Author's note: I haven't written these two in so long, this was so fun. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: J.K. Rowling owns the canon, world, and characters portrayed below and you can tell I'm not J.K. Rowling because #transrights

Hogwarts: Assignment #2, 2. Putting on a face for others/ a front or a mask

Content Warnings: NA


Feet Ready, Heartbeat Steady

She didn't recognize him right away. But then again, that was the point–wasn't it? That was why people loved masquerade balls, which was why the Black family held one every year at the Winter Solstice. Although it wasn't so much the mask as the dress robes that threw her off–the navy blue wizard robes–that he was wearing.

"Te…" she caught her name before it left her mouth with the same urgency as she might catch the string of a kite before it flew away and she couldn't take it back. She lowered her voice. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm attending a ball," he said. His face was mostly covered by a half-mask that made his face seem bronze, from the top of his forehead to the tip of his nose, but his lips quivered in a smile. A sun was embossed on his right temple, and rays shone across his face.

"Ho… how?" Andromeda asked, trying to make the question sound pressing even if she couldn't stop her eyes from roaming over him.

"The Black family is gracious enough to give each Hogwarts professor a ticket to the Solstice Ball to help fill the room–I mean, to underscore their generosity as donors to the school, of course," Ted said. "I've been working on securing Slughorn's ticket all year, which was hard since you're his reigning favourite, though I suppose he couldn't invite you to your own family's home. You wouldn't believe the things I've scraped off of cauldron bottoms."

"But…" Andromeda was still too distracted by all the amber that his mask pulled out of his irises to formulate her questions or outrage properly. She lowered her voice. "You cannot be here–you simply can not. What if my family met you?"

"It's a masquerade ball," Ted said. "Nobody meets each other, that's the point. But two strangers can dance in a room full of other people, if they're dressed the part. And you, Miss Black, look… astonishing."

She blushed so deeply, the flush of her cheek must have been seen through all the powder that her mother had brushed over her cheeks. She had said that they needed to make Andromeda's skin as pale as it could be, for her dress's shade of yellow to suit her properly. She was intensely and intimately aware, as he watched her, of the boning in her corset, the stiffness of her bodice, the layers of her skirts, and the way her shoulders were bare as the chiffon sleeves criss-crossed her frame to hold it all up.

She was also so very aware that if she reached up and touched his face right now, they may look like a sunbeam.

"You look well yourself, sir," she said–a smile tugging at her lips from the compliment and the realisation that she could simply play along with him. "Have you tried the wine yet? They are made with grapes grown on the grounds, and aged here too."

"I have not yet had the pleasure," Ted admitted. "But before I do, I would like to take advantage of the song that's playing–if you wouldn't mind giving me this dance, that is."

A smile tugged at her lips. Her feet had never been more ready.

"I do not think I should mind at all," Andromeda said. As she nodded, the strings of golden beads that closed off the eyeholes of her mask tingled against her cheekbones.

"What do I do now?" Ted asked in a whisper. "I haven't ever been to a ball before."

Andromeda smiled.

"Give me your hand, so I can take it," she said quietly–under her breath so nobody would hear her giving instructions. He did as she said, and she rested her fingers against his familiar palms daintily. They were warmed right away. "Now lead me onto the dance floor…"

Once they were there, she whispered her next instructions.

"Now we bow to each other," Andromeda said, taking her skirts in hand to properly curtsy. Then she straightened up. "Now give me your hand again. Pull me closer. Put a hand on the small of my back…"

"I know this part," Ted said with a smile. And he sure did. He was a good dancer; Andromeda knew this already. Sometimes, when they were alone in the Room of Requirement, the room would leave a record player for them in the corner of the room. He would show her the way through the history of Muggle rock and jazz–just as she sometimes filled in the things he did not know about the world of magic. Except she got to have more fun, since she got to swing dance with him.

But it was still their first time dancing with each other in front of other people. Not that Andromeda would know, of course, if it wasn't for the thrill of it. She couldn't take her eyes off of Ted, feel anything but his gentle hands on her–nor did she want to stop wondering at the way the music flowed through and from both of them in sync. Like sunbeams.

She knew that she was spending far too much time with this one dancing partner–Bellatrix and Narcissa would notice, if nobody else, and ask questions that she didn't want to answer. She might get a stern talking-to or bruised knuckles for not being as charitable and gracious a host as she could otherwise be–what with Bellatrix married and her the oldest daughter of the house. But it was hard to think of then when the now was all music and clacking high-heels and spins and sunshine.

Eventually, after a particularly animated waltz, the band slowed down and so did Andromeda and Ted. She desperately wanted to rest her head against his chest, and the pure impossibility of it made her feel somehow hollow. It made her grieve a moment that had just passed and that shouldn't even have been hers in the first place. But it had, and she wanted it. She wanted it so badly, her heartbeat went racing.

Ted sensed the change in her mood soon enough and leaned in–no more than a friend would outside the world, but too close for two people in this world, in her world.

"It might be time to try that wine," he said quietly.

She nodded and they slipped away from the dance floor. Andromeda barely had to raise her hand before one of the house elves rushed over with a tray of wine glasses. Ted thanked the house elf, which Andromeda had never seen before, and he tugged at the collar of his dress robes before taking a quick sip.

"Would some fresh air do you good?" Andromeda asked. Ted nodded and they walked along the edge of the ballroom, until they made it to the patio doors, which were propped open by planters full of golden roses. The patio itself was lined with calla lily bouquets and lanterns full of fairy lights. It almost made Andromeda forget that outside the ballroom, outside the magical boundaries of the manor, it was winter.

There were a few other pairs mingling outside, but nobody seemed to recognize Andromeda and decide they wanted to speak to the master of the house's middlest daughter. She gently guided Ted, without touching him, to a spot from which she could point out the greenhouses where she had first grown to love Herbology, the place where she and her sisters had held tea parties and picnics with empty cups and tiny china plates, the tree with the bulging roots on which she'd tripped and broken her arm… but of course, she didn't tell him any of that. The fact that he was here at all, drinking wine with her and wearing out her dance shoes, was enough.

The other couples or pairs meandered away soon enough, especially when the band started up again, and then it was just the two of them. She watched Ted fidget with his mask, and for the first time she realised that his half-mask was much bulkier than hers–much hotter, much more uncomfortable… but he had put it on and kept it on.

He must have felt her eyes on him, because he turned around and looked at her over his shoulder. He had a quick look around, to make sure they were safe, before taking her hand and gently kissing her knuckles.

"What's on your mind?" he asked.

"How wonderful of a night I am having, because of you," she said. She forced a smile on her lips. "All because you hatched this plan and worked all year to get a ticket to this ball. And now that you are here, you cannot even take off your mask because nobody can know that you were here. Making my night wonderful."

"That's okay," Ted said, reaching out and taking her hand. "I mean, it's not like I didn't know what I was signing up for, really. I… I just wanted to be with you."

"I know," Andromeda said. "No matter what it means. And I love you for that. But you should not… you should not have had to do this."

Ted's eyes looked down at his feet, and he shifted from foot to foot.

"We've already talked about this, Andra," he said softly–speaking her name for the first time that night. "It's not right, but it's okay. We make it okay."

"I can make it better," Andromeda said quietly. The idea was terrifying, but her heartbeat was steady now. "I can run away. Once we are done with school. It… it would be another six months. But that is not so bad. And then, once school is done, I can run away. I can be whoever I want. I can do whatever I want."

"Andromeda, I… I couldn't ask you that," Ted said quickly. "I just…"

"I know; you did not," she said. "I did."

She looked around once more, to make sure they were still alone, and took his hand to rest it on her chest.

"You see? Heartbeat steady," she said. And her feet? Her feet were as ready to run as they were to dance.


WC: 1692