A/N: As usual, all of my heart goes to phoenix-91 for the beta.
Chapter 1: the one with the meet-cutes (that are really not that cute, if you ask Shaw)
The first time it happens, Sameen Shaw thinks nothing of it. Sure, the only reason she'd gotten the damn cat in her third year was because the guy at Magical Menagerie had told her she was the first person ever the cat hadn't hissed at and for the longest time that remained the truth. Not even the girls sharing her room, who were around the cat every single day, dared to approach him and that suited Shaw just fine. She had named him Cat and was quite content to snuggle with him during the night and not see him for the rest of the day. Cat seemed equally satisfied with their arrangement.
That is, until she gets to her dorm late after a night of studying only to find her bed empty. It's the first time this happens in the two years she's had the cat and the school year has barely started. For a moment, she considers ignoring him and just going to sleep. She's way too tired to waste precious minutes of rest searching for a stupid pet. He's lucky he's pretty much her favorite thing in the whole school or she wouldn't have spared him a second thought.
She leaves the Hufflepuff Basement and doesn't need to walk for long until she finds a girl with wavy brown hair sitting on the floor next to the kitchens, Cat purring on her lap.
The traitor.
Shaw snatches the cat from the girl's lap and glares at her. She's about to snap at Cat but she'll be caught dead before she actually speaks to an animal with a witness present.
"Good evening to you too," the girl greets with a smirk, standing up.
Shaw narrows her eyes and looks her up and down, annoyed that the girl towers over her. She is not a Hufflepuff and she doesn't play in any of the Quidditch teams, so she isn't on Shaw's radar. Shaw would rather keep it that way.
"I don't want to see you near my cat again," she snarls.
"He was the one that came to me, you know?"
Shaw ignores the smug grin, memorizes the girl's face for when a well-placed punch might come in handy, and turns to leave.
The second time it happens, Shaw frowns for so long one would think that's just her face. Which, in all fairness, is not far from the truth.
She's already lying under her covers, one minute away from falling asleep and with Cat nestling on the spot between her neck and her shoulder, when they hear a noise outside the room. Normally Shaw would just carry on pretending it's nothing – she lives in a magical castle after all –, but Cat jumps out of bed and starts scratching at the dorm's door, making whiny meowing sounds that are awfully like pleading and there is no way Shaw owns a cat that produces such undignified noises.
She gets up and opens the door a crack, only to see Cat sneaking out at the speed of light. Shaw is too curious to return to bed now so she follows him out, the cold floor beneath her bare feet bringing goosebumps upon her skin.
She's about to enter the hallway that leads to the kitchens when she hears a familiar sickly sweet voice, "Hey, cat." There is an oomph sound and then a purr and the girl speaks once more, "Nice to see you again."
Shaw turns the corner and there is her double-crossing pet, all cuddled in the girl's arms as if he were a baby. She harrumphs and places her hands on her hips, "I told you to stay away from my cat."
The girl startles, to Shaw's great pleasure, but then the smug grin from last time makes an appearance. "Oh. It's you."
"How do you know his name anyway?"
The girl furrows her brows, looking from Shaw to the cat in her arms. "His name? Wait." She shakes her head and Shaw notices that she's not the ugliest girl in the world. "You mean his name is Cat?"
"Well, yeah," Shaw says, scratching the nape of her neck. "What did you expect me to call him? Crookshanks?"
"That would be the most obvious choice." The girl tilts her head and smirks, petting the cat absentmindedly. "Well, the second most obvious choice."
She scrunches her nose as she finishes the sentence and Shaw glowers at her, taking a few short strides to grab Cat and clutch him to her chest. "If I see you here again after curfew, I'm telling my Head of House."
"Can't a girl have a healthy appetite?"
"You're not here for food." Shaw rolls her eyes, swallowing the hiss of pain as Cat digs his claws into her forearm. "You don't strike me as the type."
"How observant of you," the girl mocks, taking a step forward. "Can you tell me your name?"
Shaw purses her lips in her best impression of a fake smile. "Wouldn't you like to know?"
The girl chuckles and does a little taunting wave that makes Shaw seethe. But there's no point in starting a fight so she just spins around and walks back to her dorm.
The third time it happens, Shaw decides bothering about it is a waste of time.
She can't claim she's a model student, not when the reason she finds the girl this time is because she's returning from the kitchens after a midnight snack. Hell, she's still munching on a piece of cake and there are crumbs on her hair and on her shirt so it's not like she could pretend she was doing something even remotely allowed. Not that the girl cares either way.
Shaw sees Cat first, crawling up and down the corridor in the hunt for a little red light. A few feet ahead she spots the girl, sitting on the floor and drawing patterns on the wall with her wand for the cat to follow.
"Why am I not surprised?"
"Got any more of that cake?" the girl asks, standing up and leaning on the wall with one shoulder. Shaw is not sure if she's comfortable with the way she's staring at her.
"Sure," Shaw scoffs. "I always steal extra cake so I can feed annoying students who are weirdly obsessed with the Hufflepuff quarters. I'm the Mother Theresa of Hogwarts."
The girl laughs at that and mouths something to turn off the light from her wand. "I know who you are now."
"You do, huh?" Shaw crosses her arms, one eyebrow lifted in challenge.
"You're the Grumpy Puff." She cocks her head, a lazy smile on her face. "Sameen Shaw, right?"
"Wow," Shaw says, with an eye-roll. She contemplates clapping for extra snarky effect, but figures it isn't worth the effort. "Impressive detective skills."
"You are not impressed?" She sounds surprised and Shaw has no idea why.
"Impressed with what? You've seen me getting inside the Hufflepuff Basement. Twice." She taps her forearm with her fingertips. It's no secret that she has a very low tolerance level for aggravations. "That reduces your student pool to one quarter. Considering I'm a girl, make it about one eighth. You probably guessed my age to be between 14 and 16, you know my cat and you know I sleep in black. All you had to do was question the right people."
"Maybe I should be the one who's impressed," the girl concedes, and there's a hint of something other than amusement in her eyes. "They did say you're the best student in your year."
"Yeah yeah yeah, enough about me already." Shaw lowers her arms, clenching and unclenching her fists. Something about this girl makes the blood pump harder in her veins. "Who are you?"
The girl pushes off the wall and gets uncomfortably closer, her face inches away from Shaw's. It's disconcerting and she smells like apples and Shaw absolutely despises invasions of her personal space, but she's not about to be intimidated. The girl's smile grows wider when Shaw doesn't move and she leans in, whispers right in her ear, "Wouldn't you like to know?"
Then she walks past Shaw without looking back, as silent and stealthy as an owl. Shaw is almost tempted to rise to the challenge and turn her into a hobby, learn about her and hate her, but that would imply she's somewhat invested and nope, she's not doing that to herself.
With a huff, she ushers Cat back into the Basement, forever mad at him for dragging her into this. Cat was supposed to only like her and now he's enjoying someone else's attention.
Shaw doesn't like sharing but if the alternative is dealing with the insufferable girl, she can learn to live with that.
Shaw expects many things from her Quidditch practice. The Ravenclaw jerks interrupting the Hufflepuff practice time because there's some scholar emergency to tend to, for example. Or the odd day when the Gryffindors are inspired and beat their asses in the trial games. Or the boring days when the Hufflepuff practice alone, instead of with another team.
Being distracted by the after-hours-mystery-girl, however, is none of those things.
Shaw is busy enjoying herself by throwing the Bludgers at John's head when she notices a familiar tiny red light jumping from one robe to the other and her eyes immediately go to the nearest stand. She can't see much since there's an irritatingly thin rain falling on them but she spots wavy brown hair and that's enough to ruin her concentration for the whole thing.
John is quick to make use of her break in focus and sends a Bludger her way. Shaw is so flustered that the ball hits her on the arm before she manages to send it away with her bat.
"I am going to murder you, John," she threatens, flying past him in the chase for the other Bludger.
"Sure, Shaw," he replies, in his deep voice that makes her grit her teeth when they're playing against each other. Which is most of the times they play. "I would like to see you try."
She prevents the ball from hitting Alicia, their Chaser, and Hufflepuff scores ten points.
"What were you saying, John?" she yells across the pitch.
It really is unfortunate that Walter Dang, Gryffindor's sneaky half-sized specimen of a Seeker that Shaw absolutely despises, chooses that moment to catch the Snitch.
"What were you saying, Shaw?" John shoots back, hovering next to her on his broomstick with a cocky grin that she wants to punch off his face.
She can't believe a rule as absurd as the Snitch being worth 150 points, and thus rendering the efforts of most team players during a game pointless, hasn't been changed yet.
This is utterly unfair and she needs a rematch right now.
"Practice over!" Joss Carter shouts, and all the Gryffindors gather around her.
Shaw isn't ready to stop playing, not with the bitter taste of defeat this fresh on her tongue, and for a moment she stares wistfully at Carter, half-enchanted with the firm way she is pointing the flaws in her team's game (and not-so-secretly rejoicing due to how she's scolding John for being more worried about annoying Shaw than about doing his job).
"Hey, Grumpcake," Fusco calls her, pointing at the space where their team is gathering around Scarface. "Stop ogling Carter. Let's be done with this so we can all go take a shower."
Shaw gives Fusco the finger but flies after him to where their captain is already talking.
It's not that Shaw doesn't like Scarface, because she does. Or as much as she can like someone, anyway. She appreciates his quietness and his solid presence, but the guy is more of a follower than a leader, and that is putting a damper on Hufflepuff's chances of winning the Quidditch Cup. They're lucky Daizo is one hell of a Keeper, which means that most teams' only score against them is managed by catching the Snitch – if they ever do manage to catch it.
Though, if Shaw is being honest, everyone in the team is pretty great at Quidditch and they have a very good chance of winning the Cup this year.
(okay, maybe she just wishes Joss Carter was her Captain. who cares?)
Scarface offers a few lines of criticism and advice, in that simple, blunt way of his, and the team nods in agreement. Except Shaw. Shaw sort of grunts in acknowledgement and Scarface shoots her a stern look.
When they land, Shaw is greeted by the sight of the girl, again, and this time she has the nerve to wink at Shaw. She's at the edge of the pitch, two boys by her side. Shaw knows one of them – he's a Chaser in the Ravenclaw Quidditch team, and a good one at that. What business could he have with her?
Shaw quickens her pace to catch up with the Gryffindors; if she is to find out who the girl is without rousing too much suspicion, now is the time. Gryffindor is, in theory, her least favorite House, what with the arrogant boastful idiots it embraces left and right, but if there is anyone at Hogwarts she can call friends, it's John and Carter. Fusco doesn't count, and he's Hufflepuff anyway.
"Hey," she calls, slowing down when she reaches their midst.
"Good game, Shaw," John mocks, his broomstick hanging unbalanced from his shoulder.
"Yeah right," she huffs, rolling her eyes. "Look, do any of you know that girl?" She tries to be discreet when pointing at her, but the Gryffindors sure aren't discreet when they all turn at the same time to follow the direction of her finger.
"Who, Root?" Fusco asks, confused.
"Root?" Shaw scoffs, glaring at him for joining them. "What kind of a name is that?"
"Name is Samantha Groves, actually," Carter informs, frowning and looking ahead again. "She just goes by Root, has done so since second year."
"What happened in second year?" Fusco asks, saving Shaw the trouble.
John shrugs. "No one knows."
"So she's in your year?"
"She's a seventh year, yeah," Carter says, using the broomstick as a walking stick. Shaw has to control herself not to snort at that. "She's my partner in Potions."
"Is she a Gryffindor then?"
"That one?" Fusco splutters, eyebrows shooting up to his forehead. "That one got sorted into Slytherin before the Hat even touched her hair."
"Hum," Shaw offers, somewhat disconcerted. "Okay."
"Why do you ask?" Carter queries, watching her with that expressions she gets when she knows something is more than meets the eye.
"I keep bumping into her after curfew and I'd never seen her before," Shaw relents. Carter is too perceptive for any other option. "I just wanted to know."
"Stay away from her, Shaw," John warns, with a grave tone that makes Shaw pay attention against her will. "She's bad news."
"Yeah, Shaw," Carter agrees, which is worrisome in itself. "Nothing good can come from there."
Shaw nods, before throwing one final glance at the girl and walking with them to the lockers.
Root.
The name has a dangerous edge to it that Shaw finds intriguing. She hadn't been curious before, but now she definitely is.
It's late. It's so so late Shaw is pretty certain even the ghosts have retired to wherever it is they go when they don't have students to terrorize.
She curses under her breath, clutching the strap of her backpack to her shoulder. Finding a hidden passage in the library that leads to a private studio hadn't been the best thing to happen to her sleeping pattern but hell if she isn't positively ecstatic about the silence and the privacy.
Whoever had cursed her with magic that can only be tamed through years of boarding school deserves to go through all circles of hell and come out of that unredeemed and ready to go through them again. Or very dead. Shaw isn't picky.
Going down the steps two at a time, she passes the entrance to the Hufflepuff Basement and runs to the portrait of the fruit bowl, tickling the pear until the painting turns into a door, a scowl never leaving her face. She can't believe how ridiculous this castle is.
The fact that no house elves can be seen anywhere and she is forced to use her wand to turn on the lights further proves how unreasonably late it is and so she just helps herself to a slice of bread, which she spreads with an unnecessary amount of peanut butter by anyone else's standards, before rushing out and heading to the dorms.
As soon as she's getting near the stack of barrels that lead to the Basement, she starts hearing voices and she stops in her tracks, her heart beating a little faster. Glancing around, she spots the suit of armor and uses it to shield her body from view. The words that get to her are muffled and she can't understand what the people are saying, but she can distinguish a female voice chattering away to monosyllabic male responses and she rolls her eyes, trying to focus on their steps.
When she realizes they're moving in the opposite direction to her hiding spot, Shaw goes back to the corridor.
Unfortunately for her, she hadn't given herself enough time for the other rule-breakers to disappear from view and she sees them still walking towards the corner.
Her automatic reaction is to narrow her eyes and groan.
The annoying girl is walking side by side with a black-haired boy that seems familiar to Shaw, her arm around his shoulders.
She is… impressively tall, Shaw notices, or maybe the guy is just short.
Which he kind of is, now that Shaw is studying him and can finally recognize him. That boy is Daizo, the Keeper from her Quidditch team, and she grits her teeth in irritation. What Root could possibly need with a fourth year Hufflepuff is beyond her comprehension skills. Not that she would want to know or anything.
It takes another moment for them to be out of sight and Shaw feels a pang of something tugging at the back of her mind. She pushes it down and soon she's forgotten all about it, nestling on her bed with Cat purring by her chest.