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The Founding of Pigwarts II – Cooking Chaos
Chapter 12: Do pigs fly? What about cows?
Ginny had decided to let their Oh – Romance! plan rest in peace for a while. Usually she didn't like backing away from her resolutions, but this time she was ready to make an exception, and that for two reason. First, Hermione and Draco didn't seem to be in need of another push, and second, she never wanted to meet that angry lioness ever again.
And so the chaos-cooking duo redirected all their effort into Pigwarts once again. With little to no trouble they had managed to convince Neville and Susan, both of whom were rather excited about the opportunity to teach in a brand new wizarding school. Ginny would have gladly taken care of Terry and Dean, as well, but Daphne kept insisting they would be left to her. Then Ginny had argued that that would leave no one else for her to persuade, but Daphne had managed to prove her wrong on that as well.
Which had brought her to another dance floor of another party, this time at the house of Millicent Bulstrode. A couple of days ago the prospect of trying to convince a bunch of Slytherins into teaching at Pigwarts would have sounded way too perilous to her, but after the Singing-Ron-Torture it felt as safe as a vault in Gringotts. In fact, danger had obtained a completely different meaning, and was mainly associated with a girl with brown eyes, bushy hair, and a love for books. A roomful of Slytherins was a piece of cherry pie compared to that. Besides, they were good dancers.
It was when Ginny had danced herself breathless and was about to bring up the subject of Pigwarts, when Millicent's voice rang over the hall.
"Game Time!!!"
Everyone stopped their present activities, and moved to sit down by the fireplace. Ginny was about to claim an utterly comfortable looking armchair when someone grabbed her arm and pulled her down to the utterly comfortable carpet on the floor.
"I think it's only fair," Millicent said by her side, putting more than enough emphasis on the word fair, "that our newest member receives the honour of naming the game and its rules."
Ginny realized at once they were talking about her, but didn't let it, or the hidden meaning behind it, intimidate her one bit. In fact, this was her chance to get what she wanted. Oh, those poor Slytherins, they had no idea what they were getting themselves into.
But not to make them suspicious, she tried to look a bit confused and bewildered, careful not to overdo it because a lion in the serpents' nest would not show its weaknesses (fake or otherwise) too easily.
"All right," she spoke with a shrug. "Truth or Dare, then."
The people around her hardly managed to conceal their grins, which made it harder for Ginny to conceal hers.
"All right, people, you heard her," Millicent smirked. "Let's start."
"One more moment," the Gryffidor said. "One more rule – everything we speak about stays solely between us."
If she had expected them to protest, she would have been wrong. Instead, their smirks only widened.
"Slytherin's honour," Adrian said, holding up his hand.
"Do I look like an idiot to you?" Ginny demanded.
"No?" he ventured after a deliberately long pause.
"That's right," Ginny nodded. "I want a vow. A magical vow."
The people around her looked like they had run out of evil grins to suppress. That's right, she thought, you have no idea whom you are dealing with.
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It was a beautiful day for playing Quidditch, and that was what Dean was doing at the moment. It was also a beautiful day for watching Quidditch, and that was what most of the audience was doing at the moment.
"Goal!" Dean cried and made a victory zig-zag on his broom. They were doing great at the moment, and they were still doing great after half an hour when the Chaser of the opposite team had taken a bad hit from the Bludger, and then an even worse hit from the ground, and the game had been suspended while the mediwitch took care of him.
Dean was hovering in the air, going through the best strategies in his mind, and already imagining their victory party, when one of his teammates poked him into the shoulder.
"What?" he was wakened from his thoughts.
"Someone seems to be looking for you," the other boy grinned, and pointed to the pitch below…
…where a girl was sitting on the grass and waving up to him. That was not unusual, although more than often his fangirls were screaming and jumping like maniacs (or monkeys) instead of sitting calmly. And more than often the security would remove them at once; this time, however, no one even made a move to approach the girl (because it's rather hard to make a move when one is paralyzed).
Curious, Dean zoomed down to her.
"Hey!" Daphne smiled and waved to him again.
Once he had recognized her, which wasn't so easy as this time she was dressed in shawls only – one around her waist filling the place of a skirt, another round her chest substituting a shirt, and the third wrapped round her head hiding her face – which still failed to make her look like Trelawney. The colours were green and silver, of course, and that helped him greatly with placing her.
"Oh, hi," he replied to her greeting rather unenthusiastically.
"Can I talk to you?" the girl asked.
"Now is not a good time," he said, realizing he didn't have to lie. "I am in the middle of something right now."
"After the game then?" she insisted.
"I suppose," he shrugged, having no intention whatsoever to grant her wish.
"See you later then," Daphne beamed, and waved him goodbye, yet instead of leaving the pitch, she lied down on the grass, closed her eyes, and enjoyed the warm spring sunshine.
"Who was she?" Phil asked once Dean had made it back to the heights.
"Just somebody," he spoke indifferently, and watched the injured-no-more opponent get back onto his broom.
"She's rather hot," Phil remarked, as he followed Dean towards the Quaffle, being a Chaser himself.
"Yes, but I wouldn't recommend. Too clingy, as you might notice. Had a go with her some days ago, but she's a Slytherin and you know they are all…"
"They are all what?" Phil asked, and when no answer came, averted his gaze from the Quaffle, and turned it to the cow by his side.
Something was definitely wrong with the sight, he realized.
For one thing, cows did not fly. And even if they did, they did not fly on brooms. And even if they did that, as this was exactly what the cow beside him was doing, they did not play Quidditch.
After a moment, Phil realized why cows didn't play Quidditch or fly on brooms longer than about ten seconds. The brooms had been built to hold human weight, and cows just happened to be a bit heavier.
The cow let out a desperate Mooo! as the broom finally realized what Phil had realized a second ago, and plummeted towards the ground.
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Ginny was silent for a while.
"Gold and ivory," she said at last, in answer to Crabbe's question of Truth about her favourite colour.
He graced her with a stupid grin, and she smiled back.
"All right, Millicent, Truth or Dare?"
"Truth!" the girl practically growled at her, still red in the face from those 20 laps the Gryffindor had made her run around the house.
"Was Snape your first crush?" Ginny asked as innocently as she could.
If their hostess had been red before, she turned burgundy now, a colour Ginny had only seen on Ron.
"Where on earth did you get the idea of me having a crush on Snape?" she managed to choke out.
"Did you?" she asked with the same angelic smile and expression.
"Do pigs fly?"
"Yes, they do," Ginny replied calmly, and drawing her wand conjured up a little pink pig with white wings hovering above Millicent's head.
"And speaking of pigs…" she added, ignoring the shocked silence of a bunch of evil little serpents who were just beginning to realize they were dealing with a mongoose in lion's skin.
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"Moo," said the cow, as Daphne led it off the Quidditch pitch. There had been a lot of mooing before, when it had reached the ground with something quite similar to a splash, and later got fixed by a rather reluctant mediwitch ("I'm not a vet!" – "Yes, but look how pathetic it looks, all flat and squashed." – "Moo!").
"I'm sorry," she said. "But it was all your fault, really, running away before I could tell you about Pigwarts."
"Moo?"
"I'm going to tell you everything. After all, there's nothing else I can do for you right now."
"Moo, moo."
"No, sorry. I don't know the counter-spell. Perhaps it wears off after a while."
"Moo!!!"
"Relax. If it doesn't, I'll just ask Ginny."
"Moo?"
"Yes, we're on the same Hippogriff here. Figuratively speaking."
"Moo."
"Do you like mushrooms?"
"Moo?"
"It's just this little song I know,
"Moo,
moo, moo, said the cow, said the cow,
Moo,
moo, moo, said the cow, said the cow,
Moo,
moo, moo, moo, I like mushrooms,
Said
the cow, said the cow."
"Moo."
"Yes, well, you can take me out sometimes, and then we see whether you like them or not," Daphne winked.
"Moo," said the cow.
"Good," said the girl, then cast her companion a concerned look. "I don't need to milk you, do I?"
"MOO!!!"
"No need to use that tone. Last time you didn't seem to mind."
"MOO!!!" said the cow and blushed.
Daphne sniggered.
"I'd better tell you the story then."
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Later, when they were back in their usual café eating chocolate cake, Daphne could not help but remark,
"Ginny, your hair?"
"Yes, what about it?" the other girl asked.
"Nothing. I just couldn't help but notice that it's… crawling."
"Just tried to experiment a little," Ginny shrugged, pushing a couple of snakes out of her eyes.
"You know," she added after a while. "I couldn't help but notice…"
"Notice what?" Daphne asked.
"That there's a cow sitting beside you."
"Oh, that," the brunette made a nonchalant wave with her hand. "Just decided to get myself a pet."
"Moo," said the cow.
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Note: When my beta first read about the CowVow, she said she dearly hoped that someone in this story will be turned into a cow. Now, someone has. :D Heh, I like this chapter. I hope you do, too. :)
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