Warrington's first thought upon walking into breakfast two mornings later was how grateful he was that he wasn't trying to impress Nerissa. While he liked to think that he could be romantic when he wanted, he had no intention of wooing his friend. Accordingly, their conversation the morning before had been brief:

"Hey, Riss, do you want to go to the ball with me?" She'd looked a bit worried, and clarified.

"As friends, you mean?" When he nodded, she'd considered. "It does sound like fun, and I'd much rather go with a friend than alone. I mean sure, Zoe will be there, but there's no way she'll talk to me if she has a date. And if neither of us do, she'll make me talk to the French boys, which is worse." Warrington had grinned.

"Glad to know I'm better than nothing."

"Shut up you prat, or you'll be dancing alone tomorrow. And I'll take plenty of pictures that you can look back on in the years to come." They'd made a few plans and said goodbye. All in all, it had been a friendly exchange. But if he'd waited until today... well, he didn't think he could've gotten away with that after this.

The entirety of the right hand wall in the great hall was covered in leafy plants, from which stood out in white roses a message:

Beautiful and smart

Light shining through a window

Zoe Accrington

It was cheesy, yes, but Cassius was pretty sure Zoe would love it. Andrew stood by the wall casually, as if this was an everyday activity for him. Pucey came to sit by Warrington and whistled.

"Do you think he realizes he's making life hell for anyone who still has to ask a girl? It's been casual until now but…" Cassius laughed and started to respond, but was interrupted by a commotion over by the wall. Adrian and Cassius turned in time to see Zoe hugging Andrew as her friends surrounded them.

"Should I be offended that you didn't even give me an individual rose?" Nerissa sat down beside Cassius and he turned to her, laughing.

"I'm pretty sure that's your call, not mine."
"Well," Nerissa mocked deep thought. "Since I'm not exactly into public humiliation, I think I'm good."

"Humiliation? This is poetry." Adrian gestured to the wall, where Fawley and Zoe still stood. "Literally. He insisted on haiku. 'You don't understand, Pucey, it's the most natural form of poetry' or something."

Warrington pushed back his plate and stood up, grabbing the book bag he'd brought with him. "Well, nice to talk to you, I'm headed to the library." Nerissa shrugged and turned to Pucey, and as Warrington left he heard their conversation turn to a discussion of whether or not Fawley's demonstration would raise the expectations of the other girls.

Cassius planned to take the most direct path to the library, but paused when he saw Potter and his friends walking to breakfast. Telling Potter anything would lose him any edge he may have by figuring out the clue. On the other hand… there was no way he could've handled the dragon as well without Potter's clue, and he didn't want to be in his debt. Of course, Granger and Weasley wouldn't be thrilled about him talking to Potter… He continued on his way. It would be better to catch him alone sometime, he figured, but he didn't see any way around it without feeling, somehow, like he'd be playing unfairly.

/

"You aren't holding your wand right," Cassius said thoughtfully, leaning over the bookshelf in front of Marietta. Surprised, she looked up.

"Rowena, Warrington, don't do that. And I know how to hold my wand, thank you very much." Warrington raised an eyebrow, and she glanced to her right before beckoning him over. Walking around the shelf, he came to her table and sat down across from her.

"First of all, let me say that I'm telling you this so you leave me alone, and if you say anything about it, ever, even to me, I will prove I know how to hold my wand when I use it to hex you." Warrington almost laughed, but nodded in agreement. Marietta narrowed her eyes, then continued in a low voice, very quickly. "I'm trying to get someone to help me, so that when he comes over, he might talk to me and ask me to the ball." Warrington's eyebrows shot up.

"You're trying to trick someone into going to the ball with you?"

"Shut up!" she hissed. "I'm not tricking him, I just want a shot, okay? I'd ask him myself, but that's not how things are done, or whatever." Warrington looked to his left, at the table Marietta had glanced at.

"Who is that?"

"Carl Hopkins. My year. He's a Gryffindor and he's soo nice and we're kind of friends but there's no way he's going to ask me to the ball."

"Okayy…" Warrington paused, thinking. "Well, I'm not exactly the best relationship counselor, but couldn't you just go talk to him? That seems more… normal? And then you can just bring up the ball." She looked at him, not speaking. "Come on, you aren't scared are you?" She blinked slowly at him as though he was the most idiotic person in the world. "Okay so maybe it's a little hard to talk to someone you're into, but you aren't asking to make out in a broom cupboard or something. Just go." Glancing over one more time, Marietta sighed.
"Fine, you're right I'll go. But if this screws everything up, I'm blaming you." Cassius watched her walk over, then looked down at her book, Charms for the Explorer. Flipping through it absently, Cassius thought it seemed pretty basic, information about various lighting charms for caves, warming charms for mountains, and charms for breathing underwater—at this point he flipped back a few pages. In annoyingly peppy writing, and with far too many exclamation points (why did anyone think that made books better?), the book talked about the Bubble Head charm, mentioning partial transfiguration and Gillyweed as possible alternatives for it. Scooping up the book, Warrington walked over to Madam Pince and checked it out, figuring that Edgecombe could yell at him later. Anyway, he noted with a grin, she and Carl Hopkins looked to be getting along just fine.

/

"So you want to transfigure yourself into some kind of fish so that you can breathe underwater." Warrington shrugged, meeting Fawley's skeptical look. "I mean, if that's what you want to do, go for it. It just seems like the Bubble Head charm makes more sense. Your vision won't be changed underwater, and more importantly, you won't have to worry about getting stuck as fish head boy."

"Gillyweed still makes the most sense to me, but you wanted to show your prowess or whatever." Adrian was not a little grumpy at his recommendation being ignored, and was refusing to take part in the discussion any further, or so he said (in reality, he simply refused to respond to the other two, and was still saying quite a bit). Cassius shot Pucey an annoyed look before turning back to Fawley.

"Okay, the fish head part is stupid, because I'm not going to get stuck." Fawley looked skeptical, but Warrington pressed on. "The vision though… you may have a point. I said you may-" Andrew looked almost gleeful.

"You said I was right. No, no taking it back, you said it and that's that. I'm right." Warrington ceded the point, figuring an argument on whether uncertainty in a response took away from a claim of correctness or not wasn't, at that moment, worth it.

"Well, it's better than transfiguring yourself at any rate." Pucey finally broke and decided to (officially) rejoin the conversation. "We can practice that later, but for now, let's take advantage of… well, your advantage."

"My advantage? Tell me more, because I'm a fan of those."

"Cassius, come on. We have a giant window into the lake, the place you're going to have to navigate, in the middle of our common room."

"That's great, in theory. But we only see part of the lake, and not very far. It's not as if I can just ask the next merperson who pops by, seeing as, y'know, they can't respond." Pucey rolled his eyes.

"Obviously. My point is that we know where they aren't, and if we watch where they come from or go, we can probably get a general idea, and maybe figure out a charm to track them." Fawley shrugged, glancing at Warrington.

"Better than nothing, right?" Slowly, Warrington nodded. "Excellent. We can do that later, but for now, you're going to help me drag Pucey away from his novel, thrilling though I'm sure it is, so we can get some snacks from the kitchen. I'm starving and dinner isn't for another hour."

Wow, it's been a while... and pretty crazy. This chapter feels kind of like a filler chapter (because it kind of is), but from the next you can expect: an awkward encounter, some Yule Ball snippets, talks with friends, and investigating the lake, hopefully leading up to the second task. Honestly, I didn't expect this fic even to be as long as it is already, but I'm trying to do it justice. The last chapters have been edited a bit, but nothing major, so there's no need to go back.

As always, I hope you enjoyed, and please let me know of anything you hate, like, or are confused by!