Devil's snare (!!!)
“Zaros,” Silas’ deep voice calls.
“Hm?” Is my only response.
Silas is one of the few people that actually know about my condition. Him and the professors. It was an accident that he found out in the first place. I suppose it’s hard to hide something like that from one’s roommate.
“Can I borrow your notes from potions?”
I roll my eyes and speak in my usual deadpan tone, “You’d think a pureblood like you’d be able to focus for more than two seconds.”
Despite my remark and annoyance, I take my notes from under my bed and hand them to him. I don’t need them, anyways. I take notes so Snape doesn’t berate me about ‘not paying attention in class,’ but I already know what he’s teaching. Potions come naturally for me. It’s not all that difficult. It’s charms and wand magic that I struggle with.
“Thanks, man,” Silas says.
I nod in acknowledgement and return to ‘reading’ my book. Not that I’m actually able to concentrate on it. It’s not even a good book. It’s some sappy romance I got for a knut to burn time. I’d be better off with nothing but my own thoughts.
I could go to the library. Perhaps visit Professor Gaunt and see if I could get a note to access the restricted section. It’s always enjoyable to brush up on the dark spells and practices. Professor Gaunt believes in learning about dark magic to be able to defend against it. She says ‘You can’t defend yourself from something you don’t understand.’ She didn’t say that in class, of course, but rather while she was tutoring me.
I wonder how much she actually knows about what I am. Of course, she knows to an extent. I had to tell all the professors. Whatever. It doesn’t matter. I’ll just take my potion and pray to cerce that I’ll sleep through the night.
I take my potion out of the vial and choke it down. It’s not supposed to taste terrible, but it does. Everything does. It doesn’t matter, though. The potion does its job and within seconds I’m fast asleep.
Nhg…What the hell? It’s still night. Fuck, I need to make stronger potions. I have to make them more potent so I don’t start falling asleep in class. Bloody hell, and that’s the only potion I had on hand.
I hate when I wake up before dawn. I’ll be dragging my feet all day. More than usual. Damn my body and its incessant need to sleep between 6AM and 3PM. 10PM to 6AM. That’s all I ask of my sleep schedule, but no, can’t have that. Can’t have a normal sleep schedule. I get the semi-nocturnal natural sleep schedule.
I roll over and rub my eyes before looking down at the bulge under my blanket. I’m hard. Why the hell am I hard? I don’t even dream with the potions. It doesn’t make it better that I have to piss. I’ll just deal with it myself so I can get it to go down.
It feels so wrong when I do this, but it’d feel even more wrong if I let someone else help me with it. I leave the blanket covering me just in case Silas wakes up, but I shimmy my bottoms so they’re around my knees. I bend one knee, making a bit of a tent with my blanket to hide my motions. If Silas wakes up I don’t want to be entirely screwed.
I run a finger up my slit. Sure, it feels good, but it’s nothing special. It’s no better than cannabis. It’s a filthy act I do purely for the sake of getting my dick to go flaccid. I grab a sock just to catch the mess and a bit of lotion just to make things more slick. I want to be done with this as fast as possible.
Even my own cock repulses me. I don’t like touching it, but I can’t deny that the sensation is… nice. I stroke myself up and down at a quickening pace, trying to keep my breathing as soft as possible.
I bite down on the side of my hand absentmindedly as I spill into the sock with an inevitable groan. I must have bit a bit too hard. The taste of my blood fills my mouth. I pull my hand away from my mouth. I don’t swallow. I refuse to swallow my own blood. I’m going to puke.
I take the sock off of my member and toss it in the hamper before going to the bathroom, spitting out my blood and thoroughly cleansing myself of any traces of my horrid actions. I am not some half-wit with no self-control. I should be able to control my urges. I shouldn’t have wanked. It is not a proper thing to do. Then add biting my own hand to the equation and it makes it all the worse. If a professor asks what happened to my hand that’s going to be a rather awkward discussion to have. It’s a thing that should not be discussed. Even if I had a partner, which I have no desire to, I wouldn’t tell them this. Nor would I let them help me with my wood. It’s just a vile act entirely, no matter the circumstances.
I can just wrap it and refuse to answer questions until it heals. Perhaps I’ll even brew a wiggenweld potion or use essence of dittany just to get it to go away. I could do so now, however, if I get caught I don’t want to have to deal with that. Filch’s cries of outrage would make just about anyone’s ears bleed.
Nevertheless, my hand should be healed before I attend classes tomorrow morning. I stuff my hands in my pockets, walking to the greenhouses. Perhaps if I just get some dittany leaves I can put something together in my dorm. Snape’s office is near the potions classroom so that’s out of the question. The old bat always seems to be awake. Either in his office or patrolling the halls. He hardly ever goes into the greenhouses, though. No one does at night. The devil’s snare takes over at night. It’s a war between the devil’s snare and venemous tentacula after dark.
I point my wand at the door to the greenhouses and whisper, “Alohamora.”
Nothing.
“Aberto.”
Still nothing. Perhaps an older spell might work. A bit brutish, but the lock with repair itself.
“Portaberto.
Finally. The lock clicks open and the door drifts open. A tenril of devil’s snare immediately wraps itself around my ankle. I raise an eyebrow.
“Don’t be cunty,” I deadpan, “Lumos.”
At the light of my wand the plant retreats. I sneeze at the spores that fill the humid air. A growling sound comes from one of the vampiric vegetation. It looks like it’s been defanged recently.
“Do be quiet. You don’t need to be so cranky just because a third-year ripped out your fangs,” I pause, “What, you jealous?” I brandish my fangs at the plant.
It’s a debate whether or not it understands or even knows what I’m doing, but I wouldn’t be surprised. I go to advance further into the greenhouse, but I trip over something. I barely catch myself before falling face-first into the bed of fanged geranium. They growl and snap at the disturbance.
“Muffliato,” I cast, silencing them as I turn to see what I tripped over.
“What in the…?” I say aloud.
There’s a large tendril of devil’s snare lying across the ground. That doesn’t seem right. They flee from the light. I hesitantly poke it with my wand, but it does nothing. I follow it down to its roots, but it’s a bit hard to do that when it’s cut clean. Professor Longbottom doesn’t do that. She doesn’t just leave plant parts lying around.
“Lumos maxima,” I cast so I can see clearer.
A few of the sentient plants shriek at the light and many snap at the disturbance, but to my horror that tendril isn’t the only one. Someone other than me hs been in here tonight, and had a horrendous experience with the devil’s snare apparently.
I sneeze again and cough a few times, covering my nose and mouth with my sleeve. I’m getting a bit dizzy, but I am most certainly sober. I look around and see why exactly I feel this way. There’s a disrupted batch of puffapods. No matter, they aren’t lethal.
I keep my sleeve over my nose and mouth as I look around some more, stepping carefully over the black tendrils. I go to the dittany plant- they keep at least one in every greenhouse in case of injury- and I pluck a few leaves, stuffing them into the empty vial I keep in my robes. The plant has mostly been plucked, but it was fine earlier today. It was full and bushy, now it’s mostly just stems.
Whoever did this had very little brains. They forced their way through a plant afraid of light and plucked nearly all of the leaves of a plant that they could have simply taken in full. If they needed that much dittany they should have grabbed the whole pot, but no, they had to do this. At least dittany isn’t sentient.
I sneeze again. This is getting annoying. This has nothing to do with me. I should just leave. This is none of my concern. Professor Longbottom can deal with it tomorrow.
When I get back to my dorm Silas wakes up from the sound of the door.
“Mm…” He mumbles, “Breaking curfew again? Typical Zaros fashion.”
He falls back asleep immediately after finishing his sentence. I sit on the edge of my bed and take the dittany out of the vial with a bit of a struggle. It’s not the proper container, but it’s what I had, I chew on a leaf, nearly gagging at the taste. I press another between my thumb and forefinger to bruise the leaf and release the juices. I place it over the bite and feel the sting as it heals. It’s not the most pleasant thing, but it’s better than having to try and explain the bite to the professors.