When Rose woke up at home, she woke up with Mungo, the family's colossal cat, weighing her feet down and cutting off the circulation. Her parents were not great believers in putting cats on diets. On the occasions when Rose woke up at home, she woke to find the sunlight streaming in through her crooked window light. It caught the glass mobile that hung from her ceiling and sent bright reflections skittering and scattering across her room.
This morning, Rose woke up to feel a similar weight on her legs, which was disorientating. She wasn't angled right - for her bed at home or her bed in the dorm - and that was frankly disturbing. The room was bathed in darkness, and she had a crick in her neck. Rose lay there for a moment, gathering her wits. Reaching out blindly she felt a hard, flat surface. It was inanimate, so she supposed that was a bonus. Add to that the relief that it wasn't slimey, and Rose decided that she was on to a winner. Her searching fingers felt smooth, thin wood and she sagged in relief, curling her hand around her wand.
"Lumos."
Soft white light told her two things. One, common room sofa. Two, fully dressed.
"Oh, thank God." Rose murmured, throwing her arm over her eyes and collapsing back against the sofa. Because her mother was nothing if not protective, and Rose had had the dangers of waking up in an unfamiliar place drilled into her her entire life. She tucked her feet up on the table, pulling the blanket around her. Her feet nudged something, and she gazed at it sleepily. Her charmed pitch map, a present from her aunt when she was given the Captaincy. What was that doing ther- Oh.
Rose remembered snapshots; Amy Fletcher shaking her head and handing her a butterbeer "Rose, I love you, but I'm tired. I'll see you upstairs." The fire flickering across the pitch as she moved the opaque chaser figures into a Holyhead Formation, the fact that she was only doing this because she really didn't want to finish the transfiguration assignment that was lurking in her bag, and if she made it to midnight then she might just get it out – and then not much more. So she fell asleep. But Rose knew from experience that she did not cover herself with a throw. She was more the "Sudden Sleep Of The Dead." type.
Shrugging, Rose ran a hand through her tangled mane of red hair and stood up. She didn't really want to deal with Amy's "Out all night, were we?" accompanied by a wink. Rose had barely even dated since last year, Merlin. And hadn't that been fun.
As she folded the throw back over the sofa, Rose realised that there was another something. She dropped the throw like it was on fire, like it scalded her hands.
Without a backwards glance, she all but leapt for her dorm and for Amy's ridicule.
Because nothing good could come of a 6"3 shadow, and "Sweet dreams, Rosie."
•
March played the rest of it's hand that day. The castle grounds, which had glinted prettily in the last of the spring frosts, were battered and saturated by driving Scottish rain. Gale force winds howled around the turrets. Students rushed from lesson to lesson with books clutched to their chests, parchment and scarves flapping violently in the breeze.
Albus was not good with weather.
With people, yes. With books, yes. With plants, yes again.
But never weather.
"This is a bloody nightmare." He moaned at breakfast. Scorpius had been engrossed in describing the giant squid to a first year, and barely reacted. Albus tore his attention from where debris rushed past the window, caught in the wind, to throw a disparaging glance at his friend. Of course Scorp didn't notice, too busy flailing his arms and sticking his tongue out the side of his mouth. Idiot. The first year had an expression of two parts amusement, one part horror. Albus did not care.
"Scorp."
"Then we all watched as this, this tentacle, it came up out of the lake and it curled around the poor bastar-"
"Scorp!"
"Sorry, mother. This poor fella's leg."
Cue: gasp. Cue: wide eyes. Cue:
"And then?"
Albus was going to turn to drink. He could make this into a drinking game easily – Drink every time Scorpius gets so involved in his own story that he forgets he made it up. Albus was not the kind to get bad results. He studied hard, he was naturally bright - His liver would be the first in his family to properly fail. Oh, woe.
"Then," Scorp continued, and Albus speared a sausage and prepared to wait it out. There was clearly no stopping him. "It got tighter, and tighter, and tighter, and it pulled. Straight into the lake." Albus watched emotionlessly as Scorpius gestured wildly, splaying his hands in the air. "He was never the same. Isn't that right, Al?"
"Oh, absolutely." Albus said, deadpan. "Every word you say is true."
The first year sat with his hands curled around his goblet, and Al could practically see the cogs turning as he tried to work out whether it was true or not. Why shouldn't it be true? Scorpius Malfoy said so, and he has a scar on his neck from fighting a dragon. Albus wanted to chip in – Ah, yes, but Scorpius Malfoy said so, and that scar on his neck is from playing with his dog when he was ten.
"Did he die?" The kid was clearly hedging his bets, trying to work out his angles. Albus took a bite of his sausage, respect growing. Smart move.
"Merlin, no." Scorp sounded almost bored, but there was a gleam in his eye. "O'Connor had been scrubbing out the cauldrons – have you had to do that, yet?" At the first year's muted head shake, Scorpius continued: "It leaves this stench to your hands. It's all the cra- rubbish that gets burnt onto them. So many potions that died a death. Anyway, the squid is old, it's picky. It spat O'Connor right back out. He tasted foul."
The first year leant back on the bench, clearly impressed "Whoa."
"Yeah. Slytherin threw this enormous party for him. They called him the Squid Kid."
"Slytherin?"
"That's right."
The first year narrowed his eyes. "I thought you said he was a Hufflepuff."
"Oh yeah, yeah. He was dating a Slytherin?"
"Liar." And the first year flounced off, but Al knew that he would be telling all of his friends just what Scorpius Malfoy had told him at breakfast.
Scorpius watched the kid go for a minute, before turning back to Albus. There was a grin on his face, and it made Al long for his bed. "You know, I thought I had him!"
"You've got to keep your facts straight." Albus chided, reaching for the pumpkin juice. "Kids are smart, Malfoy."
"And so small. Were we that small?"
"It's likely, yes."
"Merlin's beard."
•
The day was going from good to better. The first lesson had been herbology, and Professor Longbottom had actually clapped him on the shoulder. Scorp would never forget the way that his professor had paused the first time that he had had to address him as "Malfoy", and he suspected that the more he grew to look like his father, the more his professor had to actively remind himself that this was Scorpius and not Draco. Which was fair; Scorpius thought that his father went through the same kind of confusion. Sometimes he just addressed Scorpius by the labrador's name absentmindedly, and Scorp would "woof" back at him until his father realised, looked over at him and mouthed "Sorry."
Lunch was spent with his arm around Naya's shoulders until she had to shoot off somewhere important, probably, and the rest of it was spent inventing alternative rules for quidditch. Scorpius was wrapping Albus's lunch in napkins, because the idiot always forgot to eat when he stayed behind to help Professor Longbottom clear away. Potter got this fanatical look in his eye, and could tell you about sixty different ways to poison somebody with a single plant. Which was great, and yes, good passion, nice – but it did mean that Scorpius never ate or drank anything that Albus produced. And Albus just never ate. Period.
"Maybe on dragons?" Rose suggested thoughtfully. She was sitting opposite Scorpius, and every so often he would look over and catch her looking at him quizzically. And every time, he raised a questioning eyebrow at her. And every time, she just shook her head and shrugged as if to say "I've forgotten."
He did wonder just what she thought she'd remembered. Because tucking your friend in when you find them passed out on a sofa is a totally normal thing to do. Scorpius would have done it for anyone. He would definitely have done it for Albus on the condition that he could draw something on Potter's face. Like stubble, because sometimes you had to be cruel to be kind. That being said, he wouldn't be kicking Albus under the table every time he tried to help himself to Scorpius's lunch.
"Quidditch, fine, but underwater." Sean Finnegan exclaimed, with a click of his fingers. He leant forwards enthusiastically, red and gold tie dangerously close to going in his soup. "No brooms, no dragons-" Hugo Weasley looked scandalised. "But kelpies"
"Been done." Rose said airily, tearing a piece off of her bread roll. She waved it around, "But here's the thing – they didn't think about air. They enchanted the balls to fly –swim, whatever – they planted hoops, they even waterproofed everyone's kit. But they forgot air."
Scorp narrowed his eyes as he tried to remember. There had been his mother smiling into her tea, and his father had been reading the paper and he knew this story. "Wasn't that the Norwegians?"
"Yeah, think so."
"Didn't they have problems with hypothermi- Get away, Weasley! You have your own!"
Rose grinned around the piece of soup-soaked roll that she'd shoved into her mouth and shrugged, eyes shining. There was no shame to her, Scorp thought. Absolutely no shame. "Were you raised by wolves?" He demanded. "What was your mother like?"
"Hey!" Hugo objected.
"Sorry, Hu. No offence, mate. But seriously. Wolves."
Rose swallowed and threw Scorpius a charming smile that he scoffed at. "Oh come now, that's no way to treat your captain. Show some respect."
"Make me."
Raising her eyebrows and leaning across the table, Rose locked eyes challengingly with the blond. He was lounging in his seat with the kind of nonchalance that lions exhibited – lazy, flickering eyes that took everything in. "You're on."
Scorpius sat up in his seat, and Rose was reminded just how ridiculously tall he was. He opened his mouth to argue, but his foot grazed her leg under the table again and he leant back, hackles down. What was that? The world rushed back into definition. The clamour of the dining hall sounded abruptly louder and clear as a bell, and Scorp shook his head, sure that his ears were ringing. Next to him, Hugo and Sean had already moved on to the merits of kelpies over brooms, and the clatter of knives on plates and goblets on tables and chatter left Scorpius feeling disorientated for a moment.
The only one who seemed equally nonplussed was Rose. She'd sat back in her seat, cheeks flushed, and for the first time since they had sat down to lunch – her hands were still.
•
The day went from good to better, until about two o'clock. The weather was getting bleaker, and Scorpius was making his way down to the dungeons for potions with Albus. Albus, who hated weather. Albus, who had insisted that they go the long way around so as to avoid going anywhere near the weather. The world still wasn't sitting quite right on it's axis, so Scorp went along with it without comment.
Seeing Scorpius and Al walk together was as common as seeing spiders scuttle across the pale stone of the castle. Usually, Scorpius stood four inches taller than Albus. Today, however, he stood ten.
"Which colour should the potion turn just before you add the powdered unicorn horn?" Scorpius was saying. It was absent-minded, his focus on his feet. He was slowly circling his wand, and as a result of it, he was drifting six inches above the ground, alongside Albus.
"Mottled grey."
"Only if we make it, mate. I said 'should'."
"Not mottled grey."
"You are going to ace this test."
Albus allowed for that with a humble shrug. They passed Eustice the Emphatic's portrait, and he gave them a determined wave, moustache waggling. Al waved back for the both of them, because Scoprius was concentrating on his feet again, tongue between his teeth.
Al's eyes widened at the sight of Professor McGonagall walking briskly towards them, and he shoved Scorpius harshly. "Down!"
"In a sec, in a s- Good afternoon, Professor."
Professor McGonagall remained as straight faced as ever as she took the two boys in.
"Two feet on the ground, Mr Malfoy."
"Sorry, Professor." And Scorpius stepped out of the air with a thud and slight stumble. He received an arch nod for his efforts, and stayed firmly on the ground as Albus wished their terrifying headmistress a good afternoon.
As soon as McGonagall's footsteps receded, he had his wand out again and was wobbly drifting into the air.
"Detention, Mr Malfoy." Floated down the hall towards them, sounding dry and Scottish and damning.
Scorpius exchanged a betrayed look with Albus. "How does she bloody do that?"
•
The issue, Scorpius supposed, with having a school that had been around for a billion-odd years, was that it had had an awful lot of pupils.
And when you have an awful-lot of pupils, they insist on winning things.
And when they won things, they wanted trophies and really, how much was that fleeting moment of satisfaction worth, Scorpius wondered - rag in hand - in the grand scheme of things? Because fine, they had their five minutes (maybe ten, but at a stretch) of glory and then they buggered off and forgot all about their trophies.
And then, and then, some poor sod had to spend his Wednesday evening scrubbing at them.
"Maybe," Scorp mused aloud, putting his back into Francis Berry's shield of excellence. "We should just give people a pat on the back. A well done. Teach them to value themselves and not some lump of metal."
The portrait on the wall – Lord Quinton Hastings – ignored him as he had done the past six times that Scorpius had made a suggestion. He just kept studying the book in his hand, and Scorp knew that he hadn't turned a page in at least half an hour. Being blanked by a painting was a terrible feeling.
The sound of heels on the flagstones bounced around the cavernous trophy room as Scorpius was trying to get down to the same level as Melanie Schmidt, potions champ. She was clearly queen of the lower shelves, and Scorp worked out that the best way to show her some tender lovin' was to lie down in front of her. He felt a pang for the house elf who was going to have to deal with his shirt in the morning, and resolved to leave a something out with his laundry by way of an apology.
"Scorpius?"
"Naya!"
Scorp deserted Melanie Schmidt, potions champ, without a backwards glance. It had been a momentary fling, after all. A sweet nothing. Naya did not need to know. "What are you doing here?" He asked, shoving the rag into his back pocket and reaching out to her. Naya took in the state of his shirt and filthy hands, and arched a perfectly-groomed brow, lips curving upwards.
"I'm good, babe. I can appreciate you from over here."
Scorp shrugged good naturedly and leant against the cabinet. "I am wounded but I'll live. What are you doing here?"
"I was on my way through to the dorm, one of the portraits told me that Lord Hastings had company."
Scorpius looked up at the portrait with a shrewd expression. "You sly dog."
"But really, Scorpius - Detention? Again?" Naya looked agitated, tapping the heel of her shoe against the ground, forehead furrowed. "You can't afford to do this, babe! You're leaving this year!"
Lord Hastings looked up from his book for the first time and nodded in agreement. Scorp scowled at him.
"Hey, this was just a casual thing. I doubt it's even going to make it onto my record." He reasoned, turning back to Naya. He took her in, lips quirking at the frown on her face. She was stunning in this half-light, dark eyes turning the same shining black of her hair and the glow from the candles making her high cheekbones stand out.
"Scorpius, any decent employer will ask about this. All of this."
"You are gorgeous."
"Scorpius!"
Scorp shrugged again, and moved closer, slipping his hands around her back. "Naya."
She sighed, and leant her head forwards to rest on his chest. "You're impossible. You are filthy and impossible."
"I love you, too."
"You cannot keep getting into trouble for such stupid reasons."
"No promises." Scorp teased, but Naya looked up at him with an expression that he couldn't read. Her eyes were dark and painted darker, as though they had swallowed the light. Before he could put much thought into it, she reached up and pressed a soft kiss to his lips. She didn't bury her hands in his hair the way she used to, she didn't arch her back and bite his lip – it was gentle. It tasted of familiarity, and Scorp cradled her head as he met each slide of her lips with one of his own. All too soon, she was pulling away, and he was left with empty hands and a judgemental painting.
