A/N: Wow, so I never check my email, but when I did this weekend I realized that it tells you when people add your story to their Alerts or Favorites—in other words, I was completely sure that only like five people were reading my story, but now I know better and I'm so happy ^^. So thank you so much, both to the readers who faithfully review and to the ones who bother to read my story at all—this one's for you.
A/N2: Also, now that the first week has been detailed, things will start moving faster. You won't see the whole snowball until about March in the story, but it's headed in an exciting direction, I think, which still compliments both stories that I'm drawing information from and parallels between.
The Pureblood Pretense:
Chapter 11
All through Rigel's second week at Hogwarts she felt like a bug trapped in a glass jar and put on display in Snape's office; eyes, everywhere she felt eyes on her, heavy and itchy, and her shoulder blades twitched with the needles of scrutiny she could feel but not pick out. Someone or multiple someones were watching her, and it was slowly grating on her nerves. The feeling varied with intensity; it was worse during meal times, so Rigel was fairly sure at least one of her observers was from another House or year. It was nothing like Draco's patented Malfoy gaze or Pansy's coyly assessing look, so Rigel felt safe with her friends, but everywhere else she was on her guard, making sure to never show weakness, to keep her injury hidden, and to act as uninteresting and even stupid as possible. She hoped whoever was watching her would eventually get bored and quit, but it didn't seem likely to be so easy, especially considering at least one set of eyes probably belonged to her mysterious attacker.
So she played the bumbling, unexciting first-year, a role that was made extremely believable by her performance in most of her classes. Rigel's grades in Herbology, History of Magic, Astronomy, and Potions were just fine, but Charms, Transfiguration, and Defense Against the Dark Arts were proving nearly impossible for her. After her stuttering success the first week, she hadn't been able to get any of the charms or spells they learned to work, much to her professors' exasperation, and even the Flying instructor had look disappointedly at her as she wobbled in the air on Wednesday, her right and only usable arm shaking on her broom and compromising her control. She'd worn out her arm muscles potting plants one-handed in Herbology that morning, and even Neville had managed better balance on his broom than her.
At the same time, her friendship with Pansy and Draco grew by leaps and bounds. She spent nearly all her time with them, since they were the among the only people she was sure had nothing to do with her ill-wisher, and by the end of the week, the stiff, linen formality of their friendship had given way to the malleable threads of common interests and mutual, allied affection. They respected her privacy in most matters, though she didn't begrudge them general information about her 'dad' Sirius and she tried to be as forthcoming as possible about her life before Hogwarts while still not giving away her true origins. In return they told her about their families, likes, dislikes, goals, and interests. Draco had decided his favorite subject was Transfiguration, after Flying, both because DADA was boring with Quirrel as a teacher and because Transfiguration was so difficult, and therefore an impressive thing to be good at. Rigel got the feeling most of Draco's goals revolved around being impressive, and therefore valuable to his father's career and worthy of being important to him. Pansy was quite good at Charms, but she enjoyed Astronomy best. She had a great interest in the night sky, and had already learned on her own much of what was taught their first year, but she didn't mind sitting through the lessons again, because she said the view of the sky was so much clearer from Hogwarts' towers than what she was used to.
The three became thicker than Goyle's skull, and although they associated with Zabini, Nott, Greengrass, and others in their year, the ones they looked for first when they entered a room were each other.
Still, the eyes were making Rigel as irritable as a nesting dragoness, so when she noticed someone following her on her way to Transfiguration on Thursday afternoon, she whirled around angrily, determined to catch whoever was so interested in her in the act. Draco and Pansy were walking ahead of her, so they didn't notice when she suddenly arrested her motion and glared into space behind her, but Zabini did, and he stopped as well.
"What is it?" he asked quietly. His dark eyes scanned the empty hallway behind them coolly, and as Rigel glanced at his blank expression she couldn't help but think he already knew the answer to his question.
"I thought I noticed someone following—us," Rigel decided against using 'me' at the last moment, "Like a fluttering at the corner of my vision."
Zabini smiled a wolf's smile, "So you finally noticed. The little blonde butterfly has been trailing you all week."
"Butterfly?" Rigel blinked, turning to check behind them once more. The hallway was still empty—but wait! The top of a head peeked briefly around the corner at the end of the hall, before being snatched back. Rigel frowned and started after it, but Zabini's firm hand on her right shoulder held her back.
"They'll be gone by the time you get there," he said, removing his hand politely now that he had her attention, "Can you not hear the frantic beating of wings in flight?"
She cocked her head sideways and realized she could indeed hear the sound of running footsteps fading quickly. She pressed her lips together in frustration, and turned back to Zabini, who was looking at her with amusement, "Why didn't you tell me someone was following me? Who was that?"
"If you had not noticed eventually, you would not deserve to be told," he said, moving away from her and starting toward their classroom once more, "As for who it was, I imagine you'll know soon enough. Come along, Black, you don't want to be late for the quiz today."
Rigel hurried to catch up, dismissing the strange incident in favor of worrying about the quiz she was about to fail. She and Zabini made it into the classroom just in time, and Rigel claimed her usual seat between Pansy and Draco while McGonagall was passing out the written portion of the test.
"You will have thirty minutes to complete the short-answer section. You won't need all thirty minutes, but I will be coming around to each of you and asking you to demonstrate the Matchstick-to-Needle Transfiguration for me while you work. Please turn over your papers, and begin," Professor McGonagall waved her wand and a projection of the current time appeared on the board.
Rigel turned her quiz over and worked steadily through it. The questions started out fairly straight-forward ("Name the five elemental laws of Transfiguration") and slowly became more theoretical ("Why is it harder to attempt to turn an inanimate object animate, rather than the other way around?"), until she reached the last question, "How would you classify a Transfiguration that resulted in: a beetle growing the nose of a mouse and a mouse losing its nose completely?" She was confident in all of her answers, which had been discussed both in class and in the textbook, but glancing around at her peers she was surprised to find most of them frowning dejectedly or else staring blankly at their papers. McGonagall was slowly making her way around the room, and by the time she got to their table, Rigel, Pansy, and Draco had all three finished their quizzes and turned them face down on the table so they could chat quietly.
The professor placed a matchstick in front of Pansy first. "Please turn this into a needle, Miss Parkinson, and know that your grade is not based solely on the final result, so don't be nervous if you can't change it all the way."
Pansy picked up her wand and waved it confidently, speaking the incantation clearly and carefully, if not very firmly. Her matchstick seemed to hesitate for an instant, vibrating slightly as it wavered, then all at once it became a shiny, silver needle and lay still again. McGonagall picked it up and inspected it, checking the hole and the point, and nodded approvingly, "Very good. You next, Mr. Black."
Rigel studied her matchstick apprehensively for a moment, before taking a deep breath and saying the incantation, automatically waving her wand in the complicated wrist-movement over the match. It stayed a match. Professor McGonagall frowned slightly, but waved for her to try again. She tried a second time, and was sure her incantation was perfect and her wand-movement precise, but no transformation occurred. After the third time, McGonagall made a small "Hmm"-ing noise in the back of her throat, and said, "Take a moment to focus your intent, Mr. Black, while I test Mr. Malfoy."
Draco shot her a worried glance, then focused on his own match. He set his mouth in an uncompromising line and glared at it, waving his wand precisely and speaking the spell forcefully. His Transfiguration was less abrupt than Pansy's had been. His match morphed smoothly into a needle, as if it hadn't ever dreamed of being anything else, and Draco put his wand back down smugly. McGonagall inspected it, raising her eyebrows at the lethal-looking point, and nodded once more, "Very nice, Mr. Malfoy," the professor turned to Rigel once more, "Mr. Black, if you would."
Rigel performed the wrist movement once more and said the incantation. She mentally tried to coax her magic into thinking she really wanted this match to be a needle. McGonagall, Pansy, Draco, and Rigel stared expectantly at the match, but no change occurred. It was still, and probably always would be, a match.
McGonagall sighed and made a mark on her clipboard, "I can give you points for the correct incantation and wand-movement, Mr. Black, but you'd best hope you did well on the written portion of this quiz. I expect more effort from you in the future." She moved on to the next table and Draco and Pansy immediately started comforting her.
"You did everything right, it must have been a faulty match or something," Pansy said soothingly, "I'm sure it doesn't count for much of our grade, anyway."
"That's right," Draco added, though his voice lacked true conviction, "You'll be able to make it up later in the term. Don't worry about it."
"Yeah, thanks guys," Rigel said, stowing her useless wand in her bag and trying to ignore the looks coming from her classmates who had finished their quizzes in time to witness her failure.
"At least it's over with," Draco said bracingly, "We won't have to think about it until Tuesday."
"And we've got double Potions to look forward to tomorrow," Pansy said brightly, "That will take your mind off of it."
Rigel smiled at her friends, "Thanks for lying to me. It helps."
"Anytime," Draco said, and they all laughed softly.
At the end of the lesson, most of the class bolted for the door, more than ready to get out and forget about classes for the day, but McGonagall called out, "Mr. Black, please stay behind," and so Rigel waved her friends ahead of her and slowly shouldered her bag, picking her way through the tables to the professor's desk.
"Yes, Professor?" she asked politely when everyone had left.
"Mr. Black, I'm sorry to say that you were the only first-year in all of my classes who was unable to effect even a partial Transfiguration for this quiz. The Needle Transfiguration is the very first thing I taught, and I thought for sure everyone would be able to manage it by the second week of school," the older woman peered concernedly through her spectacles at her, "Can you explain why you are so far behind?"
"No, Professor," Rigel said, thinking dejectedly that if she could explain it, she would be halfway to fixing it.
"Very well," Professor McGonagall frowned, perhaps thinking she was just being difficult, "In that case I have no choice but to assign you a detention for tomorrow night, to be served with Mr. Filch at seven o-clock. I hope that this, along with the poor score that you will no doubt receive on your quiz today, will inspire you to take your studies a little more seriously."
"Yes, Professor," Rigel said tonelessly. She accepted the detention slip, which told her to meet Filch in the trophy room at seven on Friday, and left the classroom with a slight frown on her face, wondering how she was going to tell Pansy that she couldn't meet the people Pansy had wanted to introduce her to on Friday after all.
Her friends were waiting outside the classroom, and they 'ooh'-ed sympathetically when they saw the pink slip of paper in her hands.
"That's so unfair," Pansy said, after reading the detention slip aloud for Draco's benefit, "How can she give you detention for a bad grade? The grade's supposed to be the punishment."
"On Friday night, too," Draco grimaced, "And with Filch. That's just cruel."
"Friday!" Pansy double-checked the slip, "Oh, darn, I'll have to introduce you to my new acquaintances another time, I suppose."
"Sorry," Rigel offered, reclaiming the slip and tucking it into her bag.
"It's not your fault," her friend waved her hand dismissively, "I mean it is, sort of, but I don't blame you for getting detention specifically on Friday."
"We've really got to fix whatever this is, though," Draco said as they began walking toward the dungeons, "Soon our ignorant classmates are going to think you really are a Squib."
"Would you stop being my friend if I was?" Rigel felt compelled to ask.
Pansy and Draco shared a look that she wasn't pureblood enough to decipher.
"Noo," Pansy said slowly, "We'd still be your friend, although it would become a great deal harder if the information got back to our parents."
"But you're not, so it doesn't matter," Draco said firmly, "Stop being so morbid, and let's go practice Quidditch some more. Pansy can watch."
"Joy of joys," Pansy rolled her eyes, "You'd better make it entertaining if I'm going to watch you flit about on an overgrown matchstick."
Rigel shook the unhelpful thoughts from her brain easily and prepared herself for another session of awkward ball-hitting for the benefit of Draco's seeker skills. Her left wrist gave a preemptory throb at the thought, but at least it would probably be the last one she'd have to endure, since tryouts were Saturday and she had detention the following night. Rigel didn't know how she was going to make it all the way to mid-October without anyone noticing her injury, but all she could do was take one day at a time. She was good at that.
Friday night's detention was only eclipsed on the scale of misery by the time she and Archie had accidentally uncovered the portrait of Sirius' mother from the attic and activated it when Archie stumbled into the frame and cut himself, his blood breaking the sealing enchantment that was on it. The foul old woman had shrieked at them from her painted cage and Sirius had come running and caught them trying unsuccessfully to shut her up by putting drapes over the portrait. He had been livid, lecturing them about how long it had taken James and Remus to figure out how to seal the portrait away with blood magic and how much serious trouble they could have gotten into tromping about the Black Family attic and spilling a Black Heir's blood all over the place. Rigel and Archie had known he was mostly just worried for their safety and upset that he had to see his mother again to re-seal her painting, but it was the only time she could ever remember Sirius being seriously angry at them, and until that day she hadn't really understood how ugly and perverted most of the Black Family had been. The vitriol that awful woman had spewed at them shocked and scared the two seven-year-olds, and Walberga Black's demented cackle and phosphoric insults still haunted her dreams some nights. After that they were much more careful around old family artifacts.
Filch's disdainful muttering all through her detention with him brought the memory of that day back fresh, and Rigel thought spitefully that it would serve both Filch and Walburga right to have been distant relations of some kind. The thought of the perceived shame the hateful old woman would have knowing she was related to a squib made Rigel smile vindictively as she polished trophies under the caretaker's watchful eyes. The way he sneered at her, mumbling insults and complaints under his breath to his cat while she worked, would have done the old Black family house-elves proud, had any been alive to witness it.
Rigel had been put to work straight away when she arrived at her detention, and was told in no uncertain terms that she would be here until the job was finished—the job being the polishing of every single trophy and award in the room. It took her hours to get through it all, due in part to the careful maneuvering she had to do around her crippled hand, and all the while the caretaker muttered and mumbled and generally acted like a crazed, bitter old cat-lady. When she was finally done, she barely had enough time to make it to the dungeons before curfew, but she still felt nothing but pure relief and happiness when she exited the now-sparkling trophy room.
She was just breaking off of the Entrance Hall when she heard it—the faint echo of a single set of footsteps behind her.
She didn't pause or give any indication that she noticed, but she did slow her breathing so she could hear better and wished she hadn't been too afraid of Filch searching her to bring the Map that night. The footsteps got closer, Rigel estimated they were ten meters behind her, and she turned the first corner in the dungeons calmly, despite her racing heartbeat. Just as she had decided to turn and surprise them before they came around the bend she heard a whisper of sound that she realized too late was an incantation, and a jet of white light struck her uninjured arm squarely, knocking her sideways out of the way of another, orange-colored spell and into the stone wall. She cried out as her broken wrist smacked against the stone and snapped her head in the direction of the curses, but all she could she was a wand tip poking out from around the corner.
Rigel debated a split second whether she should rush her attacker and surprise them or not, but as a greenish-yellow spell struck the ground near where she stood, she took off at a run in the opposite direction. Some might call her a coward, but although Quirell had finally taught them a shielding charm that Wednesday, she had yet to get it to work, and didn't fancy trying it against an enemy of unknown power and skill (though admittedly terrible aim) when she had the advantage of home-territory. She was careful not to lead her pursuer—for she could easily hear their footsteps echoing behind her as she ran—toward the common room, but instead made them chase her through the labyrinth of tunnels beyond the Potions classrooms, where not even the Slytherins would have any reason to go.
Luckily, the house elves still cleaned this part of the castle, or her attacker could have easily followed her dusty footprints through the maze. As it was, ten minutes later she was sure she'd lost them, and she circled around the long way back toward the common room as quickly and quietly as she could. By the time she made it through the false wall, it was way past curfew. That didn't mean no one was awake—it was a Friday night, after all, and the common room was packed. She cringed internally as every head in the room turned toward her entrance, painfully aware of how sweaty and disheveled she must look after hours of polishing and running through the castle. Some of the other students stared at her, obviously curious at who was just getting back so long after curfew and why they looked like they'd run from the North Tower.
"Rigel, over here!"
Draco and Pansy held their hands up so she could see them and some of the other first-years grouped by one of the fireplaces, and Rigel gratefully stumbled over and sunk into one of the low-backed chairs. Now that she was drained of fear and adrenaline, her body began to take stock of itself. Her injured wrist throbbed dully as her pulse skittered over it, but her attention was pulled toward her other arm, where a sharper, newer pain was localized. Shaking back her sleeve gingerly, she realized the white spell that landed on her upper arm had been a Stinging Hex. The skin from Rigel's bicep to her lower forearm was swollen and red. The skin felt tight and itchy, like a mosquito bite magnified to cover her entire arm. She'd never been attacked by a dozen bees at once, but she imagined the effect was about the same.
"Merlin, Rigel," Nott leaned over in his seat to get a better look.
"What happened?" Pansy demanded, jumping up, seizing her sleeve, and pulling it up so she could tuck it into Rigel's collar and assess the damage.
"You didn't jump in front of another curse, did you?" Draco asked.
"Well, since you weren't there—no," Rigel tried to laugh but it came out shaky, "Ow, Pan, don't poke it, it burns when you do that."
Pansy blew out a breath and shook her head regretfully, "Well, it's definitely a Stinging Hex. Nothing to do but wait till it disperses."
"Was it the butterfly?" Zabini asked softly from his seat next to her.
"I didn't see their face," Rigel gritted her teeth as Pansy prodded her arm again.
"You were shot at from behind?" Draco exclaimed in outrage, drawing curious looks from the groups of students sitting closest to their circle, "Didn't you at least turn and look at the coward?"
"They were shooting from behind me and out of sight by sticking their wand around the corner. That's why I was only hit once—terrible aim," Rigel said, "That and I didn't stick around until they got me with something worse."
"You ran away," Nott chuckled, "Good form, Back."
Rigel smiled slightly in rueful acknowledgment, "They couldn't keep up in the dungeons, so it definitely wasn't another Slytherin."
"Probably a Gryffindor," Draco grumbled, "Only they'd be stupid enough to chase you through the dungeons."
Adrian Pucey ambled over to their circle to see what the commotion was about, "What's this, Black? You were attacked by a Gryffindor outside the common room?"
His question was loud, and even in the noisy common room it garnered other Slytherins' attention.
"Attacked?"
"One of our first-years?"
"They wouldn't dare."
"We don't know it was a Gryffindor," Rigel said, but she was ignored.
The mutterings grew louder and more students came over to have a look at Rigel's arm, which Pansy prevented her from covering up embarrassedly. She felt crowded and hemmed in, and as Draco recounted what she'd told her friends to the listening crowd it seemed that no one wanted to hear that it wasn't a big deal, and that she could take care of herself.
Pucey dropped a hand on her shoulder and said, "It's out of your hands now. No one tries to gut a snakelet in our own dungeons—even if your family is a bunch of blood traitors."
Rigel sighed and stood pointedly when the discussion turned toward revenge. "See you guys tomorrow," she nodded to Pansy and Draco before pushing her way gingerly through the crowd, trying to ignore the assessing stares coming her way from all corners of the room.
Great, more eyes.
Rigel went to bed uncomfortable, which was becoming the usual for her, though she knew the Stinging Hex would wear off in an hour or so, long before she woke the next morning. She had narrowed her attacker's identity down to the other three Houses, at least, but somehow, with one wrist throbbing and the other arm burning, it didn't feel like much of an accomplishment.
The weather was pleasantly cool the next day, with a cloudless sky and no wind to speak of. In other words, it was a—
"Perfect day for Quidditch!" Draco grinned at them over lunch on Saturday. He was piling his plate with energy-rich foods and alternatively turning his head from side to side as he addressed his running monologue to first Rigel, then Pansy, checking to see that they were as excited as they'd been thirty seconds ago, "Of course, there won't be any tail-wind, but since I'm not trying out for a position that only flies in one direction it wouldn't be much advantage for me anyway." He paused with a spoonful of carrots hovering over his plate, realized with a bemused quirk of his eyebrows that there was no room left on his, and magnanimously turned to dump them onto Rigel's. "You like vegetables," he told her cheerfully. He then dug into the feast he'd compiled as gracefully as anyone with that much food could.
"Aren't you afraid you'll get sick, eating all that?" Pansy asked, clearly thinking the Malfoy scion had been replaced with some kind of bourgeois doppelganger with only the bare skeletons of table manners.
"Seekers will probably try out last," Rigel said, seeing that Draco had his mouth full, "So he'll have time to digest some of it before hand, and if they play a real game there's no telling how long he might be in the air."
"And," Draco added when he came up for air (or at least pumpkin juice), "A Malfoy never gets sick."
Pansy and Rigel shared a fond look. Ten minutes later, Flint stood lazily from his seat down the table. This was apparently the cue for all the other would-be players to follow him out of the hall like sycophantic courtiers, and the Slytherin table began emptying as curious spectators followed the procession as well.
"Well, this is it," Draco set his utensils down deliberately and flashed them a confident, poster-boy grin, "Don't bother wishing me luck." He stood dramatically, but paused to look down at them expectantly before heading off, "You guys are coming to watch, right?"
"We'll be there," Pansy assured him, "In fact, we'll be cheering for you so loudly you'll be embarrassed to know us."
Rigel raised an eyebrow to show that she had not been informed of such a plan, but Draco's eyes lit up like twin Lumos Charms and he was obviously trying to stop his choreographed grin from becoming a beaming smile of Hufflepuffian affection, so she merely nodded her agreement.
"Okay," Draco said, "I have to go get ready, then. Come soon so you don't miss anything important."
He left the Great Hall at a pace that would be called a run, if he weren't a Malfoy.
"Eleven years of good breeding out the window as soon as Quidditch is mentioned," Pansy smiled, "Boys."
Rigel remembered just in time that it would be strange if she nodded in agreement, so instead she returned (with what she hoped was the appropriate amount of amused disgust), "Girls."
Pansy laughed, but then her cheerful demeanor retreated, and she glanced sideways at Rigel while toying with her teacup saucer.
"Rigel, where were you this morning? You don't have to tell me," Pansy added before Rigel could open her mouth, "I know you do your own things sometimes, but you've hardly disappeared at all this week, so I just wondered…" she trailed off, embarrassed at the weak, rambling quality of her voice.
Rigel swallowed her bite of carrots (well, she did like vegetables) slowly, trying to decide how to answer. It should have been easy—she had an excuse already planned, but she wanted to lie as little as possible. She hadn't thought about how suspicious it would be for her to go off in disguise to work on the essays she'd gotten from Flint at breakfast that morning after spending all week fairly glued to Pansy and Draco's sides to avoid 'the eyes.'
"I was in the Library," Rigel said, "That's where I go on the weekends. It's not to work on any of our assignments—I do those with you and Draco—it's just extra research I do on top of our studies, which I didn't think would interest you guys."
Pansy nodded slowly, and Rigel guessed she was trying to take her words as the truth.
"I thought you were kicked out of the Library," Pansy said quietly, blushing at her blunt query.
"I was, but I found a way around it," Rigel said, "I promise I don't have some exciting, secret life that I'm hiding from you and Draco because I want to have all the fun to myself. It really is quite boring work."
Rigel told herself that it wasn't really a lie, since the secret parts of her life were too serious and dangerous to be exciting, but it felt weak even in her head.
"Is it Potions research?" Pansy asked.
"Some of it," she admitted, thinking, technically not a lie, "I'm also trying to figure out what's going on with my magic," complete lie, "I don't fancy another detention like last night's." Also true.
Rigel made a face at the memory and Pansy graciously allowed the conversation to be steered away from extra curricular activities.
"That's right, we never asked you how it went because of all the excitement last night. Was it awful?"
"Tell you on the way to the pitch," Rigel said, standing and offering her arm to Pansy for the walk, "If we're not there by the time the chasers start, Draco will fret."
They made their way down to the stadium and found seats in the stands with the other spectators. It looked like Flint had just ordered everyone trying out to take a lap around the pitch, and was separating them into maybes and no-way-in-hells. Those who flew terribly enough to get cut so quickly joined the students watching in the stands, and since none of them looked terribly down-cast, Rigel assumed they hadn't been too serious in trying out. Flint called the chasers and keepers to try out first, simultaneously, and Pansy waved excitedly to Draco as he made his was to the side of the pitch with the other Slytherins who were trying for beater or seeker.
By the end of the chaser-keeper round of tryouts, it was looking likely that Flint intended to keep the same team as last year, and that he was merely observing formality. He picked the same three chasers (including Pucey, who waved smugly at them as he left to change) and keeper from the old team, and the potential beaters and seekers were looking less enthusiastic as the captain called them forward. Draco, though, strode right out onto the pitch, confident smile in place and head held at just the right angle for the sunlight to catch his silver eyes brilliantly. Pansy laughed at their friend's artful posturing and cheered loudly, elbowing Rigel into clapping and smiling along. Draco tossed his head like the purebred stallion she was sure he'd been frequently compared to in contemptuous answer and winked at them.
The sounds of Pansy and Rigel's sarcastic clapping was immediately drowned out by the sound of Greengrass, Davis, and several girls from second year sighing and squealing and generally giggling like twits from two rows in front of them. Rigel and Pansy shared an amused glance at Draco's slightly surprised expression. He clearly hadn't expected the girls in their grade to take his playful, self-mocking flirtation seriously. He shrugged it off, however, and turned to listen to Flint explain the drill.
There would be four bludgers let loose, to preserve the game-ratio for the eight beaters trying out, and to make the scrimmage go faster there would be three snitches released to occupy the three seekers. Whichever seeker caught the first snitch won, and the beaters were responsible for knocking bludgers toward both the seekers and each other, so it was also a test of maneuvering abilities for all the players. Rigel thought it sounded much more dangerous than a regular game, with no chasers to distract the beaters, and therefore much more challenging. She almost wished she could have tried out, now.
Flint blew his whistle after all the balls had been released and all fourteen players took to the air.
"Do you think he'll get it?" Pansy asked, her clear blue eyes narrowed against the sun, "He's only a first-year, after all."
"It seems like a straightforward competition for seeker," Rigel said, "So if he catches it first it'll be hard to deny him a spot."
"Yeah."
They lapsed into silence as they both tracked Draco's figure through the skies. He was in good form, Rigel thought, trying to be objective. Their practices (and her deliberately wild aim) had given Draco great skill at changing directions quickly, so he was able to avoid the bludgers fairly easily, and his strategy seemed to involve sticking closely to Higgs, the veteran seeker. No one was having any luck searching for the snitch, however, as the chaos of four bludgers and eight beaters, not to mention so many people looking for the snitch at once, meant that everyone was interrupted in their search every other minute. There was something naturally elegant about Draco on a broom, though. Almost as if he had been born to fly, and his grace on the earth was the true marvel.
Twenty minutes later, Pansy sighed and sat back against the seats behind them, "Well, I tried. I've been very supportive and patient, and now I'm bored. Rigel, entertain me."
Rigel spoke without taking her eyes from the drill, "What's there to be bored about? We've seen about five near-deadly accidents so far—"
"I don't think you can call them 'accidents' if someone is purposely aiming a big steel ball at you and hoping you fall fifty feet to the ground."
"—and as a human being, not to mention a Slytherin, you're supposed to be vastly entertained by mindless bloodshed," Rigel finished as if the blonde girl hadn't interrupted. She only looked away from the pseudo-match when a third voice broke into their friendly banter.
"Now, I object to the 'mindless' part of that," Flint said, nudging a couple of third-years out of his way so he could sit next to them on the bench, "I'll have you know this violence serves a very important purpose."
"And what is that?" Rigel asked politely, ignoring the looks Pansy was shooting her, knowing without looking that her friend wanted to know why Flint, a fifth-year and Quidditch captain besides, was talking to them.
"This little spectacle, while dangerous beyond reason and pretty much useless in helping to determine Quidditch potential, is part of a brilliant campaign of misinformation that is vital to our team's success," Flint explained after settling into the seat next to Rigel and training his eyes toward the chaos happening above their heads.
Pansy gave a polite cough and leaned around Rigel to say, "What do you mean by that, Mr. Flint?"
Flint gave a bark of his harsh laughter at the "Mr." and merely nudged Rigel to explain for him, still watching the players wheeling about in the air intently.
Rigel shot Pansy a small smile, saying, "Flint means he thinks the other Houses will send spies to our tryouts. When they see this nonsense, they'll think all the Slytherin players are crazy demons with broomsticks, and their morale will drop, which will do half of the Slytherin team's work for them come game time."
"Scare tactics, Mr. Flint?" Pansy chuckled appreciatively, "How devious."
Rigel saw Flint cut his eyes over toward the blonde first-year out of the corner of her eye.
"Just Flint," he said lowly, "And devious has got nothing to do with it. People deserve to have their expectations met, I figure, and one glimpse of this will vindicate the Gryffindors' every assumption about violent, bloodthirsty Slytherins."
"Then you may call me Pansy," she said, hesitating, but deciding it would be too awkward to offer her hand around Rigel's torso.
Flint grunted, "At least you don't giggle."
Pansy seemed to take this as a great compliment, and smiled with self-satisfaction as she settled back in her seat.
"Don't act like you're not also hoping someone runs and tells Wood about this," Rigel said, glancing over at the captain's hard profile.
Flint smirked, "Smart money says old Wood'll be having his team practice with four bludgers within the week. With any luck, one of those chasers gets too injured to play, and we wipe the floor with them."
Rigel frowned as something struck her, "So this whole tryout's just a farce? You'll be picking the old team no matter what?"
"Why not?" Flint shrugged unconcernedly as he watched the poor, hopeless souls battle it out in vain to further the team's consequence, "Already got a good team, and the players are young, so there's no need to add new blood for a couple years."
Rigel looked over at Pansy to see she was looking just as miserably back at her. Draco will be so disappointed, she thought. Just then, one of the players went into a steep dive. Just as she had identified the flyer as Higgs—another player on the other side of the field dived as well! Both players were weaving between beaters, dodging bludgers, and the heads in the crowd moved rapidly back and forth between the two of them as it became clear that neither was feinting.
"That's Draco!" Pansy said excitedly, pointing to the second diving figure. Rigel caught a better look as the player leveled out to follow his snitch's new trajectory and smiled at the sight of familiar, silver-blonde hair and fluid skill in maneuvering the broom. Even though she knew it wouldn't make a difference, Rigel inwardly cheered her friend on. Pansy didn't bother with inwardly and yelled wildly for Draco to go faster because he was so close!
The first seeker, Higgs, caught his snitch just a hairsbreadth before Draco did, and Flint immediately blew his whistle and left the stands to meet with the players on the pitch, briefly waving off Pansy's faint-hearted farewell as he went.
Rigel patted Pansy's arm as they swallowed their disappointment on Draco's behalf and waited in silence for Flint to dismiss the players. Whatever the captain had to say evidently didn't take long, and soon those who'd tried out were groaning and gathering their equipment, some angrily, some dejectedly, and heading back to the castle to clean up. Rigel and Pansy lagged behind the rest of the spectators as they filled out, and soon they caught site of a sweaty, red-faced Malfoy moving quickly up the stairs toward them. Draco dropped his broom when he was close enough and launched himself at them. He ended up half-sprawled across Rigel's lap, with one arm around her neck and the other around Pansy's shoulder. Pansy yelped and even Rigel stiffened with surprise, but neither pushed him off when he buried his face between their shoulders and gasped for air.
"Can. You. Believe it?" he panted, his voice distorted with fatigue and emotional upset.
"I know," Pansy said, patting his head soothingly, "It's quite ridiculous."
"Flint's an ass," Rigel agreed.
"What?" Draco pulled back with a confused look on his sweaty face.
"What?" Pansy and Rigel echoed, dumbly. Draco didn't look nearly as torn up as they'd expected.
"Well, whatever—isn't it great!" he beamed, "I made the team!"
They stared at him blankly, both trying to re-wire their responses according to this influx of contradictory information.
"What?" Draco deflated a bit, still panting slightly, but looking more put-out by the second, "It's only reserve seeker, but it's still pretty—"
Rigel was the first to catch up with the situation and she smiled suddenly into Draco's confused face, causing him to unintentionally lose his train of thought. She used her right arm to return his awkward-half hug with an equally awkward half-hug of her own, and said, "Draco, that's awesome! We thought—well, it looked like Flint wasn't adding any new players to the team." She shrugged and pulled back so Pansy, who was beaming herself now, could hug Draco in turn.
"He didn't," Draco was smiling again, one arm around each of them. If Rigel's other arm was usable she could have wrapped it around Pansy and formed a kind of huddle-triangle, "He picked all the same players as last year, but he said I had so much potential he was taking me on as a reserve, to train me up as Higg's replacement!"
"Wow, Draco, that's really high praise coming from the captain," Pansy congratulated, stepping back to smooth her robes and reminding them they were in public.
Draco and Rigel stepped back as well, and Draco said, "Well, he didn't say it exactly like that, but that's really what he meant."
They laughed, and Draco retrieved his broom from where it'd rolled under the bench in front of them.
"Let's head back to the castle," Pansy suggested, "Draco, you can get cleaned up, and Rigel can disappear mysteriously until dinner." Pansy winked at her to show she didn't really mind.
"Well, it's not mysterious now, Pansy," Rigel sighed melodramatically, "I'll have to spend all afternoon with you guys, now, if only to preserve my air of unpredictability. Besides," she nudged Draco as they started out of the stands, "We have to celebrate our group's first monumental victory together. No disappearing until tomorrow, I promise."
As they made their way up to the castle, Draco said casually, "Now that I'm on the team, I'll be watching the game from the players' box."
"O-kay," Pansy was waiting for the punch line, but Rigel could already see where this was going.
"Oh, bu-" she started, but Draco cut her off with practiced efficiency.
"Not to worry, Rigel, my mother's invitation remains open, of course. I'm sure you'll have a wonderful time watching the first game with my parents even without my illustrious presence to invigorate you," he said, his bright smile turning much more sinister, at least in Rigel's mind.
"But who will introduce us properly if you aren't even there when we meet?" she argued reasonably, shaking her head as if she could deny this new turn of events. Without Draco there to distract his mother there was nothing to stop Mrs. Malfoy from noticing all the ways in which she was not like Sirius Black, "It just wouldn't be proper."
"Nonsense," Draco smirked, a little bounce in his step telling her how much he was enjoying making her uncomfortable, "Pansy gets along famously with my mother, or so I've heard. She can introduce you."
"But I'm not going to the-"
"Oh, yes you are," Rigel cut Pansy desperately, "You have to sit in that box with me, Pansy. Please, Pan."
"Well, I suppose it would be alright, since I was invited originally anyway, and even if there are a limited number of seats reserved, Draco's just given up his…" Pansy pursed her lips, "But a couple of hours of Quidditch… you'll owe me."
"Done," Rigel nodded instantly, "Anything."
"You make it sound like you're facing a dragon," Draco scowled, "I'll have you know my mother is perfectly nice to people who don't get on her bad side."
"Introductions," Pansy decided, "I'll go with you if you give me a few hours tomorrow to introduce you to people I think you need to know."
Rigel hesitated. She'd been hoping to avoid that as long as possible, not knowing how exactly she was going to navigate the myriad political and social waters of Slytherin House just yet, but there was no way she could face the Malfoys alone in just a few weeks. Her disguise hadn't been perfected, trained into her muscles and mind, yet, and then there was the matter of distracting from her broken wrist as well. Call it paranoia kicking in, but all it took was one mistake—one instant of thinking, 'oh, so-and-so probably won't notice that' or 'no one looks that closely' and then she (and Archie's) entire fort came crumbling down.
"Deal," she said, choosing scrutiny from students over scrutiny by older, experienced snakes as the lesser of two dangers. All three of them now satisfied, the trio headed for the dungeons to celebrate Draco's victory in style.
[end of chapter eleven].
A/N: Gosh, I'm so sorry this took an entire week to get out. The good news is I now have an outline for the entire story through first year—yay! Which means there's no chance of it being abandoned and also that chapters should come faster, since I know what needs to be in each one now. As always, the disclaimer that I don't own anything is, I hope, implied, and thank you to everyone who is reading.