Story Notes

Hi…. and welcome to Cupid's Arrows! This story started as a drabble prompt in a facebook group, (Draco's Den,) and kind of took on a life of its own from there. I've had a little break from writing it just lately, due to some personal issues, but things are all sorted out now. I gave it a re read and picked up a couple of mistakes and things I wasn't so keen on so I've been through and done a bit of editing, new chapters are also lined up and ready to go!

Thank you for the follows, favourites and reviews the story has had so far, I love reading them, and it means the world to me that people like this funny little story. So after a flurry of edited chapters, new chapters will be posted on a Saturday.

Thank you for understanding.

Also, huge, huge, huge thanks you's to Champagneandliterature, my superstar alpha/beta! She is amazing with everything she does. Xx

Cupid Revealed

Hermione Granger couldn't help it, she clapped a hand over her mouth and laughed. For a moment she couldn't speak, she just stared at Theodore Nott as he strode into the room dressed as Cupid and took an elaborate bow. A one armed white satin toga hung artfully from his stocky, tattooed body, a pair of gold wings protruded from his back, and in his hand, he carried a golden bow, complete with a quiver full of arrows.

Hermione wasn't the only one laughing. Pansy Parkinson was doubled over, shaking with silent mirth and Daphne Greengrass and Ginny Weasley were both giggling behind their hands. "Come on now girls, you've got to admit, it suits me."

"If anyone can pull it off it's you, Theo," Pansy confirmed with a grin.

Theo smirked, turning in a slow circle and lifting a lazy hand to acknowledge the wolf whistles Draco Malfoy and Blaise Zabini sent his way. "Gather round then ladies and gents, I have the power of the God of Love behind me now. I have within these very hands," he wiggled his fingers with a grin, "the power to pair you up for the Halloween Blind Date Contest."

Hermione watched incredulously as he took the arrows out of the quiver and held it out to the room at large. "If you are absolutely sure you want to commit to this event, please drop your name into this magical, uh, quiver thing."

One by one everyone in the room dropped a piece of parchment with their name on into the quiver. Theo theatrically waved his wand and whispered a rather complicated incantation.

"Gather round then, boys and girls. Here we have the name of our first contender…" Theo prodded his wand into the quiver and a scrap of parchment floated up into the air. The parchment disappeared, leaving a name written in what appeared to be neon spell-light.

"Neville Longbottom. Where are you, Neville?" Blushing furiously Neville stumbled forwards, adjusting his pirate costume as Theo pulled out his partner's name. "Pansy Parkinson." Hermione gasped in shock, but Pansy grinned in apparent delight as she shimmied across to join Neville. Neville, it appeared, was completely thrown by her naughty witch's costume and had no idea where to look.

Theo continued pulling names out of the quiver. With another cheeky grin, he paired up Harry Potter and Daphne Greengrass, Ginny Weasley and Blaise Zabini, Ron Weasley and Milicent Bulstrode, and then stared with a wide grin at Hermione and Draco Malfoy, the only other remaining competitors in the room.

"Well, well well." He gave them both what looked like a genuine smile, "look at that. Who would believe it?"

"Who would indeed? Hermione suppressed a roll of her eyes as she tried to arrange her face into something slightly friendlier than its current scowl.

"Granger," Malfoy said, smiling rather disconcertingly in his vampire costume and drawing attention to his magically pointed teeth. "You're looking very beautiful tonight."

"Thank you," she replied with another rather forced smile as he took his place beside her.

"What happens to you now then, Theo?" Draco asked. "Who becomes your partner?"

"I don't have one. It's my job to keep tabs on all of you and to direct the game. That's why I get to wear these bad boys and you, Malfoy, are standing there dressed as a mere vampire." Theo's smirk was as wide as Hermione had ever seen it as he stroked his golden wings lovingly.

She wondered briefy how on earth she had let herself be talked into signing up for this, but she knew the answer. Ginny had been rather persuasive, and Hermione's curiosity had caused her to agree a little too easily.

Hermione knew Ginny had signed up to the long-standing game played between Slytherin and Gryffindor hoping she would be paired with Blaise, and it looked like her wish had been granted. Hermione's wish on the other hand….

"It hardly seems fair that you don't have a partner though," Pansy said, staring at Theo with a devious look on her face. "But oh dear, it looks like there is an odd number of us. Whatever could we do MIllie?"

Millicent grinned, "Well, if this happens in class, usually the leftover person joins an existing pair. Thereby making a trio."

"Oh yes, that could work," Pansy agreed. "But, oh. Oh dear, Millie, I only know of one other boy in this room who's bi like Theo is..."

Hermione watched Theo stare at the two girls with his expression caught somewhere between exasperation and humor. "Oh," he said sarcastically, "I wonder who that could be?" He looked across the room and caught Draco's eye. The blond was staring at Pansy with much the same expression as the one Theo wore.

"What do you think, we can't have you being on your own now can we?" Pansy continued innocently. "After all you'd be doing a good deed, you might be keeping these two from murdering each other. I know it's Halloween, but we're only meant to play with fake blood, not the real thing."

Hermione closed her eyes and breathed deeply. The only rules to the game that she knew of were that each pairing contained one player from each opposing house and that the pair had never dated before. To the best of her knowledge, there were no rules that forbade threesomes.

Draco was watching her speculatively, as was Theo and she knew they were both waiting for her to back out. She looked up, smiling determinedly instead. "Come and join us then, Theo. I'm in if you two are?"

Theo looked at both her and Draco then nodded. "You're on Granger. Let the games begin."

"Indeed!" Hermione said, then froze in alarm as someone hammered loudly on the door, "wait, I thought this room was supposed to be top secret?"

"It is!" Harry said, frowning in confusion. "Unless the person outside knows what the room is being used for, and wants to enter it for the same purpose."

"Ah." Theo strode to the door and pulled it open, his Cupid's wings bouncing jauntily with every step he took. "Good evening ladies and gents"

Hermione was amazed to see Seamus Finnigan blinking curiously on the other side of the threshold. Judging by his look of surprise it seemed that being enthusiastically confronted by a semi-naked Cupid was a little more than he had bargained for this evening. There were a couple of rather feminine giggles too, and Hermione shifted to see who else was outside.

She stifled a gasp as the others came into view. Seamus was standing in front of a small group of other eighth years. Behind him were Dean Thomas, Lavender Brown, Cho Chang, Parvati Patil, Luna Lovegood, Hannah Abbott, and most surprisingly of all, Gregory Goyle.

Just to compound the strangeness of the situation, they were all dressed in full Halloween regalia.

Theo scratched his head making his dark hair stand up in a mess that could have rivaled Harry's on a bad day. "Come in. Umm, do you all know what you're doing here?"

"Of course!" Dean grinned. "We're a little late because we had to make sure there was an even number of us, which was fine until we found Greg loitering outside the door here. Then we needed another girl, so we found Hannah and roped her in too!"

Hannah blinked, looking a little bemused at everything that was going on. "Wait a sec," Theo frowned. "This game is supposed to be Gryffindor vs Slytherin. You're... wait, what houses are you all in?"

"Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw," Luna replied, smiling sweetly. "We know what the traditional rules of the game are, but we also thought this new eighth year was all about unity and building inter-house relationships, so we thought it might be okay to include the other two houses this year as well?"

"I, umm, cannot argue with that at all. Wait though, there's too many girls here now." Theo said, eyeing the newcomers suspiciously.

Hermione gasped as Luna stepped confidently forwards. "No there's not," she said, gazing innocently into his blue eyes. "We talked about this as well, remember?"

"Oooh!" Theo's eyes lit up as his grin grew wider. "Yes we did. Are you sure about doing this?"

"Honestly, there's the right number of girls." Seamus grinned. "Now, are you going to let us in to play or not?"

"Names then. In here please," Theo indicated the golden quiver with a grin. He passed out ready spelled parchment and quills and Hermione watched as all of the newcomers wrote their names down in the silence of the room then added them to the now glowing quiver. When it was full he prodded it's contents once more with his wand and again, names rose up into the air.

Hermione raised her eyebrows once more in surprise as Hannah Abbott was immediately paired with Gregory Goyle. Goyle smiled somewhat uncertainly as Hannah went to join him. Cho paired with Seamus, Parvati's name linked her with Luna, "see Theodore, I told you there was the right number of ladies present," Luna said with a faint smile as Pavarti blushed deeply, amid a chorus of wolf whistles and claps from the boys.

Hermione wondered if Luna and Pavarti had realized that they would be outing themselves quite so publicly. From the look of sheer terror on Parvarti's face as Luna serenely took her hand, it would appear not. She also wondered how Luna and Theo seemed to know each other so well, but she pushed that small concern to one side then turned to look at the last unpaired couple in the room.

Lavender and Dean stared at each other until Dean grinned, stuck his hand out, and smiled. "Come on then Lav, it looks like it's you and me!"

Theo glanced around, clearly delighting at still being center stage and having his captive audience grow significantly. He took another elaborate bow and waved his wand yet again. Hermione rolled her eyes at his theatrics as a blinding light flashed in the room. The light was followed a split second later by a loud bang and a puff of white smoke which faded to reveal two magical pieces of parchment which floated in midair in front of them all.

The rules, ladies, and gents. You each wear one of these," Theo conjured a stash of badges in the shape of thin golden arrows and placed them on the table beside him. "Keep your badge concealed at all times though. If any of the teachers notice the pin or catch you playing the game you are instantly disqualified. The badge records your progress. At the end of each day, progress points are added here," Theo indicated the leader-board where each couple's names glowed in neon writing, coloured according to their house allegiance.

"Points accumulate throughout the game. Treating your partner well gains you points. Being a dick drops your points. Cheating on your partner disqualifies you. Each week has a theme, with optional games that can win you extra points and the bottom couple is disqualified each week. The winning couple and house are announced after the New Years' ball finishes. Any questions?" He looked around the room but nobody spoke. "This week's theme is relationship chemistry and getting to know each other. You start scoring as soon as you put your pin in place- yes Hermione?"

Hermione pulled her hand down out of the air with a frown. "You said the winning house? That seems a little unfair on Hufflepuff," she glanced over at Hannah who giggled nervously beside Greg, "Ravenclaw too."

"Last year those houses weren't even in the game Granger. This year at least they have a fighting chance," Theo said. Hermione frowned as Draco sniggered irritatingly beside her. She was starting to seriously regret her decision to take part in this game, especially given who her partners were set to be. She sighed and adjusted her wig, suddenly dressing up as Belle from Beauty and the Beast seemed like a ridiculous idea too. Ginny, it seemed, had a lot to answer for.

Nobody else was objecting to the unfair house representation in the slightest. She glanced around the room at her friends who were smiling and laughing with each other and their new partners. then she turned back to see Draco watching her in amusement. "You're looking a little put out, Granger. Whatever could be wrong?"

She scowled even harder as Theo hovered in front of them both with two pins in his hand and a broad smile on his face. "Hello, my very favorite couple in the room. Shall I fix your pins for you both?"

Draco chuckled as Theo purposely dropped one pin then bent down to pick it up. He bumped his Cupid wings purposely into Draco as he turned, laughing as one wing stroked up Draco's thigh and caught in his Dracula cloak. "Whoops a daisy," Theo smiled as he used the opportunity to brush a hand over Draco's crotch under the pretence of pulling the wing free.

Draco merely rolled his eyes as Theo magically fixed the pin to the inside of his robes, then moved on to attach Hermione's. "Draco's not too bad when you get to know him, Hermione. Give him a chance, you never know, you might find you quite like being sandwiched in between two fallen angels." Theo grinned again at her sharp intake of breath and sauntered away, leaving her gazing open-mouthed after him.

"Ladies and Gentlemen," Theo called loudly, "the game begins….. Now!"