"Quickly, Cassandra! We do not want to be late to our own engagement announcement do we?" Mrs Nott called to Cassandra who was trailing behind her mother and her father.
They had apparated to the gates of Avery Manor. It was not far from the house but felt like a mile to Cassandra. Cassandra was weighed down by the heavy fabric of her dress and was struggling to walk in her too high heels. Cassandra gathered the front of her dress in her arms in the hope of taking some of the strain off her probably already bruised hips.
"Gracefully now, Cassandra." snapped her mother as Cassandra almost fell head first into a puddle tumbling over her heels.
The lead up to the house was filled with endless lawns of grass that were cut short and parted by a stone path which the Nott family were walking on leading to an enormous grey mansion. Despite the cold evening air, Cassandra felt sweaty and flustered. Cassandra avoided looking at the many statues of purebloods from previous generations of the Avery family. In the distance the sunset was starting to set, leaving an orange purple glow in the sky Cassandra tried to focus her eyes on that. The soft beautiful colours kept her from tensing up.
When they climbed the steps to the mansion Cassandra mother used quick charms to brush away the stray hairs from Cassandra's face and smoothened any wrinkles in her dress.
"Behave." said her father sternly to Cassandra as he knocked on the Avery door.
The door was immediately opened by an ageing house elf. It took Mr and Mrs Nott's cloak and led them into a magnificent ballroom.
The size of the ballroom made Cassandra's eyes widen. It was full of pureblood witches and wizards, all staring at her as she walked through the door.
Cassandra wanted to bolt from the room. Never in all her life had this many people been staring at her at once. Mr Nott sensing it gripped his daughter arm forcefully leading her forward through the crowd. The crowd parted to let them through. Cassandra could hear a few women whispering gossip in the crowd but all eyes were still on her. In the crowd, she could see several people she went to school with.
Cassandra could see who they were walking towards, a family separate from the crowd. She recognised Mrs Avery, a woman Cassandra strongly suspected her mother was jealous of. When they approached her husband was the first to speak.
"Good evening, Grayson and Magnolia." greeted Mr Avery.
"Augustus, Octavia." Mr Nott responded nodding his head stiffly.
"And this must be Cassandra." Mr Avery said his eyes flickering to Cassandra.
"And your son…" said Mr Nott not seeing Quentin Avery.
"Quentin." Said Mr Avery standing aside revealing a sixteen-year-old boy Mr Avery's large frame had been blocking from view.
Cassandra didn't want to look into his eyes, she didn't want to see what they would behold. So she only looked at the lower half of his face his long nose and his mouth. Quentin turned his head ever so slightly to meet Cassandra's eyes. His mouth perked up at the corners into a small smile when their eyes locked. Cassandra did not return the smile. She kept her face unreadable and pulled her eyes away.
"Why don't you two socialise, the announcement will be in a few minutes." Mrs Avery said sweetly nudging her son towards Cassandra her sharp white teeth flashing into a smile.
Quentin stepped closer to Cassandra and offered her his arm. Cassandra hesitated, taking it politely. Quentin led them slowly away from their parents walking around the ballroom.
"Cassie, right?" Quentin asked.
"What?" asked Cassandra, she quickly corrected her manners adding "Excuse me?"
"Cassie. That's your name right?"
"It's Cassandra." Cassandra corrected.
"That's a mouth full," Quentin said. "You look more like a Cassie to me. It sounds nicer."
"Cassie." Cassandra tested the name, hating the sound of it. "It sounds terrible."
"So you're in my year, Cassie?" he asked.
"Yes, but my name is Cassandra," Cassandra said irritably.
"I don't think I've seen you before," Quentin said thinking.
Cassandra was about to respond when Mrs Avery appeared in front of them.
"It's time." She said.
Mrs Avery walked past them gesturing for them to follow. Cassandra involuntarily tightened her grip on Quentin's arm making him look down at her.
"Are you okay?" he asked examining Cassandra's face. "You're kind of pale."
"I'm always pale," Cassandra answered quietly her eyes staring straight ahead as they moved closer to the top of the room.
Quentin wasn't very convinced but didn't press on it. He knew that she didn't want to go through with this. He could see it in her eyes when she looked at him. He didn't want this either. There was nothing he could do for her or for himself. All he could do was grin and bear it.
Mrs Avery led them on top of a highly decorated platform only metres off the floor. Cassandra and Quentin stood in the middle of the platform, every pureblood in the room watching them. Their two sets of parents were standing in the background looking on at their children full of pride.
A silence was called. Quentin got down on one knee. A house elf that Cassandra didn't notice was there before appeared next to Quentin with a satin black pillow in its hands. In the centre of the pillow was a silver ring. It sparkled fiercely in the light.
Everything started to feel slow to Cassandra as Quentin reached for the ring, taking her hand in his. The ring slowly made it way up her ring finger. The metal was cold against her skin. It trapped her finger as it moved down it, stopping dead when it couldn't be pushed any further.
Cassandra stared at the ring hypnotised. It had a massive green emerald in the centre with large diamonds surrounding it giving the appearance of an ugly oversized flower. The band of the ring was decorated with tiny diamonds and emeralds. It was no doubt expensive.
Quentin stood back up and Mr Avery came forward. Making a grand gesture with his hands he said loudly.
"I present to you the future Mr and Mrs Avery."
The ballroom filled with applauds. Cassandra could see out the corner of her eye her mother behind her lapping up the attention with a shark like a smirk on her face.
Cassandra looked up at Quentin properly for the first time. He was looking out over the crowd not at her. She examined his face it was pale like hers, he had blue eyes with a sort of whiteness to them. His hazel hair was straight and shiny in the light. His nose was long but not to the extent of being beaky. His face was well structured. Quentin was attractive but not truly handsome. Cassandra thought his face was nice to look at.
Quentin felt her eyes on him and turned his eyes back to her. He gave her a small smile when their eyes connected. Without thinking, Cassandra returned it with her own shy smile.
Suddenly both of were blinded by a sudden flash of light.
"That was perfect! Smile again you two!"
Cassandra grinned it was her Uncle Theodore with his old fashioned camera. He was the joker of the family and by far Cassandra's favourite family member.
"Theodore, I hardly think that's appropriate." hissed Mrs Nott embarrassed by her brother in law's behaviour.
Mr Nott was in firm conversation with Mr Avery intending to ignore his oddball brother at all costs.
"Calm down, Magnolia. I just want to capture the moment for the happy couple." Uncle Theodore said as he kept flashing.
Quentin, it found quite funny and grinned along with Cassandra.
When Mrs Nott managed to shoo Uncle Theodore away the crowd's attention turned back to their group conservations.
Quentin turned to Cassandra leading her to the ballroom floor.
"Come, I'll introduce you to some people," Quentin said to Cassandra leading her towards a group of people from their school.
"That's not really necessary," Cassandra said quickly.
But it was too late. Quentin had already led Cassandra who was on his arm towards a group of people who Cassandra faintly recognised.
"Cassie, this is my best mate Bertram Mulciber." Quentin introduced. "Mulciber, this is Cassie."
"Cassandra." Cassandra corrected quickly.
She didn't need a bunch of to be death eaters calling her Cassie. It was bad enough that the name seems to have stuck with Quentin. She tried to think of possible names that she could use on Quentin to annoy him. But sadly, she couldn't think of anything as bad as Cassie.
"Just call me Mulciber," Mulciber said. "I have no clue what my parents were on when they named me."
Quentin smirked and Cassandra gave a half-hearted laugh to be polite.
"And this is," said Quentin turning a bit towards the next person or in this case people. "the Black sisters."
Cassandra eyes filled with hatred as her eyes met the familiar cold black ones of her least favourite Black sister.
"Narcissa, Andromeda and Bellatrix." He said pointing to each of them as he said their name.
Cassandra hid the hatred her eyes behind a pleasant smile. Bellatrix Cassandra had met before on multiple occasions. Bellatrix had stolen books from her, tried to humiliate her and use foul hexes on her.
"Charmed," Bellatrix said with a wicked smirk.
'I wouldn't be smirking with a head of messed up hair like yours.' Cassandra wanted to say but bit her tongue. She made her smile grow wider and returned the greeting.
Narcissa and Andromeda greeted her in a similar fashion.
"This is-" Quentin started to introduce Cassandra.
"Cassandra." Cassandra cut cross him.
She did not need the Black sister's calling her Cassie.
Quentin didn't seem to mind Cassandra intrusion, he just smiled down her.
Narcissa and Bellatrix's eyes drawled into her Andromeda looked rather bored.
Cassandra shifted uncomfortably still maintaining her grip on Quentin's arm.
An extremely tall cruel looking man appeared behind Bellatrix followed another, almost identical in looks.
"This is Rabastan and Rodolphus Lestrange." Quentin introduced. "And that's Lucius Malfoy."
Quentin said gesturing to the boy with a pointed face that had just shown up. Lucius Malfoy linked his arm through Narcissa's and flicked his glossy long blonde hair out of his face.
"This is-"
"Cassandra" Cassandra said automatically.
The boys raised their eyebrows at her and once again Quentin took no notice smiling down at her.
"And that thing over there is Wilkes," Quentin said pointing to a small rat-like boy shuttling around them trying to grab food from the trays being carried around by house elves. The house elves looked frighteningly at the boy.
"So that's just about everyone who should be here," Quentin said scanning the room. "Wait, over there is Evan Rosier," he said pointing to a boy across the room that appeared to be flirting with a group of older women.
"Quentin and Cassandra." Mrs Avery said happily as she walked over to them. "I have so many people I want to introduce you to."
Her high skill voice sounded like poison to Cassandra leaving a bad taste in her mouth. Cassandra did everything she could to hold her urge to grimace or eye roll.
Cassandra looked up at Quentin to see his features masked with seriousness. She could tell he was feeling the same way she was by the look in his eyes.
Cassandra brightened for a second when she could see not too far away Uncle Theodore heading towards them, possibly to save her like he had done countless times at other balls. But her mother stepped in his way, blocking his path thrusting a drink in his hand and instructing him to do something.
Cassandra let out a small sigh of distress as they were being led person to person by Mrs Avery. If she could barely remember the names of Quentin's friends how was she supposed to decipher these?
But thankfully she knew a lot of them already as her father's colleges (death eaters) and mother's tea party guests. She wasn't particularly fond of any of them. She didn't really remember all the people she greeted that night, they all seemed to stick together in a massive blur inside her mind.
After being introduced to about ten guests or so she was saved by Quentin.
"Mother?" Quentin said in a serious tone as Mrs Avery led then to the next guest.
"Yes, dear?"
"May we please be excused outside?"
Mrs Avery thought for a moment and decided hesitantly. "Yes, but only for a minute."
'Finally.' thought Cassandra. Her feet were killing her and she felt like she was about to drop. Her dress weighed more than her school bag.
Quentin and Cassandra stepped out into the cool night air in the Avery's garden. It was a lot like the Nott garden in size except all the flowers were writhed and dead. The garden was really just a stretch of lawn, like the front garden cut perfectly. In the distance not too far away, a lake sat sparking in the appearing moon.
Cassandra released Quentin's arm freeing herself. She wanted some space to take in the rush of night air that was hitting her lungs, clearing herself of the stuffy ballroom air.
Quentin watched her as she stepped away from him letting his arm fall to his side. He was a small bit disappointed that she wasn't by his side anymore. He liked her presence next to him. Quentin thought she was beautiful and striking. He liked the way she didn't throw it in his face like other girls who looked pretty enough did.
He watched her see travelled further and further away from him. Quentin walked across the lawn after her.
Cassandra could suddenly feel Quentin next to her.
"Need any help?" Quentin asked awkwardly.
She flushed as she continued walking with her leg shaking in her heels, her back hunched over trying to carry the front of her heavy dress. Her head was aching her, the silver pins in her hair dug into her skull. She longed to take them out of her hair.
"I doubt there is anything you can do."
"I could carry you?"
Cassandra blushed at that thought, Quentin laughed. Cassandra hoped he didn't see her blush in the dark.
"No thanks, you'd probably drop me." Cassandra joked gently.
"I take that as an insult!" Quentin exclaimed humour alive in his voice. "I am the best chaser there is on the Slytherin quidditch team. I have never dropped a quaffle in my life. I'm not going to drop you."
Cassandra laughed in what felt like forever.
"There is a big weight and size difference between me and a quidditch ball."
"Well, there's only one way to find out," Quentin said jokingly pulling Cassandra towards him.
He picked her up bridal style in his arms.
"Quentin!" Cassandra tried to sound mad but a smile kept creeping into her face.
Quentin set her back down, Cassandra held onto his shoulders shaking in her high heels while she tried to balance herself.
"Merlin, Cassie. How are you even standing in those?" Quentin asked bewildered gesturing to her shoes.
"Magic?" Cassandra suggested weakly.
"Quentin! Cassandra!" Mrs Avery was heading toward them at a swift pace.
Cassandra smoothly slipped her hands from his shoulders taking his arm once again.
Their smiles dropped, they were soon inside the packed ballroom again having meaningless polite conversations with people Cassandra thought belonged in Azkaban.
Slowly the end of the night came. The Nott's were the last to leave. Cassandra stood with Quentin her eyes drooping. She badly wanted her bed. She struggled to keep her head upright. It threatened to fall onto Quentin's shoulder.
When the Nott's finally made it home Mrs Nott had a lot say about Mrs Avery and the wedding plans. Cassandra really didn't care. She slipped out of sight to her room kicking off her ridiculous heels and calling on Ursula to help her out of her dress.
She then took down her hair and cleaned her face of the now cakey makeup. Changing into her pyjamas she fell into bed her last thought before she went to sleep was of her ring. It was getting caught in her bedsheets much to her annoyance.