"Can you believe we're not going to be in the Ravenclaw common room? You would think the Headmistress would be capable of transforming a storage closet or something into an additional dormitory, if she can whip two new common rooms out of thin air." Elia huffed from her seat across from Aiofe on the train. The only other two returning eighth-year Ravenclaw girls that Aiofe had seen so far, Alessandria and Rose, made noises of agreement, but it was clear they had already been through this conversation with Elia before Aiofe wandered up, a fresh set of ears for her complaints. Truthfully Aiofe hadn't been that great of friends with any of the three other girls in the years prior, but her few closest friends had all chosen not to return for another year. They had all gotten the option of whether they wanted to return or not, some students had chosen to continue their studies, some had chosen to enter out into the real world. Aiofe estimated it was about half and half.
The other two girls were alright, but she'd always considered Elia a bit facile for Ravenclaw… though she supposed that was probably rude to think.
She'd avoided Alessandria like the plague in the third year, as well, when she'd been in Running Club with the other girl and had gone through a bit of a sexual awakening, suddenly finding herself attracted to the tall, willowy honey-blonde girl and hadn't known what to do with these new feelings. And with a lack of awareness of the reason for Aiofe's oddly cold behavior, Alessandria had never quite forgiven her. Even now, she had a slightly pinched look on her face which Aiofe could only assume she was the cause of, given that the other two girls were Alessandria's good friends, and it had appeared almost the moment Aiofe entered their compartment.
Aiofe fought back the urge to sigh herself. She was not looking forward to spending the year in the company of only these three girls, welcoming as Elia had been to her uninvited presence when she had awkwardly shuffled into their train car. She could tell whatever Alessandria had decided made Aiofe treat her like a leprosy victim suddenly, Rose had been let in on the deduction, as she kept catching the girl staring at her, eyes curious but not exactly warm. Aiofe had to fight down the feeling that the other girl knew the real reason, in order to maintain any semblance of composure for the duration of the train ride.
The other girls hadn't addressed her for a few moments, instead moving on to Elia's upcoming birthday, so Aiofe dug around in her book bag and pulled out a worn-out old sci-fi novel and cracked it open, hoping to politely excuse herself from any more conversation topics for a while.
X
Aiofe looked up from her second dessert, some form of layered chocolate cake that she had been very engrossed in, when Headmistress McGonagall asked the eighth years to stay behind after the feast to be sorted into their new common rooms. Her eyes met Alessandria's across the table, the bewildered look on the other girl's face no doubt mirroring Aiofe's own. Obviously, they had all known about the new common rooms, but they hadn't realized there was a sorting to go with them. Aiofe glanced around the Great Hall as the other years slowly filed out. There were probably less than forty of her year that had decided to return to school. Harry Potter and Ron Weasley were both missing from the crowd, but unsurprisingly Hermione Granger was still seated at her place at the Gryffindor table. She'd heard somewhere that both boys had accepted positions in the junior auror training program. Draco Malfoy was also sat at his own house's table, along with Daphne Greengrass, Theo Nott, and a few other Slytherins. She didn't think she'd ever had a conversation outside of a classroom with any of them.
When the last of the other years had disappeared behind the massive doors to the hall, McGonagall once again stepped up behind the podium at the front of the dining room.
"I trust that you have all received and at least somewhat glanced at the letters I sent out earlier this summer." Her eyes roamed over the hall as if she expected anyone to actually admit that they hadn't. "I have made the decision that you all will be dividing up into two new common rooms. Because there are so few of you returning for this last year and your numbers are disproportionate," Aiofe glanced at the Gryffindor table, which had more sat at it than any other house. Hufflepuff was a close second. "I've decided to sort you based on my own preferences rather than your previous Houses." At this the Headmistress pulled a square of parchment out of her robe pocket and unfolded it once. "The two new common rooms are named East Commons and West Commons. As I say your name you will line up on the wall at your appropriate cardinal direction." She paused, seemed to come to a realization, and pointed out one side of the hall. "That, if you are unaware, is West."
"Abbot, Hannah." Aiofe tuned out the Headmistress' words, instead looking around at her soon to be ex-housemates, trying to gauge their reaction to this new development. She accidentally caught Alessandria's eyes again, and the other girl quickly looked away. Michael Corner and Anthony Goldstein had also both returned to school. And while Corner seemed to have no response when his name was called and he passed to one side of the room, Goldstein seemed annoyed when his own name was called moments later and he was sent to the opposite side of the room. Elia and Rose were both sent to West, the same side as Goldstein. Alessandria, whose last name was Zion, would be firmly seated at the Ravenclaw table for a while.
Aiofe looked up as Draco Malfoy's name was called, knowing after years of attending classes with the Slytherin boy that her name would be coming up next. He was sent to East.
"Malone, Aiofe." Aiofe met the Headmistress' eyes from the front of the room. "East." She got up and followed Draco Malfoy to that side of the room. Theodore Nott followed soon after her. Sandwiched between the two boys against the wall, she once again had the thought that it was going to be an interesting year. She could feel Nott's eyes on her, probably trying to reconcile her very Irish name with her half- Japanese appearance. She'd gotten that a lot over the years, being one of very few Asians attending Hogwarts. She met his eyes and he gave her a small grin before turning back to the room at large.
A few more students were sent to their side of the room, Alessandria being one of them. Aiofe tried not to pre-emptively sweat about that one. She'd gotten over her little crush on Alessandria years ago, well, mostly, but she still felt so awkward because of the way she'd reacted to it. She'd been borderline obsessed with the pretty Greek girl for a few months there, and she'd die if the other girl ever found out about it. Aiofe glanced down the row of her new housemates. Besides Malfoy, Nott, and Alessandria, they were also joined by Blaise Zabini and Daphne Greengrass from Slytherin, Dean Thomas and Fay Dunbar from Gryffindor, Ernie MacMillan, Zacarias Smith, and Joseph Banks from Hufflepuff, and other than herself, Alessandria, and Michael Corner, Isobel MacDougal was the only other Ravenclaw to be sorted with them. She noticed that there seemed to be more students on the West side of the hall, and wondered what the reasoning for that was.
"They've a larger common room." Theodore Nott said quietly to her, or so she thought until her head snapped to him and she realized he had actually been talking over her head to Malfoy, who had apparently had the same thought she had. He continued on and she tilted her head away from him, not wanting to seem like she was listening in to their conversation even though they were having it right above her head. With the two very attractive, very intimidating Slytherin boys on either side of her, and Alessandria two heads down from Nott, Aiofe was not exactly feeling super comfortable. She'd love to get out of this line and settle into her new dormitory, which was apparently only going to consist of five girls. She wondered how well this mismatched group of boys was going to get on with each other, seeing as they outnumbered the girls in the house almost two to one.
She was dragged out of her thoughts as she realized that they had apparently been dismissed and she had somehow missed the part where McGonagall explained how to get to their new common room. She turned and followed Draco Malfoy out into the hall, where he proceeded to turn right and head towards the dungeons. She threw a glance back at the others, apparently all heading towards the dungeons with her, confused, and met Theo Nott's smirk. She couldn't tell if he meant it meanly. He apparently found her bewilderment amusing, though.
After walking past the classrooms in the dungeons, but still closer to the Great Hall than she had been in Ravenclaw, Ernie MacMillan, whose appointment as eighth year prefect she had also missed, led them through a tapestry which only moved aside if you whispered a secret code into the ear of the beautiful and very naked woven lady stitched into it, they were inside their new common room.
It was dark and cool, which is to be expected from the dungeons, she thought to herself, with huge glass windows that peered into the bottom of the lake. Aiofe crossed the room to stare out the window immediately. She could just barely make out something large moving around in the dark water.
The furniture in the room was in shades of dark green and blue grey, and it looked plush and soft all grouped around the fireplace. There were dark wooded bookshelves with tables clustered around them on the opposite side of the room from the hearth. There were three doors lining the walls on either side of the bookshelves, two of which were labeled Boys, and she realized the reason for the disproportionate amount of male classmates she had been sorted with. A fourth door had the words Dining Room scrawled in gold letters across it. Alessandria came up behind her as she was regarding the door in confusion, feeling like she really should have been paying more attention during McGonagall's speech.
"Did you miss the part where the Headmistress said we were adults and free to eat in our commons, and had less strict curfews and blah blah?"
Aiofe nodded, pulling her face into a slight grimace to show her regret at missing almost the whole thing. "Did I miss anything else important?"
Alessandria shrugged. "Not really. Bit about the availability of mind-healers for anyone that would like, something about how she still expected us to set a good example for the younger students with our increased freedom and overcoming house divides. Honestly, I know it was important but I had a hard time paying attention as well…" Alessandria glanced across the room to where Fay Dunbar was chatting to Isobel MacDougal. Isobel had been dating a Gryffindor boy a year above the girls for most of their school career and had never been very close with the other girls in their dorm in Ravenclaw. Aiofe suspected Alessandria would rather be chatting with the two other girls but wasn't quite confident enough to join them uninvited. She'd had Rose, and to a lesser extent, Elia since they were first years and probably hadn't had to make friends since then. Aiofe hadn't really either, but as her friends had decided to join the real world and get careers instead of finishing their NEWTs, she'd already had to come to the realization that she would have to make new friends this year or it would be a lonely year for her. Alessandria hadn't had nearly as much time to come to terms with it as Aiofe had.
She wanted to save Alessandria a little bit of awkwardness, so she searched her mind for a topic to break the silence that had fallen over them. The best she could come up with was… "Should we check out the dorms?"
Alessandria followed her through the door to the girls' dormitory and Aiofe could hear the other girls following behind them. The furniture in the dorm matched the furniture in the common room, dark wood and soft, dark fabrics in cool colors. The hangings around the beds were grey-blue and had silver embroidered patterns sewn into them. Since Aiofe was the first one in, she got to choose one of the beds with a round window right above the line of pillows, which also looked out into the lake. The beds were all on raised platforms, each with a wardrobe and a nightstand on either side of it. Aiofe found her trunk in the pile in the center of the room and dragged it to the end of her bed to dig out her nightclothes. Unpacking would have to wait until the morning.
Alessandria had chosen a bed on the opposite side of the room from Aiofe, and Aiofe knew that despite the girl approaching her in the common room, they would not become close friends this year. Daphne Greengrass ended up on one side of Aiofe, and Isobel was on the other.
After changing into a pair of shorts and a sweatshirt of a muggle band she liked, Aiofe plopped down into her new bed and was pleased to discover that it was just as luxurious feeling as it looked.
X
She woke up before the other girls so she jumped out of bed to get to the shower first. She'd noticed the night before that there was only two shower stalls for all five girls to share. Not to sound like a princess, but she needed time to let her hair soak in her hair potions.
She'd been standing under the shower spray, distractedly thinking about the coming year when a voice cleared from outside her shower curtain. "Malone?"
Aiofe opened the curtain enough to peer out of it to see Daphne Greengrass, who was looking like she would rather be doing anything else other than interrupting Aiofe's shower. "What's up?"
"My hair potions spilled out in my trunk, any chance I can use a bit of yours?"
Aiofe glanced up at Daphne's long blonde hair. It had a similar enough texture to her own dark hair, though her hair was thicker than Daphne's, so her potions should work fine. She reached back into her shower and retrieved the bottle for Daphne.
Daphne gave her a quick nod of thanks, appearing relieved as though she had expected Aiofe to turn her down, and left her to her shower in peace. Successfully distracted from her earlier distraction, Aiofe finished up her shower and crossed the large bathroom to the mirrors to carefully use an epilator spell on her face.
Daphne let out a loud moan from behind her shower curtain that almost caused Aiofe to remove part of her eyebrow. "This potion smells fucking amazing, Malone, where did you get it?"
Aiofe laughed, still slightly startled. "A little shop in London. During the school year I just mail in my order, I'll give you the owl address."
"What is this smell?"
"The first time I went in she made me sniff different scents for like twenty minutes, and then she whipped that mixture up while I finished my shopping. It has cinnamon oil, cloves, and some weird incense mixture in it. Not sure what all else. I haven't shopped anywhere else since."
"I'll have to go in myself over the holidays." If Daphne meant to say anything else, she fell quiet when the bathroom door opened and Fay came in to take over the shower Aiofe had just vacated.
Aiofe finished putting some light makeup on, dried her hair with her wand, and slipped back into the familiar Hogwarts uniform, only with a black tie instead of her usual blue striped one, and the distinct absence of her Ravenclaw crest. Her skirt had changed itself to a black and grey plaid, too, and Aiofe thought to herself that McGonagall wasn't kidding about a whole new house for the eighth years.
When she arrived in the common room, the door to the dining hall was thrown open and the smell of breakfast washed over her like a wave. Malfoy and Zabini were sitting at the table when she crossed the threshold. She sat down close enough to them that it didn't look like she was trying to sit far away, but still far enough away that she didn't invite conversation. She'd barely reached for the pumpkin juice when Dean Thomas walked in the room, gave Malfoy a dark look, and backed out.
"Think I'll eat in the Great Hall this morning." He said on his way out.
Aiofe didn't give him much thought. It wasn't really her business the Gryffindors and Slytherins still had issues. She was doing her part to promote house unity, or whatever McGonagall had said.
She did give Malfoy a brief glance to check out his reaction to the snub, though. He seemed unsurprised and unbothered, so she went back to her pastry. She poured herself a large cup of black coffee and a water to go with her pumpkin juice, which did earn her a look from both her tablemates.
"So, Malone," Aiofe looked up at Zabini, fork halfway to her face, "what's with the…" he broke off and pointed in the general direction of her eyes. She'd inherited just a little bit of her mother's looks. Blaise was darker complected, mixed, like her, so she didn't mind his asking. She knew he meant, why is your name Irish and your skin tan, not why do your eyes look like that? Malfoy looked like he was trying to be as not a part of this conversation as was physically possible.
"My mom is Japanese." She answered him. "Dad's Irish."
He nodded. "Freckles make sense now." She was kind of surprised he had noticed her freckles at all. She wasn't sure she'd ever been close enough to him… Maybe in class.
Theo Nott decided to join them at that moment, walking through the door bleary-eyed and still wearing a pair of sweatpants. Aiofe felt her shoulders draw up. Nott threw her off her balance.
"Draco, Blaise, uhhhh, Ravenclaw." Nott sat down between her and Malfoy. He immediately plopped his head down in his hands, elbows on the table. He looked half dead. And he'd forgotten her name. She spoke up before she could stop herself.
"Uhhh, Slytherin… So much for that Nott charm I've heard so much about. All those rumors I heard in sixth year must have been a lie."
Nott shifted to look at her sideways, head still in his hands. His friends were chuckling behind him. His eyes roamed over her face, pausing at her lips.
After a few seconds he sat up and shifted his body closer to hers, the sleepy look in his eyes all but gone now. Aiofe blinked up at him.
"I'm smooth as Draco Malfoy's weirdly hairless ass, I'll have you know, Malone." Malfoy choked on his pumpkin juice.
"So you do know my name?" She tried her best to emulate the smirk he had given her last night. She tried to think of something to throw him as off his game as he seemed to be throwing her off hers. "Give us your best pickup line, then."
Nott leaned into her personal space, his chin propped up on his hand on the table. This close she could smell the toothpaste on his breath, the scent of his hair potions or maybe it was cologne. She was so distracted by the heat of his body she almost missed the words that came out of his mouth. "Are you free tonight… or are you going to cost me?" He smirked at her and she cracked up laughing.
He withdrew his arm from the table and slid back over into his original seat, grinning at her. "Okay, maybe that one isn't that great but it's the ass crack of morning, for Merlin's sake."
She fought with the urge for a few moments before pushing herself away from the table. She walked behind the bench seat to slide her body into the space next to his elbow, leaning into his side. She paused for dramatic effect, knowing he was wondering what the hell she was doing. "Roses are red, violets are blue, at night I'm using my hand, and thinking of you."
Nott choked out a laugh, as though he hadn't expected that from her, and Malfoy and Zabini both laughed from behind him.
She dropped down into her own chair just as her dormmates walked through the archway. Isobel gave her an odd look, probably because of the smiles on her and the Slytherin boys' faces, but she sat down to eat without saying anything about it.
Daphne Greengrass sat down closest to Aiofe. "Where's everyone else?" She asked the table as a whole.
Zabini was the one that answered her. "Banks, Smith, MacMillan, and Thomas all went down to the Hall to eat. Not sure where Corner went. He was gone when we woke up."
Aiofe kept her snort to herself. It was likely Corner hadn't slept in his own bed at all. She resisted the urge to look over and see if Alessandria thought the same thing.
Greengrass stood up next to her, "I'm going to go collect my timetable. Malone, care to join me?"
Aiofe was surprised to be invited, but she nodded, gulped down the last of her cooling coffee, and followed the other girl to the bulletin board in the common room. Their schedules were tacked in a pile so Greengrass flipped through them, collected hers and Aiofe's, and stuck them back to the board. Aiofe glanced down at her schedule, knowing it would be mostly the same as her sixth year's. Potions, Alchemy, Advanced Arithmancy, Charms, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Ancient Runes, Magical Art, Herbology, and Astronomy. Greengrass was looking at Aiofe's schedule over her shoulder.
"Geez, is there anything you aren't taking?"
"Divination." She said with a snort. She elected not to explain that she had no idea what she wanted to do after Hogwarts, and therefore had tried to keep as many options open as possible.
Greengrass held her own schedule up to Aiofe's to compare them. The other girl was also taking Potions, Charms, DADA, and Herbology. Unlike Aiofe, she'd elected to continue on with Care of Magical Creatures and History of Magic.
They had Charms together first, so Aiofe followed the other girl out of the commons room and they began the trek up the stairs. She'd decided on the walk that Daphne had probably realized neither of them was going to be best friends with their other dormmates and she'd probably figured the two of them could band together. Aiofe was fine with the other girl adopting her, she hadn't had many other options herself.
"I wonder if we'll see anyone else from East in Charms?"
Daphne shrugged. "Not any of the other Slytherins at least. Draco is mostly focusing on Potion-making, and I have no fucking clue what Theo is doing, but neither of them was in NEWT level Charms. Zabini wants to be a journalist but I can't even remember what he ended up taking in sixth year."
"So what's the deal with you and your former housemates, you don't seem all that friendly with them." Daphne's question caught her off guard.
It took her a couple seconds to answer. "Not much of a deal, really. Alessandria and I have just always had different friends, and Isobel was always with Michael Lake's friends so we never got very close."
Daphne hummed but it definitely wasn't an oh I believe that hum. Aiofe didn't offer any more on the subject. "What about you and the Slytherin boys? You didn't invite them to walk with us."
Daphne shrugged. "They're alright. Draco is a lot more pleasant now that him and Pansy broke up. And you know, the whole thing that happened last year is over… Father's in prison, etcetera. Theo is alright as well, I just don't think we have much in common. He can be a prat but he had a horrific childhood so I find myself able to excuse that most of the time. And Blaise pretty much sticks to the other two." She wondered about Nott's childhood and was surprised Daphne had mentioned it at all. The Slytherins had always kept things close to their chest as far as she had been able to tell.
"Why the course load? That might even be more than Malfoy is taking, and he's a swot."
"Honestly I just want to keep my options open. Not completely sure where I want to go after school."
Daphne accepted this without the surprise or judgment Aiofe had expected. She seemed to realize Aiofe had expected a different reaction so she added, "I think the last couple years have made a lot of us reevaluate our future plans. Draco and Theo both did complete circles from the careers they had planned on having in fifth year. And I didn't even think I was going to have a career when I started Hogwarts. My parents were planning on just marrying me off after school."
Aiofe didn't remember hearing much about Daphne's parents during the war, and she was afraid to ask what had changed so she didn't. "What are you planning on doing now?"
Daphne shrugged. "Well I considered politics briefly, but I'm thinking that's probably not much of an option now, at least in Britain… So maybe something else in the ministry. Or maybe I'll go international." She grinned at Aiofe.
Their conversation came to a natural end as they joined the queue of seventh and eighth year students outside the Charms classroom. There didn't appear to be that many other eighth years taking Charms, so they'd all been grouped together. Aiofe spotted Hermione Granger towards the back of the crowd, though. She wondered how the girl was doing without Potter and Weasley.
Aiofe took a spot next to Daphne in the bleachers of the Charms classroom. Michael Corner plopped down in the seat on her other side.
She gave him a grin. "Good night, Corner?"
He narrowed his eyes. "Yes, I slept great."
"Not what your dormmates say."
He rolled his eyes. "I thought Slytherins were supposed to be tight-lipped."
She didn't get to tease him any further as the professor stood and began his lesson.
X
Aiofe had a decently good first week of classes. Daphne and her had more or less become fast friends, though she wasn't sure they would either be the other's first choice if there had been other options. She liked Daphne plenty, but Aiofe liked to be the more standoffish one in most of her friendships. Daphne was intimidating. She was pretty and she had a resting bitch face that scared off anyone that would think of approaching them. Aiofe found herself being the one that dragged Daphne to sit with other classmates too often, when normally she was the one that got dragged. Daphne seemed mostly content to spend her time alone or with only Aiofe, though she didn't seem to mind Zabini's presence, Aiofe had quickly noticed. As such, Aiofe found herself in the company of all Slytherins several times during the week. Nott now definitely knew her name, and even Malfoy had started speaking to her when she sat down at the breakfast table with them. She'd always heard Slytherins were an isolated people, so their easy acceptance of her, at least in a casual social atmosphere, had been a little surprising. She'd spent pretty much all of their seventh year with her mother in Japan while the war was going on and didn't share many of her peers' prejudices, so that might have had a bit to do with it.
She rolled out of bed slightly after the other girls on Saturday morning, waiting for them to be completely finished in the bathroom so that she could spend as much time in the shower as she wanted. In sixth year she'd dated a seventh year Ravenclaw prefect for a while that had shown her the baths in the prefects' bathroom. She didn't miss him, but Merlin she missed that bathtub.
After an excessively long shower, she dried her hair and pulled on a pretty, muggle-style sundress she'd gotten from a shop in Tokyo. It was a dark grey-blue color with tiny white flowers covering it. It made her dark grey eyes look bluer and contrasted well with her dark hair. She slipped on some white tennis shoes and set off to find breakfast and then Daphne, in that order.
She passed by the bulletin board on her way through the common room. Alessandria had posted a sign-up sheet for a new running club that met every morning at the entrance to the castle at eight o'clock. A couple people were already signed up. She was surprised to see Blaise Zabini's name at the top of the list. She grinned and wrote down her own name and Daphne's.
Theo Nott was the only one still in the breakfast nook, as they'd all taken to calling it their dining room. As a house they had all seemed to reach some unspoken decision that mostly everyone ate breakfast in the common room, lunch in the Great Hall mixed in with the other houses, and dinners were a mix of both locations. The Slytherins seemed to favor eating in the common room, for sure.
She plopped down near Nott on the bench in her unofficially assigned spot, and immediately went for the coffee. He looked haggard, as usual. She suspected he might have something of a drinking problem. He seemed hungover most mornings and she'd already seen him coming back to the common room smelling of whiskey late in the evening twice now. It wasn't really her business to say anything about it, though, as she had known him for all of a week.
Instead, she poured him a mug of coffee as well, and they sat in companionable silence until she had finished her usual morning pastry, a cherry turnover that went beautifully with the bitter black coffee the house-elves served up. Finally, he lifted his head up from the crook of his elbow where it had been resting on the table and started on the coffee.
"Greengrass already left." He told her.
She nodded over her coffee mug. "I figured. I'll catch up with her when I'm done here. Did she happen to mention where she was going?"
He shook his head.
"Rough night?" She asked him.
He eyed her for a moment before answering. She wondered if he knew she knew about his drinking. "Not really." He stared at her for a few more seconds before he changed the subject.
"Do you like dragons?" Aiofe felt her eyebrow pop up of its own accord, confused by the direction of the conversation.
"Uhhh, I guess so?" She answered.
She could see all of his straight, shining white teeth when he grinned. She didn't think she'd seen him smile that big before. He looked like the wolf that ate the grandma. "Good, cause I'd like to be draggin' my nuts all over your face."
Aiofe choked on her laugh. She didn't know whether she should blush or giggle, and if the heat of her face was anything to go by, she was doing both. He looked even more pleased with himself.
"Well, that's a new one…" She couldn't think of a reply on the same level as his, so she poured herself another coffee.
"I don't really use pickup lines on girls, but I thought that one was pretty good." He grabbed the carafe after her, seemingly more alive now that he was one cup down.
"How was your first week of classes?" She changed the subject again.
He shrugged one shoulder at her. "Alright. After last year I really have no complaints." She'd noticed that none of the Slytherins ever brought up last year when others were around. Nott didn't bring it up much no matter who was around.
He was in several of her classes. He'd made it into her Alchemy and Ancient Runes classes somehow, even though she didn't think he'd taken either class in sixth year. She'd been shocked as hell when he had plopped down at the desk next to her in Ancient Runes, one of the only five other students besides herself taking the course. He was in her Advanced Arithmancy, Herbology, Transfiguration, and Defense Against the Dark Arts courses as well.
"DADA, Ancient Runes, Herbology, Transfiguration, Arithmancy, and Alchemy?" She asked.
"And History of Magic."
"Hmmm. Auror?" She guessed.
He seemed almost reluctant to answer her. "No… Honestly, I'm not for sure yet… But I'm leaning towards cursebreaker."
She wondered if that had been something he had been interested in before the war or if it was new.
"What about you?" He asked and she regretted bringing it up at all.
"Um. I'm not for sure yet. Keeping my options opened, interests varied." He seemed to readily accept that the same way Daphne had.
Aiofe had finished up her second cup of coffee so she pushed herself away from the table and stood, wrapping a second pastry in a napkin to bring to Daphne. She'd noticed Daphne didn't eat much during the week they'd spent glued at the hip. "Well, I better go find Daphne. We're supposed to be frolicking on the grounds together today."
He snorted. "I would love to see Daphne frolic. I'm not sure I've ever even seen Daphne smile."
She laughed and silently agreed with him. She figured when Daphne had said frolic she had meant, sit in the shade under a tree or something. But she'd worn her tennis shoes just in case.
She paused on her way out of the room and turned back towards him. "Hey, Nott?"
He raised an eyebrow to signal for her to continue.
"Do you want children someday?" Both of his eyebrows shot up. She could see the cogs turning in his head, could practically hear the siren screaming danger, danger, crazy girl in his head right then.
"Uhh, no, honestly I don't really like kids."
She grinned at him. "Okay, can we just practice then?"
X
Aiofe made her way to the Quidditch pitch with a little bounce in her step. Though she was slightly worried she was making this ridiculously long trek in vain. She couldn't think of anywhere else Daphne might be, and she knew Malfoy and Zabini liked to fly around on their brooms, playing some form of catch in the mornings when the pitch was still empty. The two had opted out of trying out for the Slytherin Quidditch team, which they were still allowed to do, and Aiofe wasn't sure why.
Sure enough, when she got close enough to the pitch she could make out two figures racing back and forth across the field, weaving around each other at breakneck speeds. She could also see Daphne's strawberry blonde head sitting in the stands, her face partially buried in a book while still anxiously watching the two boys. They were now practicing feints. Daphne looked vaguely green.
She stood up from her seat as soon as she caught sight of Aiofe. The look on her face was nothing short of relief.
"Had a bit of a lie in this morning, did you?" She asked, leading Aiofe away from the pitch and towards the tree line of the forbidden forest.
"Kind of. Mostly I just wanted to take a nice long shower, so I waited until the other girls were up and gone."
The two girls walked so that their view of the castle was blocked by the stands of the Quidditch pitch and true to her prediction, Daphne found a nice spot under a tree for them to sit. She'd even packed a small woven blanket for them to sit on. Aiofe plopped down next to her and pulled the pastry out of her bag, pushing it into Daphne's hands before she could refuse.
"Here, I brought pumpkin juice, too." She'd had to stop by the Great Hall on the way out to grab bottles, the dining area in the common room didn't have the bottled kind.
Aiofe laid back on the blanket while Daphne nibbled on the pastry. Aiofe watched the other girl for a moment while she was unaware of her attention. Daphne really was pretty, with delicate features that stood in direct contrast with her stern, outspoken personality. Her nose was slightly upturned, and her eyebrows were a few shades darker than her hair, making her look even more intimidating shadowing her hard eyes. She wondered if Daphne's sweet appearance was what made her feel the need to be so quick to go on the defense in the first place.
"What are you looking at me like that for?" Daphne gave her a dirty look.
"Just wondering if you were born this mean, or you became this way…" Daphne laughed and set the other half of her pastry down on its napkin, shifting so that she lay next to Aiofe.
"Weird being back here after last year, huh?"
Aiofe turned her eyes up to the clouds above them. "Not really for me. I wasn't here at all last year. Spent the entire school year in Japan with my mom, shopping for dresses and arguing about why she was never around when I was a kid." She didn't add that she felt immensely guilty and ashamed that she had been halfway across the world when so many of her peers were fighting in a war. She was no Harry Potter, she wouldn't have added anything special to the winning side. In fact, she probably would have gotten herself killed. But still…
"Probably for the best, really. People were dying left and right. Bunch of students that didn't have any business being on a battlefield, too." Daphne's voice was carefully neutral, as though she was trying to sound like her words didn't have any strong emotional effect on her.
"Were you there for the final battle?" Aiofe had kind of wondered. "Or them?" She nodded in the vague direction of the quidditch pitch.
"No, I was with my sister. Draco was there. Blaise was in Italy most of the year with his mom. Honestly, I have no idea what Theo was doing. He's a secretive fucker, that's for sure. I think the only person that knows what Theo was up to, other than Theo, is Draco, and he hasn't talked about it." Aiofe nodded. Even Draco Malfoy had been more forthcoming with the personal information in the short time that they had known each other than Theo Nott. She couldn't think of almost anything off the top of her head that she actually knew about him, other than that he apparently favored whiskey.
"Good. I'm glad you guys weren't there. Glad Malfoy survived it." Daphne sent her a small smile.
"Getting soft on me already, Malone?" Aiofe rolled her eyes in return and decided to change the subject. Slytherins were allergic to feelings.
"So, Hogsmeade next weekend." Daphne let out a pleased groan next to her.
"Thank Merlin. I can't wait to get out and do a little shopping."
Aiofe laughed at her. "What can you possibly need already? We've been here a week!"
"It's not a matter of need, Aiofe, it's a form of mind-healing. I need retail therapy. And the Halloween Dance is less than two months away. Do you have a costume yet?"
"No, and I also don't have a date."
"Oh don't tell me you're one of those lame girls that won't go to the dance if she doesn't get invited?" She sat up slightly to look Aiofe over, her eyes roaming her face and chest. "There's no chance you've ever not had a date for a dance anyways, and you won't convince me otherwise." She laid back down flat on her back. "And if either of us doesn't get a date we will just make Draco or Blaise dance with us. Draco probably won't even ask anyone. He was with Pansy for so long I'm not sure he even knows how to pull girls anymore." Aiofe had her suspicions that dancing with Blaise was half the appeal of the dance anyway, but she didn't say that.
"What are you thinking of dressing as?"
"Hmm. I don't know. What do you think?"
Aiofe gave her pale hair a glance. "Fairy, or moon goddess. Something sexy with lots of gold glitter."
Daphne laughed and sat up. "How about you be the moon and I'll be the sun and then if one of us doesn't get a date we will just both ditch our dates and go together."
Aiofe grinned and agreed, though she hoped she didn't end up having to actually dump someone right before the dance, she would feel like an asshole.
"Great, we can start looking for costumes next weekend. I want to get ours before everyone else even thinks to start looking."
"You really like dances, then?"
Daphne let out an exaggerated shudder. "Ew, no. I really like Halloween, and a dance is all we get here so I'll take it. I also just really like shopping."
"Who do you think you want to ask you?" She asked Daphne.
Daphne thought for a moment. "I don't know. Not like we have that many options anymore."
"What about a seventh year?"
"Ew! You would go with a seventh year?" Daphne looked absolutely scandalized at this suggestion.
"Yeah? What, you wanna go with Ernie MacMillan? Marcus Patton? Terry Boot?"
Daphne grimaced. "Okay, fair point." She once again shifted back to her spot on the blanket next to Aiofe. "I do still think Malfoy is a good backup plan…"
The two girls spent most of the day laying in the shade, chatting, and reading the novels they both kept in their school bags. They finally packed up the blanket and headed inside when it began to get dark, and they would miss dinner if they stayed out much longer. Aiofe didn't know about Daphne, but her stomach was growling like a pissed-off grindylow.
Dean Thomas and Michael Corner were sitting in the dining room eating dinner when Aiofe and Daphne made it back to the common room, so the girls joined them. Aiofe assumed that their presence meant there was a distinct lack of any Slytherin housemates other than Daphne around. Michael didn't seem to care much, but Dean Thomas could barely be in the same room as Draco Malfoy without apparently breaking into hives. Daphne seemed to bother him significantly less than the other Slytherins, but Aiofe couldn't imagine any guy could be too horribly disgusted by Daphne.
After stuffing herself with slices of cheese on warm bread, and forcing Daphne to at least eat some vegetables, Aiofe headed up to their dorm and promptly passed out on her cloudlike bed.
AN: This is set in a at least mostly canon, but modern world. It is completely unbeta'd, so if anyone would like to do that please let me know. I have done a couple character sketches, if anyone would like to see them I might post them somewhere. Thanks for reading!