Thank you for reading! I don't own any of Harry Potter! Please let me know if you enjoy! Updates every Saturday!
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While they hid behind the stone wall, Lily clasped a hand over her mouth to keep quiet.
Severus peered over his wife's shoulder and watched with his dark eyes narrowed to slits as Harriet slowly moved down the stairs to meet her date at the bottom.
Draco was hopelessly hypnotized as Harriet came towards him in her beautiful dress with her dark hair falling over her shoulders in elegant waves, her lips reddened, and her emerald eyes burning like two emeralds consumed by flames.
His mouth went dry.
His heart raced.
As she came closer, he pursed his lips to speak but no words issued forth.
"Are you supposed to be here, Malfoy?" Harriet asked as she paused on the last two steps to scowl at Draco with loathing in her green gaze.
"I……..I….." Draco stammered.
His head swam.
The room seemed to waver as his body became frighteningly light.
For a single terrifying second, he feared he would collapse to the floor from his own fright, but Draco gathered his courage and seized his chance.
After years of waiting, his prime opportunity to ensnare Harriet's heart had finally arrived.
Exhibiting the ambition that had led the Hat to place him in Slytherin, Draco gathered himself with one confident statement as he focused his grey gaze on Harriet and hissed, "Did you think any other bloke could have sent you those flowers? I've been standing here for an hour, Snape, and my feet are getting tired! You look more beautiful than I thought you would, but that's alright, I can still manage." Harriet blinked as Draco stuck his bent arm out and snapped, "Now are you going to walk in and dance with me or not?"
Harriet drew a deep breath.
From the startling confirmation that Draco had indeed sent her the flowers to the uncharacteristic compliment he paid her, Harriet for once was left speechless.
Behind the wall, Lily clutched Severus's arm as she steadied her husband, who had tensed himself to intervene.
"Easy, love, easy……." Lily whispered in a soothing tone to her husband while she kissed his cheek, "They're only talking…..They're only talking."
Instead of a witty retort, Harriet took the last two steps down and off the staircase before she slowly gave Draco her arm.
A few students who walked by stared at the unlikely couple in disbelief and whispered, but for Harriet and Draco, time seemed to slow down.
The world shrunk to the two of them only as they looked into each other's eyes with frowns of distrust as Draco began to lead Harriet into the ballroom.
As the Champions entered and the music began to play, it was difficult to tell who caused more gossip…..Harriet or Draco.
Harriet scowled as he placed his hand on her waist while they began to waltz.
She made sure to grip his shoulder punishingly tight each time before he spun her.
One dance passed, then two before the rest of the students and attending staff members entered the floor.
While they glided across the Great Hall, Draco could feel Severus's ominous stare of disapproval burning into him.
As Harriet looked into his face with a frown of utter detestment, Draco used the privacy offered by the orchestrated chaos to frown back at her while he spoke, "I meant what I said, Snape."
"Which part?" Harriet scoffed as he led her into another graceful turn.
The folds of her golden dress swished over his shoes before they rejoined once more, her hand on his shoulder, his palm on her waist.
"You look beautiful tonight." Draco frowned.
Harriet sucked in a breath as she gazed into his grey eyes.
Draco's black and white suit made him seem rather handsome under the light from the floating candles, but Harriet wouldn't dare admit that to him.
Lily clasped Severus's hand as they watched, but he didn't share her sentimental look at their daughter's first dance with a boy.
Instead, Severus waltzed Lily across the floor and made certain Draco saw the hateful scowls of abject hostility he threw his way.
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The night passed in anxious tension as Harriet and Draco continued their endless dance together.
As the third hour of the ball arrived, Severus finally sat down for a glass of punch at Lily's urging, though he kept his dark gaze focused firmly on the young couple.
"How long do you think they'll go on for?" Ron asked Hermione as they scowled at their friend in disbelief.
"Well, surely they'll have to take a rest soon." Hermione reasoned. From her seat, she could see the perspiration that glistened on their faces, "Look at them, they're going to dehydrate if they aren't careful."
"Can you believe she's dancing with Malfoy?" Ron asked Hermione.
Harriet had never informed her best friends of the betrothal Severus and Lily had agreed to after her birth.
It was something she herself often tried to forget.
"No!" Hermione exclaimed with a laugh.
She and Ron looked away from each other for an awkward moment before he cleared his throat and asked, "Would you, um….."
Hermione looked over at him.
"Would you like to dance….with me….again?" Ron asked with a hopeful frown.
Hermione blinked before she smiled and nodded, "...Sure, Ron."
As Ron led Hermione back onto the dance floor, Severus and Lily watched Draco's lips move as he spoke to Harriet.
"Are you certain you don't want any punch?" He asked, "I know you must be dreadfully hot in that dress."
"If we stop moving, we'll have to speak to everyone." Harriet gasped as she glanced over and saw the crowd of students who had congregated at the refreshment table.
Every set of eyes followed her and Draco as one gossiping rumor hurriedly gave birth to another.
"We'll have to face them eventually, Snape." Draco hissed, "We can barely hold hands now, can we not have one drink?"
"Oh, alright, Malfoy….Fine!" Harriet rasped.
Her voice sounded scratchy as it escaped her dry throat.
Grateful his stubborn darling finally abandoned her ridiculous battle, Draco led Harriet off the dance floor and towards the punch bowl.
Crabbe and Goyle smirked as the couple approached.
If Draco had known of his friends' malicious plot, he would have taken Harriet into his arms and run.
Facing Severus's wrath would have been far more preferable than what happened next.
Draco and Harriet approached the refreshment table until they were halted by a barrage of intrusive questions from several different students in their year and older.
Harriet answered hers in stride but the need to explain himself irritated Draco.
How was he supposed to be a gentleman with Harriet if he couldn't even offer her a drink?
While Draco found himself trapped by two curious Ravenclaws, Harriet became separated from him in a chat with three inquisitive Hufflepuffs.
Neither watched the punch bowl.
Neither saw it raise into the air as Goyle pointed his wand at it and laughed with Crabbe.
By the time the large punch bowl moved to hover over Harriet, everyone gasped.
Draco's eyes widened.
His grim realization of what was about to happen came too late.
With one swing of his wrist, Goyle used magic to turn the punch bowl over and dump its contents all over Harriet in one vicious, red splash.
She shrieked in surprise as the cold, scarlet fluid soaked through the golden fabric of her beautiful dress.
The music stopped.
Teachers and students gasped in shocked horror.
Those who disliked Harriet giggled in wicked amusement.
Soaked through and through, she turned to snarl at Draco, who blinked at her with his mouth agape.
"Got her for you, Draco!" Goyle chortled as he and Crabbe shared a hearty laugh at her plight.
"No……." Draco whispered.
Nausea churned his stomach.
"NO!" He cried as he reached out to Harriet.
Before he could pull her towards him, she turned away with a great cry of humiliated frustration and ran from the room.
"HARRIET!" Lily called.
She and Severus glanced at each other before they both chased after their daughter as she fled the Great Hall.
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Harriet was not a girl prone to sobbing.
Regardless, as she gnashed her teeth and ran down the stone corridor, with her wet hair slung behind her while her damp gown clung to her flesh, hot tears of frustrated rage poured down her cheeks.
She intended to race up to her dormitory, but she underestimated how thoroughly the punch had soaked down to her feet.
Slippery against the smooth insides of her shoes, as she ran faster and faster, the excess of liquid caused her to trip, slip, and fall painfully onto the stone floor.
If she hadn't caught herself on her hands, her face would have collided directly with the unforgiving material.
Harriet was too upset to mind the smarting scrapes her accident left on her palms.
As she pulled herself up, a miserable throb of wrenching disappointment wracked her chest.
Harriet didn't know what to do or where to go until a loud, hissing voice came from the walls in her moment of greatest need.
Let me……..help you.
Let me………guide you.
Harriet sniffed as she looked up.
She worried that she had hallucinated until she heard the voice again.
Won't you…….let me?
Won't you…….trust me?
"Who are you?" She asked in a hateful hiss, "Go away! Leave me alone!"
Friend of…….your friend.
Sent to……bring you….where you need…..to be.
Come……….
…….And follow.
Harriet could hear an uncertain, swirling sound from inside the castle walls as if something very large moved under the stone.
As the sound began to fade away, she decided to stand to her feet and for once……..obey.
Harriet followed that swirling noise through the castle and up the stairs to the vacant girls' lavatory on the second floor.
The sink……..
The voice directed.
There's a faucet that bears………a serpent.
Touch it and follow the path that opens.
Harriet furrowed her brow as she sniffed again and examined each of the many faucets.
It took several moments of close inspection, but eventually she noticed the carving of a snake on the tap closest to the toilets.
Harriet touched the engraving with her finger and frowned when nothing happened.
Curious, she pulled out her wand from the inside of her dress and pressed its tip against the snake carving.
Her eyes widened as the sinks and mirrors spread apart to reveal a hidden tunnel as the voice commanded again.
Follow the path.
Harriet's chest heaved with anxiousness for a moment as she stared down at the tunnel's black void.
Deciding to take a chance and desperate to escape her embarrassment, Harriet leapt down the tunnel and fell with a scream.
One of the stall doors creaked as a transparent girl in a Hogwarts uniform watched Harriet disappear.
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Her short tumble abruptly concluded as she landed with an ungraceful thud into a pile of soft moss.
As Harriet looked around, she realized she was in some sort of subterranean area, with rocks, dust, and a…….
A……
Her emerald eyes widened at the massive snake skin that laid strewn across that place, almost as long as the Quidditch field.
She stood to her feet and stumbled past the unsettling sight.
Up ahead, she could see it, a round, bronze door.
Once she reached it, she scowled at the metal serpents that lined the surface in tight, locked positions.
Command with your voice what you wish to happen.
The voice explained.
Harriet closed her eyes for a moment before she opened them with a scowl and ordered the snakes on the door in Parseltongue, "Open."
She blinked as she watched a new metallic snake emerge from the side of the door and slither around to push each of the other serpents into place.
With one heavy click, the door swung open.
Harriet had no idea where she was going, but she was happy with her destination, wherever it was…….any place would have been better than returning to the Great Hall.