A/N: Sorry, everybody, I know I should have been updating much sooner, but
my computer didn't agree with you, so I'm a bit (half a year) behind
schedule. But the story's gonna keep going, better and faster than before,
I hope, so you can look forward to unrealistic, boring or sappy chapters.
Happy? Good!
P.S.: Important notice on the story: There are about 450 students at Arx Aurea, and since there are four regular and one 'exclusive' house, Forma, Fortitudo, Liveralitas and Disciplina all have 100 pupils, while Fortuna has 50. That means that with five grades, every grade in Fortuna consists of roughly 10 people (20 for the other houses). Divide these into boys and girls, and there are approximately 5 girls and 5 boys in one Fortuna grade (10 boys and 10 girls in the others). Tell me if you follow my mathematical calculations, math isn't exactly my best subject!
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Legilimency & Levitational Dance
There was a sharp, irritating pain in Ginny's left arm. It felt as if someone were poking her, maybe with a wand. There were voices, too - or was that one voice, just being blurred into many?
Ginny's eyes snapped open. They took in an unfamiliar hall, littered with unfamiliar golden chairs, and the unfamiliar face of a girl peering at her.
After Ginny had blinked again, the fog in her brain cleared, and she looked at the scene through a different perspective: this was the Intersection at the Arx Aurea, her school, and she was sitting in one of the travelling chairs herself. Only the wide-eyed face in front of her remained unknown to her memory.
'Are you alright?' the girl, who had to be more than a year younger than her, asked timidly.
Still considering this, Ginny answered automatically: 'Yes, I'm fine. What happened? Did I go to sleep here?' Her head certainly felt as though she had overslept for hours.
'No, you were lying here in a faint when I arrived,' the girl said, looking a bit uncomfortable. 'I didn't know what to do, so I just poked you.' She shot Ginny a swift, slightly embarrassed smile.
'Well, thanks for - waking me up,' Ginny told her, getting to her feet rather shakily. 'What time is it?' It was still not possible for her to remember what had happened. She had fainted - of course, she had been doing that a lot lately, because of the accident coming here, she reminded herself. But what had it been this time?
Her slightly short rescuer was quick to answer: 'It will be five in a minute. Actually, I should get going, or I'll be late.' But she made no signs of leaving, looking up at Ginny expectantly.
Ginny guessed what she wanted. 'Where are you going to?' she asked interestedly, though she was still trying to retrace what had happened. School had been over, she had been talking to Marianne from Disciplina -
'Levitational Dance practice', the girl replied proudly, flipping her curly blond ponytail over her shoulder.
That did catch Ginny's attention. One look at the younger girl's red ribbons told her she was in Forma - but what did that name stand for again?
The Latin definitions and their English translations clogging up her mind, she asked: 'Aren't you a little young to be in the Levitational Dance Company? I mean, I'm new here, so I don't know how everything works, but they only take much older pupils for the Quidditch team -'
She was cut off by a vigorous shake of the Forma girl's head. 'Oh, no, you're right; normally I would probably be too young to join the Company, and I'd have to audition in any case, but you see, Professor Kelsey is my mother, so -' she stopped and made a significant gesture with her hand.
Professor Kelsey? Ginny knew at once that she couldn't ask about her, but in her confusion she really didn't remember who she was. She had to be connected to Levitational Dance in some way - a brilliant smile and glittering white robes flashed up in her mind. The witch from the transport, of course!
'Oh,' she said in a voice respectful enough for the occasion. 'Professor Kelsey was the one who accompanied us in the Sedes Aeris. She didn't say she had a daughter.'
The other girl shrugged, losing her smug self-confidence as quickly as it had come to her. 'Well, so of course she told me when the first practice is, and I'm going to watch the dancers and participate too. At least, I hope so.' She looked so worried and doubtful that Ginny smiled reassuringly at her, even though she was trying hard to remember just what had happened before she had fainted.
'Do you want to come, too? I could tell mum I'm showing you around the school and just taking you with me.'
The question startled Ginny, but she was immediately caught by it. Finally seeing what Levitational Dance was about would be very interesting, especially as she still couldn't imagine anything that would suit the term. Her consciousness did make her glance rather guiltily at her books, but there would be time for those later.
'OK, thanks for inviting me; I'm sure it will be fun.' No sooner had Ginny said it than the girl squealed happily and, confidently taking her hand, led her among the chairs and couches until she found one that was labelled 'The Levitational Dance Company Practice Studio', a name that Ginny would come to know very well over the next year.
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'Yeah, Draco, just the guy I need!'
Draco Malfoy was greeted with this relieved cry as soon as he appeared in the Fortuna Boys' Common Room.
Some guys were lounging in front of a fireplace ( in which black fire was crackling and shooting brightly-coloured sparks at them), others sat at the desks that stood against the walls, doing homework or constructing lavish ink wars.
It took Draco some time to recognize the walls for what they were - they had been bewitched to look like a galaxy, complete with moving planets. A second look informed him that the floor and ceiling looked the same, so that the whole room appeared to be hovering in space.
Just copied from the Great Hall's ceiling back at Hogwarts, Draco remarked mentally. He still refused to think well of Arx Aurea. The whole school was ludicrous and flashy. And most of the students fit right in, probably including the boy who was calling him over.
'Hey, come on, help me out, buddy; Laura and Tina won't let me copy theirs and Tim's hopeless anyway - can't figure out anything! Please!' the boy from his dormitory - the Ron-Weasley-hair-double - was imploring him from his perch on a vividly orange see-through water bed. A huge book and several rolls of smirched or blank parchment surrounded him.
'Help you?' Draco put extra arrogance into his tone of voice. 'When Smarty Tim can't figure it out?' He of course knew nothing of the person he was insulting, but he had learned never to accept directly when he was asked for help. Then, not even listening to the small, uneven wave of laughter that circled the room, he was suddenly tired of forever trusting his eloquence to get him out of trouble and dropped his sneering attitude.
'Joking aside, what do you need help with?' Draco asked brusquely, striding over to the red-haired boy, who looked at him with both anxiety and eagerness.
'Latin homework,' he groaned, showing Draco a column of miniscule Latin words forming the endless sentences they had to translate. They tempted him; he loved showing off what he was good at, but he didn't want to be pinpointed as a geek who pathetically thought that if he helped everybody with their homework, he would be popular.
Besides, he had an idea. 'How about a deal?' Draco suggested slyly, enjoying the power his 'talent' gave him. 'I dictate the translation to you, and you copy it twice - once for you and again for me.'
The Weasley-hair-double hesitated, eying Draco as if he wasn't sure he was trustworthy.
'OK,' he finally agreed, 'but if I find out tomorrow that my homework is wrong, I'll bewitch Fatso here to beat you up.' Grinning, he indicated an enormous Latin dictionary.
'Don't worry, I know how to handle Latin, whether it's a translation or a dictionary,' was Draco's ambiguous answer.
'No problem then,' said the boy who Draco was beginning to think of as R.W.D. (Ron Weasley's double), but was liking a lot better than the original back at Hogwarts. He shifted his weight on the water bed to allow the transfer student some room and handed him the roll of parchment, where the homework column was already marked.
The few people around them who had been watching the interchange, turned back to whatever they were doing, and the noise enveloped them again.
Just before he immersed himself in the delicate work of unwinding complicated Latin sentence structures, Draco looked over the common room again, searching for something that appeared to be missing. When he realized he was wondering where Jason was, he was so surprised to find out he thought of his solemn room mate as practically the only friend he had here, that he didn't even stop to wonder where he was.
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Even though she had imagined the practice room to be beautiful like the rest of the school, Ginny still got a delightful surprise when they appeared at their destination.
The room was surrounded on all four sides by mirrors. When she slipped off the armchair and onto the pearly floor of the palest green, she noticed it gave with every step she took. The ceiling was of the same material and colour.
Several clouds of glittering golden stars hovered in one corner of the room. As Ginny watched them, entranced, a tall girl materialized out of one of them and joined the group that was watching the newcomers curiously.
All five of them were dressed in the same shiny pale green leotards, their hair tied up loosely and their legs and feet bare. One girl was stretched down on the soft floor in the splits, causing Ginny to feel very out of place.
Just as Ginny's companion was opening her mouth to introduce herself, her mother appeared in person.
Ginny just had time to recognize the witch with the platinum blond hair and the wide smile as Professor Kelsey when she was approached by her.
'Oh, dearie, here you are! I hope your wound isn't hurting you, I heard all about what happened in the transport. Are you in pain?' Her sweet, dramatic voice rose in anxiety as she gazed at Ginny, for once without a brilliant smile.
'No, I'm fine,' Ginny assured her and, taking the opportunity to explain why she was here, added: 'I met your daughter and she was showing me the school . . .'
She got no further, because at this point Professor Kelsey noticed her daughter and introduced her to the girls in leotards as her only child Heather, already a very good Levitational dancer.
The group was clearly impressed and greeted Heather kindly, but their eyes flicked interestedly over to Ginny. From Kelsey's remarks it was obvious that she was one of the transfer students, which was enough to rouse anybody's curiosity at Arx Aurea.
'Well, darling, go change; you brought your leotard, didn't you?' Professor Kelsey was instructing her daughter. Heather nodded meekly, apparently scared and a bit shy in front of the others and walked right into the nearest patch of stars, disappearing as she went.
Her mother looked after her fondly, then addressed her dancers: 'Right, is there anybody who disapproves of taking Heather Kelsey into the company?' Judging by their reaction, none of the girls had any complaints to the issue, and their teacher seemed satisfied.
Ginny was beginning to feel out of place, just standing there apart from the others. Luckily Professor Kelsey noticed her again before she could get too embarrassed and told her kindly that she could watch the class if she wanted to.
'After all,' she told Ginny confidingly, 'if you've never seen Levitational Dance it's best if you find out how it works, otherwise you'll have trouble in lessons, won't you?'
This remark did not cheer Ginny up, as she was already worried about getting all her homework and extra Latin done. What if she was a failure at the dancing lessons, too?
After ten minutes of the practice had gone by, Ginny was certain. There was no way she could ever manage to do this. Alone the stretching that the company did on the floor seemed impossible, as they appeared to fold up their bodies into the most awkward positions.
Following that came the jumping. Each student would leap gracefully into the air - and hover there for half a minute before slowly drifting to the floor again. Every one of them, even little Heather, managed this exercise completely effortlessly to Ginny's untrained eye.
As Ginny watched disbelievingly how the members of the Levitational Dance Company went into perfectly straight hand-stands and attempted to push themselves off the floor and into the air like that, she wished wholeheartedly that she could one day have their grace, athleticism and the remarkable talent to simply lift herself up into space.
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Amazingly, Draco was getting on well with R.W.D.. Because he didn't dare say anything about his father or his family in case it roused suspicion, the only bragging in his conversation was about his Latin accomplishment, and the other boy obviously thought he had a right to do so. R.W.D.'s real name was Steve Primac, and he was funny, swore continually, and, the best quality of all, admired Draco to no end. Also, criticism seemed to bounce right off him.
'Hey,' Steve commented, frowning over the sentence Draco had just dictated, 'there aren't any men in here, and I'm sure there was a vires in the Latin sentence.'
'You idiot,' Draco smirked, enjoying himself immensely, 'you've just made the oldest mistake in history. Vir means man, but the plural is viri, not vires. That comes from vis, which means strength or violence. Got it?'
R.W.D. only remarked: 'Oh, sorry, I always get those two mixed up.' Which made him even more agreeable in Draco's eyes.
Then he carefully rolled up the parchment with his homework on it and, hurling the rest of his Latin equipment onto the floor, let himself fall backwards onto the water bed. 'Yay, my homework's done for another day!'
'And where's my copy?' Draco demanded, cocking an eyebrow. Steve good- naturedly handed it over, remarking casually: 'We definitely have to go into business, pal. Man, that's my tough luck for not being enrolled in Hogwarts! Any school that can turn out Latin pros like you and good-looking girls like that Virginia must be amazing!'
Draco smirked at the first part of his statement and openly laughed at the last. 'Good-looking?' he sputtered before he even thought about it. 'What, have you joined a weasel fan club or something?'
Even as he was still talking, Draco felt the iciness grip his stomach. He had been distracted as soon as he had entered the common room, but now he remembered and could have slapped himself for his comment.
Half an hour after he'd kissed the damn Weasley - not just once, not to annoy her, but when she was unconscious! - he was insulting her in front of others. So what if R.W.D. thought Ginny attractive? It was probably a red hair thing. He was just really lucky nobody had seen him and that Ginny would never remember.
Steve had been staring at him as if he had suddenly turned into a Hippogriff and a few other guys had also turned around with a disbelieving frown.
'You mean the Ginny from Hogwarts?' one asked, astonished. 'Weasel fan club? She's ho- oh, hi, Professor Sole!'
A tall witch had just appeared, regally sitting on a golden chair. Draco vaguely recognized her as the woman who had greeted them when they first arrived. It seemed so long ago that it was hard to image it had been only yesterday . . . but the hell had already started then, he just hadn't known it.
'Good afternoon, Mr Parving,' the professor smiled at the boy who had spoken. There was an almost undetectable sarcasm in her voice, but Draco heard it and was on the alert. You never knew what people with such a softly sneering disposition would do. He had had enough experience with his father.
Meanwhile, the queen on the throne was examining her students, who were all looking at each other rather puzzled, some of them guiltily.
Cocking one eyebrow, Draco waited, resigned to what seemed to him to be his uncannily bad luck. Sure enough, when the witch turned her face towards him, her smile broadened, and she said quietly: 'Draco Malfoy. A word in my office.'
He smirked an unwilling 'Fine, professor' at her, just before stiffening in shock and dropping his head so he was staring at the shiny surface of the water-bed he was still sitting on. His head and heart thumped in unison.
He heard the collective rise of the noise level which marked the witch's departure, but he didn't dare look up until Steve nudged him.
'You better go, dragon boy, she'll be nicer to you if you're on time.'
Instinctively making a face at the ridicule his name was being made into, Draco asked the question that was haunting him: 'Who is she?'
R.W.D.'s face split into an evil grin. 'Our Headmistress. What do you think of her?'
Welcome to nightmare school, was the only thing Draco thought, letting himself fall backwards onto the water-bed in exhaustion. His headmistress could do Legilimency. And how.
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A/N: Big apologies from author. I really had honestly planned not to let the fifth HP book interfere with my story, cuz I started writing this when it wasn't out yet, and I would have definitely done some things completely different if it had been. But this time I couldn't help myself. It just fits! For those of you who haven't realized what I'm up to yet, Professor Sole is a mind-reader. (Thank you for the definition, Snape, but I'm a muggle, so I might as well call it mind-reading).
Also sorry that nothing happens in this chapter till the cliffie at the end. . . very popular choice for frustrated writers who have only just reread their chapter, decided it sucks, and therefore have shoved in some of their plot which was supposed to come later. See my earlier chapters, I do it all the time!
OK, now I'm REALLY rambling, I'd better cough up the thanks to my reviewers from somewhere within my 'nicer' self.
Luv you all:
Diana - don't we all feel sorry for Draco once in a while? I mean, let's face it, he always gets the raw end of the deal in all DG fics. But I'm so happy you don't think him OOC here. Must be my evil Slytherin influence *grins*
Liz Swarthy - wow, me writing cool, unholy things? Never heard that before, it's so nice of you to say so *sniff* I'm touched.
Ms K - can't really help it, Draco is so cool (not to mention hot - at least the way I imagine him) that I just have to have a way to show him at his best! And it's kind of you to say I have a good storyline, been kinda worried about that.
The Totally Sarcastic Sprite - hm, was that sarcastic or not? *j/k*
Taunting Ave - great idea, marketing toy Dracos. . . can't you just see sadistic authors toying with him? And I'm honoured, can I be invited to the toga party? *j/k* Oswari - you're confused? Nothing new, I have trouble keeping up with the story myself! But seriously, you can email me anytime you like and I'll answer your questions and hopefully clear up a few confusions. C ya!
Julie - don't worry, I'll email you. . . as if I would miss the chance to get another review!
Anjelline - no flames about the late updating, please, if you want to blame somebody, burn off my computer. Yay, that would be fun. . . or maybe not, cuz then I could never update again. Anywayz, hope you review again if you're always so nice!
Thanks to you all, I'm in a much better mood now. . . just love reading complimentary reviews. Or any other ones, for that matter.
Hope you get all the stuff that my beta-reader (Arabian Knight) has sensibly pointed out to me as extremely difficult to understand. Thanks to her as well. (Oh, please, do I really have to say this every single time? *j/k*)
Till next time,
Shooting Jewel
P.S.: Important notice on the story: There are about 450 students at Arx Aurea, and since there are four regular and one 'exclusive' house, Forma, Fortitudo, Liveralitas and Disciplina all have 100 pupils, while Fortuna has 50. That means that with five grades, every grade in Fortuna consists of roughly 10 people (20 for the other houses). Divide these into boys and girls, and there are approximately 5 girls and 5 boys in one Fortuna grade (10 boys and 10 girls in the others). Tell me if you follow my mathematical calculations, math isn't exactly my best subject!
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Legilimency & Levitational Dance
There was a sharp, irritating pain in Ginny's left arm. It felt as if someone were poking her, maybe with a wand. There were voices, too - or was that one voice, just being blurred into many?
Ginny's eyes snapped open. They took in an unfamiliar hall, littered with unfamiliar golden chairs, and the unfamiliar face of a girl peering at her.
After Ginny had blinked again, the fog in her brain cleared, and she looked at the scene through a different perspective: this was the Intersection at the Arx Aurea, her school, and she was sitting in one of the travelling chairs herself. Only the wide-eyed face in front of her remained unknown to her memory.
'Are you alright?' the girl, who had to be more than a year younger than her, asked timidly.
Still considering this, Ginny answered automatically: 'Yes, I'm fine. What happened? Did I go to sleep here?' Her head certainly felt as though she had overslept for hours.
'No, you were lying here in a faint when I arrived,' the girl said, looking a bit uncomfortable. 'I didn't know what to do, so I just poked you.' She shot Ginny a swift, slightly embarrassed smile.
'Well, thanks for - waking me up,' Ginny told her, getting to her feet rather shakily. 'What time is it?' It was still not possible for her to remember what had happened. She had fainted - of course, she had been doing that a lot lately, because of the accident coming here, she reminded herself. But what had it been this time?
Her slightly short rescuer was quick to answer: 'It will be five in a minute. Actually, I should get going, or I'll be late.' But she made no signs of leaving, looking up at Ginny expectantly.
Ginny guessed what she wanted. 'Where are you going to?' she asked interestedly, though she was still trying to retrace what had happened. School had been over, she had been talking to Marianne from Disciplina -
'Levitational Dance practice', the girl replied proudly, flipping her curly blond ponytail over her shoulder.
That did catch Ginny's attention. One look at the younger girl's red ribbons told her she was in Forma - but what did that name stand for again?
The Latin definitions and their English translations clogging up her mind, she asked: 'Aren't you a little young to be in the Levitational Dance Company? I mean, I'm new here, so I don't know how everything works, but they only take much older pupils for the Quidditch team -'
She was cut off by a vigorous shake of the Forma girl's head. 'Oh, no, you're right; normally I would probably be too young to join the Company, and I'd have to audition in any case, but you see, Professor Kelsey is my mother, so -' she stopped and made a significant gesture with her hand.
Professor Kelsey? Ginny knew at once that she couldn't ask about her, but in her confusion she really didn't remember who she was. She had to be connected to Levitational Dance in some way - a brilliant smile and glittering white robes flashed up in her mind. The witch from the transport, of course!
'Oh,' she said in a voice respectful enough for the occasion. 'Professor Kelsey was the one who accompanied us in the Sedes Aeris. She didn't say she had a daughter.'
The other girl shrugged, losing her smug self-confidence as quickly as it had come to her. 'Well, so of course she told me when the first practice is, and I'm going to watch the dancers and participate too. At least, I hope so.' She looked so worried and doubtful that Ginny smiled reassuringly at her, even though she was trying hard to remember just what had happened before she had fainted.
'Do you want to come, too? I could tell mum I'm showing you around the school and just taking you with me.'
The question startled Ginny, but she was immediately caught by it. Finally seeing what Levitational Dance was about would be very interesting, especially as she still couldn't imagine anything that would suit the term. Her consciousness did make her glance rather guiltily at her books, but there would be time for those later.
'OK, thanks for inviting me; I'm sure it will be fun.' No sooner had Ginny said it than the girl squealed happily and, confidently taking her hand, led her among the chairs and couches until she found one that was labelled 'The Levitational Dance Company Practice Studio', a name that Ginny would come to know very well over the next year.
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'Yeah, Draco, just the guy I need!'
Draco Malfoy was greeted with this relieved cry as soon as he appeared in the Fortuna Boys' Common Room.
Some guys were lounging in front of a fireplace ( in which black fire was crackling and shooting brightly-coloured sparks at them), others sat at the desks that stood against the walls, doing homework or constructing lavish ink wars.
It took Draco some time to recognize the walls for what they were - they had been bewitched to look like a galaxy, complete with moving planets. A second look informed him that the floor and ceiling looked the same, so that the whole room appeared to be hovering in space.
Just copied from the Great Hall's ceiling back at Hogwarts, Draco remarked mentally. He still refused to think well of Arx Aurea. The whole school was ludicrous and flashy. And most of the students fit right in, probably including the boy who was calling him over.
'Hey, come on, help me out, buddy; Laura and Tina won't let me copy theirs and Tim's hopeless anyway - can't figure out anything! Please!' the boy from his dormitory - the Ron-Weasley-hair-double - was imploring him from his perch on a vividly orange see-through water bed. A huge book and several rolls of smirched or blank parchment surrounded him.
'Help you?' Draco put extra arrogance into his tone of voice. 'When Smarty Tim can't figure it out?' He of course knew nothing of the person he was insulting, but he had learned never to accept directly when he was asked for help. Then, not even listening to the small, uneven wave of laughter that circled the room, he was suddenly tired of forever trusting his eloquence to get him out of trouble and dropped his sneering attitude.
'Joking aside, what do you need help with?' Draco asked brusquely, striding over to the red-haired boy, who looked at him with both anxiety and eagerness.
'Latin homework,' he groaned, showing Draco a column of miniscule Latin words forming the endless sentences they had to translate. They tempted him; he loved showing off what he was good at, but he didn't want to be pinpointed as a geek who pathetically thought that if he helped everybody with their homework, he would be popular.
Besides, he had an idea. 'How about a deal?' Draco suggested slyly, enjoying the power his 'talent' gave him. 'I dictate the translation to you, and you copy it twice - once for you and again for me.'
The Weasley-hair-double hesitated, eying Draco as if he wasn't sure he was trustworthy.
'OK,' he finally agreed, 'but if I find out tomorrow that my homework is wrong, I'll bewitch Fatso here to beat you up.' Grinning, he indicated an enormous Latin dictionary.
'Don't worry, I know how to handle Latin, whether it's a translation or a dictionary,' was Draco's ambiguous answer.
'No problem then,' said the boy who Draco was beginning to think of as R.W.D. (Ron Weasley's double), but was liking a lot better than the original back at Hogwarts. He shifted his weight on the water bed to allow the transfer student some room and handed him the roll of parchment, where the homework column was already marked.
The few people around them who had been watching the interchange, turned back to whatever they were doing, and the noise enveloped them again.
Just before he immersed himself in the delicate work of unwinding complicated Latin sentence structures, Draco looked over the common room again, searching for something that appeared to be missing. When he realized he was wondering where Jason was, he was so surprised to find out he thought of his solemn room mate as practically the only friend he had here, that he didn't even stop to wonder where he was.
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Even though she had imagined the practice room to be beautiful like the rest of the school, Ginny still got a delightful surprise when they appeared at their destination.
The room was surrounded on all four sides by mirrors. When she slipped off the armchair and onto the pearly floor of the palest green, she noticed it gave with every step she took. The ceiling was of the same material and colour.
Several clouds of glittering golden stars hovered in one corner of the room. As Ginny watched them, entranced, a tall girl materialized out of one of them and joined the group that was watching the newcomers curiously.
All five of them were dressed in the same shiny pale green leotards, their hair tied up loosely and their legs and feet bare. One girl was stretched down on the soft floor in the splits, causing Ginny to feel very out of place.
Just as Ginny's companion was opening her mouth to introduce herself, her mother appeared in person.
Ginny just had time to recognize the witch with the platinum blond hair and the wide smile as Professor Kelsey when she was approached by her.
'Oh, dearie, here you are! I hope your wound isn't hurting you, I heard all about what happened in the transport. Are you in pain?' Her sweet, dramatic voice rose in anxiety as she gazed at Ginny, for once without a brilliant smile.
'No, I'm fine,' Ginny assured her and, taking the opportunity to explain why she was here, added: 'I met your daughter and she was showing me the school . . .'
She got no further, because at this point Professor Kelsey noticed her daughter and introduced her to the girls in leotards as her only child Heather, already a very good Levitational dancer.
The group was clearly impressed and greeted Heather kindly, but their eyes flicked interestedly over to Ginny. From Kelsey's remarks it was obvious that she was one of the transfer students, which was enough to rouse anybody's curiosity at Arx Aurea.
'Well, darling, go change; you brought your leotard, didn't you?' Professor Kelsey was instructing her daughter. Heather nodded meekly, apparently scared and a bit shy in front of the others and walked right into the nearest patch of stars, disappearing as she went.
Her mother looked after her fondly, then addressed her dancers: 'Right, is there anybody who disapproves of taking Heather Kelsey into the company?' Judging by their reaction, none of the girls had any complaints to the issue, and their teacher seemed satisfied.
Ginny was beginning to feel out of place, just standing there apart from the others. Luckily Professor Kelsey noticed her again before she could get too embarrassed and told her kindly that she could watch the class if she wanted to.
'After all,' she told Ginny confidingly, 'if you've never seen Levitational Dance it's best if you find out how it works, otherwise you'll have trouble in lessons, won't you?'
This remark did not cheer Ginny up, as she was already worried about getting all her homework and extra Latin done. What if she was a failure at the dancing lessons, too?
After ten minutes of the practice had gone by, Ginny was certain. There was no way she could ever manage to do this. Alone the stretching that the company did on the floor seemed impossible, as they appeared to fold up their bodies into the most awkward positions.
Following that came the jumping. Each student would leap gracefully into the air - and hover there for half a minute before slowly drifting to the floor again. Every one of them, even little Heather, managed this exercise completely effortlessly to Ginny's untrained eye.
As Ginny watched disbelievingly how the members of the Levitational Dance Company went into perfectly straight hand-stands and attempted to push themselves off the floor and into the air like that, she wished wholeheartedly that she could one day have their grace, athleticism and the remarkable talent to simply lift herself up into space.
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Amazingly, Draco was getting on well with R.W.D.. Because he didn't dare say anything about his father or his family in case it roused suspicion, the only bragging in his conversation was about his Latin accomplishment, and the other boy obviously thought he had a right to do so. R.W.D.'s real name was Steve Primac, and he was funny, swore continually, and, the best quality of all, admired Draco to no end. Also, criticism seemed to bounce right off him.
'Hey,' Steve commented, frowning over the sentence Draco had just dictated, 'there aren't any men in here, and I'm sure there was a vires in the Latin sentence.'
'You idiot,' Draco smirked, enjoying himself immensely, 'you've just made the oldest mistake in history. Vir means man, but the plural is viri, not vires. That comes from vis, which means strength or violence. Got it?'
R.W.D. only remarked: 'Oh, sorry, I always get those two mixed up.' Which made him even more agreeable in Draco's eyes.
Then he carefully rolled up the parchment with his homework on it and, hurling the rest of his Latin equipment onto the floor, let himself fall backwards onto the water bed. 'Yay, my homework's done for another day!'
'And where's my copy?' Draco demanded, cocking an eyebrow. Steve good- naturedly handed it over, remarking casually: 'We definitely have to go into business, pal. Man, that's my tough luck for not being enrolled in Hogwarts! Any school that can turn out Latin pros like you and good-looking girls like that Virginia must be amazing!'
Draco smirked at the first part of his statement and openly laughed at the last. 'Good-looking?' he sputtered before he even thought about it. 'What, have you joined a weasel fan club or something?'
Even as he was still talking, Draco felt the iciness grip his stomach. He had been distracted as soon as he had entered the common room, but now he remembered and could have slapped himself for his comment.
Half an hour after he'd kissed the damn Weasley - not just once, not to annoy her, but when she was unconscious! - he was insulting her in front of others. So what if R.W.D. thought Ginny attractive? It was probably a red hair thing. He was just really lucky nobody had seen him and that Ginny would never remember.
Steve had been staring at him as if he had suddenly turned into a Hippogriff and a few other guys had also turned around with a disbelieving frown.
'You mean the Ginny from Hogwarts?' one asked, astonished. 'Weasel fan club? She's ho- oh, hi, Professor Sole!'
A tall witch had just appeared, regally sitting on a golden chair. Draco vaguely recognized her as the woman who had greeted them when they first arrived. It seemed so long ago that it was hard to image it had been only yesterday . . . but the hell had already started then, he just hadn't known it.
'Good afternoon, Mr Parving,' the professor smiled at the boy who had spoken. There was an almost undetectable sarcasm in her voice, but Draco heard it and was on the alert. You never knew what people with such a softly sneering disposition would do. He had had enough experience with his father.
Meanwhile, the queen on the throne was examining her students, who were all looking at each other rather puzzled, some of them guiltily.
Cocking one eyebrow, Draco waited, resigned to what seemed to him to be his uncannily bad luck. Sure enough, when the witch turned her face towards him, her smile broadened, and she said quietly: 'Draco Malfoy. A word in my office.'
He smirked an unwilling 'Fine, professor' at her, just before stiffening in shock and dropping his head so he was staring at the shiny surface of the water-bed he was still sitting on. His head and heart thumped in unison.
He heard the collective rise of the noise level which marked the witch's departure, but he didn't dare look up until Steve nudged him.
'You better go, dragon boy, she'll be nicer to you if you're on time.'
Instinctively making a face at the ridicule his name was being made into, Draco asked the question that was haunting him: 'Who is she?'
R.W.D.'s face split into an evil grin. 'Our Headmistress. What do you think of her?'
Welcome to nightmare school, was the only thing Draco thought, letting himself fall backwards onto the water-bed in exhaustion. His headmistress could do Legilimency. And how.
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A/N: Big apologies from author. I really had honestly planned not to let the fifth HP book interfere with my story, cuz I started writing this when it wasn't out yet, and I would have definitely done some things completely different if it had been. But this time I couldn't help myself. It just fits! For those of you who haven't realized what I'm up to yet, Professor Sole is a mind-reader. (Thank you for the definition, Snape, but I'm a muggle, so I might as well call it mind-reading).
Also sorry that nothing happens in this chapter till the cliffie at the end. . . very popular choice for frustrated writers who have only just reread their chapter, decided it sucks, and therefore have shoved in some of their plot which was supposed to come later. See my earlier chapters, I do it all the time!
OK, now I'm REALLY rambling, I'd better cough up the thanks to my reviewers from somewhere within my 'nicer' self.
Luv you all:
Diana - don't we all feel sorry for Draco once in a while? I mean, let's face it, he always gets the raw end of the deal in all DG fics. But I'm so happy you don't think him OOC here. Must be my evil Slytherin influence *grins*
Liz Swarthy - wow, me writing cool, unholy things? Never heard that before, it's so nice of you to say so *sniff* I'm touched.
Ms K - can't really help it, Draco is so cool (not to mention hot - at least the way I imagine him) that I just have to have a way to show him at his best! And it's kind of you to say I have a good storyline, been kinda worried about that.
The Totally Sarcastic Sprite - hm, was that sarcastic or not? *j/k*
Taunting Ave - great idea, marketing toy Dracos. . . can't you just see sadistic authors toying with him? And I'm honoured, can I be invited to the toga party? *j/k* Oswari - you're confused? Nothing new, I have trouble keeping up with the story myself! But seriously, you can email me anytime you like and I'll answer your questions and hopefully clear up a few confusions. C ya!
Julie - don't worry, I'll email you. . . as if I would miss the chance to get another review!
Anjelline - no flames about the late updating, please, if you want to blame somebody, burn off my computer. Yay, that would be fun. . . or maybe not, cuz then I could never update again. Anywayz, hope you review again if you're always so nice!
Thanks to you all, I'm in a much better mood now. . . just love reading complimentary reviews. Or any other ones, for that matter.
Hope you get all the stuff that my beta-reader (Arabian Knight) has sensibly pointed out to me as extremely difficult to understand. Thanks to her as well. (Oh, please, do I really have to say this every single time? *j/k*)
Till next time,
Shooting Jewel