Grindeldore Big Bang - Only You by Oshun, Chapter 4 - Quest for the Deathly Hallows
Title: Only You, Chapter 4 - Quest for the Deathly Hallows
Author: Oshun (heartofoshun)
Rating: R (this chapter is rated R)
Word Count: 15,411 in five chapters; this chapter 3,185.
Artists: fabledtruant, ghostangel; see ghostangel's art work here: http://grindeldorebb.livejournal.com/6777.html [Will include links to other artwork when I receive them.]
Fanmixer: queenofthebobs Find the the mix here.
Extraordinary Beta: ignoblebard; he is my "go to" man! Thank you so much, my friend!
Summary: This is the story of how Dumbledore meets, falls in love with and loses Grindelwald. Pure canon (very close anyway, if one includes book verse, JKR interviews and my own relentless extrapolation!), which means it cannot have a happy ending. All and all I hope it projects the old adage that it is better to have loved and lost than never loved at all. Teaser: ”Magic like his is a marvel that I have only encountered a few times in my life and that was my first experience. I had no defense against it. My own magic strained and buzzed beneath my skin in a barely controllable response.”
“Give me your hand?” Gellert stretched out his hand and waggled his fingers at me in the most annoying and demanding way. It irritated me how Gellert believed he could get anything he wanted from me.
“Give me your hand, Albus!”
“Why?” I asked, stubborn and resistant.
“I want to tell your fortune, you lovely boy,” Gellert said. I took a deep breath and watched as his face transformed into tender longing. Wonderment and affection had vanquished the clumsiness of our first forays into sexual intimacy. We shuddered simultaneously at the memory of the afternoon and evening before.
Shaking my head at him with a pretense of reluctance, I offered him my hand. He traced the center crease of my palm. It tickled, causing me to want to jerk my hand away, but I restrained myself.
“Ah, this is your life line. You are destined to encounter great passion at a very early age. I hope I am not too late.” He laughed again and ran his tongue along his lower lip before pursing his lips at me obscenely. He truly was outrageously pretty. I wanted to grab him and kiss him into silence, but how far he intended to take his nonsensical game still intrigued me.
“Don’t be silly,” I said. “That is a Muggle gypsy trick. You cannot predict my fate.”
“You don’t know if I can or not. Test me.”
“Stupid boy!” I complained. The insult earned me a wide smile. He already had learned to enjoy provoking me. “How can I test you?”
“You can kiss me. And if the kiss is not the most incredible thing you have ever experienced, then I will admit I was wrong and leave you alone.”
I moved against him, until my thighs touched his. I knew he could feel my erection hardening through my thin, loose summer trousers. He responded in kind. I mustered all the courage and strength of will I could and asked, “Never said I wanted to be left alone, did I?”
He inhaled two, perhaps three, stuttering breaths. The habitual smirk had completely vanished from his face. He whispered, “Albus,” half plea, half expression of astonishment. If Gellert had shared this experience with anyone before, he must have been an excellent actor, because his amazement at our physical joy in one another seemed as new and surprising to him as it did to me.
I leaned forward, threading my fingers into his wild blond curls and pressing my lips against his with deliberate force. The kiss turned into everything I hoped it would be and so much more. The only sound out of Gellert was that of his labored breathing. My only experience with kissing had been the day before. I was only faking it, but with commitment and sincerity. Gellert did not seem to notice my lack of method, moaning and pushing his tongue into my mouth. He tasted of the applesauce we had eaten with our breakfast, with the faintest hint of cinnamon, his breath as fresh as that a child. I now understand how heartbreakingly, painfully young we were. Emboldened by my initial success, I rotated my hips against his groin. Suddenly, he gasped and groaned with impressive volume while returning the pressure. Out of nowhere, he trembled convulsively in my arms, triggering me.
“Score one for Hogwarts! You’re brilliant,” he said. I muttered something about coming in our pants liked fourth year boys. It really did feel a bit ridiculous, but exciting, that we wanted each other too much to wait. I mumbled a cleansing charm against the sticky mess. I was getting quite good at those.
“You completely surprise me, Albus. I had no idea before we started yesterday that we would be anything like this together.” He grinned and kissed me again. “We should not have waited so long, I think.”
“I honestly don’t know what I’m doing,” I admitted, kissing the delectable concave space behind his ear. Feeling the goose bumps spread along the skin of his neck, I licked and sucked there. He tasted salty and his fingers dug into my biceps like talons.
“Don’t stop!” he gasped.
By then I had pinned him against the wood burning cooker. Thankfully it had long since cooled. We were not in the habit of keeping it lit throughout the day in the summer. “Don’t worry. I have no interest in stopping, but do you think . . . can we do this again so soon?”
“We can have fun trying.”
The kitchen door slammed against the wall and Ariana’s high-pitched voice sent the blood flowing back to my heart and head. “There the two of you are! I went to the orchard looking for you. Aberforth said to tell you he went into the village. How long have you been here?”
Gellert groaned, although more in frustration than passion that time. “Not quite long enough.”
“Liar,” said Ariana. “I waited outside the door until I was positive that you had finished.”
“Where do you learn such things?” I shrieked at Ariana, aghast.
“Certainly not from you!” she said. “Why, if it weren’t for Gellert explaining about . . .”
“No. No. I do not want to hear any more!” I covered my ears with my hands. Ariana and Gellert both laughed at my embarrassment until their tears flowed.
** ** ** ** **
Aberforth and Ariana played chess in the parlor while Gellert and I sat at the kitchen table and looked over the lists I had made of everything we could cull from the books in my library and that of Professor Bagshot about ownership and location of each of the Deathly Hallows artifacts. Of greatest interest to Gellert, we discovered the Elder Wand was last known to have been in Germany, possibly Franconia in Bavaria, before the trail was lost. A couple of books in German were noted. Of course, Bagshot did not have them; she did not read German. I suggested a trip to London. Gellert insisted that, although he wouldn’t mind stopping in London, it seemed logical to go directly to Germany. His parents’ estate had finally been freed of all encumbrances. While he was not a wealthy man, neither was he penniless any longer.
Aberforth heard us arguing in the kitchen and stuck his head around the doorway to complain. “I have never known two such supposedly great friends to argue the way the two of you do. What now?”
“We are thinking of going to London later in the week,” I said with forced mildness. “We might stay overnight. First, we will need to go to a large library, perhaps the Wizarding division of the British Museum.” Gellert was shooting me such daggers with his eyes the entire time I was speaking with Aberforth that I reflexively glanced at his wand hand. I was not, however, going to give him the satisfaction of reacting in front of Aberforth. “And then we might need to talk to some people thereabouts.”
Gellert rolled his eyes at me one last time, before announcing in a loud angry voice. “I think we should go straight to Germany and start looking there.”
For some reason that struck Aberforth as incredibly funny and he howled laughing. “Ah, now the difference comes out. And who would pay for this grand expedition to Germany?”
“I have money now,” Gellert said, jerking up his chin in a gesture of haughty disdain.
Aberforth laughed again. ‘Well, if you are planning a trip hiking around Germany, you better do it quickly, because Albus has to be back in time for me to prepare to return to Hogwarts at the end of August.”
Ariana popped her head up over Aberforth’s shoulder. “I want to go to Germany.”
I said, “You are not going anywhere.”
“We should talk about this later,” Gellert said, releasing a huff of air while shaking his head at me, his sign that he had declared an armistice and planned to reengage later when he was better armed.
** ** ** ** **
I heard a scratching at the window. A scant five minutes earlier, I had sent my owl Beatrice with a message to Gellert. The bird might have reached him and returned, but Gellert would not have had time to read the rambling letter she carried, much less have drafted the simplest response. Nothing I had written was worthy of immediate attention in any case. Alone in my room, over the sounds of crickets and a nightjar, I thought I heard a scrapping upon the roof.
The cheeky rogue had come himself and intended to climb in through my window. After crossing the room and throwing the shutters open, I reached up to help him over the window sill with one hand, while placing a finger against my lips in the universal plea for silence.
He grabbed me by both arms and leaned into me, whispering, “I did not come to talk. I need to touch you, to hold you. I could not sleep.”
That was the first night that I recall Gellert sleeping in my room. It was to become a habit. For the first week or so, he tried to sneak back to the Bagshot cottage before anyone else woke up in the morning. Later we stopped bothering.
** ** ** ** **
I threw a wild tickling curse. Merlin only knows how I managed to hit him at all, but I did. He bent over almost double from the waist laughing and coughing at the same time, while sputtering in an attempt to breathe. Unsure of whether to rush to help him or guard myself, I chose caution over empathy and held my position, wand at the ready.
My opponent after all was Gellert Grindelwald, expelled from Durmstrang for excessive use of potentially dangerous curses with younger and more vulnerable students. I was right to remain alert. He virtually flew into an aggressive posture, looking half fencing master, half danseur; countering with a curse that we called a Stinging Nettle at Hogwarts in my youth, harmless after a few minutes but excruciating upon contact. His miss was intentional, veering at the last possible moment to ricochet off my bedroom wall, leaving a viscous green smear reminiscent in appearance and smell to that of rotting vegetable matter.
“Eww!” I called out to him. “Cast curses often, blondie?”
Throwing his head back and laughing with abandon, he sent curse after unpleasant curse at me, the deliberate narrow misses more spectacular in the tight quarters than any direct hits would have been. I responded in kind. We were so nearly equally matched that the effect upon me was exhilarating. I stopped first, collapsing onto the ancient overstuffed chair behind me in a panting boneless mass.
Gellert straddled my lap. I could feel his arousal hard against me. The sweetness of his smile contrasted with the wicked twinkle in his eyes.
"Oh, yes, Albus," he whispered, drawing a deep shuddering breath. "I’ve been waiting to be able to fuck you or be fucked by you since I first saw you, but I had never expected to like it so much, to need it so very much. Did you? Do you want to do everything? To go the rest of the way?”
I wasn’t sure what the rest of the way entailed. "Hmm. I think I would like to do anything you want to do," I answered. "In answer to your first question, I might have suspected we would be spectacular together. I've wanted you since I saw you walking up that path to our door. Before I knew a thing about you. Wanted you so . . . needed you so . . ."
"And you still do? You still want me now that you know me? Foolish lad. Well, I'm happy that is true. You should be aware, however, that once we have known one another in that way, there will be no going back.” He was nothing if not dramatic. “No one else will ever be able to match the two of us together. I know that, Albus. I know I am not wrong." His beautiful face looked almost sad. His intensity was not just passionate, but tender. At that moment, although I still feared it would be short-lived, I was certain that he loved me--loved me as I loved him.
He reached to unbuckle my belt. His mouth was everywhere, all over my lips, my face, my neck, as he wrenched and pulled at my clothing. I gasped; this was what I wanted, what I had been waiting for since I first saw him walking up the path to my door. I held my breath involuntarily, before releasing it and panting, hyperventilating, unable to draw any air into my lungs. Unable to think or move for a moment, I at last grasped his face in my hands and, holding it still, began to kiss him back.
I was ready to be taken, to be penetrated by Gellert. That was what I had expected for some time. But in the end, it turned out that was not what he wanted. He wanted to be the bottom, as young people refer to it nowadays; he wanted to be the vessel, open and accepting of me. But then he still wanted to control every aspect of our love making, how fast, how forceful, even how long he wanted it to last. He had some problems with me initially in the execution of the latter. But I am nothing if not a fast learner and the practice required was stunning.
** ** ** ** **
The ultimate consummation of our physical relationship was distracting enough for a while that the Gellert let go of the discussion of going to Germany. In truth, distracting is an radical understatement. All the clichés of story and song were true for us. We could not keep our hands off one another. The recovery time of teenagers and the staying power we finally mastered ensured that we spent most of our time making love or looking for a private corner in which to do so for the greater part of a month.
When Gellert turned his attention back to the quest for the Deathly Hallows, however, he was relentless. Not only did he want to go immediately, he determined that we should take Ariana with us as well. Whether he wanted to bring her along because he knew I would refuse to leave her permanently, and leaving her temporarily would mean my travels with him would always be constrained by anxiety, or because he genuinely cared for her, I’ll never know for sure. I know he identified strongly with her. Her disability touched something profound within him. He also always claimed to disagree strongly with the way we cared for Ariana.
“She is not your sister, Gellert,” I said to him one afternoon when he badgered with greater than usual persistence.
“You hurt me,” he pouted, sticking out his lower lip. I could not decide if I wanted more to kiss him or punch him in his pretty mouth. “I would think of her as a sister. If the world were a fair place, you could be my spouse and she would legally be my sister.”
Hearing those words I had so much wanted to hear-that he wanted our relationship to be deep and permanent-made me suddenly and viciously angry. How dare he lead me on and torture me the way he did. If that had been what he wanted, then why had he not said so earlier and if this was some sort of game, I could not think of a crueler, more heartless one. “I am not at all convinced you could ever want that, Gellert,” I said, trying to pull together the last of my dignity and independence. “We have been intimate countless times, in every way that two people can be, and you’ve never said you loved me.”
“You’ve hurt me again!” he complained, the very picture of injured outrage. “Of course, I love you.”
“Even if you do, she would not be your sister . . . ”
“More’s the pity,” he said, finally truly angry and not just playacting.
“ . . . and her welfare is still my responsibility. Not yours.”
“You treat her like an invalid. She is strong and nearly as clever as you, if not interested in the same things. And she’s very beautiful for a girl. Surely you can see that. It’s wrong that your entire family has prevented her from . . . forbidden her to use her magic. She is the injured party and you have treated her as though she is criminally insane.”
“Precisely. That is an accurate description. She is my sister and I love her. But I cannot forget, should not forget, one of her vicious explosions killed my mother. She cannot be trusted any more than one can trust a tamed beast of the jungle. I endanger myself and life of my brother to keep her from being locked away. I have allowed you access to her against my better judgment and because I have loved you too much. And she loves you as well.”
By then I had begun to sob. There is nothing charming about that kind of crying. One would never have found anything like it in one of Ariana’s maudlin books of star-crossed romance. I could see nothing through my fogged up eyeglasses. I removed them and tossed them in the direction of my dresser. My nose was running and I tried to wipe it with the back of my hand, smearing snot across my face.
Gellert flew at me. I raised an arm in front of my face to protect myself from the expected blow. Instead he hit me with a full body slam, nearly knocking the wind out of me as he pushed me onto the bed. He straddled me, pinning my arms above my head. He kissed me repeatedly, with great force, causing my teeth to cut against my upper lip. Only when I opened my mouth to him did he begin to gentle.
“Love you. Love you, Al. You really know how to hurt me,” he stammered, hands everywhere, buttons flying, the sound of ripping cloth, as he managed to undress us both with a combination of magic and reckless force. Even then I doubted the sincerity of his protestations of affection and need-one part sentiment and two parts manipulation, I thought. But I also marveled still at my fortune. Who was I truly to question him? I was too tall, too clumsy, ungainly and plain while he was graceful and beautiful, worldly and sophisticated. I was simply smart but not savvy Albus Dumbledore faced with my perfect prince. But I could change for him and I would change him, I thought. Why couldn’t we have everything?
Gellert faced the open window with me spooned against his back. He held my hand in a fierce grip, with my arm trapped beneath his and my knuckles pressed against his lips. At longer and longer intervals he would kiss my hand, as his grasp of me loosened slowly. I fell asleep nuzzled up against him, thinking that when I awakened in the morning I would find Aberforth and explain that we were taking Ariana to Germany with us. It would be hard to convince him but I would have to do it.
Chapter 5 - Epilogue
Author: Oshun (heartofoshun)
Rating: R (this chapter is rated R)
Word Count: 15,411 in five chapters; this chapter 3,185.
Artists: fabledtruant, ghostangel; see ghostangel's art work here: http://grindeldorebb.livejournal.com/6777.html [Will include links to other artwork when I receive them.]
Fanmixer: queenofthebobs Find the the mix here.
Extraordinary Beta: ignoblebard; he is my "go to" man! Thank you so much, my friend!
Summary: This is the story of how Dumbledore meets, falls in love with and loses Grindelwald. Pure canon (very close anyway, if one includes book verse, JKR interviews and my own relentless extrapolation!), which means it cannot have a happy ending. All and all I hope it projects the old adage that it is better to have loved and lost than never loved at all. Teaser: ”Magic like his is a marvel that I have only encountered a few times in my life and that was my first experience. I had no defense against it. My own magic strained and buzzed beneath my skin in a barely controllable response.”
“Give me your hand?” Gellert stretched out his hand and waggled his fingers at me in the most annoying and demanding way. It irritated me how Gellert believed he could get anything he wanted from me.
“Give me your hand, Albus!”
“Why?” I asked, stubborn and resistant.
“I want to tell your fortune, you lovely boy,” Gellert said. I took a deep breath and watched as his face transformed into tender longing. Wonderment and affection had vanquished the clumsiness of our first forays into sexual intimacy. We shuddered simultaneously at the memory of the afternoon and evening before.
Shaking my head at him with a pretense of reluctance, I offered him my hand. He traced the center crease of my palm. It tickled, causing me to want to jerk my hand away, but I restrained myself.
“Ah, this is your life line. You are destined to encounter great passion at a very early age. I hope I am not too late.” He laughed again and ran his tongue along his lower lip before pursing his lips at me obscenely. He truly was outrageously pretty. I wanted to grab him and kiss him into silence, but how far he intended to take his nonsensical game still intrigued me.
“Don’t be silly,” I said. “That is a Muggle gypsy trick. You cannot predict my fate.”
“You don’t know if I can or not. Test me.”
“Stupid boy!” I complained. The insult earned me a wide smile. He already had learned to enjoy provoking me. “How can I test you?”
“You can kiss me. And if the kiss is not the most incredible thing you have ever experienced, then I will admit I was wrong and leave you alone.”
I moved against him, until my thighs touched his. I knew he could feel my erection hardening through my thin, loose summer trousers. He responded in kind. I mustered all the courage and strength of will I could and asked, “Never said I wanted to be left alone, did I?”
He inhaled two, perhaps three, stuttering breaths. The habitual smirk had completely vanished from his face. He whispered, “Albus,” half plea, half expression of astonishment. If Gellert had shared this experience with anyone before, he must have been an excellent actor, because his amazement at our physical joy in one another seemed as new and surprising to him as it did to me.
I leaned forward, threading my fingers into his wild blond curls and pressing my lips against his with deliberate force. The kiss turned into everything I hoped it would be and so much more. The only sound out of Gellert was that of his labored breathing. My only experience with kissing had been the day before. I was only faking it, but with commitment and sincerity. Gellert did not seem to notice my lack of method, moaning and pushing his tongue into my mouth. He tasted of the applesauce we had eaten with our breakfast, with the faintest hint of cinnamon, his breath as fresh as that a child. I now understand how heartbreakingly, painfully young we were. Emboldened by my initial success, I rotated my hips against his groin. Suddenly, he gasped and groaned with impressive volume while returning the pressure. Out of nowhere, he trembled convulsively in my arms, triggering me.
“Score one for Hogwarts! You’re brilliant,” he said. I muttered something about coming in our pants liked fourth year boys. It really did feel a bit ridiculous, but exciting, that we wanted each other too much to wait. I mumbled a cleansing charm against the sticky mess. I was getting quite good at those.
“You completely surprise me, Albus. I had no idea before we started yesterday that we would be anything like this together.” He grinned and kissed me again. “We should not have waited so long, I think.”
“I honestly don’t know what I’m doing,” I admitted, kissing the delectable concave space behind his ear. Feeling the goose bumps spread along the skin of his neck, I licked and sucked there. He tasted salty and his fingers dug into my biceps like talons.
“Don’t stop!” he gasped.
By then I had pinned him against the wood burning cooker. Thankfully it had long since cooled. We were not in the habit of keeping it lit throughout the day in the summer. “Don’t worry. I have no interest in stopping, but do you think . . . can we do this again so soon?”
“We can have fun trying.”
The kitchen door slammed against the wall and Ariana’s high-pitched voice sent the blood flowing back to my heart and head. “There the two of you are! I went to the orchard looking for you. Aberforth said to tell you he went into the village. How long have you been here?”
Gellert groaned, although more in frustration than passion that time. “Not quite long enough.”
“Liar,” said Ariana. “I waited outside the door until I was positive that you had finished.”
“Where do you learn such things?” I shrieked at Ariana, aghast.
“Certainly not from you!” she said. “Why, if it weren’t for Gellert explaining about . . .”
“No. No. I do not want to hear any more!” I covered my ears with my hands. Ariana and Gellert both laughed at my embarrassment until their tears flowed.
** ** ** ** **
Aberforth and Ariana played chess in the parlor while Gellert and I sat at the kitchen table and looked over the lists I had made of everything we could cull from the books in my library and that of Professor Bagshot about ownership and location of each of the Deathly Hallows artifacts. Of greatest interest to Gellert, we discovered the Elder Wand was last known to have been in Germany, possibly Franconia in Bavaria, before the trail was lost. A couple of books in German were noted. Of course, Bagshot did not have them; she did not read German. I suggested a trip to London. Gellert insisted that, although he wouldn’t mind stopping in London, it seemed logical to go directly to Germany. His parents’ estate had finally been freed of all encumbrances. While he was not a wealthy man, neither was he penniless any longer.
Aberforth heard us arguing in the kitchen and stuck his head around the doorway to complain. “I have never known two such supposedly great friends to argue the way the two of you do. What now?”
“We are thinking of going to London later in the week,” I said with forced mildness. “We might stay overnight. First, we will need to go to a large library, perhaps the Wizarding division of the British Museum.” Gellert was shooting me such daggers with his eyes the entire time I was speaking with Aberforth that I reflexively glanced at his wand hand. I was not, however, going to give him the satisfaction of reacting in front of Aberforth. “And then we might need to talk to some people thereabouts.”
Gellert rolled his eyes at me one last time, before announcing in a loud angry voice. “I think we should go straight to Germany and start looking there.”
For some reason that struck Aberforth as incredibly funny and he howled laughing. “Ah, now the difference comes out. And who would pay for this grand expedition to Germany?”
“I have money now,” Gellert said, jerking up his chin in a gesture of haughty disdain.
Aberforth laughed again. ‘Well, if you are planning a trip hiking around Germany, you better do it quickly, because Albus has to be back in time for me to prepare to return to Hogwarts at the end of August.”
Ariana popped her head up over Aberforth’s shoulder. “I want to go to Germany.”
I said, “You are not going anywhere.”
“We should talk about this later,” Gellert said, releasing a huff of air while shaking his head at me, his sign that he had declared an armistice and planned to reengage later when he was better armed.
** ** ** ** **
I heard a scratching at the window. A scant five minutes earlier, I had sent my owl Beatrice with a message to Gellert. The bird might have reached him and returned, but Gellert would not have had time to read the rambling letter she carried, much less have drafted the simplest response. Nothing I had written was worthy of immediate attention in any case. Alone in my room, over the sounds of crickets and a nightjar, I thought I heard a scrapping upon the roof.
The cheeky rogue had come himself and intended to climb in through my window. After crossing the room and throwing the shutters open, I reached up to help him over the window sill with one hand, while placing a finger against my lips in the universal plea for silence.
He grabbed me by both arms and leaned into me, whispering, “I did not come to talk. I need to touch you, to hold you. I could not sleep.”
That was the first night that I recall Gellert sleeping in my room. It was to become a habit. For the first week or so, he tried to sneak back to the Bagshot cottage before anyone else woke up in the morning. Later we stopped bothering.
** ** ** ** **
I threw a wild tickling curse. Merlin only knows how I managed to hit him at all, but I did. He bent over almost double from the waist laughing and coughing at the same time, while sputtering in an attempt to breathe. Unsure of whether to rush to help him or guard myself, I chose caution over empathy and held my position, wand at the ready.
My opponent after all was Gellert Grindelwald, expelled from Durmstrang for excessive use of potentially dangerous curses with younger and more vulnerable students. I was right to remain alert. He virtually flew into an aggressive posture, looking half fencing master, half danseur; countering with a curse that we called a Stinging Nettle at Hogwarts in my youth, harmless after a few minutes but excruciating upon contact. His miss was intentional, veering at the last possible moment to ricochet off my bedroom wall, leaving a viscous green smear reminiscent in appearance and smell to that of rotting vegetable matter.
“Eww!” I called out to him. “Cast curses often, blondie?”
Throwing his head back and laughing with abandon, he sent curse after unpleasant curse at me, the deliberate narrow misses more spectacular in the tight quarters than any direct hits would have been. I responded in kind. We were so nearly equally matched that the effect upon me was exhilarating. I stopped first, collapsing onto the ancient overstuffed chair behind me in a panting boneless mass.
Gellert straddled my lap. I could feel his arousal hard against me. The sweetness of his smile contrasted with the wicked twinkle in his eyes.
"Oh, yes, Albus," he whispered, drawing a deep shuddering breath. "I’ve been waiting to be able to fuck you or be fucked by you since I first saw you, but I had never expected to like it so much, to need it so very much. Did you? Do you want to do everything? To go the rest of the way?”
I wasn’t sure what the rest of the way entailed. "Hmm. I think I would like to do anything you want to do," I answered. "In answer to your first question, I might have suspected we would be spectacular together. I've wanted you since I saw you walking up that path to our door. Before I knew a thing about you. Wanted you so . . . needed you so . . ."
"And you still do? You still want me now that you know me? Foolish lad. Well, I'm happy that is true. You should be aware, however, that once we have known one another in that way, there will be no going back.” He was nothing if not dramatic. “No one else will ever be able to match the two of us together. I know that, Albus. I know I am not wrong." His beautiful face looked almost sad. His intensity was not just passionate, but tender. At that moment, although I still feared it would be short-lived, I was certain that he loved me--loved me as I loved him.
He reached to unbuckle my belt. His mouth was everywhere, all over my lips, my face, my neck, as he wrenched and pulled at my clothing. I gasped; this was what I wanted, what I had been waiting for since I first saw him walking up the path to my door. I held my breath involuntarily, before releasing it and panting, hyperventilating, unable to draw any air into my lungs. Unable to think or move for a moment, I at last grasped his face in my hands and, holding it still, began to kiss him back.
I was ready to be taken, to be penetrated by Gellert. That was what I had expected for some time. But in the end, it turned out that was not what he wanted. He wanted to be the bottom, as young people refer to it nowadays; he wanted to be the vessel, open and accepting of me. But then he still wanted to control every aspect of our love making, how fast, how forceful, even how long he wanted it to last. He had some problems with me initially in the execution of the latter. But I am nothing if not a fast learner and the practice required was stunning.
** ** ** ** **
The ultimate consummation of our physical relationship was distracting enough for a while that the Gellert let go of the discussion of going to Germany. In truth, distracting is an radical understatement. All the clichés of story and song were true for us. We could not keep our hands off one another. The recovery time of teenagers and the staying power we finally mastered ensured that we spent most of our time making love or looking for a private corner in which to do so for the greater part of a month.
When Gellert turned his attention back to the quest for the Deathly Hallows, however, he was relentless. Not only did he want to go immediately, he determined that we should take Ariana with us as well. Whether he wanted to bring her along because he knew I would refuse to leave her permanently, and leaving her temporarily would mean my travels with him would always be constrained by anxiety, or because he genuinely cared for her, I’ll never know for sure. I know he identified strongly with her. Her disability touched something profound within him. He also always claimed to disagree strongly with the way we cared for Ariana.
“She is not your sister, Gellert,” I said to him one afternoon when he badgered with greater than usual persistence.
“You hurt me,” he pouted, sticking out his lower lip. I could not decide if I wanted more to kiss him or punch him in his pretty mouth. “I would think of her as a sister. If the world were a fair place, you could be my spouse and she would legally be my sister.”
Hearing those words I had so much wanted to hear-that he wanted our relationship to be deep and permanent-made me suddenly and viciously angry. How dare he lead me on and torture me the way he did. If that had been what he wanted, then why had he not said so earlier and if this was some sort of game, I could not think of a crueler, more heartless one. “I am not at all convinced you could ever want that, Gellert,” I said, trying to pull together the last of my dignity and independence. “We have been intimate countless times, in every way that two people can be, and you’ve never said you loved me.”
“You’ve hurt me again!” he complained, the very picture of injured outrage. “Of course, I love you.”
“Even if you do, she would not be your sister . . . ”
“More’s the pity,” he said, finally truly angry and not just playacting.
“ . . . and her welfare is still my responsibility. Not yours.”
“You treat her like an invalid. She is strong and nearly as clever as you, if not interested in the same things. And she’s very beautiful for a girl. Surely you can see that. It’s wrong that your entire family has prevented her from . . . forbidden her to use her magic. She is the injured party and you have treated her as though she is criminally insane.”
“Precisely. That is an accurate description. She is my sister and I love her. But I cannot forget, should not forget, one of her vicious explosions killed my mother. She cannot be trusted any more than one can trust a tamed beast of the jungle. I endanger myself and life of my brother to keep her from being locked away. I have allowed you access to her against my better judgment and because I have loved you too much. And she loves you as well.”
By then I had begun to sob. There is nothing charming about that kind of crying. One would never have found anything like it in one of Ariana’s maudlin books of star-crossed romance. I could see nothing through my fogged up eyeglasses. I removed them and tossed them in the direction of my dresser. My nose was running and I tried to wipe it with the back of my hand, smearing snot across my face.
Gellert flew at me. I raised an arm in front of my face to protect myself from the expected blow. Instead he hit me with a full body slam, nearly knocking the wind out of me as he pushed me onto the bed. He straddled me, pinning my arms above my head. He kissed me repeatedly, with great force, causing my teeth to cut against my upper lip. Only when I opened my mouth to him did he begin to gentle.
“Love you. Love you, Al. You really know how to hurt me,” he stammered, hands everywhere, buttons flying, the sound of ripping cloth, as he managed to undress us both with a combination of magic and reckless force. Even then I doubted the sincerity of his protestations of affection and need-one part sentiment and two parts manipulation, I thought. But I also marveled still at my fortune. Who was I truly to question him? I was too tall, too clumsy, ungainly and plain while he was graceful and beautiful, worldly and sophisticated. I was simply smart but not savvy Albus Dumbledore faced with my perfect prince. But I could change for him and I would change him, I thought. Why couldn’t we have everything?
Gellert faced the open window with me spooned against his back. He held my hand in a fierce grip, with my arm trapped beneath his and my knuckles pressed against his lips. At longer and longer intervals he would kiss my hand, as his grasp of me loosened slowly. I fell asleep nuzzled up against him, thinking that when I awakened in the morning I would find Aberforth and explain that we were taking Ariana to Germany with us. It would be hard to convince him but I would have to do it.
Chapter 5 - Epilogue