A/N : Sorry for the late update! Enjoy the story!

Chapter 17

In which the three chaperones questioned their sanity.

While Draco and Theo had their fun with the afternoon snacks and tea provided to tide them over until dinner in the corner of the Forbidden Room, Pansy stared wide eyed at the scene in front of her. She spared a glance to her two friends nonchalantly sipping their teas and hissed in irritation.

"Guys, shouldn't we be worried?"

She flinched as one head of the three headed dogs snapped the fanged Frisbee three inches above her head.

"Why? Do they look like they are in danger?" Theo asked as he examined the raspberry swirl on the clotted cream in his scones with deep interest.

The three of them looked at the happy couple throwing fanged frisbees and blood red colored squeaky balls that sounded human squeaks when they got clamped between the huge jaws of the Cerberus. As if to prove the uselessness of Pansy's worries, Quasimodo, or The Thing (depending on who you asked), bounded happily and played tug-o-war with the squeaky ball in one of the head's mouth. That head happily indulged the puppy and growled playfully as he dragged the puppy slowly around. Pansy winced at the amount of slobbers flying around in that area and wondered how anyone could think that this is a fun date.

Harriet looked happy, patting one of the head that had spit out the fanged frisbee with praises while the Dark Lord scourgified the toy and getting ready to throw it with a smile. The Cerberus' tail was wagging excitedly, and it behaved like an oversized puppy in happiness. The room shook with a small earthquake as the dog turned over, showing them it's belly for a belly rub that both their Lord and Lady participated whole heartedly. The thumps of tail and vibration from one of its legs made Pansy dizzy.

"Yeah, no. But it doesn't change the fact that they could just up and snap our heads in a moment's notice." she said in trepidation.

Slytherin, in general, tends to stay out of creatures that could make snack out of them. The Dark Lord, though, was another matter entirely. She almost didn't believe Draco when he said they had to play chaperones for their Lord and Lady's Valentine Date. In the Forbidden Room in the third-floor corridor, no less. Why can't they have a normal date for once? Or was this a normal dating situation for Dark Lords? With all the added danger and excitement, it probably does. It gave her an idea to write a memoir of The Dark Lord's dates.

"I wouldn't worry about that if I were you. The Dark Lord prepared this one thoroughly. Apparently, The Groundskeeper was a huge sucker for romantic dates and gave him pointers about this Cerberus. His name is Fluffy, by the way, and The Dark Lord asked Father to invite a string quartet to play the romantic background music to their dinner." Draco said calmly.

"In here? With the dog? Wait, the Cerberus was named Fluffy?" Pansy asked incredulously.

Theo joined her at staring at Draco. "That's not sanitary, is it?"

"Of course, why did you think they brought The Thing to the date? and Theo, we're wizards. we can just scourgify the table or put a shield so that the slobber didn't get to our table. My Father taught me when The Thing first came to live with The Dark Lord. You wouldn't believe the amount of troubles that little guy brought to the house. I was impressed that the Dark Lord was quite attached to it despite his grumbling about kneazles" Draco rolled his eyes at them while pouring himself another cup of tea.

As if on cue, Professor Snape came in with a sour expression on his face followed by four trembling musicians holding their instruments like a shield in front of them. He escorted them to a raised platform and nodded dourly before glaring at the three chaperones and clapped once. The musicians started playing to the theme of Fur Elise, making four pairs of doggy eyes droop low and soon the loud snores started to compete with the volume of the classical music. The professor muted the dogs' snores with a scowl as a house elf appeared and snapped a candlelit table to appear near their table.

The three of them sighed in relief as the Professor swooped out like a bat out of hell and the first course appeared on their table.

"Ah well, it's not that bad, I think. The dogs are sleeping, and it's peaceful. Definitely beats the boring dinner at the Great Hall and the common room afterwards." Theo said quietly as he eyed the three heads piled over each other with The Thing between its front paws.

Pansy sighed heavily. "Yeah, at least the food is good enough to make up for the Valentine dinner I missed, and your company instead of Pucey's"

"Didn't he go on a Valentine date with the fifth-year female prefect? I heard they were betrothed." Draco drawled and ducked a bowl of clotted cream heading his way.

He caught it with magic though, he didn't want to know what would happen if one of them was caught messing up The Dark Lord's date.

"All the good ones are always taken or gay." Pansy sniffed mournfully.

"Err, we are one of the good ones." Theo said with a frown.

Pansy lifted an eyebrow at him, and her eyes flicked to Draco, who was calmly slathering fragrant garlic butter to his dinner roll.

"My point exactly."

In the other table, Harriet and Thomas were discussing courting tradition, something Harriet wasn't familiar with, and something that Thomas was just learning from Lucius.

"...so, since this is our second date, I would have to come up with a courting gift for you. Any idea what you would like? I don't want to accidentally give you something you hate. Lucius said that I should surprise you, but I remember Abraxas whining about how Narcissa threw Lucius' first courting gift to his face. Apparently, she thought it was tacky and pretentious." Thomas said.

It was no wonder, actually. Lucius was a bit pretentious and apparently passed that trait over to his son, While Narcissa was born a Black and had impeccable taste. He certainly wasn't about to repeat the humiliation. He was a Dark Lord, after all, he had reputations to uphold. Besides, Dumbledore reiterated 'Communication is the key to relationships' in every class they had with him. Which was rather ironic since he never heard the man having any relationship with anyone, bar his brother Aberforth, and that was the prime example of a relationship to avoid. As in the Dumbledores pretended to not know each other while passing by on the street. It was kind of a public secret in Hogsmeade, which meant that everyone at school and their grandmothers knew about it. none of the Hogwarts population ever mentioned Aberforth in the Headmaster's presence and likewise, despite being a regular at the Hog's Head.

"Uh…may I get back to you? I need to research it first. I heard that the first gift should have a stone or something." Harriet said, mentally taking note to search for courting gifts.

"oh, I already have the stone in mind, I only need what kind of jewelry do you want for your first gift? A bracelet? A necklace? A ring? A comb? Anklet?" Thomas listed, "or something else? We can create our own tradition, no worries. No one would dare to criticize our choice."

Harriet leaned back in thought. She doesn't really like to wear jewelry. It's heavy, and Cousin Narcissa is right, it's tacky. Hmm…

"Think about it, alright? The stone is blood red, by the way." Thomas said when he saw Harriet's confusion.

"Blood red? Was it Ruby? Or Blood Diamond?" Harriet asked curiously.

She was once interested in gemology, after all.

"Oh, it's way better than those plebeian stones. It's a magical stone. If you're curious, you can come with me to procure it in May. I'll have the jeweler finish your gift before June." He said, waving his hand unconcernedly."It's here, actually, below that trapdoor."

Thomas suddenly straightened up. "Actually, let's make a date for it. It'll be fun. There's challenges we need to do to get the stone. Like a quest. But you don't need to do anything, of course, I will do all the quests for you." his hand reached to hold Harriet's hand.

Behind them Draco drawled. "Hands' off" without looking up from his sticky toffee.

"And maybe ditch those three stragglers?" he asked irritably as he withdrew his hand.

Harriet giggled. "Alright then, after end-of-term exam?"

"Deal. let's meet here in the evening, before dinner? We can have dinner there, and no chaperones. We're married after all." he said excitedly.

"Okay then, it's a date." Harriet nodded.

The date ended pleasantly, and Harriet returned to her common room escorted by her three chaperones with thoughts on courting gifts.