“Stop.”

The story of how Taehyung - with much effort, and with two accidental spells fired off, and three
 phones fried and melted in the cause - learns how to Snapchat (and more importantly, what ensues
afterwards), is for another time.

For now, all that's important to know, is that Taehyung does make use of that phone. (After all, he's
been attending secret lessons on how to use a smartphone with his handy dandy muggle-cultures
club, of which he is the proud founding president.)

Chapter End Notes

i tried to include some of rain's favorite lines she uses in her aus towards the end, as
tribute - iykyk. ;)

End Notes

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