"It would seem inefficient," Edmund admits. "Also my brother has told me stories of the faces you made when he tried to pay you back, so I'm ready to interpret it as a personal quirk."

"Yes, caring about other people as themselves without having ulterior motives or expecting payback. I am a very quirky character."

He extends one hand outside their shield and places it on the floor, palm down, then electrifies it and this causes one of Edmund's chairs (one that definitely had not been there earlier this night) to shrivel up with a shriek. He then grabs said chair, mutters something in French, and now his hands are magma-hot, and now so is the ex-chair, and now it's dead.

Edmund raises his eyebrows. "You can care about people without looking at a poison detection charm like a dead rat because someone wants to thank you with it."

He really should've noticed that mimic. Good thing Lake is a killing machine.

"I did not," he protests between spells, "and anyway it is terrible for my image if people start thinking I'm doing this for some sort of, of reward or something."

Yes. His image. That is absolutely the reason he objected to Peter's thank-you-for-saving-my-life gifts. Mmhm.

"Your image. You know what would help your image? Nothing, people think you're the fucking Second Coming of Christ. A bodhisattva of violence."

"Yes but they'll start doubting I can walk on water if they get the idea that I'm not doing this for free after all, and where would we be then?"

"A little better off, I think. Your halo makes it a little hard to see your face."

"Maybe I'm so pretty it's better if people don't see my face."

"Once again: noted."

"What is it with you Pevensies, it's like you've made it your personal project to get a degree in how to get under Scorpius Lake's skin."

It's not entirely clear whether he thinks that's a good or bad thing. Not even to himself.

"It's a popular track, but there can only be one valedictorian."

"One per year," he corrects after a small pause to set a wall of living flame by the door, "and you all seem evenly spaced for that, don't you!"

"That's right, you wouldn't know about Lu. She'll be in next year, but I doubt she'll major in Lake Studies. After me it's all downhill."

"At last, some peace. I'm really not that interesting, you know."

"You don't hide something no one would want."

"And what's that supposed to mean?" he protests, perhaps a bit too much, but it's surely better than if he'd said "I'm not hiding anything!" since there is not a single person in this school who could have said that sentence truthfully.

Edmund does not give this the dignity of a response.

So Scorpius Lake sticks his tongue out at him and resumes his bloodbath—the school really really does not want kids together past curfew, he knew about it already but seeing firsthand just how many mals it manages to dig up just to harass them for it is kind of incredible.

The silence (broken up by the blasting of spells and the shrieking of mals) feels almost companionable. They might be able to stay like this for a while.

Curfew ends at 6AM sharp and Scorpius suspects that is exactly how long this parade is going to go on for.

"You should catch some sleep, no reason for both of us to stay awake all night," he says during another short lull in the onslaught, after having spent a while recasting the dome shield which had been about to wink out.

"For the record, you're suggesting that I put up a silencing circle around my bed and ignore you slaughtering maleficaria by the dozens not five feet away?"

"Yep."

"Just making sure."

Edmund climbs into bed, fully dressed (when he was a freshman he slept naked, but it took exactly one instance of waking up to the feeling of a scorpion-shaped mal crawling along his bare thigh to cure him of that habit), and mutters a quick bit of Latin. He closes his eyes and mutters some more, and soon enough he's asleep.

In his sleep, he smiles.

When it's about time for the seniors to get up, Scorpius pokes Edmund awake. His room is... still clearly a battlefield, but at least most of the actual physical remains of the maleficaria are gone, destroyed by spells or just eaten by other, more opportunistic mals. His door is in two pieces, though, and the place smells of all sorts of different things. It's almost the smell-equivalent of white noise, almost ignorable in its pungent multitude, but not quite.

Scorpius himself is no longer glowing, but he's covered in grime and his skin has the sheen of sweat of a whole night of strenuous exercise and his clothes are stained by all sorts of things. He doesn't seem put out by it, though, even sporting a light smile on his lips. Probably used to the carnage.

Edmund awakens feeling unaccountably good. Bright. He feels - hopeful. His eyes open and he sees Scorpius, and he remembers why.

"I should really save you sometime," he says. "Fair's fair."