Title: "Beautiful Intelligence" Chapter 2
Pairing: Theodore Nott/Pansy Parkinson
Rating: R for the language.
Notes: Based on events from the Harry Potter RPG harrygoesdown. Dedicated to all the players because I love you all.
Beautiful Intelligence
Chapter 2 – Eavesdropping
"No one cares, no one cares, no one cares..." she sighed, as Professor Binns droned on and on about the execution of Hetty von Slipperfoot in the nineteenth century.
Nothing that Binns had to say ever seemed important, but especially not today.
The ball three days before seemed like eons ago. Despite everything, the thought that Theo had not spoken to her since that night had been bugging her.
Minutes passed; Pansy's mind had wandered back to the ball, and that look in his eyes when he'd been watching her, just before he'd noticed she was looking back at him. Did he often look at her like that when no one was watching? Did she even care if he did? She'd asked him to the ball in the first place because she couldn't bear the thought of having to spend the evening having to watch Draco and Potter make out. And Theo was... well, from what little time they had spent together over the years, he'd been interesting company. Always on the sidelines - not because he couldn't choose, but simply because he didn't think he should. She'd never quite understood his distant demeanour, but then again, it was no wonder he thought himself above everyone; he was probably right.
One time she'd been talking to him, Draco had caught her eye and frowned at her. He'd sauntered over to them, made her excuses, and pulled her away whilst spitting a patronising speech about how it made him look bad if his girlfriend was seen flirting with his house-mates. "I wasn't flirting," she'd said incredulously as Draco held a firm grip on her arm and dragged her upstairs to his dorm. "He's actually rather intellige–" But Draco hadn't wanted to hear what Theo was, nor why she'd been touching his arm like that. He'd captured her lips then, and nothing more was ever said on the matter.
"You're still in love with him, aren't you?"
Pansy's head snapped round to look at Mil.
She's right behind you...
Theo mentally thumped himself for the hundredth time that lesson and tried to focus.
"Slipperfoot... died in 1876... prosecuted for interfering with nifflers... I should really just talk to her... she's probably still annoyed that I let Zabini pour all those drinks down her throat... in fact, she's probably bitching to Mil about it right now... ugh... stop caring, Nott. Stop caring."
He bent over his parchment once more, when–
"– you're still in love with him, aren't you?"
Mil's voice carried over to where he was sitting. Theo didn't move; he listened carefully.
"I – what?"
She sounded startled. Mil had caught her off guard. Theo wondered what Pansy could have been doing to make Mil bring something like that up so unexpectedly, and shook his head to clear the images of textbooks with "PP and DM forever" scrawled all over them.
"You've been distant."
"So have you, Mil," she retorted almost callously, then cleared her throat. "Who were you talking about?"
Don't say it, don't say it...
"Draco, of course," Mil said matter-of-factly. Theo stiffened. "Who else would I be talking about? I've been sitting here watching you stare at him for the past five minutes."
So, that was her game. The "thing" with Harry Potter at the ball was all about getting Malfoy's attention. Well, whatever.
He ignored the fact that he suddenly found himself wanting to fill Draco Malfoy's bed with poisonous snakes, and let Binns' voice filter into his mind instead.
Pansy shifted uncomfortably. "I – what?"
Why would Mil think she loved Theo? It's not as though she'd talked about him or anything. In fact, her quiet and mild interest in him had only flared since the Ball, and she hadn't even seen Mil since that afternoon when they'd been getting ready...
"You've been distant."
"So have you, Mil. Who were you talking about?"
"Draco, of course." With a soft 'oh' of understanding, Pansy noticed that Draco was sitting just outside of her line of vision, and that Mil must have mistaken where she'd been focusing. "Who else would I be talking about? I've been sitting here watching you stare at him for the past five minutes."
"Right," she said, not meeting Mil's eyes. Mil started for a moment, then hesitated, and eventually said nothing. She knew when to drop the subject.
Pansy laid her head on the desk, decided to put Theo to the back of her mind, and looked up at her best friend, who was now chewing on her nails and gazing out the window.
"What's going on, Mil?" she whispered, not lifting her head from the desk.
Mil turned her head slowly, and looked down at her friend. "I hope you noticed I wasn't there at the ball or in the dorms the last day or so, Pansy."
"Of course I noticed," she lied. Have I been that out of it since the ball? she wondered, and chanced a look at Theo, who had his head down and was hastily scribbling notes onto the parchment in front of him. She flopped her head back down onto the desk. "What is it you needed to talk about? What happened?"
"Well, you know how Draco ran into his father last night?"
Ah. Yes. Draco. He'd had words with her a couple of days ago out the Licking Incident at the ball. Too bad if Potter was his new boyfriend; was it her fault if she was more lickable than him? Though, from the way Draco had been looking at her lately, it seems as though he might agree.
Hm, that was something to think about: would she ever take Draco back, if given the chance? Well, he wouldn't deserve it, she thought bitterly. Cheating on her with Potter and then dumping her was not the way to treat Pansy Parkinson. Though, was there a reason she'd felt the need to wink at him at breakfast this morning?
"Pansy?" Mil prodded her arm.
"Mm? I'm listening, Mil. What about Draco's father?"
Mil eyed Pansy sceptically for a moment, then sighed and looked down at her hands. Pansy hated when she did that.
"The thing is, he wasn't here to talk to Draco, really." She turned away and gazed back out the window. "He came to talk to me, about, you know... joining."
Pansy lifted her head from the desk.
"Fucking hell, Millie, he came to see you?" she hissed.
Mil said nothing. Her silence said enough, however, and Pansy took a moment to try and comprehend the news. Whatever she had been expecting, it wasn't this.
"I don't understand why you, Mil. Why not Draco? Or any of the rest of us?"
"I don't know," Mil said in barely a whisper.
"Fuck..."
"Pans..." Mil hesitated for a moment. "That's not all that happened."
This isn't right... this isn't right at all
Pansy's face revealed no emotion as she listened to her friend's revelation.
"William Stratford... consort of Slipperfoot's... died a year later when clubbed to death by a drunk pixie..."
Theo, relieved that he could no longer make out Pansy and Mil's conversation, had already scribbled a foot's worth of notes. He sighed wearily and was just reaching into his bag for another roll of parchment, when Mil's voice caught his attention once more.
"–down to this place, and... the Dark Lord himself was there... in Hogsmeade..."
"What?"
Theo frowned, recalling his father's words at dinner the night before he'd had to return to Hogwarts. 'Theodore, this year will be a very important year for you. The Dark Lord is stronger than ever, and getting stronger every day. If you hear anything around school about your fellow classmates, I want you to tell me, understood?' Theo hadn't needed any elaboration. 'Right, Dad,' he'd said with a shrug.
"I – I... he... I don't know, Pansy. He was inside my head. He – he showed me things..." Theo listened carefully for Pansy's response, but if she said anything her voice was too quiet for him to hear. "...His childhood. His parents. He's almost just like Potter, Pans... just like Harry Potter."
Silence.
"I can... I can still hear his voice in my head, Pansy. I-I'm really scared..."
A shuffling on the desk. Further silence. Theo wondered how Pansy would react to something like this; she could be extremely unpredictable at times. Only a couple of weeks before she had walked in on a drunken Draco kissing a very sober Harry Potter, and instead of hexing the both of them into oblivion, rumours say she simply walked right back out again without a word.
She had made it recently clear, however, that she was still far from a pushover. Zabini walked into the boy's dorm just yesterday accompanied by a bright red thong with the words 'Drink this, Zabini' that had been fused to his head. Theo had smiled to himself behind his Potions book, presuming that Pansy had gotten her sweet revenge for the incident at the Ball.
"What does he say to you?"
Another shuffle.
"Just praising me for my studies... trifle things, really... nothing important. It's... it's his voice, Pansy. He – he almost chuckles inside my head. Like... like he h-has plans for me..."
Both said nothing for a while. Theo pondered.
So, the big DL was in Hogsmeade? He wasn't particularly surprised. Then again, he wouldn't be surprised if this was another one of Mil's attention-seeking ploys.
He turned his head slightly and surveyed the pair from the corner of his eye. They appeared to both be staring out the window to their left, but on closer inspection, he noticed that it was Mil Pansy was looking at, not the rain pattering hard on the ground outside.
For a brief and stupid moment he considered turning around and admitting to his eavesdropping just to properly see her face, but easily stopped himself when he realised he would have nothing to say after that. Fuck what his dad had said; he'd rather not get involved if he could help it.
Pansy watched her friend carefully. Could she be lying? Would she go this far to get attention? She dragged her eyes away from Mil and looked around the room. Theo appeared to be in his own world; no longer scribbling notes, but now watching the rain outside.
Past him on the far side of the room, Draco was grinning idiotically next to Harry Potter, but saw his smile falter as she caught his eye. She didn't want to think about what they'd been doing under the desk. On the other side of Draco sat Daphne Greengrass and Blaise Zabini. She could still spot bald patches on Zabini's scalp from where he'd had to incinerate the thong to remove it, and normally she would have smirked at the look of mild distaste on Daphne's face.
Everyone else was either looking out of the window with glazed expressions, or had their heads down much like Zabini, while Binns' voice continued to bore into their skulls.
It didn't look as though anyone else knew Voldemort had recently been taking random Slytherins to some location a couple of miles away, she thought.
Her eyes fell once again on Theo, and she smiled as she formed the plan to confront him in the common room later. He was going to have to face her sometime, and she figured it might as well be on her terms.
"Pansy, this is serious." Mil sounded irritable, yet exhausted. Pansy could think of many reasons why Mil could be lying, but she also knew she'd never find out the truth if her friend knew she had doubted her.
The rustling of books and parchment being hastily shoved into school bags and scrapes of chairs against the wooden floor rapidly filled the room, and Pansy was stirred from her daze.
"I know, Mil. I'm not fucking stupid."
Mil had already packed her things away and she watched Pansy with a wary expression.
"I never said you were stupid, Pans," she said slowly. "You're just so... distracted."
Pansy chuckled. "I'm never that distracted."
She stood up and did a double-take as she reached for her bag and realised she'd never taken her books out in the first place. Mil gave her a pointed look and lead the way to their next class.
TBC