Chapter Text
Most methods of magical transportation are either too uncomfortable or too conspicuous for Muggle London. Since Diagon is only a few streets away from his flat, John suggests they walk. He decides against disillusioning both of them, considering he’s seen stranger outfits on London streets before.
Sherlock peppers him with questions as they walk, often not stopping talking long enough to hear John’s replies all the way to their conclusion.
When they reach Charing Cross and the entrance to the Leaky Cauldron, John stops, and Sherlock keeps walking. John watches, amused, as his boyfriend continues to walk down the road, speculating away about the mechanisms behind wand movements and magical incantations and their implications in the sciences of the non-magical world. After not too long, Sherlock stops and calls his name, looking around in confusion for John.
“Why have you stopped?” he asks as he spins on the pavement and returns to John’s side. His eyes slide between the two buildings on either side of the Leaky.
“We’re here.” John gestures at the pub, fascinated to witness the potency of the anti-Muggle charm.
Sherlock scoffs, eyes not quite focused as they glance towards the pub. “That’s just a broken-down shop. What do you mean, ‘we’re here?’” A wrinkle appears between Sherlock’s brow as he says thoughtfully, “Do you know…I lost a criminal here, once. I was chasing him through London and he just…disappeared.”
“He must have been a wizard,” John says, steering Sherlock so that he’s facing the pub and placing a hand on his back as he stands slightly behind him, “Because this is The Leaky Cauldron, address: number one, Diagon Alley.”
Sherlock gasps, stepping back and into John’s touch as his eyes widen, then blinking as though someone had just flashed a very bright light into his eyes. “Where did that building come from?”
“It was always there. What did you see?” John asks, curious.
“First just a door. Then the sign, and the windows. It was like a different building was pushing its way out from behind broken-down shop. Did you put a spell on me?”
“Almost the opposite. There’s a spell called the Fidelius Charm that can hide things, entire houses and neighborhoods, unless you get told by the right person where the thing is. I think that’s sort of how this works. Except with Diagon, every wizard is a de facto secret keeper until they reveal the existence of the magical world to a Muggle. Like you.”
Sherlock turns eyes so balefully confused on John that he looks pained by his lack of knowledge.
John grimaces. “Yeah, I got a Poor on my written exam when we covered concealment and unplottables in fifth year. I was busy trying to get off with this witch named Sarah. We’ll stop by Flourish and Blotts and pick you up a book on magical theory, eh?”
Sherlock’s eyes instantly brighten. “There’s a bookstore?”
John groans, already regretting what he’s just done. How is he going to get Sherlock to spend any time with John when he’s just been introduced to the literature and scholarly writing of an entire previously unknown culture?
* * *
“You have to put one of them back.”
“John!” Sherlock’s lip nearly wobbles, eyes wide and pleading.
John groans, pulling out his money sack and flourishing it in front of Sherlock. “We counted how much I have. Twice. Nine Galleons, eleven Sickles, and three Knuts. That’s worth at least a week of meals, Merlin help me, but only four books.” John looks over Sherlock’s stack with a critical eye.
A Complete Magical Theory by Adalbert Waffling (understandable)
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newton Scamander (unexpected)
Alchemy, Ancient Art and Science by Argo Pyrites (predictable)
Magical Misdemeanours in the Modern Law by Arsenius Bode (predictable)
Legal Guidelines for the Manufacture and Sale of Magical Poisons by Phyllida Smith (worrying)
John tells him, “Dump the Scamander and the Waffling, I still have those from my Hogwarts days. We can pick them up from my old room at Watson House later this week, if you’re willing to endure tea-time with my Mum. And if you swap out the Pyrites for a second hand version, then you can also get those recent editions of The Practical Potioneer I saw you eyeing.”
Sherlock is reluctant to leave the bookstore behind, but he squeezes John’s hand when they leave the shop, and gives him a quick kiss on the cheek at John’s long-suffering expression.
“What next?” he asks, bright and enthusiastic about exploring Diagon. John had thought Sherlock would be overwhelmed, after his near panic at John’s flat. Instead, he seems to be happily gathering an infinite amount of new data, shouting out a new deduction or revelation every few minutes.
John counts what’s left of his pocket change: a mere 12 Sickles and 3 Knuts, but more than he’d been expecting. In fact, it should be just enough for…
“Speedy’s.”
Sherlock looks ready to protest.
“Did you know it was part of a chain?” John asks innocently, and tugs on Sherlock’s hand to begin leading him to the corner of Diagon and Horizont Alley. Sherlock stops pouting when he realizes that John is not leading them back towards the Leaky Cauldron.
That doesn’t mean the journey is an easy one, though. John barely manages to get his boyfriend to continue walking once he’s spotted Slug & Jiggers Apothecary, and again when Sherlock sees Gringotts and bleats that they have to stop to take out money for more books.
Eventually John manages, after some careful and patient negotiations, to get Sherlock in front of a familiar red awning. John gestures at it with a “ta-da!” motion.
“It looks just like Speedy’s,” Sherlock says with a frown.
“It is Speedy’s. I originally applied to work this half of the operation, but Mrs. H wanted me on the Muggle side, so Irene could train me,” John explains as he opens the door for Sherlock.
The layout is the same as the Muggle Speedy’s, but the décor is different: more mismatched chairs, moving photographs on the walls, and a Security Sneakoscope over the door as well as a bell. John ushers Sherlock into a seat approximately where he would usually sit if they were in Muggle space and goes to the counter to order them drinks. A pumpkin fizz for himself and a mug of soothing nettle tea for Sherlock. He even scrapes together a measly tip for the Hogwarts-age witch behind the counter, who looks unimpressed at the single Knut and Muggle five pence piece.
John joins Sherlock at his chair just in time to intercept their drinks, which are soaring towards the table at an alarming rate.
After examining their drinks, Sherlock leans across the table intently. “Where are we? Why does this place look just like Speedy’s? How is there a whole city inside London that nobody knows about? Except for the people that do, that is.”
John shrugs. “Wizarding space. It’s all folded up inside the Muggle world. Bit genius, really. Wizards came up with a way to hide where nobody would look: where there was already something else to look at. I’ve read that you can fold space up to seven times, if you’re powerful enough to cast the charm. The Speedy’s you’re familiar with, occupies at least two other places that I know of.”
“Does that mean that we’re in a Speedy’s right now, but we’re also…at Speedy’s?” Sherlock asks, frowning at his own phrasing.
John nods, taking a sip from his pumpkin juice.
“But what about Mrs. Hudson? If she owns the Speedy’s on Baker Street, then who owns the wizard bit?” Sherlock asks.
John cracks a smile. “Who do you think?”
“No.”
“Yep.”
“No. No! First Irene and your other flatmates, now you’re telling me Mrs. Hudson is magical, too?! Who else is a wizard, Molly?”
“Who?”
Sherlock ignores him and groans, burying his face in his hands. “My whole life is a lie. Mrs. Hudson simply cannot be a witch.”
John giggles. “Sherlock, think about it. Where is your flat, in relation to Speedy’s?”
“Above it,” Sherlock answers, although he looks uncertain, now. John nods to confirm his answer.
“And where does Mrs. Hudson live?”
“Downstairs.”
John waits for the Knut to drop.
“Oh my GOD. How did I not notice that!” There’s pain on Sherlock’s face as he tries to wrap his mind around this revelation. John pats his hand sympathetically.
“Combination of a mild Confundus charm and simple inexperience with folded space. If you’re interested, I’m pretty sure Mike has a book on non-Euclidian geometry and wizarding physics that he’ll let you borrow. He was obsessed with the mechanics of wizard space when he came to Hogwarts and got stuck in a vanishing step. He and Irene were both raised without magic, you know.”
They launch into a discussion on wizarding genealogy, which leads to John’s family history. John promises a visit to the Watson ancestral home to meet his mum and sister sometime soon, and so they can browse through John’s dusty collection of textbooks.
* * *
They’re still talking when the shop closes hours later, their discussions moving between theoretical and personal, from wandlore to John’s favorite subjects in school.
“What does magic feel like?”
“What's it feel like?” John repeats, as they stroll down Diagon Alley towards the Leaky. “I’ve never had to think about it before.”
“How could you not?” Sherlock asks, exasperated. John giggles.
“It’s always been a part of my life, and I never met anyone who asked me to analyze it.” John pushes his shoulder against Sherlock’s, threading their fingers together. “In my house growing up…magic was a certainty. It was as certain as…that the Earth goes ‘round the sun.”
Sherlock looks skeptical. “Does it?”
John laughs, his turn to be the incredulous one. “Even Muggles know that. Didn’t you take astronomy in school?”
Sherlock’s nose wrinkles. “Astronomy is archaic. If I learnt any of it I must have deleted it.”
“Well, it was required at Hogwarts.”
Sherlock smirks. “Did they cover astrology as well?”
John thinks of batty old Trelawney lecturing on star signs and planetary charts. “No, that was an extracurricular.”
They’ve reached the fireplace at the Leaky Cauldron, and John gets inspired. “Do you want to try Magical transport instead of walking back to Baker Street?”
Sherlock cocks his head curiously. “What are you suggesting?”
John grins, taking a pinch of floo powder from a cup on the mantel. “Travel by fire.” He tosses the powder into the fireplace and the embers rage up into tall green flames.
Sherlock steps back in surprise, putting a hand out to shield his face from heat that does not come. “I’m guessing it was something more than boric acid in that cup to turn the flames green?”
“Floo powder. You step into the flames and announce your destination, and it’ll take you to the registered fireplace that’s closest.” John brushes his fingers through the flames to show Sherlock that it’s safe.
Sherlock is shaking his head, looking horrified at the sight of John’s hand in the fire. “I’m sorry, but no. The magical pet store was great and thank you for the books, but I think stepping into a great pit of fire is my limit for one day. I’ll walk.”
“C’mon,” John cajoles teasingly. “Walking is boring. If you really don’t want to try the floo today, then what do you think of apparition?”
“A magical form of teleportation, through which a qualified witch or wizard can disappear from one location and reappear in another almost instantaneously.”
John nods, trying to maintain a serious expression. “That is the literal dictionary definition, yes.” (Sherlock had speed-read a single book in the section of Flourish and Blotts dedicated to non-magical parents and partners before declaring that he was ready for more advanced material and striding towards the nearest clerk to ask where he could find books on transfiguration theory.)
Sherlock considers for a moment, then nods his head. “Acceptable.”
John takes Sherlock’s elbow. “Technically, this is enough contact to take you along with me when I disapparate. But the closer we are, the more comfortable the journey will be for you.”
John gets an eye-roll in response to this line, but Sherlock nonetheless steps closer until they’re pressed against each other in an embrace. John smiles sunnily up at his boyfriend, who scoffs and looks away.
“Still trust me, Mr. Holmes?” John asks.
“I suppose I do, Mr. Watson.”
“Brilliant. Hold on tight.”
Crack!
“Oof!” Sherlock sways towards John, clutching at his shoulders as he regains his balance.
John takes a moment to orient himself. Baker Street. The light is dim, and it takes a moment for his eyes to adjust. Sherlock’s flat, in the exact spot John had been envisioning between the two chairs by the fireplace. He’d always been an excellent shot on the Quidditch pitch, and it had served him well when apparition lessons began.
“Hi again, handsome. First impressions of apparition?”
“Uncomfortable, but expedient.”
John nods at the apt assessment. Now that they’ve arrived, he could let Sherlock go. But he quite likes having the man in his arms. He hasn’t held him properly in days and days. John wonders how, despite that, there’s a sense of ease between them, and comfort.
“What are you thinking about?” Sherlock murmurs, leaning his forehead down against John’s, apparently equally content to stay in this embrace a while.
“When I woke up today, I was worrying about my secret coming between us. But it’s the opposite, isn’t it? It was the secret, keeping the distance. Now you finally know the real me.”
Sherlock knocks his head against John’s with a stern expression. “Of course it’s the opposite. All the things that made me doubt about you, or made me wonder why you wouldn’t let yourself get close to me, they were all about hiding this part of your life. Even if it is a ridiculous secret.”
“Your fourth theory was that I was a time-traveler,” John teases.
“I did have all the data!” Sherlock insists.
John wants to kiss him, so he does.
It starts out light and playful, but soon becomes intense, their motions filled with relief and meaning and passion. Sherlock wraps his arms around John’s back and tugs him closer, so they’re pressed together and there’s nothing left between them. Finally.
“Sherlock!” John gasps as he feels a leg slide between his own. His cock twitches, already halfway to hard. “Do you remember,” John gulps, as Sherlock licks at the exposed collarbone at the opening of his robes, “last time we were here.”
Sherlock hums and starts to suck a bruise on the side of John’s neck like a bloody vampire. Oh, vampires! John needs to remember that Sherlock will want to hear about them sometime.
Sherlock lips at the shell of John’s ear and John groans, guttural, and tries hazily to finish his thought. “Last week I said…I didn’t want to have sex yet…because I was hiding something from you?”
“Yes, John,” Sherlock answers, tearing his mouth away from John’s neck to look him in the eye. His eyes are smoldering and his hair is already a mess from John’s fingers running through it. “I remember.”
“Well, I’m done hiding….So…. Can I take you to bed?”
Sherlock grins, and smacks a kiss on John’s lips. “I thought you’d never ask.”
Bloody cocky git.
With a playful growl, John heaves Sherlock over his shoulder and carries him to the bedroom, shaking under Sherlock’s laughter all the way there.
John is more careful with him as he lowers Sherlock down onto the bed and crawls on top of him. Sherlock doesn’t seem the least bit nervous, but John, at least, is mindful that this is only Sherlock’s second time ever being this intimate with someone.
In the end, it’s easy. A natural progression from the physical and emotional affection between them that they’ve been waiting ages to make.
* * *
John comes, collapsing beside Sherlock in a coma of oxytocin, and feeling like there might be Nargles in his brain and glow worms in his heart.
John glances at Sherlock beside him, and finds Sherlock looking back. The second their eyes meet, they collapse into a mutual fit of giggles.
“That was…”
“Quick?” John giggles.
“Quick,” Sherlock agrees through his own laughter.
“Still good,” John insists. “Just…finished pretty soon for something I spent so much time thinking about!” John chokes out between laughs. Sherlock giggles in return, then rolls onto his side, clapping a hand onto John’s blond-haired chest.
He pins John with a look that is attempting to be serious, but keeps breaking into a smile. “Don’t worry. I have a feeling the second time will last longer. Maybe we’ll even get my trousers all the way off. But first, I have to clean off.”
John grins, and waves a lazy hand to cast a quick Scourgify. It’s not as powerful as it would’ve been with a wand, but it’s enough to keep Sherlock in the bed beside him, and that’s all that matters. “There are some perks to dating a wizard, Mr. Holmes.”
“Mr. Watson,” Sherlock growls. “I find it deadly-sexy when you do impossible things.”
John growls and pulls Sherlock on top of him. “Oh yeah?” he asks. “Then you’ll love this one,” John says, and snaps his finger to vanish the remainder of their clothing into the corner of the room (a skill it had taken him months to perfect, to great acclaim in bed). John rolls them over and leans in for a thorough snog.
* * *
Their second time having sex together is just as fun as the first, and but not nearly as quick. John gets a chance to show Sherlock all the magical things he can do with his mouth, and Sherlock returns the favor.
* * *
Their third time (and last in the night’s marathon) is different. It's early morning when Sherlock rolls onto a dozing John and whispers in his ear, “Again?”
John pretends to protest, citing the early hour and teasing Sherlock for his apparent insatiability, but he was ready to go the second he reached consciousness and felt Sherlock’s breath tickling at his ear.
It starts out slightly sleepy, and only builds in intensity as it stays slow, and sensuous, and powerful. It’s like guzzling amortentia straight from Sherlock’s lips.
As they rock together, John feels a sensation building in his veins that he used to think was magic but now thinks might be love, inspired by the gorgeous, luxurious, ridiculous creature above him. John climaxes before he has a chance to think about what the feeling might mean, and Sherlock follows soon after, moaning wordlessly with pleasure.
Hazy and satisfied, John has enough presence of mind to clean them up as best he can before dropping off to sleep, Sherlock’s limbs curling around John like an affectionate Devil’s Snare.
* * *
“John.” John feels something pushing at his shoulders. “Jo-ooohnnn” a deep voice sing-songs. “Wake uuu-uuuup.”
“Mmmmm….time for more sex?” John asks groggily, stretching out his limbs as he blinks his eyes open. Sherlock’s face is hovering inches above his own, a fond smile on his face.
“Later. Definitely. But right now, I think there’s something you’ll want to see.”
“Are you sure?” John growls, voice low and gravelly with sleep as he rolls Sherlock onto his back playfully. “I think I’m ready for another round now.” John nips at Sherlock’s chin as his boyfriend giggles, pushing gently at John’s chest.
“John, look.”
“Okay, okay. What is it?” John asks, rolling onto his back and blinking. The ceiling – there’s something on the ceiling. Curling tendrils of…John doesn’t know what.
It’s too dark to see properly, so John rolls out of the bed to open the curtains.
His feet land on something unexpectedly cool and soft. They look like vines. Long green vines, winding along the floor and crawling up the bedposts to the ceiling. They don’t look dangerous, or like any of the many poisonous, sometimes temperamental plants John has encountered in his studies of Herbology.
“Look, John! They lead out the bedroom door.”
John turns to see that Sherlock is right. The vines converge on the door, squeezing underneath it and through the sides. Sherlock is reaching for the doorknob when John calls, “Stop!”
Sherlock freezes.
“We don’t know anything about these plants, Sherlock. And I’m unarmed. And naked.”
“What good is a gun against a vine?”
John rolls his eyes. “I meant my wand. I left it in my trousers. Hence why I’m both unarmed and naked.”
Sherlock tosses John a bathrobe with a grin, and wraps another one – red and silky - around himself. “Yes. By my calculations, your trousers ended up somewhere in the hallway. Shall we look for them?”
John bites his lip as he ties the borrowed blue bathrobe around his waist. He doesn’t want to risk angering whatever obviously magical plant this is, but he’s no good stuck in here without his wand, either.
“It’s just a plant. They’re harmless,” Sherlock wheedles. One of the nearby tendrils reaches out to wrap itself around Sherlock’s pinky finger. “And friendly, apparently. Are magical plants sentient?”
John inspects the curly green vine that’s wrapped loosely around Sherlock’s finger. It has the bud of a flower at the end of it. Yellow, and looking ready to open at any moment. John shuts his eyes in disbelief, because he suddenly knows exactly what this is.
Best to get it over with, he thinks after a pained moment. He pushes open the door wide, allowing a wide-eyed Sherlock to step out first.
“Oh, John.”
John pads silently behind Sherlock as they follow the vines out the bedroom door and into the sitting room of 221B. There are more flower buds in the hallway, starting to open as Sherlock weaves through them. Sherlock reaches the center of the sitting room, morning light streaming through the front windows, and does a full turn in wonder at the explosion of plant life.
Daisies. Hundreds.
Yellow and white.
Vines of them climbing up every chair and table, winding up the lamp, between books, over the mantel and even peeking through the eyes of the skull. They sway gently, seeming to open wider for Sherlock, shine brighter as they wave at him. Sherlock laughs at the swell of color, delighted.
John is mortified.
“Daisies! Magical ones! Are these all for me?” Sherlock asks.
“I didn’t mean to,” John answers, face hot with embarrassment. “My magic does this sometimes. It likes to misbehave when I get emotional. Usually glass breaks when I’m angry if I don’t have a proper outlet, or people’s possessions catch fire. But when I’m around you…nicer things usually happen. Tea. Candles. Flowers, apparently.”
John covers his eyes, unwilling to meet Sherlock’s gaze, or spend any more time looking at the riot of flowers filling the room. This is outrageously over-the top, even for John. It must have happened during their last bout of love-making in the early morning, or perhaps when he was falling asleep on a cloud of bliss afterwards.
John was so lost in loving Sherlock he didn’t even notice.
“Are you embarrassed?” Sherlock asks, stepping closer to John and gently prying his hands from his face.
John looks pitifully up at Sherlock. “Of course, I am. This is the cheesiest, showiest thing I’ve ever seen, and I don’t even get to claim it was intentional!”
“Don’t be embarrassed. I like them.”
“Come on!” John cries, voice high. “I’m over here trying very hard to be this athletic, repressed type and I’m making bloody flowers grow at your feet I’m so emotional?”
“I love you.”
“...What?”
Sherlock shrugs, eyes clear and unbothered by John’s mortification.
“That’s what the flowers mean, right? So. I love you. If I was a wizard, then after last night, this flat would be full of…honey bees and unsolved murders. Because I love you, too.” Sherlock sounds so matter of fact about it, like these aren’t the most stunning, precious words John has ever heard in his life.
John reaches up on his tiptoes to kiss Sherlock, fiercely, because he worries if he doesn’t share all the light inside him in some tangible way, that he’s going to burst. So he pours that light out through his lips, and fingers, and toes, whispering out “I love you,” between kisses, because that’s what’s been inside of him trying to get out for ages now. Maybe since their first day together.
John breaks off the kiss when he feels Sherlock start to shake under his hands, and hears the beginning rumble of Sherlock’s laugh.
“What?” John asks, eyes still shut as he unconsciously mirrors the smile on Sherlock’s mouth, trying to persuade him back to snogging with little nips and pecks. Sherlock breaks into a full-blown giggle and John finally settles down on his heels, opens his eyes to ask—
More daisies. Fresh chains of them, curling around Sherlock’s wrists and forearms and blooming atop his hair into a riotous crown of curls and petals as flowers open before his eyes.
John groans and covers his face with his hands. “Bloody bee prince. You cannot tell Irene or Bill about this ever. They will tease me until the day I die.”
Sherlock giggles some more, and plucks two flowers from his wrists to plant behind John’s ears.
* * *
“You’ll be fine, Sherlock. I promise.”
Sherlock turns a skeptical eye on him.
John chuckles. “Shall we try it together, then?”
Sherlock takes a deep breath. “Okay.”
“Remember to keep your elbows tucked in.” John takes Sherlock’s hand before ducking the pair of them into the green flames of Mrs. Hudson’s fireplace (upstairs only has electric) and calling, “Golpalott Terrrace, number twenty-one!” He holds Sherlock securely at his side as they spin through London grates, shutting his eyes against the dizzying sight.
They stumble out into John’s flat to a collective cheer from Irene, Bill, and Mike. Now that Sherlock has been introduced to magic, he can finally attend their regular movie night at John’s magic-infested flat.
Sherlock, of course, slots into the group with enviable grace, and it isn’t long before he’s begun interrogating Irene for details of the gang’s exploits at Hogwarts and sweet-talking his way through Mike’s and Bill’s bookshelves.
They’re having an altogether lovely night when Sherlock asks.
“Where’s John?”
“Uh. I’m right here, babe,” John says, shooting a confused look at his boyfriend.
Sherlock rolls his eyes. “Obviously. I was referring to Irene’s dog, John.” Sherlock gestures towards the red collar and leash hanging on a peg next to the door.
“Oh, right!” John squeaks, ears turning red. “I’d forgotten about him.”
Bill guffaws, while Irene and Mike have the courtesy to stifle their amusement.
Sherlock looks at them oddly. When he returns his eyes towards John, he’s met instead with the sight of a golden-haired German Shepherd with a very familiar pair of blue eyes.
John barks, tongue lolling out of his mouth and tail wagging.
“You cannot be serious.” Sherlock squats to get a closer look in John’s eyes. “The physics alone-”
John gives another happy bark, and licks Sherlock’s face.
“…You’re lucky I’m a dog person,” Sherlock grumbles, wiping at his sticky face.
“Mate, out of the two of you, I think John’s the dog-person,” Bill cackles. “Get it? Dog-person!”
John ignores Bill in favor of nuzzling against Sherlock’s hand. He thumps his tail furiously against the floor and barks again, giving Sherlock his best doggy smile.