He noticed her for the first time when he had been assigned a detention.

He and Lavender- thank Merlin Lavender escaped- had been down to free a second year Hufflepuff, hanging from his arms in the basement. They'd gotten the boy free and Seamus had sent him off with Lavender, but before he could reach the Room of Requirement someone had sounded an alarm. He'd really started running, then, and he'd managed to hex at least two Slytherins before he had rounded the corner, and was so near the tapestry- and ran full pelt into a savagely gleeful Amycus Carrow.

"Should've expected it from a filthy half-blood," Carrow had spat almost gleefully, gripping his arm so tightly Seamus was half afraid his blood circulation would be cut off. "You're comin' wi' me, scum."

And so he had been dragged, stumbling across the stone hallways of a school he had once loved and thought of as safe. The torchlight flickered on the walls, and he had glimpsed several sympathetic faces from the portraits. There was Porthos- who had once warned him of Alecto Carrow's approach- and there, Violet, whose shriek had once alerted him to raise a shield charm. Even in that corner over there he saw Sir Cadagon, who had taken refuge in another painting after one of the Carrows had slashed his initial frame (Ernie had whispered that Cadagon had threatened Alecto to a duel).

He had known, of course, where he was going. He was going where Neville had been before him- several times- where Luna had been, where Ginny had been. Where Dean would have been, too, he had thought with a pang, and wondered where the hell his best mate was, hoping to highest heaven that he was alive. He would be going to a Defence Against the Dark Arts class.

If he weren't currently in this predicament, Seamus would have snorted at the irony of it all. Defence Against the Dark Arts class? Bollocks. Some student would be forced to cast the Cruciatus curse on him- whether they wanted to or didn't want to, and if they failed, they, too, would be subject to 'detention'.

His stomach coiled at the thought, seemed simultaneously to plunge down beneath the cold tiles and rise up like bile to the back of his throat. He didn't want to feel the pain of the Cruciatus curse. Merlin help him- he was scared to feel the pain.

For the first time, he had felt so unlike a Gryffindor- so unlike- bloody hell, so unlike Neville, who had gone in and faced the curse so many times, had come out shaking but stronger, and had only urged more and more people to take refuge in the Room, to fight back against the tyranny at Hogwarts. Neville. Bloody hell, that boy had balls when it came to it. If only he, Seamus, had half the guts-

A sudden movement sent him crashing into a desk, and a sudden spasm of pain shot through his head. When he opened his eyes, he saw the floor (beside? Above)- and he took a sharp intake of breath.

"Well, class," Amycus crowed in the background- his head was spinning too much for anything to be clear- "time to see how our spells have improved, isn't it? Miss Greengrass!"

Greengrass? He had thought vaguely.

The name was familiar enough- he could have sworn there was a Greengrass in his year. Slytherin, of course- that would be why he didn't know her. Distantly, he heard the scraping of a chair, the swish of robes as the girl made her way to the front. She was a prettyish girl with dark brown hair and a rather classic profile, and she steadily refused to deign to look at him, raising her nose and staring coolly at the door behind.

Look me in the eye, he thought furiously, raising his head. His hands were shaking. If you're after cursing me, you're gonna have to look me in the eye!

"So, Miss Greengrass!" Amycus was saying gleefully, clapping his hands. "Let's see if you've improved!"

Look at me!

"Crucio," she said, her voice hard and edged with something Seamus couldn't quite place. And before he could even think, the pain burst through him, bright sparks and tatters like misshapen scythes curling and tearing at every corner.

He wasn't sure if he screamed, or if he heard laughter (though there possibly was some, he was sure of it)- and then his vision retreated into the cool numbness of silence.

He had been hit by a truck. He had been set ablaze and left to burn. He had been-

In a Defence Against a Dark Arts class.

Oh.

If he could have, he might have emitted a groan. But there was cold floor beneath him (so calm and soothing, so cold and forgiving)- and it was quiet, and oh Merlin, it was peaceful. He could have stayed there for hours. He could-

He could hear someone.

Blearily, he fumbled for his wand, only to feel it jerk across the room.

"Please," a voice whispered urgently, "please don't say anything. Don't do anything, just don't make a sound! I've got something here, it'll help you."

One of the DA, then. He struggled to place the voice. It was a girl, but it wasn't Lavender or Parvati or Padma, it definitely wasn't Ginny, it couldn't be Hannah or Susan, and he just couldn't think- (oh Merlin, the pounding in his head was worse than that hangover the time he'd bought Dean all that Firewhisky when Ginny had dumped him and taken up with Harry)- and-

The figure was kneeling beside him, somewhat hazily.

"Drink this," the girl commanded in a cool voice, "it'll clear the pain."

"Wh- wha- ist?" Seamus croaked, blinking.

The girl's face swam into focus.

Soft hazel eyes on a classical face, high forehead and small dainty nose, framed by dark hair.

Greengrass.

"You!" he choked, drawing back. He tried to push the flask away.

The girl's eyes flashed.

"You idiot, I'm trying to help!" she hissed, thrusting the flask at him. "It'll ease the pain! Or is it a requisite for a person to be deficient in their brain to be Sorted as a Gryffindor?"

As he cautiously took the flask, Seamus was sure she muttered something about idiot boys, followed by a string of far less flattering terms. He couldn't smell anything (but really, what had he been expecting? Pumpkin juice?), so he took a small sip.

The liquid left a fresh shimmer in his throat, and he eagerly drank more until the flask was empty, and the classroom was clear. He could see the edges of the arched doorway now, the degrees of shadow over shadow bleeding into the wall.

"Thank you," he said, standing up. He turned his face, just slightly, and held the flask out. "I think this is yours?"

He heard a humourless laugh as the flask left his hand, and glanced up.

"I should have expected you wouldn't look at me," Daphne Greengrass murmured, her eyes both distant and entirely too focused. "I did just cast an Unforgiveable on you." Then she raised her face to his, her eyes strangely urgent. "Finnegan- that's your name, isn't it? – Finnegan, I swear I didn't know it would be strong enough to make you to lose consciousness. I don't do it very often, and I don't like to do it, but I had to, you don't know how awful the Carrows can be if you don't actually do what they ask!"

The shimmer in his throat twisted into a hot rage.

"I don't actually know how awful the Carrows can be?" he snorted, images of Neville's wounds rushing through his mind, "I don't know how awful the Carrows can be?"

She seemed to realise what she had said, and flushed.

"Look, I'm sorry," she said, crossly. "I'm sorry if I don't exactly want to put myself on the line for the next Cruciatus, or be strung up in a dungeon for my sister to pass by and weep. But I just wanted to let you know that I didn't enjoy doing what I did, and I hope you're well so that you can just- disappear wherever it is that you disappear."

She stood abruptly and moved swiftly to the door.

"The Room of Requirement."

She paused, mid step, and turned around. There was a strange light in her eyes, like the gleam of some of Mam's energy light globes at home, when they first turned on- just after the cold blue light that made him worry that the light was dying, and just before the full warmth of the light filled the room.

She didn't say anything, merely raised an eyebrow, and Seamus stammered into speech.

"I mean- it's- that's- that's where we- I mean- I- that's where I go. The Room of Requirement."

Coolly, she drew her wand and pointed at the door. The lock clicked into place.

"I, uh- you're… you're good with non-verbals," Seamus muttered, feeling somewhat as though a cesspool had sprouted in his stomach. "Um, er, can I- can I go?"

She pursed her lips and crossed her arms.

"Only twenty minutes ago, I cast the Cruciatus curse on you," she said, as though Seamus had forgotten the searing pain and the pounding darkness. "I sit and eat and work with Pansy Parkinson, who frequently wishes death and pain upon your motley crew. My uncle is a Death Eater, and my parents, though not Death Eaters themselves, support the Dark Lord and his followers. And you tell me where your crew meets."

Yeah, a cesspool. How Seamus wished one would appear so he could jump into it. Maybe after wiping Daphne Greengrass' memory. What was the charm again? Oblivate? Obliviate? And how was one meant to flick the wand? And where was bloody Hermione Granger when you really, really needed her?

"Um- er, yeah," he said, looking at the floor very determinedly. It was a lovely shade of grey, thin spidery cracks breaking the smoothness in rather odd places. "Um."

"Um," she repeated, unimpressed.

"Yeah."

It was a very long silence that followed, as the second stretched by like hours, and even the shadows seemed to move with the tick of an imaginary clock.

You bloody idiot. You've gone and ruined everything. You bloody idiot.

"I hope that at least someone in that room has been smart enough to ensure that no one unwanted enters," she said presently, her voice breaking through the unbearable crescendo of quietness and cutting into Seamus' thoughts.

"Oh, and I've found a way."

"A way to do what?"- staring at Neville as he airily picked up a bottle (Essence of Dittany) that hadn't been there a moment before.

"Oh, a way to keep the Carrows and Malfoy and his gang out of here. It's really easy, actually, and I dunno why we didn't think of it last time, I've just been really specific about who the Room can and can't let in, so-"

He laughed in relief. And laughed, and laughed, until his stomach ached (not that it would have taken much as whatever had been in the flask was good but not that amazing) and his eyes glazed over with a welcome pain.

When his vision cleared once more, he found Daphne Greengrass, still standing by the door, a mildly impatient but half amused look on her face.

"Care to share, since you seem so willing to expose tactical secrets?" she said archly, and Seamus grinned.

When he'd been little, he'd once asked his Mam why everyone smiled at him.

"It's you, my boy," she had said, smiling wildly. "When you smile you see everyone else smile, too. And you're always happy."

And she had held him (before he had momentarily grown too old for his Mam's hugs), and kissed him and told him she was proud of him.

So maybe it was just that, maybe it was because he was grinning, but it seemed that the light that had been present for just a moment in Daphne Greengrass' eyes was brighter, nearly at that warmth when the globe would embrace the whole room in that homey haze he associated with cotton and oily bambrack. But then he was sure that it couldn't be just that, because the light was growing, almost fiercely bright. And it was a fierceness he liked, and blast it all if he wasn't feeling something rising in his chest (which he hadn't felt since that incident with Lavender in fifth year, now something of utmost unimportance).

"You're crazy, Finnegan," she said, and he could swear she was trying to hold back a smile, a real smile.

She'd be so pretty if she smiled.

Damn it all, where had that come from?

"It's Seamus," he blurted out, and wished he could sink into the ground.

She smiled, then, really smiled, and her face lit up as she met and held his gaze for the first time that day. (Bambrack and the sheets that Mam would bring in, fresh from the sun, Aunt Tessa's boxty, and that burst of wind when he kicked off during a match of Quidditch).

"Daphne," she said, and beneath the cool tone, Seamus caught a waft of gentleness almost attempting to seep into the grey stone.

They stood for another moment (or it could have been several, Seamus really had no idea), before Daphne coughed.

"I-" she swallowed. "I have Potions now."

"Oh," said Seamus. "Er, yeah. I should- go."

She nodded, turning away briskly, and flicked her wand at the door. The lock opened, and she gripped the handle.

"Well, goodbye, then," she murmured, her back to him. "And next time if I have to point my wand at you, please start screaming when I say the curse."

Seamus winced, and the cesspool in his stomach lashed out violently.

"I don't think I'll have-"

She whirled around hastily.

"I won't mean it," she said, earnestly, "I won't mean it when I say it. So, please, just scream. Seamus." At his name, her voice almost imperceptibly dropped.

The whirlwind calmed, shimmered, and disappeared.

"I'll scream," he promised, and she smiled, her hazel eyes warm and (almost) impish.

"Well, until then," she said, then smirked. "Unless I catch you around the- ah, the Room of Requirement, I think you said?"

He laughed.

"Good luck getting in," he said.

She merely raised an eyebrow, and then, with a smart click of heel against stone, she was gone.

Seamus went to collect his wand, stood up straight, and almost instantly slid down against one of the chairs.

Daphne. Pretty name. Pretty, that was it- her profile, her hair, her eyes. Her didn't know she could smile. And then coming back for him, with that flask. And smiling.

Oh blast it.

He rubbed his forehead and wondered when this would all end.

A/N: Wow. Officially the longest one shot I have ever written. And it's completely unbetad, and I am totally happy to take it down and revamp it when I get reviews. So please, review. That would make my day