Miles did not know how lines was going to help his tardiness. If anything, they were going to make him hate the smell of chalk and want to avoid class entirely. He stretched up on the tip of his toes to start his next column of ‘Je ne serai pas en retard en classe’ and let out a few cuss words when his chalk snapped in half. It was so stupid, it was not even his fault that he had been late, this time! The other four times this week, yes, but not today! Bloody Malcolm Delacour had challenged him to a match of Exploding Snaps, how was he supposed to disregard something as important as that?

The fourth-year trudged over to the chalk box to find a new writing utensil and startled when a door creaked open behind him. Miles jumped, but let out a breath at the sight of the professor who had sentenced him to the mundane assignment.

“Taking a break, Lufkin?” Professor Venjolie said, her heels clicking loudly on the stone floor of the empty classroom. The creaky door shut behind her and Miles groaned. She was not here to let him out early, in fact, with the amused expression on her face he was now certain that she was going to make him stay here all night, keeping an eye on him as he filled up every last blackboard. Her blonde hair was loose around her head, very unlike the tight bun she usually held it in, and Miles could tell she was enjoying his torture.

“My chalk broke,” he said miserably, holding up his cracked in half piece. He went back to rummaging for a new piece, and when he found one of acceptable length he stalked back to where he had left off. Miles felt the back of his neck heat up as Venjolie stared at him and he could feel her eyes boring into his back as he started back up. Did she not have anything better to do than watch him get punished? She was always picking on him, asking him question she knew he didn’t know, taking house points away when he didn’t deserve them to be, and while Miles was not the most dedicated of students, he certainly did not deserve the attention this professor gave him.

“Your script, it is terrible,” Venjolie snipped, pushing up from her position against her desk. Miles watched from the corner of his eye as she approached, noticing for the first time in the dimly lit classroom that she was not in her regular professor robes, but in a sleeping gown. A prickly feeling raced up and down his back as she grew closer. It suddenly felt very strange to be in the classroom with her and no other students. Miles ducked his head and rolled his eyes, putting his hand out with the chalk so that she could show him how to properly write the bloody sentence. At least he’d get out of writing one line.

“No, no,” Venjolie said, taking hold of his wrist. She pushed him for to face the blackboard and Miles jumped when she stood closely, much too closely, behind him. Her hand pulled his arm up and she pressed the chalk to the board, showing him in slow, elaborate script how it should be done. He couldn’t be bothered to concentrate on the motions, however, and Miles’ breaths grew short when Venjolie pressed herself harder into his back. He could feel everything.

“Madame,” he let out with something that sounded like a squeak. Miles turned around, pulling his hand out of her grasp and keeping his fists up at his chest. He made to push her away, but there was no place he could touch her without it being inappropriate, though it seemed like Venjolie did not have the boundaries the other professors did. Miles eyed her, wondering if this was some sort of trick to get him expelled, but he watched with uneasy surprise as his professor undid the top buttons of her sleeping gown. Miles flushed deeply, looking away as she revealed herself, but Venjolie put her finely manicured hand out and took hold of his chin.

“Madame,” was all he could manage, looking everywhere but at Venjolie. Miles winced as her nails began to pierce his skin and finally he forced himself to look her in the eye. She was grinning a wicked grin, and Miles felt sick to his stomach.

“Do you not find me attractive, Lufkin?” she asked, as if she was giving a surprise exam. “I see the way you stare in class.”

Miles pressed his lips tightly together. She was certainly a young, pretty woman, but she was a professor and that set her far, far apart from the girls he chased around the corridors. As much as the boy despised classes and homework, since starting at Beauxbatons he’d managed to just barely toe the line of annoyance. He’d already been banished here because he’d been expelled from Hogwarts, something his parents would never forgive him for. He could not get kicked out of this school no matter how much he hated it.

“I need to finish my lines,” he managed, feeling his face grow even hotter as Venjolie’s hand dropped its grip on her chin and went to his shoulder. “Madame...”

“If you kiss me, you will never have to do lines again,” she whispered hotly on to his lips. Miles gulped, feeling queasy but unable to move. When he didn’t respond, Venjolie’s eyebrows went high, “Or I could tell the headmaster you were stealing valuables from my office.”

“But I didn’t---!” Miles started, terrified at the prospect of the threat. She kissed him before he could protest any further, pushing him into the chalkboard. His mouth and eyes stayed firmly shut, but her hands began to roam and with a bit of pressure from her tongue Miles’ lips parted. His mind was dizzy, spinning out of control---this had to be a dream, this couldn’t actually be happening to him. Miles knew this was wrong, that she shouldn’t be doing this to him, but it felt so good at the same time---she was a professor, but she’d get him expelled if he didn’t----

“Shhh,” she whispered against his cheek. Miles’ eyes remained closed, and he silently screamed for someone to wake him up from this nightmare.

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There was really no point in telling Miles Lufkin not to do something. It was as if the phrase, the order triggered something in his brain that immediately set off a RED ALERT! DO---THAT---THING! When he was restless in his bed at night he wondered if there may be something wrong with him, but then the morning came and there were new adventures and troubles to get into, and all his midnight musings vanished from his thoughts. Today was the prime example of his inability to follow the rules as he marched across the Hogwarts grounds and towards the very dangerous Whomping Willow.

Oh, this was going to be quite the treat!

A few students had been caught throwing rocks at the branches of the tree, which had been planted last year on the far end of the premises. Professor Dumbledore had let off many warnings that no one was to go near the tree, that you could be killed if a branch struck you hard enough, and that any student attempting to climb its trunk could receive a year’s worth of detention, or even worse, expulsion. Miles had managed to distract himself enough in his second year of schooling to not feel the need to clamber up the branches of the Willow, but this year, ha! All the rock-throwing kids got was a slap on the wrist. Six detentions? That was it?

Pfft! He ate six-detentions for breakfast.

Though this really was going to be a thrilling sight, Miles had made no effort to announce his grand stunt to any of his friends of classmates. Too much of a crowd would draw unwanted attention from the professors, and he would have to polish a decade’s worth of school trophies for just thinking about stepping near the Willow. No, no, he was quite content in scaling the tree without any witnesses, as he was a boy that lived for the adrenaline rush of stepping out of bounds and causing a ruckus. The silent catastrophe, he had dubbed himself, and he was quite pleased with the title.

The Whomping Willow was a grand sight, Miles thought to himself as he finally reached its destination. The branches were long and thick, seemingly too sturdy to flail and inflict the pain it was most definitely was capable of. It was late in the fall, so most of its leaves had turned color, but the trunk itself was so twisted and seemingly angry that Miles took a moment, or two, or three (or four) to consider his options. Maybe he could just touch the trunk, and scurry back unscathed. He had no real desire to die tonight, so maybe his moment of grandeur would have to be performed elsewhere.

“Miles!”

He snapped around at the sound of his name and couldn’t help his grin at the sight of the pretty blonde that was hurrying toward him. Giada Vance was the only girl in his year that Miles did not torture. There was no pigtail pulling, no shoelace knotting, and definitely no bugs in her soup. She was just always so nice to him that he couldn’t find it in himself to treat her like any of the other girls, and he blushed when she finally reached him.

“What are you doing out here?” he asked, ruffling the hair at the back of his head. Giada was pink in the face from the cold, her blue knitted hat causing her curls to cascade over her shoulders. She bounced on her toes.

“I saw you coming out here,” she said, her eyes wandering toward the Willow, “I thought maybe you’d want to talk a walk with me...what are you doing all the way by the tree?”

Miles’ heart had nearly jumped out of his chest. She wanted to take a walk with him! He could do a cartwheel right now, but he’d caught her quick glance to the Willow. A successful challenge was much more impressive than a walk.

“I was going to pick that flower by its base, for you,” Miles said smoothly, glad he’d recalled the one lone yellow flower. It was probably a weed, but it was the thought that counted! He felt warm at the sight of Giada’s blushing cheeks, but she reached out and tugged on his cloak.

“Don’t, it’s all right---you can get really hurt!” she squeaked, but she’d used the magic word! ‘Don’t’ set off all sorts of bells in his head and Miles held up his hand.

“Ah, tut tut, you just wait right here, okay?” He had figured out the radius of the Willow’s pounding by the dents in the ground its branches had left. A few feet forward and he could get squashed, but they were safe where they stood now. Miles grinned cheekily at Giada, leaning forward and presenting her his cheek, “But I think I need a kiss for good luck.”

Giada looked conflicted, her eyes jumping from Miles to the Whomping Willow. She bounced on her toes in nervousness, but after a few seconds of trepidation she pecked him on the cheek, going scarlet once she dropped away. That was all he needed to calm any nerves he had. He tightened his scarf around his neck and without a second thought (or a first, he’d have admit) bolted toward the base of the tree.

“Be careful, Miles!” Giada shouted after him, but his focus was on the trunk and that dinky flower he had his eyes set on. The prize was within reach, this really wasn’t going to be that bad, but at the thought he heard the creaking of the Willow’s branches and he felt the breeze of a branch swinging toward him. Miles dropped flat onto the ground, the knot of the branch whizzing over his back and causing his scarf to go flapping in the wind. That had been a close one, and he belly crawled a bit further. “LOOK OUT!”

The shadow of a branch covered him in darkness, and if it weren’t for Giada’s shout Miles would’ve been smashed to bits. Instead, he rolled to his left and managed to not become a crater in the ground, hearing a loud thud erupt in his ears. He scurried up to his feet and got tripped up by some smaller branches, and he got whipped by a few vines that were dangling closer to the trunk. But, he had made it to the trunk of the Whomping Willow. Miles bent and plucked up the dandelion, glad that the tree had decided that risking battering its own trunk was a bad idea, given his cozy position on one of the knots. He held up the flower for Giada to see, and the grin on his face because of how excited she looked hurt his cheeks. Miles was about to shout, asking if she wanted him to carve her name into the trunk, when the Willow made another loud creaking sound and a thick branch swung out.

Miles’ body went into shock at the sight of the branch striking Giada, sending her small body flying back. She landed with a sickening thud, and Miles suddenly regained feeling in his limbs. She must have moved forward while watching him, she’d entered the radius of the tree, she’d been hit! Miles completely forgot that the branches hanging above him were active and ready to kill, he pushed himself off the trunk of the Willow and ran as fast and as hard as he could toward Giada, shouting her name. The Willow wasted no time, as if angry at him for making it past its barriers the first time, and tripped Miles up by his feet, causing him to slam face first into the dirt.

He got shoved around some more, but one final swing sent him out of the radius of the tree. He tumbled head over heels for what felt like eternity, but once he came to a halt he was able to stand. Miles wasn’t standing for long, however, as he immediately dropped to his knees beside Giada’s seemingly lifeless form.

“Giada!” he shouted at her, dropping his ear to her face to see if she was breathing. Oh, thank Merlin, she was alive! But----she seemed to be in the deepest sleep he’d ever seen. Miles shook her shoulders, pushed her hair out of her face, grabbed her hands, but there was no reaction from the girl. He looked up frantically, his stomach seizing at the wide and empty grounds of Hogwarts, “HELP! HELP HER!”

He didn’t want to leave her, but she needed help, but---he couldn’t leave her side, he’d done this, he’d done this---Miles struck out his wand and shot up sparks and flares, anything sort of spell that he could remember made noise or was bright in form, but he could barely see what he was doing. His blurry eyes startled him, as he hadn’t realized he’d been crying in his panic. Miles looked up at the sound of voices, and when he wiped his tears away he spotted people coming towards them from the school. Someone must have seen, someone must have heard---

“It’s going to be okay,” Miles whimpered, grabbing onto Giada’s hand. He silently begged her to squeeze his hand back, but again there was nothing. He could’ve killed her, he may have killed her...

It was a whirlwind, the next few minutes. Miles was dragged away from Giada and the professors who had come conjured a stretcher for her, levitating her onto it and quickly heading back to the castle. Someone was examining some cuts and bruises on Miles’ face, an older Ravenclaw it may have been, but Miles sat on the hard ground in a daze, Giada’s blue knitted hat getting torn in his grip.

He was never going to forgive himself for this.

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