Chapter 3
Peter, Remus, Sirius, and James followed Honey into the library,
because she liked going to the library.
"I'll have to meet up with you later." Remus said innocently. "I have to tutor Sybill Trelawney in Charms."
"Syble is having trouble in Charms?" Honey asked half closing her eyes, untarnished by brash makeup. "That's funny, I've never noticed her struggling before."
"Well, she will be after she fails next week's pop quiz and miss a few days when she catches bronchitis. I'll be surprised if that actually happens, but..." He opened his binder and took out the Maurader's Map, which he handed to Sirius. "Why would she ask for help if she didn't need it? See you guys later."
"Isn't Trelawney that crazy bug eyed girl?" James asked, before glancing over at Lily's table. "Twerp alert," he said through his teeth.
A fourth year Slytherin boy with neatly combed black hair was speaking to Lily in a rather flirtatious manner. He was quite a handsome and svelte for his age, but his curled smiled said he was anything but benelovent. He playfully handed the redhead an envelope and kissed her hand. He then began to walk toward Honey's table. As soon as Lily was out of earshot, Honey's perceptive hearing heard the boy mutter, "Prissy Mudblood." Honey frowned at the profanity. She wasn't a prude, she just thought it was mean.
James instinctively brought out his wand and knocked the boy down the moment he noticed him. The kid spiritfully popped back up a moment later, still with a grin on his face.
"Lovely to see you too Mr. Potter, but I am here for official business, not for fun." The boy was about 14, and his voice was still breaking. He suavely turned to Honey. "Good day."
"Knock it off Reggie; she's too old for you." Sirius leaned back and casually let his hair fall into his eyes.
"Who is this?" Honey smiled, but the glow didn't seem as overwhelming for this boy.
Sirius put his handsome face in his hands. "This is Regulus Black...my little brother."
"Not since you were blasted off the family tapestry." The boy's voice cracked. "Mum says I'm not supposed to talk to you but I'm making an exception because I'm on official business."
"Well get it over with quick." Sirius spoke loudly.
"You're getting into trouble again aren't you?" the boy sneered. James opened his symmetrical mouth to curse him but was cut off by Regulus's squeaking. "Ooooh, going to humiliate me like you do to Severus Snape? Go ahead, I am shaking with fear." He looked over at Lily perversely. Honey frowned, a few lines creasing her otherwise perfect face.
"What is it, Reggie?" Sirius said through his teeth.
"The honor committee is having an exclusive gathering for the cleverest students at Hogwarts and somehow you were placed on the list." He slickly hand him the invitation. "...As well as you Mr. Potter... Miss Astrid...maybe next year, Mr. Pettigrew..." He handed each invitation to its recipient respectfully with a disturbing smirk. "You can't take a date so don't even ask," he said with a hint of immaturity. He turned to James and began to speak thoughtfully. "But of course your little "tomato" will be there anyway, and she's the only one you want...she's the one that everyone wants, actually, even the Slytherin's are secretly in love with her. Yet there's really only one boy she ever talks to— Where is that boy, by the way...sick again? You'd think he was on a routine or something."
"Vera--" James said ravishly, raising his wand. Regulus screamed and cowered behind the bookshelf.
Honey put up her manicured hand. "Jimmy, please, none of your bullying."
"Jimmy?" Regulus popped back up from behind the shelf. He turned to Honey. "They say I shouldn't talk to you because you're a Ravenclaw, but I just have to say I have never had the pleasure of meeting a woman so lovely." He kissed her lily-white hand. "Good day." He smirked at James and snickered, "Jimmy."
"Wow, I can't believe I am one of the top 6th year students!" Honey exclaimed, despite the fact that she was years ahead of most her classmates.
"I don't know if I can stand it...if all the 6th year prefects will be there," said Sirius, his silver eyes greyed with unease. "It means my cousin Narcissa, the Slytherin prefect, will be there."
"You have other relatives here?" Honey asked curiously, her quick mind eager for more backstory on one of her knew best friends.
"Two cousins, actually. They're sisters. The one's a snob, the other is a freakin' sadist, but they do have an older sister who's real nice. Naturally she's been disowned," Sirius shook his head.
Honey looked him in the eye, but of course he had to look away because she was so pretty. "Well, if your cousin is so bad we had better keep an eye on her, hadn't we?"
"Yes, I suppose so. But it also means that a few of my ex-girlfriends will be there."
"Really?" Honey rested her head on her hand.
"Alice, Tabitha, Christina, Britney, Florence..." he lowered his voice, "Lily."
"You went out with—"
"Shhhhh...only once, it was uncontrollable circumstances...before I knew how much he liked her. I would never ever betray a friend like that. Ever. —and nothing happened. Nothing at all. Really." The next day, in the evening, Honey and company had reached the special meeting room. On the table was an overhead projector and an unbelievable amount of various chips and dip. Severus was already sitting at the table when they walked in. James looked as if he was about to say something insulting, when Honey walked right over to the boy.
"Do you mind if I?" Honey motioned to the chair right beside him. Severus noticed she was wearing a nice pink dress that went down to her knees, that had a design of roses at the hem, which was higher on one side. Her hair was in a nice updo with little star clips in it and two braids on one side while her bangs were kind of messy, but in a cool way. Her shoes were very small strappy platform sandals which had her own personal sign on them and her astrological symbol. Severus nodded and gave a hint of a smile! Sirius and James were wholly confused but took a seat farther down the table and began snacking on snacks.
Next came in the Hufflepuff prefects, a dashing young man with short hair named Frank Longbottom and the adorably round faced Alice Meadows. Then came Lily and Remus, looking (to James' dismay) very comfortable with each other. After them came a discontented looking blonde, wearing lots of gaudy expensive jewelry, who wrinkled her nose as soon as she saw Lily. With her was a solemn looking boy that did not blink, speak, or show any signs of actually being alive other than that he was walking. They were the Slytherin prefects.
Regulus then came in, prattling a reason for being there, as he was a fourth year. Next was Sybyl Trelawney in a garish silver dress and shimmering violet shawl. She had put on twice as much tacky costume jewelry than normal, and had tied her frizzy hair back in a green headscarf. She glanced around as if she had happened to wonder in.
"What are you doing here?" Remus asked inquisatively.
"She's a top student." Regulus said, running his fingers through his luxurious black hair, and then stopping as soon as he noticed his brother simultaneously and unknowingly doing the same thing.
"I thought you were failing Charms?" Remus asked, raising an eyebrow as the girl sat down beside him. She gasped and looked to the ceiling for a moment. She mumbled something inaudible and shrugged. He shrugged.
The blonde girl took a seat as far away from Lily as she could possibly get. She glared at Lily loathingly, and whispered something to the other prefect and burst into laughter, whereas the other prefect blinked, (still having made no vocal sound.) Sirius noticed this and decided to break in.
"So are you still dating that Lucifer guy?" Sirius asked devilishly.
"No, I'm dating Lucius, the bloody rich, rising ministry official." Narcissa wrinkled her nose, causing a few premature wrinkles
"What's the difference?" James jested, but it didn't have as much of affect without Peter there to shamelessly rupture with laughter.
"I'm surprised you haven't caught hypothermia from all that ice he's bought you," said Sirius, looking at her bracelets, necklace, earrings, etc.
"Well, you do know that Slytherins make better money," Narcissa said haughtily.
"But Gryfindor's make better lovers," said Sirius, catching Alice's eye.
Severus rolled his eyes. "Maybe we should start the meeting before this grows violent?" Honey nodded in agreement, fearing that James might do something drastic if Narcissa did something to his best friend.
"We have to wait for the Ravenclaw prefects," Alice said kindly. The door handle slowly began to turn. "That must be them."
But the Ravenclaw prefects did not enter. Instead, a long white leg stretched out from behind the door, followed by the girl it was attached to. Pitch-black shoulder length hair fell unbound and carefully styled. High arched eyebrows topped of heavy lidded eyes, giving the young woman a dangerous, sultry look. A sly smirk crossed her blood red lips as she sauntered over toward the head of the table.
"Bellatrix..." there was a soft murmur throughout the table.
"It's lovely to see you, Bella." Regulus said deeply. His voice grew into a squeak again. "My goodness, it's like a whole family reunion, right Cissy?"
Bellatrix flipped her hair. "I'm sorry to say Tabitha Stevens and Joey Lawrence have taken ill and will not be able to attend." She had an annoying accent strangely reminiscent of Elizabeth Hurley in Bedazzled. "In fact, all of the other people invited have taken ill."
"Did they get a whiff of that perfume you slathered on?" Sirius asked insultingly.
Belatrix ignored him and sashayed around the table. "I wasn't going to come but I didn't think I could trust my sister," she gave Narcissa a kiss on the cheek and turned to the solemn boy, "with my man," Bellatrix patted Rudolphus on the head, who blinked.
"It's nice that you could make it," Alice said kindly.
"Hello Alice," Bellatrix smiled, looking beautiful but frightening. The whole room was startled when she whipped out a wand and sent a spark a foot off from Alice's head. Luckily, it only conjured up another chair between Alice and Frank, smoothly pushing their chairs apart. Bellatrix glided over to the chair and prepared to sit down when Sybil gasped, "No!" Bellatrix boredly looked over at her and put her hands up in question.
"There will be thirteen! The first to rise will be the first to die...." Sybil whispered, lightning going off behind her head. Or maybe it was just the light reflecting off her outfit.
"Well... we'll have to make sure it is someone we won't mind losing." Bellatrix glanced over at Lily. Before anyone could protest, Bellatrix turned her own chair around backwards and stradled it like a jock. "So what are we here for?"
Frank waved his wand at the overhead projector on the table, which then projected a picture of a graph. He used his wand to create a red dot of light on the screen. "As you know, we are living in dark times, and once again the ministry has once again cut our funding...you can see in this next picture, Potions Mistress Professor Eden has been recycling potions for each class (rather dangerous.)" He clicked to the next picture. "I'm sure you recall the panic when they started supplying us with cheap muggle Kleenex...." There was a soft shudder throughout the room. He clicked to the next picture. "Then there's our sports equipment, which speaks for itself." He flipped to a picture of their quaffel, a floating red ball held together with about a whole role of duct tape. "Several attempts to raise money have only led to greater losses." He clicked to a picture of last year's school musical, Owls, "The other day, our headmaster told me a most shocking piece of information—" he clicked to the next page, which showed a crudedly looped animation of a stick figure. "The school is practically broke."
Narcissa fainted, face first into a bowl of guacamole.
Frank continued, "There has also been talk, much to our headmasters protest, of canceling the quidditch program." The table was suddenly awake, except Narcissa, whose only comment was a few bubbles in the guacamole, and Rudolphus, who gave a blink of concern.
"What, no they can't!" James exclaimed. "We have to stop them!"
"Why do you think we've gathered you here? We are the cleverest students of our age, if we truly wish to keep this running...we must find a way to raise money." Frank grabbed a handful of cheetos.
"What exactly did you have in mind?" Remus asked, reaching for a bowl of Doritos.
"Well, there was a suggestion that we might be having a Costume Ball for Halloween..." Alice said kindly. She popped the lid off a Pringles canister.
"Yee haw, I love dances!" Honey giggled, "and I am sure that if we all united we could plan a heckuva jollification!"
"Here here!" Regulus held up his water glass. "I'm sure I could convince mumsy to donate." Thus our talented students sorted out all matters of the dance. They got along rather well for all being in different houses, until there was a soft knock at the door.
"Come in!" Regulus called. The person responded with another knock and a violent jiggle of the door handle. "Will somebody get that?"
Lupin was about to, when Sybill shrieked and held him down with surprising vigor. "First to rise is the first to die!"
"Idiotic superstition." Severus said, his hair shining with bravado, but everyone remained frozen in their chairs as the knocking continued. Finally Sirius spoke, throwing back his glorious hair as he spoke."I'll risk it, everyone's got to die sometime," he said as Bellatrix grinned intently.
"Sirius, wait!" James held his pal down.
"Are you serious? You actually believe this superstition?" asked Lily from across the table.
"No, I'm not Sirius, I'm James," said James seriously, "I just had a bad vibe."
"So we're all just going to sit here for the rest of our lives" Lily asked and turned to the Slytherins. "Even you're afraid?"
"We are not afraid of anything, you prissy little Mudblood," Narcissa whispered, suddenly looking up, her now green mask showing all hatred, her teeth having globs of guacamole in them as she spoke. Remus gave Lily a sympathetic look. James was heading for his wand, but Lily gave him a hard kick underneath the table.
"Let me help you get that off your face...although that actually is very good for your skin." Lily withdrew her wand. Narcissa obviously saw this as some type of threat and went for her wand as well.
"Please! No duels here..." Regulus shouted. He turned to Lily and Honey with a sly grin. "but I wouldn't mind a catfight."
"I'm just going to help." Lily raised her wand and painlessly zapped all the guacamole from Narcissa's face, getting rid of some of her ugly makeup, acne, and premature wrinkles as well. Meanwhile Honey had ingeniously wheeled her chair over to the door. Bob Chang entered, curious as to what was going on.
"Wotcher, Bob! Great to see ya!"
"Come sit down with us, Bob! We were just hoping for a fourteenth member..."
"My that cast looks good on you, Bob!"
"Just sit down, Chang." Severus conjured him a chair. Bob put his hand on the back of the chair. "Well, I was really just looking for my quidditch cleats, but I suppose I have time for a chat and chips." Bellatrix gave loud mocking laugh and said evily, "Well, I suppose you would have. After all, you broke up with Rosmerta last Tuesday."
"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked.
"Bob, I think if you had the brains to figure it out, you would have actually been invited to this meeting." Bob torrented out of the room in tears. Sirius called his sadistic raven haired cousin something.
"Rudy, did you hear what my cousin just said to me?"
Then Rudolphus apparently snapped out of whatever trance he was in, and said the first words he said all evening, which just happened to be a curse. "Tarenteggella!" he pointed his wand at Bellatrix's cousin, who hopped onto the table as his legs suddenly began to dance around. However, he had cursed Regulus instead of Sirius, so it there wasn't really any point. James and Sirius cracked up, Narcissa and Bellatrix were utterly amused, despite it being the wrong cousin. Remus was looking sympathetic, while Severus looked annoyed that he was dancing in the chips and dip and splashing salsa all over everyone.
"Nixdancio!" Lily, Honey, and Alice shouted at the same time. The triple counter curse knocked him back violently; luckily, Honey performed a quick levitation charm so that he was not hurt.
"Impressive," Bellatrix said, watching the boy frozen in mid air, "But I'll bet my broom no one can't make him break dance in mid-air."
Immediately, several spells came shooting at the boy. He began dancing like mad, but still enjoying the attention. Eventually he began to show signs of weariness as his veins began to pulsate like mad and stick out of his skin. The boy was about to faint.
"That's enough!" Every looked at James in disbelief as he stood up and dispelled the curse. While the youngest Black was on the ground, (well, the table) he still appeared trying to dance. James scratched his head. "Sorry, kid, I can't stop it—Lily, I know you're the best at charms, will you help me—" "Mmmkay," she said nervously, "Only because I want to help him." She stood up and took Regulus's arm as James took his other. Just before they left, Regulus stuck out his tongue at Sirius, who scowled furiously.
"That little boy...was the first to stand up." Sibyl said mystically. Sirius looked after the door for a moment, and left without a word.
Honey wandered out onto the balcony after everyone had left, and was suddenly struck when she saw Severus's white face sillohetted against the night sky as he gazed out across the Scottish scenery.
"Howdy," Honey said, walking up to him. "I can't say this has been a nice evening but it's been an informative one."
"Go away," he whispered.
Honey turned to leave, but thought better of it."Have I done somethin', horribly wrong to you? 'Cause if I have I am absolutely sorry." She spoke slowly. Severus said nothing. She continued, a single tear rolling down her face. "Its just, when we first met, on the train, I thought we were kinda getting' along or somethin', but I guess it was just my good old Texas naiveté. In fact, I've never seen us actually argue, but still there's something just blocking my way." He turned to her, eyes glistening in the moonlight. She kept talking, "I just wanted you to know that I don't want to hurt you, and I don't want to judge you. And I know we've been through similar things, so in case you wanna..." He wiped the tear from her face; they were very close now. "...If you wanna talk or something..." Her eyes widened as her voice trailed off. Slowly, Severus leaned forward and pressed his lips to hers. As soon as the kiss was broken, they each looked completely surprised at what had happened. Nervously, he kissed her again, this time longer. The moment after, Honey smiled and pulled him to her again.
"I'll have to meet up with you later." Remus said innocently. "I have to tutor Sybill Trelawney in Charms."
"Syble is having trouble in Charms?" Honey asked half closing her eyes, untarnished by brash makeup. "That's funny, I've never noticed her struggling before."
"Well, she will be after she fails next week's pop quiz and miss a few days when she catches bronchitis. I'll be surprised if that actually happens, but..." He opened his binder and took out the Maurader's Map, which he handed to Sirius. "Why would she ask for help if she didn't need it? See you guys later."
"Isn't Trelawney that crazy bug eyed girl?" James asked, before glancing over at Lily's table. "Twerp alert," he said through his teeth.
A fourth year Slytherin boy with neatly combed black hair was speaking to Lily in a rather flirtatious manner. He was quite a handsome and svelte for his age, but his curled smiled said he was anything but benelovent. He playfully handed the redhead an envelope and kissed her hand. He then began to walk toward Honey's table. As soon as Lily was out of earshot, Honey's perceptive hearing heard the boy mutter, "Prissy Mudblood." Honey frowned at the profanity. She wasn't a prude, she just thought it was mean.
James instinctively brought out his wand and knocked the boy down the moment he noticed him. The kid spiritfully popped back up a moment later, still with a grin on his face.
"Lovely to see you too Mr. Potter, but I am here for official business, not for fun." The boy was about 14, and his voice was still breaking. He suavely turned to Honey. "Good day."
"Knock it off Reggie; she's too old for you." Sirius leaned back and casually let his hair fall into his eyes.
"Who is this?" Honey smiled, but the glow didn't seem as overwhelming for this boy.
Sirius put his handsome face in his hands. "This is Regulus Black...my little brother."
"Not since you were blasted off the family tapestry." The boy's voice cracked. "Mum says I'm not supposed to talk to you but I'm making an exception because I'm on official business."
"Well get it over with quick." Sirius spoke loudly.
"You're getting into trouble again aren't you?" the boy sneered. James opened his symmetrical mouth to curse him but was cut off by Regulus's squeaking. "Ooooh, going to humiliate me like you do to Severus Snape? Go ahead, I am shaking with fear." He looked over at Lily perversely. Honey frowned, a few lines creasing her otherwise perfect face.
"What is it, Reggie?" Sirius said through his teeth.
"The honor committee is having an exclusive gathering for the cleverest students at Hogwarts and somehow you were placed on the list." He slickly hand him the invitation. "...As well as you Mr. Potter... Miss Astrid...maybe next year, Mr. Pettigrew..." He handed each invitation to its recipient respectfully with a disturbing smirk. "You can't take a date so don't even ask," he said with a hint of immaturity. He turned to James and began to speak thoughtfully. "But of course your little "tomato" will be there anyway, and she's the only one you want...she's the one that everyone wants, actually, even the Slytherin's are secretly in love with her. Yet there's really only one boy she ever talks to— Where is that boy, by the way...sick again? You'd think he was on a routine or something."
"Vera--" James said ravishly, raising his wand. Regulus screamed and cowered behind the bookshelf.
Honey put up her manicured hand. "Jimmy, please, none of your bullying."
"Jimmy?" Regulus popped back up from behind the shelf. He turned to Honey. "They say I shouldn't talk to you because you're a Ravenclaw, but I just have to say I have never had the pleasure of meeting a woman so lovely." He kissed her lily-white hand. "Good day." He smirked at James and snickered, "Jimmy."
"Wow, I can't believe I am one of the top 6th year students!" Honey exclaimed, despite the fact that she was years ahead of most her classmates.
"I don't know if I can stand it...if all the 6th year prefects will be there," said Sirius, his silver eyes greyed with unease. "It means my cousin Narcissa, the Slytherin prefect, will be there."
"You have other relatives here?" Honey asked curiously, her quick mind eager for more backstory on one of her knew best friends.
"Two cousins, actually. They're sisters. The one's a snob, the other is a freakin' sadist, but they do have an older sister who's real nice. Naturally she's been disowned," Sirius shook his head.
Honey looked him in the eye, but of course he had to look away because she was so pretty. "Well, if your cousin is so bad we had better keep an eye on her, hadn't we?"
"Yes, I suppose so. But it also means that a few of my ex-girlfriends will be there."
"Really?" Honey rested her head on her hand.
"Alice, Tabitha, Christina, Britney, Florence..." he lowered his voice, "Lily."
"You went out with—"
"Shhhhh...only once, it was uncontrollable circumstances...before I knew how much he liked her. I would never ever betray a friend like that. Ever. —and nothing happened. Nothing at all. Really." The next day, in the evening, Honey and company had reached the special meeting room. On the table was an overhead projector and an unbelievable amount of various chips and dip. Severus was already sitting at the table when they walked in. James looked as if he was about to say something insulting, when Honey walked right over to the boy.
"Do you mind if I?" Honey motioned to the chair right beside him. Severus noticed she was wearing a nice pink dress that went down to her knees, that had a design of roses at the hem, which was higher on one side. Her hair was in a nice updo with little star clips in it and two braids on one side while her bangs were kind of messy, but in a cool way. Her shoes were very small strappy platform sandals which had her own personal sign on them and her astrological symbol. Severus nodded and gave a hint of a smile! Sirius and James were wholly confused but took a seat farther down the table and began snacking on snacks.
Next came in the Hufflepuff prefects, a dashing young man with short hair named Frank Longbottom and the adorably round faced Alice Meadows. Then came Lily and Remus, looking (to James' dismay) very comfortable with each other. After them came a discontented looking blonde, wearing lots of gaudy expensive jewelry, who wrinkled her nose as soon as she saw Lily. With her was a solemn looking boy that did not blink, speak, or show any signs of actually being alive other than that he was walking. They were the Slytherin prefects.
Regulus then came in, prattling a reason for being there, as he was a fourth year. Next was Sybyl Trelawney in a garish silver dress and shimmering violet shawl. She had put on twice as much tacky costume jewelry than normal, and had tied her frizzy hair back in a green headscarf. She glanced around as if she had happened to wonder in.
"What are you doing here?" Remus asked inquisatively.
"She's a top student." Regulus said, running his fingers through his luxurious black hair, and then stopping as soon as he noticed his brother simultaneously and unknowingly doing the same thing.
"I thought you were failing Charms?" Remus asked, raising an eyebrow as the girl sat down beside him. She gasped and looked to the ceiling for a moment. She mumbled something inaudible and shrugged. He shrugged.
The blonde girl took a seat as far away from Lily as she could possibly get. She glared at Lily loathingly, and whispered something to the other prefect and burst into laughter, whereas the other prefect blinked, (still having made no vocal sound.) Sirius noticed this and decided to break in.
"So are you still dating that Lucifer guy?" Sirius asked devilishly.
"No, I'm dating Lucius, the bloody rich, rising ministry official." Narcissa wrinkled her nose, causing a few premature wrinkles
"What's the difference?" James jested, but it didn't have as much of affect without Peter there to shamelessly rupture with laughter.
"I'm surprised you haven't caught hypothermia from all that ice he's bought you," said Sirius, looking at her bracelets, necklace, earrings, etc.
"Well, you do know that Slytherins make better money," Narcissa said haughtily.
"But Gryfindor's make better lovers," said Sirius, catching Alice's eye.
Severus rolled his eyes. "Maybe we should start the meeting before this grows violent?" Honey nodded in agreement, fearing that James might do something drastic if Narcissa did something to his best friend.
"We have to wait for the Ravenclaw prefects," Alice said kindly. The door handle slowly began to turn. "That must be them."
But the Ravenclaw prefects did not enter. Instead, a long white leg stretched out from behind the door, followed by the girl it was attached to. Pitch-black shoulder length hair fell unbound and carefully styled. High arched eyebrows topped of heavy lidded eyes, giving the young woman a dangerous, sultry look. A sly smirk crossed her blood red lips as she sauntered over toward the head of the table.
"Bellatrix..." there was a soft murmur throughout the table.
"It's lovely to see you, Bella." Regulus said deeply. His voice grew into a squeak again. "My goodness, it's like a whole family reunion, right Cissy?"
Bellatrix flipped her hair. "I'm sorry to say Tabitha Stevens and Joey Lawrence have taken ill and will not be able to attend." She had an annoying accent strangely reminiscent of Elizabeth Hurley in Bedazzled. "In fact, all of the other people invited have taken ill."
"Did they get a whiff of that perfume you slathered on?" Sirius asked insultingly.
Belatrix ignored him and sashayed around the table. "I wasn't going to come but I didn't think I could trust my sister," she gave Narcissa a kiss on the cheek and turned to the solemn boy, "with my man," Bellatrix patted Rudolphus on the head, who blinked.
"It's nice that you could make it," Alice said kindly.
"Hello Alice," Bellatrix smiled, looking beautiful but frightening. The whole room was startled when she whipped out a wand and sent a spark a foot off from Alice's head. Luckily, it only conjured up another chair between Alice and Frank, smoothly pushing their chairs apart. Bellatrix glided over to the chair and prepared to sit down when Sybil gasped, "No!" Bellatrix boredly looked over at her and put her hands up in question.
"There will be thirteen! The first to rise will be the first to die...." Sybil whispered, lightning going off behind her head. Or maybe it was just the light reflecting off her outfit.
"Well... we'll have to make sure it is someone we won't mind losing." Bellatrix glanced over at Lily. Before anyone could protest, Bellatrix turned her own chair around backwards and stradled it like a jock. "So what are we here for?"
Frank waved his wand at the overhead projector on the table, which then projected a picture of a graph. He used his wand to create a red dot of light on the screen. "As you know, we are living in dark times, and once again the ministry has once again cut our funding...you can see in this next picture, Potions Mistress Professor Eden has been recycling potions for each class (rather dangerous.)" He clicked to the next picture. "I'm sure you recall the panic when they started supplying us with cheap muggle Kleenex...." There was a soft shudder throughout the room. He clicked to the next picture. "Then there's our sports equipment, which speaks for itself." He flipped to a picture of their quaffel, a floating red ball held together with about a whole role of duct tape. "Several attempts to raise money have only led to greater losses." He clicked to a picture of last year's school musical, Owls, "The other day, our headmaster told me a most shocking piece of information—" he clicked to the next page, which showed a crudedly looped animation of a stick figure. "The school is practically broke."
Narcissa fainted, face first into a bowl of guacamole.
Frank continued, "There has also been talk, much to our headmasters protest, of canceling the quidditch program." The table was suddenly awake, except Narcissa, whose only comment was a few bubbles in the guacamole, and Rudolphus, who gave a blink of concern.
"What, no they can't!" James exclaimed. "We have to stop them!"
"Why do you think we've gathered you here? We are the cleverest students of our age, if we truly wish to keep this running...we must find a way to raise money." Frank grabbed a handful of cheetos.
"What exactly did you have in mind?" Remus asked, reaching for a bowl of Doritos.
"Well, there was a suggestion that we might be having a Costume Ball for Halloween..." Alice said kindly. She popped the lid off a Pringles canister.
"Yee haw, I love dances!" Honey giggled, "and I am sure that if we all united we could plan a heckuva jollification!"
"Here here!" Regulus held up his water glass. "I'm sure I could convince mumsy to donate." Thus our talented students sorted out all matters of the dance. They got along rather well for all being in different houses, until there was a soft knock at the door.
"Come in!" Regulus called. The person responded with another knock and a violent jiggle of the door handle. "Will somebody get that?"
Lupin was about to, when Sybill shrieked and held him down with surprising vigor. "First to rise is the first to die!"
"Idiotic superstition." Severus said, his hair shining with bravado, but everyone remained frozen in their chairs as the knocking continued. Finally Sirius spoke, throwing back his glorious hair as he spoke."I'll risk it, everyone's got to die sometime," he said as Bellatrix grinned intently.
"Sirius, wait!" James held his pal down.
"Are you serious? You actually believe this superstition?" asked Lily from across the table.
"No, I'm not Sirius, I'm James," said James seriously, "I just had a bad vibe."
"So we're all just going to sit here for the rest of our lives" Lily asked and turned to the Slytherins. "Even you're afraid?"
"We are not afraid of anything, you prissy little Mudblood," Narcissa whispered, suddenly looking up, her now green mask showing all hatred, her teeth having globs of guacamole in them as she spoke. Remus gave Lily a sympathetic look. James was heading for his wand, but Lily gave him a hard kick underneath the table.
"Let me help you get that off your face...although that actually is very good for your skin." Lily withdrew her wand. Narcissa obviously saw this as some type of threat and went for her wand as well.
"Please! No duels here..." Regulus shouted. He turned to Lily and Honey with a sly grin. "but I wouldn't mind a catfight."
"I'm just going to help." Lily raised her wand and painlessly zapped all the guacamole from Narcissa's face, getting rid of some of her ugly makeup, acne, and premature wrinkles as well. Meanwhile Honey had ingeniously wheeled her chair over to the door. Bob Chang entered, curious as to what was going on.
"Wotcher, Bob! Great to see ya!"
"Come sit down with us, Bob! We were just hoping for a fourteenth member..."
"My that cast looks good on you, Bob!"
"Just sit down, Chang." Severus conjured him a chair. Bob put his hand on the back of the chair. "Well, I was really just looking for my quidditch cleats, but I suppose I have time for a chat and chips." Bellatrix gave loud mocking laugh and said evily, "Well, I suppose you would have. After all, you broke up with Rosmerta last Tuesday."
"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked.
"Bob, I think if you had the brains to figure it out, you would have actually been invited to this meeting." Bob torrented out of the room in tears. Sirius called his sadistic raven haired cousin something.
"Rudy, did you hear what my cousin just said to me?"
Then Rudolphus apparently snapped out of whatever trance he was in, and said the first words he said all evening, which just happened to be a curse. "Tarenteggella!" he pointed his wand at Bellatrix's cousin, who hopped onto the table as his legs suddenly began to dance around. However, he had cursed Regulus instead of Sirius, so it there wasn't really any point. James and Sirius cracked up, Narcissa and Bellatrix were utterly amused, despite it being the wrong cousin. Remus was looking sympathetic, while Severus looked annoyed that he was dancing in the chips and dip and splashing salsa all over everyone.
"Nixdancio!" Lily, Honey, and Alice shouted at the same time. The triple counter curse knocked him back violently; luckily, Honey performed a quick levitation charm so that he was not hurt.
"Impressive," Bellatrix said, watching the boy frozen in mid air, "But I'll bet my broom no one can't make him break dance in mid-air."
Immediately, several spells came shooting at the boy. He began dancing like mad, but still enjoying the attention. Eventually he began to show signs of weariness as his veins began to pulsate like mad and stick out of his skin. The boy was about to faint.
"That's enough!" Every looked at James in disbelief as he stood up and dispelled the curse. While the youngest Black was on the ground, (well, the table) he still appeared trying to dance. James scratched his head. "Sorry, kid, I can't stop it—Lily, I know you're the best at charms, will you help me—" "Mmmkay," she said nervously, "Only because I want to help him." She stood up and took Regulus's arm as James took his other. Just before they left, Regulus stuck out his tongue at Sirius, who scowled furiously.
"That little boy...was the first to stand up." Sibyl said mystically. Sirius looked after the door for a moment, and left without a word.
Honey wandered out onto the balcony after everyone had left, and was suddenly struck when she saw Severus's white face sillohetted against the night sky as he gazed out across the Scottish scenery.
"Howdy," Honey said, walking up to him. "I can't say this has been a nice evening but it's been an informative one."
"Go away," he whispered.
Honey turned to leave, but thought better of it."Have I done somethin', horribly wrong to you? 'Cause if I have I am absolutely sorry." She spoke slowly. Severus said nothing. She continued, a single tear rolling down her face. "Its just, when we first met, on the train, I thought we were kinda getting' along or somethin', but I guess it was just my good old Texas naiveté. In fact, I've never seen us actually argue, but still there's something just blocking my way." He turned to her, eyes glistening in the moonlight. She kept talking, "I just wanted you to know that I don't want to hurt you, and I don't want to judge you. And I know we've been through similar things, so in case you wanna..." He wiped the tear from her face; they were very close now. "...If you wanna talk or something..." Her eyes widened as her voice trailed off. Slowly, Severus leaned forward and pressed his lips to hers. As soon as the kiss was broken, they each looked completely surprised at what had happened. Nervously, he kissed her again, this time longer. The moment after, Honey smiled and pulled him to her again.