The Death Spitters
are celebrating their newest member tonight, in the old dorm in Slytherin that
they have taken over. It's in a high tower at the top of the house. The stairs
leading up to it are broken-down and tricky; they creak loudly if someone steps
on the wrong one. The door has been broken down, and is used as an all-purpose
table, held up by magic. There is a ragged curtain across the doorway. It has
the Death Spitters logo imprinted on it.
Andrew and Jenny,
who are, at the moment, romantically connected, are lying on the ancient bunk
bed, making out. Random is sitting at the table, making a potion for her own
nebulous uses. Later, she will distill the potion and pour what is left into a
small crystal bottle. Every month, she takes these bottles to an alley in
Hogsmeade. Money will change hands. Rachel is lying on the floor, smoking a
cigarette and looking through a stack of CDs. Rachel has managed to enchant a
CD player to work in Hogwarts, despite the high magical field. It has better
sound quality than a thousand-dollar speaker. Draco is sitting near the window,
watching Rachel.
Rachel holds up a
CD. "How about Guns N' Roses?"
Draco shrugs. "Are
they a Muggle band?"
Rachel grins. "Most
of 'em. One of the guys, Slash, I think, can speak in Parseltongue. I met him
once at a concert."
"Never heard of
'em." Draco pulls open the curtain on the window, revealing a cloudy
night. The Gryffindor tower is directly
across from the window.
Rachel checks her
watch. "Midnight. They should be back from Hogsmeade by now."
The dorm directly
across from the Spitters' room is the dorm that Harry Potter sleeps in. They
have been planning this for a week.
Lights go on in the
window. Jenny and Andrew roll off the bed; Random leaves her table.
Rachel throws open
the window. "Hello, Gryffindor!"
The other window
opens. Ron Weasley sticks his head out. "Will you guys shut up? We're trying to
get some sleep here."
Rachel waves. "Hey,
Ron. Is Harry there? Draco's got something to tell him."
Draco pokes his head
out beside Rachel and mimes a kiss.
Ron's face goes
almost as red as his hair. "Stick it up your ass."
The Death Spitters
giggle. "Ooh," Jenny says. "This means war."
Harry appears beside
Ron. "Leave us alone, okay?"
Rachel licks her
lips at him. "Harry. How absolutely wonderful to see you." Draco leers at him.
"Look," Harry
begins. "That little…stunt…this morning was the stupidest thing you have ever
done. I have no idea what you guys mean by that, but Dumbledore saw it and you
guys are in a lot of trouble."
Andrew laughs.
"What, for making out? You know you liked it."
Harry disappears.
Ron glares at them and slams the window.
Rachel turns to
Random. "Did you get them?"
Random produces a
bagful of small soft stones. These contain odd materials, some light acids,
some disgusting yet harmless things, and some contain Silly String. All of them
explode on impact. Random got these from Fred and George Weasley, both of whom
have crushes on her and also have no idea why she wanted them.
Random grins. "Two
hundred of them. That's twenty per person, if we're going to save half of
them."
She empties the bag
out onto the floor, very carefully, and splits them into even piles with a
practiced hand. Everyone scoops up a pile.
Rachel leans out of
the window and hurls a stone. "Ready…go!" The stone explodes against the
Gryffindor wall, splattering the stone with fluorescent goop.
Draco throws one
against the outside window, etching patterns on the glass. "See how you like that!"
Random quietly turns
on Guns N' Roses.
The Gryffindor
window flies open again. "TURN THAT MUSIC DOWN!" yells Hermione Granger.
Jenny giggles. "Ooh,
someone got a girl in their room."
Rachel knows that
Hermione and Harry are going out. She selects a stone that's filled with acid,
and throws it at Hermione's face.
Hermione screams.
Rachel grins
triumphantly. "You little whore."
The Death Spitters
march into the Great Hall, late as usual. Harry and Ron are sitting at the
Gryffindor table, as far away as they can from the Slytherins. Hermione is
nowhere to be seen.
Rachel slinks up to
Harry. "So," she says huskily, "where's your girlfriend?"
Harry concentrates
on his scrambled eggs. "Go away."
"Is she out sick?"
Rachel whispers in his ear. "Hmm?"
Ron turns and glares
at Rachel. "Look, you little…"
Rachel laughs.
"Well, aren't we outraged? I'm very intimidated, Weasley. That'll teach me not
to mess with you."
Harry sighs. "Look,
what do you want now?"
"You know what I
want," Rachel tells him.
Harry glares at her.
"How could you even think that it's possible for me to be remotely
attracted to the daughter of the man who killed my parents?"
Rachel slips into
Hermione's chair. "It's not my fault," she says. "My dad didn't even know I
existed until about a year ago. And believe me," she adds, "I got nothing from
my dad. I'm my mom all over, which might be worse, if you look at it that way.
Yeah, your parents are dead, but they're still protecting you. Both my parents
are alive, but my mom's a junkie and my dad hates me. Can you blame me for
wanting some secondhand affection?"
Harry looks away. "I
thought you were with Draco."
Rachel leans in very
close to Harry, almost touching him. "But Draco isn't who I want." She stands
up. "Think about it, hot stuff."
Before Rachel gets
three steps away, Ron grabs her by the shoulders. "Look," he hisses, "I don't
know what you're trying to pull here, I don't know what you want us to do, I
don't know who you think you are, but I do know that you have no business
seducing my best friend."
Rachel gives him a
blasé look. "It's the Death Spitters you got a problem with, not me." She
twists away from Ron and saunters over to the Slytherin table. "If you want to
bust us, be at the bell tower at midnight." She winks at Harry and is gone.
Random sits at the
teacher's desk in the Potions dungeon, idly turning the pages of a porn
magazine that one of her boyfriends bought from Garden of Temptations, a sex
shop in Hogsmeade. It has a recipe at the back of the magazine for a Sexual
Attraction potion, as well as an amulet design for sexual potency. Random rips
out the page and circles the potion.
Snape comes in.
"Random. Did you finish with the assignment?"
"Yeah." Random hands
him the cut out page. "Right here."
Snape scans it. "You
expect me to teach this in class? This is going to be highly amusing."
Random shrugs.
"Whatever. Look, Rachel's meeting some guy in the bell tower at midnight and I
promised her I'd get that pheromone perfume to her before eleven. Can I go
now?"
Snape nods. "Go
ahead. Who is she meeting?"
Random folds the
magazine under her arm and heads out the door. "Your guess is as good as mine."
Rachel wraps her
thick green cloak about her and stares off into the distance. The wind whips
the cloak about her and ruffles her hair, making her appear to be a guardian of
something ancient and forgotten. Drops of rain sprinkle the stone towers.
Harry Potter climbs
up the steps to the bell tower. He is wearing only a poet shirt and a pair of
jeans; not even shoes or socks. "Rachel?" he calls, stopping at the last step.
Rachel turns around
in surprise. "Harry. What's up?"
Harry climbs up and
stands beside her. "Did you want to talk to me?"
Rachel glances at
him sideways. "Yeah, I guess."
"About?" Harry
prompts. It's not easy to talk to Rachel when she's not mad at you.
Rachel runs her
fingers though her hair. "You know, the Yule Ball's coming up."
"And you're asking
me to go with you?" Harry said.
Rachel shrugged.
"Nah, cause we're skipping the Ball this year and going to a party in
Hogsmeade. It's going to be huge."
Harry blinked.
"You're asking me to a Death Spitters party?"
Rachel started. "No!
It's not a Death Spitters party. It's a general thing, at a rave. The Salon
Sorquina." The wind shifts, and Harry catches a whiff of Rachel's perfume. It's
dark, heavy and hormonal. It stirs something primal in him.
Rachel senses that
this is a good moment, ducks under the stone apse, and starts going down the
stairs. Harry hurries after her and catches her arm.
Rachel turns around
and stares at him. "What?"
Harry's pupils are
dilated. His hair is plastered to his forehead, and he is breathing heavily.
"Please," he says. "Stay."
Rachel hesitates for
a moment, just for show. In reality, every cell in her body is screaming screw
him! Screw him now!
Rachel takes him in
her arms and slowly presses her lips to his.
