Chapter 14: Beltaine

The Gryffindor dormitory was aflutter with preparations for the Ball. The boys dressed themselves upstairs, while the girls occupied the common room, putting on dresses, fixing hair, and applying makeup. Hermoine felt a headache coming on with all the noise, but appreciated the distraction. The dresses were even more lavish this time around: Lavender settled on a sleek almost '20s-style red dress, Vermilda chose a purple one with heavy pleats, Ginny eventually settled on a puffy one in a darker pink, while Hermoine herself stuck to the one from the Yule Ball, but slightly modified with a large broach.

"I heard Susan Bones will be coming in bright yellow!" Lavender gushed

"Oh, how awful. It'll wash her out completely!"

"What have you heard, Parvati?"

Parvati was indeed unusually quiet this time, gossiping little, except to hint sagely at a possible surprise later on. Hermoine shivered every time she saw that face; it reminded her too much of Dumbledore.

Soon, the first of the boys came down to brave the pokes and comments of the girls downstairs. The most common of which was definitely "You wore that last time, how unimaginative!". Neville was not brave enough to be among the first, but came down early enough to get some notice. He wore gray dress robes with a solid green tie. Hermoine raised an eyebrow.

"Neville, why are you wearing...green and gray?"

"Uuuuhh...Luna told me to. She said she had a last minute dress change."

Luna left the common room early to go "meet Neville" under an archway, but it looked like Pansy was going to be late. She hoped that Pansy hadn't left notifying Draco about the change of plans until last minute, like she was threatening to.

"What are you doing here, Lovegood?"

Luna spun around and landed right into Pansy's arms.

"Finally! I was starting to worry the Wrackspurts were keeping you!"

"No, Draco was just being a paranoid prat again."

"How did you - "

"I reminded him what Beltaine was all about. Now step back, I want to see how stunning you are."

Luna was wearing a dress in the same style as Pansy's, but in light green, with an oversized bow dominating the right side of the neckline. Pansy's dress was black, with a few checkerboard-patterned feathers on the left side, held in place by a light blue bird pin. She spun Luna around.

"There. No way I was going to let Longbottom hog you all evening."

Luna laughed.

The Ball was a lot brighter this time around. The season inspired a gorgeous display of flowers and greenery, both outside and inside the castle. The Great Hall was rearranged to make room for dancing, with three of the tables left along the wall for food and refreshments. The green tablecloths blossomed with flowers – daisies, violets, poppies, jasmine, lilies, and orchids unfurled their petals, grew to full bloom, and then shrunk back to buds in a never-ending cycle. It seemed that the Lady of Spring herself lent some of her own court's decorations to Hogwarts.

There was butterbeer and fruit punch, dandelion lemonade and pomegranate juice. There were desserts of all kinds, cheese, and candy, for when the dancers get hungry or nervous. The adults supervising loitered around these delicacies, sipping hibiscus wine instead of firewhiskey, looking vaguely unhappy to be stuck here for the evening. As students started filing into the hall, the hushed chatter ceased, replaced by hearty greetings and ecstatic cries. The enormous room was soon filled with people looking forward to enjoying an evening of pure fun. Ron Weasley, true to form, went straight for the food. Hermoine rolled her eyes good-naturedly, allowing him his flaws just this once. She eyed the decorations absently, expecting to wait for a while before Harry found them, but the small sunflower peering at her from the bouquet on the table left a nagging feeling in the back of her head, like she'd forgotten something.

"Oh!" she said, grabbing Ron's arm, causing him to almost drop a cream puff, "We haven't seen Neville and Luna yet! Neville said they were going to meet up and join us near the entrance."

"Hold on Hermoine, we've been here barely 5 minutes. Give 'em some time."

Hermoine turned towards the crowd to try to spot Neville's unusually-coloured robes. It shouldn't have been hard, since pretty much every other boy had settled on black, but there was not a hint of gray to be seen. Suddenly, there came a loud squeak from near one of the entrances. Hermoine, still holding on to Ron, made her way through the crowd towards the source. Ron found himself being pulled away from the dessert table and fumbled for his last eclair. He wouldn't get the chance to enjoy it though – finding himself back near the entrance from which he came, he looked up and had to drop it. Right in front of him stood Draco Malfoy in black dress robes and a shiny green-and-gold tie, arm-in-arm with none other than Neville Longbottom. Neville was blushing furiously, while Draco looked extremely pleased with himself, smirking in triumph at the staring crowd. From somewhere in the back, Parvati Patil was heard yelling "I bloody knew it!". Hermoine stared with the widest eyes she'd ever made, while Ron simply stood slack-jawed as his brain attempted to process what was going on. Hermoine regained the gift of speech first:

"But what about - "

Her answer presented itself shortly after, as Pansy steered Luna in next to Neville. Luna was smiling wide, while Pansy's expression closely mirrored Draco's.

"Took you long enough, Malfoy."

"Took you longer, Parkinson."

"Touché."

Ron's expression became even more confused, while Hermoine's face conveyed something more along the lines of "Neville and Draco, I could understand, but this? This is just plain weird!". Neville, uncomfortable with his friends' silence, gave a fake cough and decided to do some explaining.

"Well, y'see, first we'd arranged it so I went with Luna and Draco went with Pansy, but...Pansy was less than happy with that arrangement."

Pansy nodded.

"We'd been going out secretly for some months, but it was getting painful being so careful all the time."

"Yeah, and what is Beltaine but the time for renewal?" Pansy added

The two couples finally walked into the hall, partially escorted by Hermoine, who fluttered around Neville to make sure that there was no coercion involved.

"I still don't get it..." said Ron when he finally found Seamus

"I think it'll be a while before ya do."

Soon the music started and, temporarily distracted, everyone gathered in the middle of the hall to jump and dance. There would be rumors and hushed voices in the morning, but for one evening, the couples were free to enjoy themselves. The night was otherwise uneventful... except for perhaps the sudden disappearance of Professor Snape halfway through the dance. Doubtless his concern for the young Malfoy had driven him to abandon flower-wine for heavier stuff.

A/N: What happened? Massive writer's block, that's what happened. And finals. And work. And..I'm just making up excuses aren't I?

Anyway, fun fact, this was the first scene I actually came up with in this story. It's been such a long time, it was kind of hard to write, but here it is, finally.

whew

thank you for sticking with me this far. One more chapter left!