[fic] grey magic [7/?]
Title: Grey Magic
Rating: T/PG
Summary: As a Slytherin Arizona Robbins knows that her crush on a Gryffindor has every chance of causing problems. But with the Triwizard Tournament again at Hogwarts and mysterious things seeming to seek out Alex Karev, her best friend, the Romeo and Juliet thing she has going with Callie Torres is the least of her issues.
{Grey's Hogwarts AU} The gang's all here, somewhere, but the focus is going to be Callie/Arizona.
“Where the hell is Alex?” Arizona muttered, eyes narrowed in the dark, close confines of the closet she was tucked into. It took her a second to realize that the words had escaped.
Callie laughed and rolled her own eyes, unseen in the dimness. “Well, he's not in here and he's not welcome.” Her voice was low, breathy and close, and Arizona flushed, remembering exactly where she was and why. “I can't say I love you thinking about Karev when we're making out,” Callie continued, sarcastic now.
Arizona caught her lips, embarrassed blush warming her neck. Callie answered the kiss readily and they collided lightly with the shelves behind her. “I am not thinking about Alex right now,” muttered Arizona against her mouth, chasing the words with another kiss. He hadn't been at lunch, his absence peculiar enough to bug the back of her mind even in the circumstances in which she found herself currently.
“Just talking about him,” Callie teased.
Groaning, Arizona kissed her again. “Now you're talking about Alex. Stop please,” she pleaded, nipping on a full lower lip with her teeth. She'd pulled her girlfriend in here to get a few minutes alone. Definitely not to discuss her best friend's absence from lunch. Either hand in the loose fabric of Callie's robes tugged her in closer, pressing them together.
Callie broke away from her lips to shift to her neck, both of them breathing hard. Arizona could only throw her head back and try to muffle herself. Teeth and suction made her knees weak and Callie laughed helplessly as Arizona slumped noisily against the shelves, dislodging more than one bit of junk. “Maybe we should -” she suggested breathlessly, a tremble shivering down her own spine as Arizona's head turned in, her mouth doing its own work under Callie's jaw. “Maybe we should go to - oh God - lunch?”
She was right, of course. All three schools were in the Great Hall for a meal before the first task of the tournament began on the lawn outside. Arizona didn't want to miss her brother's performance but Callie had presented herself first as a much more appealing distraction than sitting in the Hall by herself. Alex hadn't been at the table, so catching Callie on her way in was just good luck.
In the week since the disastrous Quidditch game against Hufflepuff Arizona had found herself with a subtle but constant shadow. Mistaken displays of solidarity from her Slytherin classmates meant that she was never alone, always watched. They were trying to watch her back, she knew, but all it had done so far was further the rest of the school's belief that she had had something to do with the game's outcome. It was making it difficult to keep track of Preston Burke as well.
More personally, the whole thing made snatching time with Callie even more tricky than it had been before. Slumping into her girlfriend's shoulder, Arizona let her groan of protest be heard. “Fine,” she groused. She angled in for a final kiss, extending the contact and their time together for as long as she could manage. “Will I see you later?” she asked breathlessly.
“What are you talking about?” Callie was busy combing through her hair with her fingers. “We're going to lunch.” She was nonchalant, as if it were a foregone conclusion.
“We are?” Arizona had to lower her brows consciously when Callie shot a look across the closet at her. “I mean - we are?” Her voice was still high and uncertain. Callie cocked an eyebrow at her, appearing to wait patiently for her girlfriend to catch up. “I mean, we are,” Arizona repeated, nodding despite her own hesitations.
Callie's smile was dazzling, more than reward for the halfhearted attempt at confidence. “Good.” She held one hand out, waiting until Arizona finished her own grooming efforts and took it before she turned the knob.
First out the door, Callie was helpless against laughing at the sheepish expression on Arizona's face as she was drawn willingly enough into the light of the hallway. It wasn't their dark, private closet, they could see people milling in and out of the Great Hall, perhaps a bit more crowded than a usual Saturday with visitors coming in to watch the tournament. Sudden weight against her hand, Arizona stopped dead behind her, made her question her assumption about Arizona's will.
“Daddy.”
The word made Callie go stiff as well, glancing between her girlfriend and the man she was plainly addressing. She'd heard of Daniel Robbins, of course. Everyone had, after the war. The pictures in the Prophet hadn't lied about the scowl he appeared to have perfected. It was much more intimidating in person and Callie regretted that she hadn't spent more time on her hair. It felt more than obvious what they'd been doing in the closet.
Arizona was stunned by her father's sudden appearance right in front of her. She knew he was close by, she'd read it in the paper, but Hogwarts was the last place she'd expected him to show up. His eyes were steely, darker than her own shade of blue, and missed nothing, one hand rubbing at his jaw while his gaze skimmed across the joined hands between his daughter and the Gryffindor girl who'd dragged her out of the closet.
Sure that Arizona's nerves about appearing in public would only be heightened by the fact that her father was right in front of them Callie started to drop her girlfriend's hand. But at the first flex of her fingers Arizona's grip tightened, not letting her go.
“Arizona,” he answered her in the same flat tone Arizona had greeted him. His eyes moved deliberately to his daughter's apparent captive. “And this is?” It was a clear request for an answer and Callie felt her mouth drop open without her meaning for it to happen.
“Callie Torres,” Arizona said before she could. “My girlfriend.” Her glance toward Callie was apologetic. “Callie, my dad, Daniel Robbins.”
“Auror Robbins is fine,” he told her without Callie having a chance to say a word.
Her head ducked. “Of course, sir.”
At her side, Arizona's eyes rolled. “What brings you all this way?”
Callie could admire Arizona's courage, but at the moment she sort of wished she'd let her disappear into the crowd. This didn't feel like a conversation, or confrontation, rather, that she wanted to witness.
“Your brother is in the tournament. Of course I'm here.” His eyes shifted. “Your mother couldn't make it this time.”
Arizona held her scoff in but only barely. It made a smile quirk Callie's lips and she squeezed her hand. “Okay, awesome. Well, we'll see you later!” A patently false smile was pasted on. Callie let herself be towed along by the hand, sure that her own expression was closer to a grimace of dismay. She managed a wave before Arizona dragged her around the corner.
They were two flights of stairs away before Callie dug in her heels. “Are we going to talk at all about your dad being here?” Arizona huffed and didn't answer. Callie turned her gently by the arms, blue eyes avoiding her gaze. “Can we at least eat? I'm hungry.” Arizona's smile was sheepish. “We're close to the kitchens,” suggested Callie. She didn't want to push the public appearances with Arizona's father in the castle.
“Yes!” Arizona's agreement was swift, her relief at the suggestion obvious. “Thank you.” She leaned into Callie's side, brushed a kiss to the corner of her mouth. “I'm sorry about that. My dad -” She couldn't really find the words to describe her father accurately, could just shake her head. Of all the times for him to just show up at her school.
“That wasn't really how I figured I'd meet your dad,” Callie said, nervous chuckle drawing Arizona's attention from her own mental ramblings. “Of course, I don't even know if we were at the 'meet the parents' point or not.”
Recognizing that her girlfriend was starting into her own ramble, Arizona quickly got ahead of her, jogging backwards nimbly. “Calliope, that was not how I wanted you to meet my dad.” Callie's mouth tightened but she didn't allow her expression to fall. “But that's not because I didn't want you to meet him. Or my mom.” Arizona's smile was hopeful and Callie's breath came out in a huff of a laugh. “I mean, we were making out and then my dad showed up!” recalled Arizona, Callie laughing even as her face flushed. “Oh my God, that really happened!”
“Don't remind me,” Callie groaned, shaking her head. “Not exactly the first impression I was hoping for.”
“Well, we just won't mention it to my mom when you meet her,” Arizona joked. “I'll write and see if she's coming to any of Tim's games this year.” She smirked wickedly. “We can tell her about the time you broke my nose instead.”
Callie's mouth dropped open and she swatted her girlfriend's arm. “That was during a game! And we weren't together then! We weren't even talking!”
“Alex kind of thought you might have had a thing for me then though.”
“Oh, I did,” Callie confirmed, grinning even as she blushed. Arizona caught the handle to the kitchen door and pulled it open, holding it gallantly. Callie rewarded her with a swift kiss. “How could I not like you?” Arizona felt the flush travel from the back of her neck to her knees and she clung a little more tightly to the door. Smirking almost knowingly, Callie reached back to pull her along by a handful of her robes.
They snacked while they walked, trading slices of apple for wedges of orange, tossing grapes for each other and catching them in their mouths. Arizona had sandwiches wrapped in her pocket and she dug Callie's out as they reached the groups milling out toward the field. “Here you are.”
Callie just slipped her fingers through Arizona's, standing on her toes to look into the crowd. “Let's get seats up high.” It was a subtle gesture, but considerate none the less. Parents had their own seats near the front. Arizona let herself be steered by the hand up the stairs toward the middle of the seats. From a few rows down Meredith waved from where she was climbing up the stairs beside Cristina.
“If you want to -”
“I would like my sandwich,” Callie said pointedly, holding her free hand out for it. Her other held Arizona's on her leg. “I want to sit with you, okay?” Arizona nodded, passing the sandwich across. She waved to the row in front of them as Callie's friends got closer though.
“Hey. You missed lunch,” Meredith observed as she sat down in front of Callie. Mercifully, she didn't push for answers about where she'd been.
“Y'all were hooking up,” declared Cristina without a pause. “So still -”
“Nope!” Callie yelped loudly to cover her next words, her cheeks blazing with embarrassment. “Shut up!”
Spotting Alex picking his way down the row toward them, Arizona spoke up, “Callie met my dad, actually.” Alex flopped down on the bench next to her, a frown on his face, brows furrowed. “He's here.” The whole group's heads turned when she pointed down to the front of the section.
“Did he -?”
Arizona just shook her head, keeping her voice down. “We didn't really get a chance to talk.”
Meredith and Cristina leaned forward for a closer peek at the famous Auror. “So, you dating Torres and all, we're friends, right? Think we could meet him?” Cristina asked, earnest even when Meredith elbowed her.
Exchanging a glance with Alex and then Callie, Arizona shrugged. “If you want to, I guess.” Callie could only shrug, her eyes rolling. She couldn't say that she was all that anxious to see Auror Robbins again. “He probably won't stick around long,” Arizona told Alex, leaning over confidentially.
He nodded dourly. If Arizona's father was absent it was because the Auror was trying to track down Alex's own father. “Yeah, I know the deal.”
“Alex -”
There was no time before the trumpets signaled the beginning of the task. Personally, Alex didn't feel all that comfortable rehashing their parental dynamics in front of the eagerly listening pair sitting in front of them. It was enough that he was going to root for a Gryffindor today. Leaning forward to clap, Alex cheered to avoid having to continue the discussion with Arizona.
She knew exactly what he was doing but only dug her own sandwich out of her pocket while the opening fanfare finished. As the sound's echo faded the section of grandstand they were in lifted from the ground and moved slowly and smoothly into the sky. There were several other sections in motion, all orbiting the field and the sectioned obstacle course that spread across the terrain.
At the moment it all looked very innocuous. Until the champions lined up in their lanes and the traps started moving in earnest.
Arizona forgot about her sandwich, couldn't hear Callie talking quietly to Meredith and Cristina, could barely register Alex's stiff posture beside her. Tim stretched at the line, shrugging out of his red and gold lined game robes and waving toward the crowd. He got a roar of response from the Hogwarts students, Gryffindors all around stomping their feet to amplify the noise. Arizona could see when he spotted their father in the stands, the expression on her brother's face freezing in surprise. He rolled his shoulders again and deliberately faced the course.
Down the row from them a girl screamed “Go Tim!” loudly enough to make Arizona look across, surprised to see Teddy Altman on her feet and waving. Was her brother, Hogwarts champion and the Head Boy, blushing? She was too far away to tell for sure. Alex noticed but only shrugged.
“I didn't know Teddy has a thing for Tim,” Callie noted. In front of them Cristina went still and stiff. Her own eyes were taking darting glances at a less than excited looking Owen Hunt on the bench beside Teddy.
“Hunt has a thing for Altman but I don't think she's noticed,” the Ravenclaw reported, sounding for all the world as if the information meant nothing to her. She wasn't blinking though, her jaw tight. Meredith frowned at her side and Alex just shrugged again as Arizona met his gaze.
The trumpets sounded again, drawing their attention back to the ground to watch their champions take off into the field.
The whole pitch was open, three lanes marked off by jagged lines of vine covered shrubs that lashed out if a champion got close enough to scale them. The barriers weren't tall enough to hinder one champion watching another run, but all three were too busy with their own race to do so. From the stands, each section rotating the field and each other, it was clear that each of the champions was facing similar obstacles, though each were placed in different spots along each lane. On the far side of the field three orbs of different sizes and colors waited for their champions. First one to touch theirs was the winner of the first task.
Tim's first obstacle appeared to be a pond, the surface flat and calm but too wide to jump. As Tim approached though, there were quick moving ripples across the water. In the next lane April Kepner, the Beauxbaton champion was clambering up an angled wall of rocks, her climbing distracted by ominous cracks and creaks from the stone. She didn't appear flustered at all when one just above her broke free and fell toward her. April just spun to the side and a swipe of her wand sent the rock careening off to meet the next stone that broke free. In the last lane the Durmstrang champion was fighting his way through sticky, clinging webs. Over his head, a colossal spider was spinning its way down to him.
Arizona's gaze was locked on her brother, flinching when a tentacle stretched out of the water to whip him back from the pool. Alex couldn't help glancing toward the head of gray hair on the front row. Arizona's father was rarely anywhere if his own father wasn't close by. The thought made sweat prickle on the back of his neck even as Tim froze an icy track across the water and started into his second obstacle.
His father's presence had always frightened Alex, really. It wasn't something he talked about, something he even acknowledged. As a child it had been practicality, an instinct for self-preservation. Now that he was older he wouldn't admit the fear aloud, not even to Arizona, but the thought that his father was close here at school made something deep in his gut twist and tighten. Hogwarts was supposed to be safe but it couldn't feel that way for him as long as Auror Robbins was here. Not if his father was out there too.
Even in the bright sunlight Alex got a chill when Daniel Robbins turned on his seat to look at them.
As if she sensed her father's gaze Arizona went still and stiff beside him. One arm dropped to brace itself beside his. She didn't touch him, didn't talk. She didn't have to.
Their strained stare snapped when the trumpets announced victory, Tim scratched, sore, and only a second ahead of April Kepner in securing his orb. He hefted it, as big as a muggle baseball and crimson in color, up toward the stand in exuberance and grinned at the applause. He was gracious to the other champions, clapping as Charles Percy retrieved his goal, and shaking hands with both of them before they departed the field.
The crowds in the stands queued up to climb out of their seats and Arizona could see her father waiting on the ground. With a sigh she led the group down the stairs, conscious the whole time of Callie on the step right behind her.
“Hey Dad, I had some...” she swallowed, “friends that wanted to meet you,” Arizona greeted him.
Cool eyes swept the line of them, ending on Alex leaning against the grandstand with his arms crossed over his chest. Daniel Robbins blinked and smiled after a beat. “I believe I've met Miss Torres, but of course I'm happy to meet any of my daughter's friends.” Alex scoffed under his breath but Cristina Yang's eager lunge forward to introduce herself covered the sound of it.
Seeing that her father was distracted for the moment, Arizona edged backward with a hand on Callie's arm. “Hey, so, I've got some homework I need to -”
Callie's excuse wasn't halfway out of her mouth but Arizona nodded. “Yeah. I'll see you later.” There was no reason Callie needed to stick around for the family meeting that was coming. Arizona managed a less than convincing smile, aware that not only was her father waiting, Meredith and Cristina were right there.
Callie didn't move though, not until Arizona found her eyes again. She smiled softly and Arizona's dimples answered her. “Better,” she murmured, stepping forward the half step she needed to touch her and leaning in to kiss her. Arizona was still, slow to answer the kiss, but Callie was patient, holding her sleeves lightly until Arizona stepped back. Brown eyes sparkled and Arizona felt her cheeks grow hot. “Good luck,” Callie told her, her expression more serious as she glanced over her shoulder at her girlfriend's father. “Later.”
Breathing deep, Arizona nodded and licked her lips. “See you,” she told Meredith and Cristina, feeling her blush reignite as they passed. They were both chattering eagerly about her father and barely noticed. Callie let herself be led away, waving.
Tim passed them on their way off, his prize in the pocket of his robes. Seeing the apprehensive grimace on his sister's face, he slung an arm around her shoulders and steered her gently toward their father. “Come on. I'm sure it's not as bad as whatever you're expecting.”
Alex was still leaning against the stands looking dour and Arizona couldn't muster her brother's optimism. He never thought things with their father could go as badly as she did. Of course, Tim hadn't defied their father's expectation and joined Slytherin. “We'll see,” she muttered, sliding out from under his arm as they faced their dad.
“Well done, Timothy,” he greeted his older child, the two of them engaging in a stiff, awkward hug for a pair of seconds before they stepped back.
“Thanks, Dad.” Tim rubbed the back of his arm where a vine had whipped him during the task. “I'm glad you got to come.”
“Your mother wanted to attend, of course, but -” Daniel looked askance at Alex, listening but not looking at them. “Outside of the school is not particularly safe at the moment. And I was already nearby.” Tim glanced at Alex but didn't say anything. “I'll get him.”
Still not speaking, Alex looked up to shoot a conflicted glare at the group of them before stomping off the field.
Arizona sighed, pinning her father with her own narrow look. Her frustration, her anger with him was never hard to rouse. “You know he's not like his dad. Why do you have to be so you to him?” she questioned, ignoring her brother's attempt to drown her out. “He's my friend!”
“And his father is one of the most depraved monsters that has existed in our world in more than ten years!” Daniel shot back, his voice rising.
Arizona stepped forward even as Tim got in between the two of them. “You're trying to kill his dad and you rub it in his face every chance you get!”
“His father is trying to kill people!” They were both yelling and Tim put both hands up to either side. “He's trying to kill me!”
Tim turned swiftly to face his sister, both hands catching her shoulders. “Get out of here!” he shouted over either of them, not specifying who he was talking to. He locked his gaze on Arizona's angry expression. “Just go back to the castle. Catch up with Alex,” he suggested, lowering his voice.
He was always putting himself between the two of them, keeping them from saying things they'd regret later. Arizona never meant for it to happen that way but it seemed to happen regardless of her intentions. Now they were spoiling Tim's moment of victory. Her anger deflated enough to let her shoulders slump. “I'm sorry.” Her eyes were stony as she caught her father's unrelenting gaze. “Let's go Snakes,” she said flatly, flipping her green and silver scarf around her neck defiantly. She walked away without looking back, able to feel the tears burning in her eyes.