CHAPTER TWO (#5): BLAISE & GINNY
Ginny was fuming mad that she'd been stuck with Blaise as a partner – he could see it in the set of her shoulders and in the fire in her eyes. He inwardly chuckled, enjoying her discomfort. He did find it strangely fortuitous that he'd drawn her for his game companion, considering Drake hadn't been able to cheat to arrange it for him. It must have been Fate, he supposed, just as Malfoy had explained the odd coincidence to Granger. Apparently, he'd been meant to have this time with the Weasley girl, and so he intended on making the most of it.
They squared-off on either side of the white bed, with its white blankets and pillows, in their floor-to-ceiling white room, her staring at him with distinct loathing, while he stood in parallel opposition, infinitely pleased with the idea of being her 'date' for the duration. They'd been silent for the past five minutes, neither willing to back down.
"For Godric's sake," his redheaded fascination finally growled. "Are you going to go first or shall I? 'Cause I've got places to be and better people to see."
"So forfeit," he challenged, smirking at her.
Ginny scoffed. "Not a chance."
"Fine. Since I drew my card first, I'll go," he decided, and read the card out loud to her…
DEED: Spank and/or rub sensually your partner's naked bum over your lap.
His partner gasped and turned white as a ghost.
A sneaky suspicion overtook him. "It's one of yours, isn't it?"
Glumly, she nodded. "I don't suppose you'd consider not doing it?"
Even before the fifth word was out of her mouth, Blaise heartlessly dashed her hopes against the rocks, shaking his head. "I'm not quitting this game until I'm satisfied, Weasley, and that won't happen until after you're under me, screaming my name to the rooftops as I fuck you six ways from Sunday."
"You unmitigated bastard!" she hissed in fury. Her cheeks were flushed, and her eyes spit fire. At her side, her fists were clenched, and her chest heaved with violence. "I'll fight you tooth and nail! I won't make this easy for you!"
Leering, Blaise gazed into her dark sienna depths with lustful anticipation, feeling his blood ignite in his triumph. He thought up what he wanted to fulfill this requirement, and next to him appeared a white cozy chair with no arms. He took a seat in it, adopting a lazy, exalted posture. "You might want to ditch the jacket at the same time as your knickers." When she didn't immediately move, he let his witch stew for thirty extra seconds. "Every minute you delay I'm taking out of your time, you know. And as the first to go, if I don't get in my twenty-five minutes, that means you've forfeited the game."
With a sneer of unadulterated hatred, Ginevra Weasley stripped off her jacket, untying the ribbon and whipping it through the eyelets with quick, nimble fingers. Shucking the coat from her shoulders, she caught it and folded it, placing it on the bed with care. Angry though she was with him, clearly she wasn't going to ruin her outfit for his sake.
When he caught a look at what little she was wearing under the jacket, Blaise's heart leapt into his throat. It was a simple slip dress that narrowed at the waist, showing off her curves. It had a plunging sweetheart neckline that allowed the barest amount of succulent cleavage to show. Lacy spaghetti straps held it in place. Wearing just that and the thigh-high stockings and the heels… "Beautiful, my little lioness," he breathed in awe. "Flirty, sexy." He smiled, throwing her his best sultry smile. "I like it very much."
She sniffed with disdain. "I didn't wear it for you. I was honestly hoping for Seamus."
Whatever warmth Blaise had managed to siphon out of their minimal discussion so far was leached away with that one comment. In its place settled the ugly, bile-laden acid of jealousy.
Finnigan. Of all the males she could have named…
Fuckin' fairy.
"Tick, tock, Weasley. Get that arse over here so I can spank it good."
Ginny gave him a flat stare. "You fink. Torturing me with my own slagging card! What kind of man are you anyway?"
He narrowed his eyes, his ire increasing. "The kind that's going to give it to you like you deserve, woman. Now take your knickers down and lay across my lap before I call foul."
Her cheeks were bright crimson with mortification as she reached up under her dress and took off a pair of black, satin-lace panties, putting them on the bed next to her jacket. It then required two more deep breaths and apparently a whole lot of Gryffindor courage for her to walk over to him and bend over his lap. Hanging with her head down, she waited for his first blow to land, awkwardly tense.
Gently, Blaise lifted the hem of her dress, exposing her bare bum to his hot stare.
"My, what a sweet arse you have, Ginevra," he murmured, thoroughly entranced. Rubbing all along the curves of her buttocks in slow circles, he began his torment of his heart's greatest obsession. His fingers danced across her waist, smoothing down her hip to cup the soft mounds of her backside. "Such pretty, creamy skin…soft and curvy," he said as he continued caressing her, unable to deny his need to touch every inch of her skin. Dipping into the sway at her spine's end, he circled the tiny mole she had just above her right cheek. "Your uniforms do your bum no justice, my little lioness. I'd have never known how delicious this side of you was if not for this game."
"Just get it over with," she growled, her nails clenching into the plush, white shag rug beneath their feet.
"Eager to be punished?" he wondered aloud, continuing to torture her with tender contact. "Tell me, has anyone ever sexually spanked you before, Ginevra?"
She barked a laugh. "Loads of men have. Plenty of times. You'd be no different."
An expert on ferreting out untruths amongst his Housemates, Blaise heard the obvious lie in her voice, said out of a need to falsify bravado in the face of her shame. "Tsk, tsk. Lies aren't a Gryffindor trait, kitten."
"No, they're the province of you slimy Slytherins," she goaded him.
"Perhaps," he acknowledged, running a single digit up the middle of her cheeks, barely touching the tiny entrance to her rear. He purposefully stroked the spot with expert attention, wanting to prolong his getting to know her in this manner. "Has anyone ever fucked you here?" he asked, tickling the small hole.
His partner sharply inhaled and held her breath, and her back cheeks tightened up. "Don't," she choked, clearly uncomfortable with him touching her there. "You can spank me and rub me outside, but don't–"
She faltered, losing her nerve.
"Don't what, Ginevra?" he asked, sincerely curious now. She sounded and acted as if she were terrified, which was wholly uncharacteristic for his brave lioness.
He left his finger temporarily resting in place, trapped by her tensed muscles as it was, not quite ready to leave off until he was given a good enough reason. This was his reward, after all, and he wanted to touch every bit of her during this game if possible, even places she would consider 'forbidden.' He gently prodded her teeny, furrowed opening, wiggling against the creased skin, allowing the tip of his finger to very carefully poke—not enough to break through, but enough to cause her breathing to become distressed.
"What don't you want me to do?" he posed the question in a different way, curious as to why this act intensely bothered her.
He actually heard her swallow, the gulping noise loud and heavy in the hushed room. Clearly, whatever she was thinking, it was not just embarrassing to voice, but quite painful, too.
"Don't go inside there. You can do anything else you want to me, Zabini, and I won't flinch, but buggering me–"
"Is your limit," he guessed. "It will make you quit this game, won't it?"
A critical pause followed for a beat, then two before she replied. "Yes, it's the only thing that will."
He removed his finger from her grip and began stroking her rounded flesh again. "What if I made such a thing very pleasurable for you, my lioness?"
She firmly shook her head, her long, fiery hair flopping about on the carpet. "There is no way that could ever feel good. So, just don't go there. Please."
He hummed, dropping the matter for now, knowing eventually that they'd talk about it. He was determined to know the reason such a thing had horrified her so. Who had touched her there and caused her enough pain to actually scare her?
A cold, leaden weight settled in his chest at the imagined thought of her screaming and crying as some unknown man violently penetrated her little rosette, tearing into her.
If that was the case, he'd personally hunt the man down later.
"Are you ready now, my lovely kitten?" he asked in a deceptively calm voice, still sensually touching her, exciting her nerves all along his intended area of purchase. He was going to make that pretty, pale skin bloom and scarlet.
"I won't stoop to begging you not to do your card, Zabini. Just get on with it."
"Fair enough."
His strike was well-measured, but solid and unapologetic. And loud.
The contact of his hard hand on her soft, sensitive flesh had to have stung, he knew, but for her part, Ginny did not scream. She did not make a single noise, in fact.
Had anyone ever spanked her, he wondered again. She hadn't answered truthfully a moment ago, but he bet he could get her to tell him now. "I'll ask you again, my lioness: has anyone ever done this to you before? Be truthful this time or I'll add five extra spanks on the end just for trying to deceive me."
"If anyone should know about deceit, you double-dealing serpent–"
He cut off what he was sure to be a scathing insult with another resounding slap. "Answer the question, Ginevra," he commanded. "It's a simple request."
She shook her head again, stubborn to the core. "I don't have to do anything of the sort, you Slytherin bastard! The card doesn't require me to divulge my private interests to you. It doesn't require me to interact with you at all, in fact, except to allow you to humiliate me like this. So I think I'll just keep my mouth shut and let you spend the rest of your days wondering whether or not I let men do this to me in the privacy of my bedchambers."
He spanked her again, a little harder this time for provoking his jealousy once more. "Language, young lady," he scolded. "I've let you get away with calling me a bastard twice tonight. No more."
"I hate you," she spat with venom. "I loathe the very ground you walk on, you slimy, reptilian–"
Smack!
"You're too wild for your own good, Weasley," he caressed her pinking bottom. "I think I'll rein in that mouth and temper of yours during this game. That'll be one of my goals."
"Bite me, you sleezy whore corpse."
Whap.
Blaise shook his head, amused with her audacity. "Keep it up, kitten. I love watching your pretty arse blush for me." He stroked her erotically in between slaps now, just to add some spice to the mix.
"You're a total arsehat, Zabini, you know that?"
Whack.
"I think it's time we got a little more serious, Ginevra, as apparently, my message isn't getting across." He stepped up his strikes, putting a little more force into them, not enough to bruise or injure, but enough to nicely rouge her bum. As his palm came down again upon her skin, he explained, "That's for all the years you looked down your nose at me, woman."
Ginny gasped in outrage. "Why you hypocritical arse-monger! I didn't look down my nose at you until you did at me!"
Her bottom, he figured, must be nettling her by now, but still she didn't beg him to stop as another stinging slap rang through the high ceilinged room. "And that's for all the times you slammed me in Quidditch," he told her.
"You slammed me right back! Don't you dare deny it!" she snarled at him in righteous fury.
Her whole body quivered now with barely-repressed rage.
He gave her another satisfactory blow for her willful insolence. "And that's for all the names you've called me over the years to your friends when you didn't think I was listening."
She hissed then, sounding just like a viper about to strike. "You eavesdrop on my conversations? What the hell, Zabini? Got nothing better to do than to stalk me, you sick fuckwallop?"
He spanked her again. "Profanities from such a lovely mouth should be outlawed," he mocked, loving her outraged scream.
He then gave her three more slaps in succession, each one as passionate as the last. Finally, her bum was a nice crimson in color, and Blaise felt quite vindicated for all of her slights over the last two years.
Now it was time to end her torment and give her some pleasure…
Returning to rubbing gentle hands over the warmed, quivering flesh, he soothed the pain he had caused away with an erotic massage. As his touch softened, Ginevra immediately stopped squirming and instead lay limply across his lap, unresisting. "And this, my dear lioness, is because you have never backed down from me, and because you have never let me beat you into submission. Not even now, as you lie across me, hating me with every fibre of your being, as I stroke your beautiful, ruby-coloured bum."
With a sigh of contentment, he bent his tall frame down and laid his cheek against her buttocks, softly nuzzling against her hot flesh.
"What are you doing?" she asked, suddenly panicked, going rigid again. "You're only allowed to rub."
Turning his head, he ran his lips over her cherry skin. "I am rubbing, Ginevra. The card doesn't say what body parts I'm confined to using for this task, though." He ran his bottom lip over the curve of her spine. "You should have been more specific when you wrote it down, my fiery kitten. You left it open to interpretation, so I'm interpreting it to mean rubbing you with my lips and tongue right now."
"Oh, hell no!" she shrieked, indignant. "Let me up this instant! Isn't your turn over yet?"
Blaise chuckled. "Not yet. I still have fourteen minutes. So, for the next thirteen and so many seconds, I intend upon properly rubbing you. Just lie there and enjoy."
"I don't want to enjoy anything you do to me, you twisted narcissist!" she yelled.
Licking along her spinal column, Blaise used his fingers to once more stroke along the bottom curves of her arse, creeping closer to the centre divide. He teased, retreated, and returned over and over again, inching closer to his ultimate goal. "Ah, but I want you to, my lioness. And since this is my reward…"
"I am so going to make you pay for this!"
He let his lips and tongue trail down to the split of her backside. "What you fail to understand, Ginevra, is that I'll let you do anything to me, so long as I get to fuck you tonight—preferably several times and in different positions. Nothing else matters for the next twenty-four hours." With that, he traced every inch of her bum, placed wet, sucking kisses all along the tender skin, dipping down as far as he could go to lick, tasting a bit of her salty quim in the deal. He even separated her back cheeks at one point and tickled her rear opening with his tongue, just over the outside. He started with light flicks around the small, puckered hole, making her squirm, and then boldly laved her centre, coating her with his saliva.
In his arms, his lioness quavered, and her breathing grew ragged as he pushed her comfort levels, retreating only when he felt her ready to call it her limit.
When he'd covered every bit of her, and rubbed away the pain, he noticed that Weasley remained strangely silent and had gone deathly still, her trembling ceased all together. In fact… He leaned his head back down between her legs and inhaled.
My, my, but she was very aroused.
Gently moving one leg outward, he opened her up a bit and looked. There, glistening at her pretty, small entrance lay the proof of her excitement. Blaise hummed with appreciation, even as his cock came wide awake in his pants. "You're wet and ready for me, my beautiful lioness." Against his thumb, he could feel her pulse through her femoral artery pounding like mad. "Would you like me to keep exploring?"
"N-no, let me up!" she stammered, scrabbling to lift her chest off his legs.
"Are you sure?" he asked in his most seductive voice. "No one has to know what we do here. I'm good at keeping secrets." He lazily stroked the inside of her thigh, inching towards the beautiful, bare cunt that beckoned him closer. "And I promise to make you feel good. No more pain, only intense pleasure."
She shook her head and pushed against his knees again, trying to raise herself up. "I'm not required to endure anything more than what you've already done to me."
Endure?
She'd actually gotten off on what he'd done to her!
"Let me up, Zabini," she demanded again. "You've had your fun humiliating me."
She got her feet under her and started to rise, but he put a hand on her spine to stop her. "Not just yet." Before she could protest, he bent again and kissed her on both cheeks. Then, he sat back and let her go.
Ginevra turned stony eyes on him, her face as flushed as her bottom had been earlier. Without another word, she turned and walked back to the bed to grab her knickers and slipped them back on. She put her arms through her jacket, but left it undone for now, then gingerly sat on the bed, picked up her card, and read it aloud.
DEED: You get to ask your partner any five questions you want about them and they must answer wholly and truthfully.
Sitting back in the chair, Blaise crossed his legs and stared down his partner. "Ask away. I have nothing to hide, Ginevra."
Nothing you're likely to guess, anyway.
Cool, whisky-brown eyes glittered with icy hatred for him. "Question one: what's your True Wizarding Name?"
Blaise felt the colour drain from his cheeks.
He'd been wrong – there was something he had to hide from her, and this would be it. This was one of his two big secrets that could be used to utterly destroy him.
A wizard's or witch's True Name was something only they and their parents knew. No one else was privy to this most sacred of secrets, not even the Ministry. Usually, not even spouses had disclosure, in case of divorce. A TWN was first bound to a magical, non-Squib child (well, half-bloods and pure-bloods; he wasn't sure what Muggle-borns did, as they didn't have magical parents to bind them to the name) at the age of five, and then reaffirmed and rebound to the child when they began their magical training at the age of eleven, before they went off to school for the first time. It was the most closely guarded secret of a witch or wizard's lives, as it was the gateway to their magical ability. It's how He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named managed to control his Death Eaters in the Dark War, twenty-eight years prior; the madman's loyal followers had given their Master their True Wizarding Names when they swore fealty to his cause. As a result, he'd been able to slide through their minds at any time he'd wanted, day or night, and he'd had the power to summon them to his side using the magic of the Dark Mark he'd branded on them.
If he gave Ginny his TWN, she could abuse him with it for the rest of his life, forcing him to do things against his will, much like the Imperius Curse. If he didn't give her the name, he had to forfeit the game right here and now.
How badly did he want her again?
Was it worth this price?
Leaning his head back against the chair's cushion, he stared up at the ceiling and ran his hands over his face. For a Gryffindor, she'd just neatly maneuvered him into a very Slytherin ruse…which was totally hot and one more reason why he had to have her.
Fuck, fuck, FUCK! He was so screwed!
Reveling in his mental torment, Ginevra smiled at him with a flat, serpentine gaze. "Tick, tock," she mimicked his earlier sentiment.
Gritting his teeth, he growled out his own demand, wanting at least some power in this negotiation. "I want an Oath from you not to tell anyone else my TWN, and not to use it against me."
Weasley firmly shook her head. "I'll compromise and agree to the first, but the second, no. It's my guarantee that you can't ever hurt me again." She innocently held her hands out to the side as if to say, 'What are you going to do?' and shrugged, all the while grinning like a man-eating shark. "Take it or leave it, Zabini. Tell me the name or quit the game. Your choice."
He stared hard at her. Was this really worth it? Was she?
The answer to that question was obvious and required no serious consideration: everything inside of him called out to have Ginevra Weasley.
For the last two years, he'd stood back and seethed in helpless frustration watching her dally with other boys, barely restraining his need to do violence upon the competition. The day after she'd given away her virginity to Potter, he'd almost committed murder, in fact, having felt the shift in her sexual aura and instinctively known what it had meant. That day, something deep inside him had despaired and raged at the lost opportunity to own that important piece of her. Now his desperation had reached a peak. He was a man on the edge, and he had to have her, and this game gave him the only legitimate excuse. If he quit now, he was certain she wouldn't let him anywhere near her ever again, especially after that spanking, and then he'd end up becoming the monster he feared he might be for too many years so he could just take what he wanted. If things went that far, he'd hate himself forever.
No, there was no choice but to go on.
"Fucking, buggering hell!"
"You said it," his partner cheerfully agreed. "So, I guess this means you'll be dropping out of the game now? Too bad. A shag is hardly worth the risk, though, huh?" He heard her stand up and make her way to the door. "I'll just tell the others and make your excuses. Ta-ta, Zabini!"
He heard her turn the knob and panicked. "Shut the fucking door! We're not done here," he snarled and stood up, pacing back and forth, feeling a muscle in his eye twitch in irritation. "Fine, I'll give you your answer."
It took her a good twenty seconds to move, as if she were too shocked to comprehend what he was about to do, and then she quietly closed the door and came to sit back on the edge of the mattress, waiting.
He put his hands over his face again, refusing to look at her, unable to believe he was about to make what would be, he was quite sure, the biggest mistake of his life. "Take the Oath first," he stipulated. "Right now. Swear on your power as a witch that you will never, under any circumstance, reveal my True Wizarding Name to another for as long as your soul walks the Earth, whether in life or as a ghost."
His partner raised an eyebrow at that. "Extreme, but fine." She held her hand up over her heart. "I, Ginevra Molly Weasley, do hereby swear upon my power as a witch and a practitioner of magic that I will never, under any circumstance, reveal Blaise Zabini's True Wizarding Name to another soul for as long as my soul walks the Earth, whether in life or as a ghost."
There was no glow, or fireworks, or sound of a ringing bell, but the Oath she had just undertaken would certainly now bind her powers to it as firmly as if she had signed a magical contract before the entire Wizengamot. It was the best he could ask for, since an Unbreakable Oath wasn't an option, as they'd need to include a third party to bind them, and then they'd have to explain all of this mess to that person…which Blaise had absolutely no intention of ever doing.
His fists clenched and unclenched at his sides. "MERDA!" he swore in Italian, then turned and pointed an emphatic finger at the little redhead sitting on the mattress and claimed her right then and there as his own. "Tonight, I'm going to fuck you hard for this, Weasley—all over this sodding room! I'm going to own you, body and soul! And after this bloody game is over, I'm coming after you for more, I swear it! You're mine!"
Ginevra waved him on. "Sure, sure. Whatever. Spill it or forfeit already. We're wasting time."
Gritting his teeth, Blaise ran a hand one more time over his closely-shaved head, shut his eyes and took a deep breath. "My given name is Blaise Alessandro Zabini." He turned and looked his woman dead in the eye. "My True Wizarding Name is Blasius Cyne Sovrano Zabini. It means 'Fiery Royal Ruler.'"
To his surprise, his lioness did not laugh. Instead, she looked rather shocked that he'd actually done it.
In truth, he was, too. He was feeling a little ill over the whole thing, in fact.
Weasley opened her mouth, and Blaise knew—just knew—what she was going to say. "Don't you dare," he warned, giving her a stern frown.
Blinking with faux innocence, looking entirely too scrumptious for his sanity at the moment, she absolutely dared.
"It's a very nice name, Blasius."
At the tingle along his spine at the speaking of just one of his three magical names, Blaise started swearing his head off. He paced back and forth, feeling utterly defenseless.
What had he done? Had he finally gone insane?
"Tsk, tsk, Zabini. Language," his auburn-headed minx mocked, smirking. "Now we're even. You made me vulnerable, and I've made you vulnerable. We both have secrets about the other we're never going to tell anyone else. I think that's more than fair."
She would, as the situation appealed to her Gryffindor sensibilities.
It rubbed his Slytherin ones all wrong, though.
He swore some more, again in Italian so she wouldn't understand him.
"Are you quite done?" she inquired. "We should move on, because this round's almost over and I still have four more questions to ask you."
Blaise stopped cold, turned to her and gaped. How could she continue on after having so fantastically manipulated him? Didn't she realize that now she could just use his name and order him to quit, and he'd have no choice but to obey? Fuck, was she really that naïve that she had no idea of the power she now held over his will?
Weasley had the audacity to shrug, clearly not understanding the look he threw her way. Either that or she was intentionally ignoring the two-thousand-pound elephant in the room in favour of torturing him further.
"Question two: what's your favourite colour?"
Blaise narrowed his eyes and assessed her. She wasn't curious about something as simple as his list of favourite things. No, she recognized what she'd just put him through and was going easy on him now. Her bloody Gryffindor compassion had kicked in…which meant she had no intention of exploiting his TWN, as a less-then-scrupulous Slytherin might were the situation reversed. Knowing that didn't help to alleviate his anxiety much, for he also understood that although she seemed rather benign now, she would abuse his name if the conditions were right. His little kitten had sharp claws when provoked.
"Purple." He indicated his shirt with a tug. "Next."
"Give me the run down on your family. Question three: how many Zabinis are you?"
Sighing, he slumped back down into the cosy chair, having paced himself out and resigned himself to his fate. "There are seven children. I have five sisters and one brother, and I'm dead in the middle of them all. The eldest, my brother, is twenty-three. The youngest is ten. My mum's a Black Widow, and my dad barely escaped her web. We're pure-bloods, the lot. Next."
"You have an older brother, hmm?" She seemed piqued by that little fact. "Does he look like you?"
Blaise shook his head. "None of my siblings come from the same father, so technically we're all half-brother and sisters. My dad was from Morocco. The rest of my siblings are as white as you."
"Well, well, well," she breathed, tapping a finger against those pretty lips of hers in consideration. "You might have to introduce me to big brother someday. Maybe he'll prove to be much more considerate of a girl's needs."
Inside his chest, Blaise's heart locked down, squeezing tight. The thought of his lioness sidling up to Lorenzo, who was all charm and charisma personified, positively infuriated him.
"Are you growling?" his partner asked with incredulity.
"What's your next bloody question?" he demanded between gritted teeth. "I want out of here pronto. I need air."
She looked at him askance. "Question four: do you hate me?"
"No."
It was the truth. He didn't hate her. Not at all.
What he hated was that she despised him.
Clicking her tongue on the roof of her mouth, Weasley pondered that, and her last question. "Hmmm… Let's see… Question five: what's your favourite memory from Hogwarts? In other words, what one thing will you remember for the rest of your life when you leave here next weekend?"
Blaise's heart slammed under his ribs; he was physically shaking in fury now. He pursed his lips and angrily stared at her, not wanting to reveal any more hidden parts of his soul, but knowing he had no choice. The spell on the cards was going to force this one since he'd chosen to answer the first question and not forfeit.
And hell, it wasn't like she'd just stripped him of his last defense in getting out of him his True Wizarding Name. What more could she do to him now that she'd totally unmanned him?
"You," he softly stated, livid inside that he was obligated to say this out loud. "On your broom this last game, when Potter caught the Snitch and won the Cup for your House. The rain had just stopped and the sun had peeked out through the clouds, and the light was glinting like fire off that crimson hair of yours as it blew about in the wind. Your eyes were bright and shining with happiness and your smile was so fucking beautiful that it hurt to look at it." He stared at the white shag rug beneath his feet, wishing he had the magic to command his feelings to die out as assuredly as his pride was doing right then. "All I could think in that moment was how you were like that Tonge painting of the redheaded angel dancing in the air, temporarily keeping the storm at bay." He closed his eyes, awash with rioting emotion. "You hovered at my side when the game was called, then turned to me and said–"
"'It was fun, Zabini,'" she whispered in remembrance across the space between them. "'I'll miss you.'"
His head jerked up, their eyes met, and in her lovely dark gaze were wavering tears.
"It's you I'll never be able to forget," he admitted, fighting the catch in his throat. "You'll haunt me to the end of my life, Ginevra."
Emotionally naked, exposed as a fraud, Blaise knew in those seconds that there was nowhere left for him to hide. None of his Slytherin training was going to save him from this fall.
With his heart bloodied and raw, he stood up and stormed from the room in irrational self-hatred, slamming the door behind him.
"Hey, mate, anything wrong?" Theo asked him as he retook his previous seat on Slytherin's side of the sofa in the main room.
Everything's wrong, Blaise wanted to scream. It's over with now. She knows!
"Nothing," he replied instead, turning away his friend's concern.
Laying his head back on the cushions of the couch, he pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes and cursed himself a fool, seriously considering quitting the game.
TO BE CONTINUED...
AUTHOR'S NOTES:
Merda! = Italian swear meaning "shit!"
Blasius = (pronounced 'blaa-see-us') Ancient Roman name that the French name "Blaise" derives from. Means 'fiery.'
Cyne = (pronounced 'sine') Old English for "royal."
Sovrano = (pronounced 'soov-ra-no') Italian for "ruler" (as in leader, not the measuring stick).
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Musical Selection for this chapter: "Remember When It Rained" by Josh Grobin. Lyrics are as follows…
Wash away the thoughts inside
That keep my mind away from you.
No more love and no more pride,
And thoughts are all I have to do.
Ohhhhhh, remember when it rained.
Felt the ground and looked up high
And called your name.
Ohhhhhh, remember when it rained.
In the darkness I remain.
Tears of hope run down my skin.
Tears for you that will not dry.
They magnify the one within,
And let the outside slowly die.
Ohhhhhh, remember when it rained.
I felt the ground and looked up high
And called your name.
Ohhhhhh, remember when it rained.
In the water I remain.
Running down…
Running down…