#hlspreadthelove

Jocelyn loved like a weather system, seemingly bright, relentless, everywhere at once. She filled corridors with her presence and voice. But then had the audacity to look offended when Orpheus refused to let her fill him, too.

He had tried, initially, to ignore her the way he ignored most things. Not out of fear. Not because emotions made him skittish. Simply because they were, most of the time, irrelevant.

But Jocelyn had a talent for becoming relevant against his will.

He’d learned that the hard way, on an afternoon that he still hadn’t filed properly in his head.

He’d gone up to the Owlery as a raven, because flying was the only kind of quiet that satisfied him. Wind and distance. Perspective. A place where the world couldn’t touch him unless he allowed it. He’d settled high, watching the grounds below in the absent, idle way a predator watched a field. Watching the owls come and go and the birds in flight across the grounds.

Then the magpie had appeared.

Not the usual prancing little show of feathers and flash. This one was frantic, darting hard, sharp turns, landing and taking off again like the air itself was too crowded. It chased other birds away with startling aggression, as though the world had committed a personal offense by existing too near.

Orpheus had watched, curious in the way he rarely allowed himself to be. Not amused. Not sentimental. Just… attentive.

Because it wasn’t normal. It was specific. So he followed.

And then, with no warning, no flourish, the magpie dropped behind a cluster of timbers in forbidden forest and returned as a girl.

Jocelyn.

Breathless and furious, hair loose in a fiery tumble, Jocelyn paced in frantic little circles like the dirt had personally betrayed her. She flung her hands up and hissed into the trees, words tumbling out too fast to stop. High above, Orpheus landed on a branch and watched.

“He keeps doing it,” she snapped, voice shaking. “He looks right through me. Like I’m…like I’M NOTHING.”

She stomped, then jabbed a finger at the ground.

“I made him a PIE! SO MANY PIES! And I KNOW they’re his favourite!” Her laugh was sharp and wobbly at the same time. “So WHY does he refuse them? Because I made them? Because it’s ME?”

She kicked a stone hard enough it skittered away.

Orpheus, had gone perfectly still on his branch.

He’d expected a great many things from her…tears, Howlers, dramatic declarations, a scene. He had not expected this. A confession thrown into the open air when she thought no one could hear it. Raw. Messy. Whiny. Strangely honest.

And as she ranted, he found himself listening.

Not to plan. Not to gather leverage. Not to predict an outcome. Just… listening to her.

Her voice caught, then sharpened, softer and more dangerous in the next breath, veering manic around the edges.

“I’m not asking for much,” she blurted, suddenly smaller. “Just… STOP RUNNING. STOP HIDING!.” She grabbed at her hair like she could pull the feeling out. “I picked you. I want you. I WANT you, I WANT YOU…”

Her voice cracked. She swallowed it down like it made her angry.

“Just… don’t leave me,” she muttered, almost too quiet to hear. “I love you….”

She grabbed at her own hair, shook her head like she could shake the feeling loose.

Orpheus had felt something shift at that.

Not fear. Not discomfort. A quiet, sharp intrigue. He couldn’t quite shake the sensation of being hunted by someone who genuinely believed she was offering a gift.

He’d stayed on that branch until she finally stopped pacing, wiped her face like she was angry at herself, and flew off again, magpie into the low afternoon light, a streak of black-and-white defiance.

Only then had Orpheus moved, without thought he followed. Not close enough to be seen. Not close enough to be caught. Just close enough to confirm one thing he hadn’t wanted to admit…

He didn’t like her behavior. But he liked her certainty. He liked the fact that she could be sweet and possessive and reckless, and still, somehow, deliberate.

He liked the thrill of it in the ugliest way. The sense that if she decided he was hers, then the world could not simply take him without consequence. That was the part he kept quiet. That was the part he pretended not to notice.

And now here he was, back in the library, ink on his skin, putting his name into a puzzle like a man pretending he was not placing a blade into someone else’s hand.

The first letter had been a joke. It was just enough to set her fluttering through the castle, hunting for a raven that didn’t want to be found.

The second had been a flirty declaration.

The third had tested her, really tested her, putting that so-called Ravenclaw cleverness on trial.

And the fourth…

The fourth was the one he was writing now. He wrote each line carefully, because precision mattered. Because if you were going to give someone a piece of yourself, you did it correctly or not at all.

He didn’t look up when the chair across from him scraped.

He didn’t need to.

There were only a handful of people who moved through the library like it owed them space, and only one who did it with that particular brand of cheerfully obnoxious confidence.

Garreth.

“Alright,” Garreth whispered, far too loud for a whisper, “what are you up to?”

Orpheus didn’t change his expression. He kept writing.

“Nothing.”

Garreth’s grin widened. “Nothing,” he repeated, delighted. “Then why is your expression so soft? My guess is you’re doing something extremely incriminating.”

Orpheus’ quill paused for the smallest moment, just long enough to sigh, then he continued. If he finished the last line, he could fold it, seal it, be done.

Garreth leaned in. Then a hand flashed. The parchment vanished off the table. The silence that followed was not the library’s. It was Orpheus’.

He looked up. No dramatics. No lunging. He simply let his gaze settle on Garreth the way a blade settled into a sheath. Quiet, deliberate, already decided.

Garreth held the scrap as if he’d snatched a dragon’s egg and was now trying to remember why. His grin wobbled but didn’t disappear. His eyes skimmed the page.

“Oh,” Garreth mouthed, and then, worse, softly laughed. “Oh.”

“It’s not what you think,” Orpheus said, voice low and even.

Garreth’s brows lifted. “It’s exactly what I think. You’re the one sending these mysterious messages.”

He read it again, slower, savoring it.

Orpheus felt heat crawl up the back of his neck. Not fear. Not embarrassment. Annoyance, clean and sharp, at the fact that Garreth was witnessing something that had not been meant for him.

At the fact that it was true enough to sting.

“Give it back,” Orpheus sighed.

Garreth clutched it to his chest like it was sacred. “No… wait…this is… you may as well have written her a declaration in this. You wrote her a…Merlin’s pants, Orpheus…”

Orpheus didn’t move. He didn’t have to. He simply stared. Stoic. Flat. Absolute.

Garreth’s excitement wilted under the weight of that look. He swallowed, then, mercifully, slid the parchment back across the table.

Orpheus took it without haste.

His ink-stained hand folded the scrap once. Twice. A clean crease. A decision made physical.

Garreth leaned in like he might still win something. “You’re down horrendous,” he whispered, half-glee, half-awe.

Orpheus didn’t look up.

“Leave,” he said, voice even, betraying nothing.

Garreth stood, hands raised in surrender, backing away between tables like a man retreating from a sleeping predator. “I’m going,” he whispered. “But for the record…Leon…”

Orpheus’ eyes flicked up. One glance. A quiet threat. His cheeks warmed anyway, traitorous.

Garreth grinned anyway. “…I support it.”

When he was gone, the library returned to its oppressive silence.

Orpheus stared at the folded parchment for a long moment, thumb brushing the crease.

He could tear it. Burn it. Drop it in the nearest bin and pretend this never happened.

Instead, he slid it into the inside pocket of his robes where his pulse lived, close enough to feel.

Because Jocelyn would solve it.

For reasons Orpheus refused to name, the thought of her reading it and smiling, triumphant, seen, felt less like vulnerability… and more like control he was choosing to surrender, carefully, on his own terms.

RECOMMENDATIONS FROM ME:

so many, but I shall limit it to a few and hope someone picks up on some others:

- “Just Once” by @whizzing-fizzbee

Read this like months ago, it changed my brain chemistry and I have spent the last few days SEARCHING high and low for it again

(Explicit, Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Sebastian Sallow/Original Female Character)

- “Before It Felt Like a Sin” by @myokk

Still making my way through this one, but I ADORE the way she writes Sebastian so I had to include it

(Explicit, Creator Chose Not to Use Archive Warnings, Sebastian Sallow/Original Female Character)