A/n: The finale to Coraline's day, plus the introduction of a charming Slytherin (there seem to be a lot of them, huh?).

Coraline

'Okay,' Marvel admits. 'Dinner didn't go so well.'

Didn't go so well?

Didn't go so well?

The fight against Voldemort didn't go so well. Dinner was a complete and utter disaster.

It all began as Fred sat down. I tried to cover up my surprise and happiness by reaching for a roll. And then in bringing my elbow back, I spilled pumpkin juice in Lorcan's lap. And I tried to clean it up with a napkin, forgetting that I'm a witch, which produced enough red cheeks and awkward looks. Next came the soup affair, where, after Fred told a funny joke, I laughed, snorted, choked, and spat a mouthful of soup across the table at Marvel. And of course, every other word that came out of my mouth made me sound like a demented loony. Fred took his chance and ran off as soon as possible.

'I'm going to lock myself in my dormitory until the end of term. Then I'm moving to Nepal to live with the monks. Hopefully Fred won't be able to find me there.' I groan into my arms.

The five of us – Julien joined us just before dinner and got filled in on the scheme – are currently squished into a small alcove with a window, discussing my inability to act normally.

'I thought that you were charming, Coraline.' Julien says, patting my arm in a comforting manner. I scowl at him. 'In a sort of loony way. Like Lorcan and Lysander's mum, Luna.'

My scowl deepens. Luna Lovegood-Scamander is crazy. I would rather not be compared to her.

'She makes really good pumpkin pie.' Marvel comments, as if trying to make me feel better.

'Thanks guys. But I think that Fred would be better suited with a completely normal, funny, sweet girl. I'm not any of those, so you can stop trying.' I sigh and glance at my watch, realising that there's only five minutes left of our auction day. 'I'm sorry that we didn't finish your list of things to do today...'

'S'okay.' Marvel replies, searching in his pocket. 'We made a new list anyways.'

He passes me a crumpled piece of parchment. There's only one thing written on it: Get Fred to fall in love with Coraline. I smile at him, genuinely touched by this, and lean over to give him a hug. He places his hand on my face and shoves me away with an eye roll.

'I haven't got anything better to do all year, and besides, this is going to be hilarious.' He admits. 'Come on, as your last job of the day you can walk us to our common room.'

We slip out of the alcove and move on down the hall and up the moving staircases. The boys lead me to the portrait of the Fat Lady and turn to say good bye. Suddenly the portrait swings forwards and an orange haired boy flies out, crashing into me and knocking the two of us to the floor. I fight the limbs holding me to the ground, but stop when I smell the soothing scent of Fred Weasley's spicy cologne...

'Damn you smell good.' I hear, but it's not me that's said it. I freeze and he pulls away to reveal the very boy I've been mooning over for years.

'Fred!' I squeak, voice several pitches higher than usual. He looks down at me for a moment, then shrugs and returns to smelling my hair. I clear my throat and, with some serious self-restraint – my lips are just centimetres away from some prime snogging material and my biggest crush – repeat firmly: 'Fred.'

He pulls his nose from my hair and sighs against my neck before raising his eyes to meet mine.

'Sorry Coraline.' He says before jumping to his feet. He reaches out a hand to help me up, and I take it, revelling in the feel of his skin against mine. 'Someone set off a dungbomb in there and you smell like heaven right now.'

Mmm... I smell like heaven?

'Coraline?' Marvel asks, tapping my shoulder.

'Right,' I say, pulling my hand out of Fred's, realising that I'd drifted. 'S' – uh – alright. I mean, dungbombs suck.' I laugh awkwardly and curse inwardly. Time to tell a story which will most likely humiliate me, then dash. 'Once I was staying over at the Burrow and Albus filled my trunk with them. I couldn't get the stink out of my underwear. Ever.'

Yep. Sufficiently humiliated. Now to make my escape.

'Oh yeah!' Fred laughs. 'We had to pool our clothes because your parents were touring France and you couldn't go home.'

'You remember that?' I ask, blushing.

'You looked quite striking in my quidditch jersey and boxers.' He winks at me, then turns to his friends, who are watching us with great interest. 'Well, mates, we should probably see if we can room with Moaning Myrtle until the dorms are fumigated.'

'Bye Coraline.' They chorus, leaving me standing in front of the Fat Lady portrait, who is holding her breath and looking a little green.

'See you in class.' Marvel winks, then follows the others down the hall.

I stand there watching their retreating backs for a moment before the stink of the dungbombs reach my nose. I send a pity-filled look at the Fat Lady, then turn and run off down the hall, feeling strangely content with how the day went.

Ruth

Boots? Check.

Hat? Check.

Signature Taytum scowl? Check. Checkity-check-CHECK.

I glare over at Amelie as I leave our dormitory, but she's a little preoccupied cursing Potter's name. Personally, I thank him for buying her. At least one other girl on the quidditch team is going to have a shite day.

As I enter the Great Hall I snatch up a pumpkin muffin and take a large bite out of it, looking around the hall for the brats – ahem, lovely little Slytherins – who bought me. Finally I spot them amongst the other third years and step forwards, snatching the one with the dark skin and hair by his collar.

'Alright,' I say, spinning him around to face me. 'You bought me for the day, let's get it over with.'

He fights me off and taps three other boys on their shoulders before turning back to me. 'I'm Sal Zabini.' He tells me, puffing out his chest arrogantly. 'This is Perseus Flint, Gavin Dale and Steel Graham.'

Flint has dark hair, sly eyes and is wearing his school cloak over a sweater the colour of the inside of an avocado. Dale is a blonde with pasty white skin, and Graham has shaggy brown hair and is in desperate need of a shower. They all sneer at me in unison.

'Ruth Taytum.' I reply with my own sneer. 'Come on, let's go.'

They grin and rush towards the line of people waiting to leave the school, cackling like the evil snakes that they are. Graham shoves a young Hufflepuff out of the way and I help her up, clapping the boy upside the head.

'You won't get any brownie points with her in the future for stuff like that.' I tell him and he scowls at me.

We finally make it through the line to where the carriages are and the boys force me into the first one they see – which already has four people in it: Coraline and her buyers. They insist on squishing onto the remaining bench, with me in between Flint and Zabini. The snakes jump out before the carriage even stops, Dale dropping his hat on the ground as he charges towards Honeydukes. I rush after them, picking up the hat and scowling at all of the students who spare me a sympathetic look.

When the boys have bought several galleons of candy each, they pass me their bags and move on to the quidditch store.

'Next year, my cousin Scorpius is going to make me a chaser.' Zabini declares as we look at the new brooms. 'I'm going to take my brother's place on the team and we're going to win the cup.'

Pht. Yeah right. Is what I think, but I keep my mouth shut.

We move on to Zonko's and the boys pick up enough bags of dungbombs to stink up the whole school, and then on to The Three Broomsticks. They find a booth near the back and allow me to drop the many bags of tricks and treats they purchased.

'You're going to order us drinks.' Sal says, turning to me with a corrupt glint in his eye. 'We want firewhiskey.'

I raise a brow at him. 'You're thirteen.' I say.

'Thank you, wizard obvious.' He replies in an 'a-dhur' fashion that just makes me want to punch him. 'That's why you're going to buy it for us.'

I tip my head to the side contemplating his order. 'Alright, fork over some sickles then. Firewhiskey isn't cheap.'

I make my way over to the counter, four handfuls of sickles jingling in my pocket. The aging Madame Rosmerta raises her brow at my sly grin and I'm quick to point out the Slytherins in the back.

'Give me four firewhiskeys. One part whiskey, three parts butterbeer.' I tell her, then think about it for a moment. 'Just make them all butterbeer, actually. They're third years, they've never been here before.'

She smiles at me and slips four butterbeers across the counter, accepting the money I press into her hand. I pocket the rest of the money with a smile and carry the drinks back to the table. The boys gulp down the drinks without a complaint, and I thank their parents for not introducing them to alcohol at an early age. After they're convinced they've drunk a pint each, we carry out into the streets.

'Wee!' Graham cries as he leaps off a wooden bench, startling a pair of elderly women.

'Inflatus!' Zabini is yelling, running around jinxing all of the students he sees. 'Melofors! Tarantallegra!'

Flint is dancing some sort of horrible jig and Dale is making a snow angel and singing a song about pumpkin pasties. Eventually, they all end up on the ground in fits of giggles.

'We-hee-hee are so-ho-ho drunk!' Flint shouts, throwing fist-fulls of snow into the air.

I plunk my bum down on a snow-covered bench near the boys and laugh my arse off at them. The prats think that they're drunk!

'What's going on here?' Someone asks from my left and I spin around, afraid of finding that Head Boy and Girl have come back early from their day in London. Instead I see a boy my age, with dark skin and hair, and a face similar to one of the third years.

'Romeo!' Zabini cries, 'Guess what!'

'What?' The boy asks, stopping next to me and sticking his hands in his pocket.

'No! Guess!'

The boy looks at the four snakes writhing on the ground, then turns to me. 'Did you give them alcohol?'

Zabini looks put out at him guessing right away, but Dale throws snow up in the air and it falls down on them and they all start laughing again.

The boy steps towards me with a raised brow and open mouth, but I hold up a hand to stop him. 'They aren't drunk.' I say. 'I gave them butterbeer and said that it was firewhiskey.'

He grins. 'I should have guessed that you hadn't broken a school rule, you are Ruth Taytum after all, a Ravenclaw.'

'You know who I am?' I ask, seriously puzzled. I always thought that I just sort of melted into the background, with Amelie being the quidditch obsessed one and Nell being the obscenely attractive one, leaving me to be the normal, forgotten one.

'Sure. You're a chaser on your house team.' He replies, taking a seat next to me on the bench. 'We have transfiguration together, but you always sit in the front of the class and answer questions, whereas I find the seats in the back to be more comfortable, and you were bought last night at an auction by my brother, who proceeded to spend an hour telling me, in great detail, about all of the things you were going to do today. By the looks of it, and the fact that you're here and not sitting in detention, I can see that they've only managed to do a few of the things they wanted to do.'

'What?' Is all I can say.

'What?' He returns. 'I'm sure that you know me...'

'Yeah, a Slytherin in need of a nice blow to his ego.' I retort sarcastically.

He snorts. 'Well, I was hoping for something more along the lines of roguishly handsome or positively charming or even-'

'Egotistical prat?' I raise a brow at him and he scowls.

'Well, I'm Romeo Zabini. I've been a Chaser on the Slytherin quidditch team since my second year and I have a thing for Defense Against the Dark Arts.' He holds out his hand for me to shake and I accept it, rolling my eyes. 'So, what have you guys been up to?'

I nudge the bags surrounding the bench. 'Honedukes, Zonko's... the usual when it comes to conniving little boys.'

'I get egotistical and they get conniving?' He laughs and shakes his head, placing a hand on his heart. 'Oh, how you wound me.'

I laugh too and swing my legs, looking at the four boys rolling in the snow in front of us.

'Well, I ought to get them back to the school before someone reports this.' I say, standing and picking up Dale's dropped hat.

'I'll join you,' Romeo says, snatching up his and his brothers bags. He takes a look inside of the younger's Zonko bag, finding the dungbombs. With a sly smile at me he snatches a handful for himself. 'He won't even notice they're gone.'

'Alright boys,' I say, dropping Dale's hat on his face. 'Let's head back to the school.'

There's some moaning and groaning, but with a few threats from Romeo we make our way to a carriage and pile inside. When we pull up in front of the school the boys roar with laughter at the scene before us. It seems that Potter and his cousins have teamed up on poor Rose and her buyer in a snowball fight. As soon as the carriage stops the younger ones fly out the door and begin to pelt all red-heads in sight. Romeo takes a moment to help me down the steps.

'Who are you rooting for?' He asks.

'Rose and Malfoy, all the way. Potter needs a face-full of snow.' I reply and both we laugh.

'Taytum!' Flint calls out to me as Fred Weasley tackles him to the ground and begins to shove snow down his jacket. With a flick of my wand, Fred finds himself flying through the air, landing near Graham and Dale, who kick snow in his face.

I send Romeo an apologetic smile and rush over to stop Fred from throttling the pair.

Upon my approach, the Gryffindor roars and lunges at my legs, taking me out. Graham and Dale laugh and join him in rubbing my face in the snow.

'Bah – you little buggers!' I cry. 'You traitors! I'm on your side!'

'Oh,' Dale thinks for a moment, then nods vigorously. 'Right!'

Together we manage to get Fred off of me, then we run like mad because he looks quite murderous.

We join up with Romeo and Rose and Malfoy, and we all laugh as Rose charms her snowballs to form themselves and smash her brother in the face. Her and Malfoy then scamper off, leaving us to deal with five angry Gryffindors. Well – four. Amelie and James seem rather distracted cleaning each other's brains out with snow.

While Romeo and I deal with Albus, Hugo and Louis, the four youngsters team up on Fred. They get him down on the ground and hold his arms behind his back, rubbing his face in the snow until he cries for Merlin. After that they march him down to the shore of the Black Lake, where ice has yet to form.

'This is – this is –' He splutters. 'Madness! Come on Taytum, you're in seventh year! This is when you step in and flaunt your superiority and stop them!'

I think for a moment – a very brief moment. I can feel snow seeping into my underwear from when he gave me a face wash.

'Dunk him, boys.' I say, laughing. His furious expression is the last I see of him disappearing into the freezing, black water.

'I was wrong about you, Taytum.' Romeo says, putting his arm around my shoulder. 'You could be a Slytherin.'

I can't decide if I like that or not.

The other three Gryffindors run for the safety of the school, leaving Fred to splutter and splash around. When he gets back on dry ground he points a finger angrily in our direction.

'Curse you!' He shouts. 'Curse all of you!' He marches up to the school without a backwards glance.

We follow him, the four younger Slytherins running on ahead, and the older one walking beside me.

'I'm going to glue this to your head, Dale!' I say as menacingly as I can when he drops his hat for the third time, but Romeo slips his warm hand into my frozen one and it feels good, so it comes out as a joke. When the boy comes to collect his hat he sticks his tongue out at me and I stick mine right back.

There certainly are some horrible Slytherins out there. Voldemort was one, after all. But I'm starting to realise that there are some nice ones too. Ones that aren't proud and conceited, or pompous and pratty and evil. And you know what? I think I'd like to get to know these nice ones a little better.

Starting with the one on my left.

A/n: Next we have Nell and Arne, joined by McLaggen (that guy doesn't take break) and we get a shock from Ida's buyer...