There was one week to go before holidays, and the school's excitement over the Yule Ball was starting to be ridiculous.
Almost every day now, at least one girl received her dress robes at breakfast. This led to squealing and primping, which irritated Bruce and made Beth feel somehow inferior. (She had her sky-blue dress robes from last year altered over the summer, when their school letter said that they would need them; apparently most of her classmates had decided to get new ones instead.)
There was plenty of gossip to go around: who would be dancing with whom, who was going to be dancing with somebody they didn't like, who wouldn't be dancing at all. Melissa enjoyed that part. Beth hated it -- especially after she heard her own name come up in a group of seventh-years, who then lowered their voices as if she had died.
Some girls (Blaise, for instance) moaned about not being asked to the Ball by anyone. Beth was being asked entirely too much.
"Goot morning! Vant to go to t'e Yule Ball vith me?"
"No thank you, Josef."
"Ah vell. Perhaps tomorrow?"
Tomorrow came.
"Goot morning, Beth. Vant to go to t'e Yule Ball vith me?"
"No, Josef."
"Alas. I vill ask another day."
Another day.
"Goot morning! Vant to go to--"
"What did I say yesterday?"
"Yes?"
"No."
"Vell, tomorrow perhaps."
Melissa thought Beth should accept on the grounds of Josef's sheer tenacity.
"I don't want someone with tenacity," Beth roared, at that suggestion. "I want R--"
Then she broke off and went very red in the face, while Melissa rocked with laughter.
One day Josef failed to make his scheduled appearance at breakfast. Beth was almost out of the Great Hall, convinced she had got off scot-free, when Josef came scooting in from where his class was gathered in the Entrance Hall.
"Goot morning," he said showily, bowing low to intentionally moon his classmates. He straightened up and in his hand appeared a bouquet of flowers, which he thrust at Beth. "So, vant to go to the Yule Ball vith me?"
"I said no," said Beth, but grinned despite herself.
"The stress of schooling, it is getting to her head," Josef called to the Durmstrang students. He sighed heavily. Then, brightening instantly, he shoved the bouquet into Melissa's hands and jogged away to the Entrance Hall, rejoining his class as if he had never left it.
"See, I told you he was just a flirt," said Beth, motioning toward the flowers in Melissa's hands.
"Yeah," said Melissa, smelling a daisy, "but he didn't ask me to the Ball, did he?"
"You're taken," Beth said shortly. "It's been Galen-this and Galen-that for weeks."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Melissa demanded, but by then they had reached the Charms classroom.
Professor Flitwick stood in the doorway. "Good morning, my dears!" he squealed, as they came in. "Here you are, Miss Parson -- something for you as well, Miss Ollivander ..." He thrust a stuffed toy animal into each of their hands.
Beth's plushie turned out to be a soft red lobster, to her delight. Melissa traded her manticore for Bruce's fluffy toy duck. Mervin nearly broke into tears when he was handed a toy snake that bore more than a passing resemblance to his former pet, Gina.
"Shrinking Spells again!" sang out Professor Flitwick.
This had not been a popular lesson among the Slytherin men. First off, they were working with cute and cuddly things, which in themselves led Aaron to make fake gagging noises at least twice per class. Second, if you did the Shrinking Spell right, you would end up with something even cuter and cuddlier.
"It would be different if we were, you know, growing warts or boils on these things," Bruce discoursed, his manticore at wandpoint. "Likewise, making them scaly or pointy or growing quills all over them. But I can't see the point of making anything more teensy and defenseless than it already is."
"Size doesn't matter," Beth said offhandedly. "Attenuus." Her lobster's claws shrunk disproportionately to its tail. "It's how you use it."
Antigone let out a little shriek.
Everyone turned to look. Across the classroom, Warrington's desk was quickly being enveloped by an enormous brown teddy bear. It was growing by the second. Behind its furry bulk, Warrington could no longer be seen.
"No, no, no, Mr. Warrington!" Professor Flitwick scurried over to the expanding bear and poked it with his wand. "You have quite the wrong idea!"
The bear shrank back to its original size, emitting a sad little fweee noise on the way. Warrington scowled sullenly at the teddy bear, who smiled innocuously back at him with sightless button eyes. Across the room, Antigone von Dervish turned up her nose at him despite the fact that she had yet to perform the spell correctly herself.
Flitwick wasn't the only one who stuck to his syllabus. Yule Ball or not, the professors had everyone hopping for their end-of-term tests and projects. Alchemy was a particular horror. Snape and Vector wanted a summary of what had been accomplished so far, and very frankly Beth didn't have much to say. It seemed like there was always just one more thing to research before she got started. Melissa got to hear all about the project every night at dinner.
"... but it turns out that you can't just transfigure your eyes into cat eyes, because you'd need a cat brain to interpret what you see -- you know? And I can't really do brain transfigurations without a salve of some kind ..."
Melissa murmured an incoherent reply.
"So I thought, maybe I could do a salve and a potion. But that's outside of the scope of the project -- Snape won't let me change it, do you believe that? So I have to keep the eye human while adding characteristics ..."
"Mm hmm." Melissa's attention alternated between dinner and Pansy's Witch Weekly.
Beth chewed meditatively on a carrot stick. "At least I've got a few months yet."
There was a loud clatter of shoes on the stone floor and both of them looked up. Mervin skidded up to them, a horrified expression on his face. "Hide me," he squeaked, glanced over his shoulder, and dove under the table. Seconds later, Maria-Regina strode into their midst and sat down beside Beth.
"Vare is Mervink?" she asked. "I am thinking I am seeing him heading here, yes?"
"Er," said Beth. "I think he's -- ow!" Something bit her ankle and she kicked out reflexively. There was a whimper from beneath the table. "He's not here," she finished grumpily. "He's probably off irritating somebody." Melissa stifled a snigger.
Maria-Regina sighed heavily and propped her head on one fist. "I am vishing to speak vith him," she said sadly, "but I am haffing trouble to catch him."
"He's slippery, all right," said Melissa, with a straight face.
"Slimy, almost," Beth agreed.
"Perhaps he is very busy," said Maria-Regina. "I vill be to look for him in t'e library." She got up and made her way out of the Great Hall, looking around hopefully as she went.
Several moments passed. Finally a feeble "Is she gone?" wafted from below the table.
"Yes, it's safe," said Melissa disapprovingly. She watched Mervin struggle to the surface. "Why won't you go to the ball with her?"
Mervin looked at her with fearful eyes. "I can't!"
"I don't see what's so bad about her," Melissa said primly. "She goes to Durmstrang, so she must be a pureblood. She was one of the competitors, so she must be smart. She's not even that bad-looking."
"Sure, if you like Amazon women," grumbled Mervin. "She's three times my size."
Melissa eyed Mervin's scrawny build. "I daresay that's not her fault."
"Hey!"
"Well, she's right," said Beth.
"I can't go with her," Mervin said again. "Just think how we would look dancing! Like Flitwick and Madame Maxime doing the tango."
"Oh good heavens, it's not that bad," said Melissa scornfully. "Honestly -- first Antigone, then Beth, now you. What's wrong with accepting an invitation?"
Both Mervin and Beth were speechless. Beth had no idea how the conversation had suddenly turned into an accusation against her. "I have to get to the library," she said shortly. She picked up her bookbag and left before she could gauge Melissa's reaction.
She was attacked by Josef on the way.
"Beth, vill you go vith me to the --"
"No," Beth barked, and strode past.
The library was full; apparently Snape and Vector weren't the only ones giving their students end-of-term panicwork. Beth spent a few minutes looking for an empty table and finally had to settle for a tiny three-seat table where Blaise sat, hunched and scowling, over some Transfiguration.
They hadn't been there more than twenty minutes when their President plunked down with them.
His hair was rumpled and his eyes looked a little bit feverish. "What are you up to?" Beth said warily. Richard answered before her question was even finished.
"Yule Ball planning," he breathlessly. He had a large stack of papers with him, and smudges of ink on one cheek. Beth could make out a list of names on the top paper. "Who's Herne going with?"
Beth and Blaise looked at each other. "He hasn't asked anybody," said Blaise. "He was so upset about getting turned down by Ginny Weasley that he doesn't want to try again."
"Nobody?" Richard looked alarmed. "He's got to have a date! It's his duty!" He rifled through his stack of papers. "Let's see ... we don't have anybody dating a Ravenclaw. I'm sure one of them's still free." He stood up. "I'm going to talk some sense into him." He hurried away.
Beth and Blaise watched him go. "He's batty," said Blaise simply.
"Yeah," said Beth. She sighed. It looked like Richard would probably just end up running his spy ring on Christmas and not ask anybody to the Yule Ball. "Who do you want to go to the ball with, Blaise?"
Blaise looked away. "He's taken."
"Oh."
They sat there glumly.
"You know what?" Beth said at last. "This whole thing is such a pain."
Blaise's eyes slid across the room to where Pansy and Draco were not studying several tables away. "Only for some of us," she said, and she was unable to hide the bitterness in her voice.
Studying with Blaise was sometimes difficult because she tended to be moody. Beth stuck it out for another hour in order to keep from hurting her feelings; then she made an excuse about missing some textbooks and headed out to the common room. Poor Blaise, she thought, as she gave the password. She's so unhappy, but I don't think she knows what she wants.
Beth stepped into the common room to see Melissa screaming into the fireplace.
The first thought was that her best friend had finally lost her mind completely. Then she stopped laughing long enough to hear what Melissa was carrying on about.
"I can't believe you won't even take the time out to --"
A male voice broke in over her hysterics, and Beth realized that there was a large disembodied head floating just over the fire. It looked vaguely familiar.
"Look here, Mel, you can't expect me to just pack up in the middle of something so monumental --"
"You jerk, I thought we were monumental, not some stupid artifact --"
"It's a very important artifact, and I thought you of all people would recognize that!"
Hesitantly, Beth came a little closer. Once she had a good view, she recognized the face: Galen Melhorn, Melissa's longtime boyfriend.
"Fine!" bellowed Melissa, very red in the face. "Fine! Now that we know what's really important to you --!"
"Ah, Mel, I didn't say that," Galen began angrily, but Melissa conjured a bucket of water and dumped it over the burning logs. Galen's head went up in a puff of blue steam and vanished.
Melissa tossed the bucket into the fireplace for good measure and lit the whole thing with a vast green fire that was rather larger than necessary. Beth approached gingerly.
"Uh ... Mel?"
Melissa turned to face her, an evilly satisfied smile on her face. "Yes?"
"Are you ... uh ... what was all that ...?"
"That?" Melissa waved a hand at the fire. "Just taking care of some business. Doesn't matter much. Obviously," she said, face reddening again, "it means very little, probably even nothing to certain others --" Her voice rose as she spoke. "Some people place very little value on the really important things --"
"You might want to hush," said Beth, with a quick glance around at the students gathered in the common room. "People can hear you."
"I don't care!" Melissa roared. To Beth's horror, she turned to face the rest of the room. "I want everyone in the common room to know that Galen Melhorn is a Gryffindor jerk!"
She turned and stalked off to the sound of wild applause.
Melissa sulked for about a day, during which time her only joy was telling people how much she had disliked Galen from the beginning and how, in fact, she had been intending to break up with him since the summer anyway. She spent a lot of time commiserating with Blaise. After that, she must have decided that no Gryffindor jerk was worth wasting her tears on, and she got interested in the Yule Ball again.
About midweek, a fifth-year Gryffindor came up and asked Audra if she'd be his partner for the Yule Ball. She graciously accepted and then immediately left for class. The Gryffindor showed up every once in a while for the next few days, offering to carry her books or commenting about the weather. Audra was always polite, but that was all. She wasn't like Antigone, purposefully ignoring the boy who padded after her like a puppy. She wasn't intentionally cold. She just didn't look like she cared very much whether or not she went to the Yule Ball, and who was with her if she did. In fact, Richard was far more excited about the invite than she was.
"Splendid!" he cried, at the meeting that week. "A Gryffindor, you say? I didn't think we'd be able to get in with them. Audra, you're a marvel." He gave her a serious look. "I know this won't be up your alley, but you've got to keep him talking, you understand?"
Audra nodded.
Richard shifted his attention to Oren. "You two are still following Ginny Weasley. What have you find out?"
Oren glanced at Audra and cleared his throat. "Well," he said, adjusting his rimless spectacles, "she's not all that excited to be going to the Yule Ball, even though not a whole lot of our classmates are going. Everyone knows she's got a crush on Potter -- eyes as green as a fresh pickled toad, and all that." Many of the members snickered. "Let's see ... she's been in the library a lot lately for a big Transfig report. She had to owl home for dress robes because her mother didn't expect her to need them ..." He shrugged a little apologetically. "That's all, really."
"Well, it's better than nothing," Richard sighed. "Anyone else?"
Melissa put on her cat's grin and gazed idly at the ceiling. "Somebody might have got into Gryffindor tower while the third-years were off at lunch."
It took a minute for Richard to understand what she was saying. "Into ... into Gryffindor tower? What -- who?"
"Me!" said Melissa, annoyed. She went on, as Richard was having trouble forming words. "I got the password off an underclassmen I met the other year. I dug around her room a bit, got into her trunk and bureau and things."
Finally Richard managed, "What did you find?"
Melissa broke into a grin. "She's got 'Mrs. Virginia Potter' written all over her notebooks."
Richard let out a huff of impatience. "Yes, yes, all right, but what's in them?"
Melissa shrugged. "Stupid stuff. Class notes ... scribblings in the margins from Colin Creevey ... little doodles of hearts and things ..." She gave Richard a look. "Didn't mention the Ledger once -- I ran a research spell on them -- and there wasn't exactly a stamp that said Property of the Dark Lord."
"What, no Dark Mark in her textbooks?" Bruce grinned.
"Just because they're all over yours ..." said Melissa primly.
"Okay." Richard ran both hands through his hair. "All we know is it's not in her room. She could be keeping it in -- in another classroom, or in the common room ..."
"D'you want me to go in again?" Melissa offered. Beth suspected that her eagerness to do so was half a desire to get revenge on Galen and all his ilk.
"Well ..." Richard trailed off. "Let's see what we unearth at the Yule Ball. If we don't find anything out, we might need you to go live there."
Richard continued to plan. Students continued to pair off. And every day now, Antigone von Dervish was giving the cold shoulder to the same tenacious Beauxbatons boy.
On Tuesday he was there waiting for her outside of Charms.
"I actually feel bad for her," said Beth, watching Antigone brush past the Beauxbatons boy without a glance. "That kid's as bad as Josef."
But the Beauxbatons boy, like Josef, was not to be dissuaded. "Mademoiselle!" he cried, struggling to get to her through the flock of moving Slytherins. "Mere words are not enough -- oof -- me pardonner -- are not enough to describe your exquisite beauty! I 'ave -- m'excuser -- I 'ave written you a verse!"
A murmur of interest spread through the Slytherins and the crowd ground to a halt. Most of them turned to the Beauxbatons boy, to see if he had actually written a poem and would have the guts -- or bad judgment -- to read it aloud in the corridors. Antigone stayed frozen, arms crossed, facing away from her paramour.
The boy seemed no worse for having to deliver his love poem to his idol's back. He dug a parchment from his pocket and unrolled it hastily. "It is in your language," he said awkwardly. "I will deliver it in mah own tongue at a time more appropriate for ze language of love."
Aaron nearly smothered himself holding back his sniggers. Beth could almost feel Antigone's cold glare.
The Beauxbatons boy cleared his throat and began to read.
The Beauxbatons boy looked up from his parchment nervously. The entire crowd had fallen into a deathly stillness. "For you, Mademoiselle," he said simply, holding out the parchment to Antigone's back.
Antigone turned to address him for the first time. "Votre mots sont bĂȘte et enfantin," she said haughtily, blue eyes like ice. "Si vous me voulez, vous devez agir." She sauntered away, leaving the Beauxbaton boy agog with desire, parchment drooping in his hand.
The stunned silence shifted into delighted chatter.
"I don't believe it," Melissa said, watching Antigone disappear around the corner. "That airhead actually learned French."
"What did she say?" asked Beth, prodding Bruce in the ribs.
"'Words are silly and childish'," Bruce translated. The Beauxbatons boy sadly rolled up his parchment and retreated. "'If you would have me, you must act.'"
Somebody, Beth thought, should tell that to Richard.
But nobody did. And on the Friday before the Yule Ball, with one paltry week to go, Richard had yet to make his move.
"Richard's never going to ask me to the Yule Ball," Beth said glumly, picking at her breakfast without appetite. "I don't know where you got the idea, but you were dead wrong."
Melissa chewed on her lower lip. "So ... are you going to go with Josef?"
"No!"
"Why not then? He's asked you about a dozen times ..."
"Oh Mel, he's not serious!" Beth said, exasperated. "He's probably asked every girl in Slytherin by now. Just look at him," she added, and gestured down the table to where Josef was egging on the boys to see how high they could stack their goblets. "He'd ask Professor McGonagall if he got a chance."
"But he hasn't --"
"I just don't want to be the one idiot who actually falls for it and accepts!"
"He only --"
"He's only trying to get attention," said Beth, in a tone of finality. "All I've got to do is keep on taking lessons from her." She gestured down the table where Antigone stood, twirling her long hair around her fingers and completely ignoring the boy from Beauxbatons who was once more ardently in pursuit of her attention.
"Do not scorn me, fairest of ze fair! I lay my 'eart at your beautiful feet!"
She had repeatedly and fetchingly refused to go to the ball with him. If anything, he seemed to be encouraged by every new dismissal.
"But I pine for you day and night! Mon cher, I weep when I leave your presence! Your eyes are like orbs of crystal --" Here he bent and fervently kissed her hand. "Will you not ease my aching soul?"
"No, cherie," said Antigone, with a vicious smile.
"But 'ow can you ignore me, when Ah dream of nothing but your gorgeous smile ..."
There was a loud thud. Beth turned in time to see Warrington land his fist square on the Beauxbatons boy's chin. He fell like a stone.
"She's coming with me," he boomed at the unconscious figure in blue robes. He turned to Antigone. "You're coming with me," he repeated, with a hint of uncertainty.
But Antigone was looking at him in a way that she never had before. "Oui," she breathed.
"Well yeah, me an' you," Warrington mumbled, shuffling his feet.
Antigone reached out and slid her slender hand into Warrington's large one.
"Wow," breathed Warrington.
It was a long time before the look of astonishment left his face.
~~~~~~~~
Executive decision: That "author's notes" page was a really bad idea. It's screwing people up because I have to re-order it every time I put up a new chapter, which is twice a day. So I'm scrapping it. The heck with story continuity.
Also, I just found out that Morag is a Scottish girls' name. Oops.
Netrat: Regarding Audra: I think her hair's pretty white. If it's blonde, it's the kind of blonde that doesn't have any yellow in it. Since you're curious, I didn't know I was going to induct Audra when she was Sorted in book 2. For this book I just went through all the third-years and picked the two names I liked best.
