Because I'm a wordy bitch, I went over my self-imposed 20k-word cap, so this one is going to have to be a two-parter. The scene goes straight through, there was no convenient place near the middle to split it, but hopefully it shouldn't be too jarring if you need to stop after the first part and come back to it. Let's get this ridiculous show on the road, then.
Liz didn't notice the mark until she was almost done fiddling with her hair. The stuff was, of course, completely fucking unmanageable — getting it all mussed up really didn't help — but she could at least get it into a state of semi-orderliness, bound up in a fuzzy plait using a charm she'd picked up at some point. She couldn't use any of the charms that would just do the whole thing at once, that would always end up pulling something (or her hair would just resist it somehow), but she'd found one that would only pull things around an inch at a time, Liz tugging things this way and that between castings to make sure everything was going more or less well. She didn't normally bother tying her hair back, since it was such a pain and just holding it out of the way with a scarf was much easier, but she expected she'd be taking things on and off dress shopping, and her hair would definitely end up getting in the way. Like when she was flying or duelling, it was a pain to set up, but less of a pain in the long run.
She was just tying it off, using one of the hair thingies Hermione had gotten her for Christmas a couple years ago now, when she spotted it. On the side of her neck, a couple inches below her ear, a reddish splotchy blob about the size of the pad of her thumb. Liz scowled at her reflection for a second, finished tying off her hair before turning back to look at Daphne over her shoulder. Pointing at her own neck, "You did it again."
Sitting relaxed on the sofa, in the now-familiar little sitting room they slipped away to now and then, Daphne smiled up at her. "Oh, did I? I'm sorry." That was a lie, but she didn't expect Liz to believe it, an obvious sly sort of tone on her voice.
Which, sure, Liz definitely didn't mind how this had happened — though she was trying not to think about it, because being distractingly turned on while out dress shopping would be extremely awkward — but, "You know I have to be somewhere, right? I don't have my bruise stuff on me..."
"Oh dear, that is unfortunate. I suppose there's nothing to be done, then." Not that Daphne was really that sympathetic about Liz's problem. The thought of Liz going out with a very obvious mark on her neck, and people seeing it, made her feel kind of...smug. Maybe not quite the right word, there was a bit of a sexy thrill to it too, but it also almost felt like a kind of ha ha I win feeling at the same time.
(Not that Liz felt like snogging her was something worth bragging about, but.)
Liz shot Daphne a glare — not super serious, because it was kind of funny, even if she couldn't quite explain how even to herself — before turning back to her mirror charm. She cast a copy glamour, reproducing a patch of her skin elsewhere over the bruised part. Glamours tended not to work quite right for mind mages, it took a moment of concentration for Liz to not see through it, so she could properly tweak it, make sure she had the colours and the positioning right — she then, carefully, tied the charm into her magic, anchoring it in place so a stray dispel wouldn't kill it. (She hadn't realised that fiddling with charms after they were cast like that was an unusually advanced skill until she'd talked about it at a duelling club meeting, and Flitwick had asked her to demonstrate and been strangely delighted when he saw she wasn't just talking out of her arse. Oops?) Since she was just copying a patch of skin somewhere else, it didn't look quite natural, so she cast the smoothing-out-skin-imperfections glamour, tweaked it a little until it was mostly unnoticeable. There we go, she dispelled the mirror charm and then turned back to Daphne, giving her a Severus-ish raised eyebrow.
Daphne just pouted up at her, barely managing to hold the expression against the affectionate amusement bubbling in her mind. Though Liz wasn't really sure what was so funny.
Liz had already sheathed her wand (so she could properly plant her hands on her hips), but she didn't bother drawing it again to check the time, cast the charm with a snap of her fingers. (Wandless magic did take more effort, but Daphne got a little tingly thrill every time, so Liz did it whenever possible while she was around...because apparently she was a show-off like that?) She waved her fingers through the illusion, dispelling it. "I should get going. It's going to take a few minutes to get down there, I don't want to make them all wait for me."
"I suppose. Do you know where you're going?"
"No, Susan's organising the whole thing. Somewhere in the magical world, obviously — the fashion's different." You could probably get away with wearing a muggle-made dress to this sort of thing, but it'd have to be a really fancy one, and people might still notice.
"Mm. Most likely Charing, but if Susan decides to get creative and use the occasion to show our muggleborn friends more of our world, she may think Paris is a good option."
That sounded sort of ridiculous at first glance, but magical transportation was really quick and easy, and it wasn't like you needed papers or anything, so Liz guessed that was actually possible. And it wasn't even quite noon yet, so, they could be out long enough for that to be practical. Except, "I didn't think they use galleons much in France? We were told to bring goblin money."
"Ah, no, then perhaps not. I do wonder what Susan has planned, but I guess I must ask afterward."
"Yeah, sure, remind me tomorrow." Daphne was using the opportunity of the Hogsmeade weekend to visit home, she might not be back tonight. "I forgot to ask—" She'd been rather preoccupied with other thoughts on the way up here. "—did you ever get that sample for me?"
"Ah! Yes, I have it here, of course..." Daphne fiddled in her bag for a moment, stood up to hand the scrap of cloth over to Liz. Normally, Mistwalkers would make their clothes themselves, but sometimes that wasn't always practical — like when they needed something special for a formal event, and/or were busy with other occupations (like being a student). Since Daphne was too busy to do it herself, a couple people at the Greenwood had volunteered to do it for her, they'd sent along a sample of the pattern so Liz could pick out colours that wouldn't horribly clash, at least.
Liz took the square of cloth, about the distance from her wrist to the tip of her fingers on each side, her thumb reflexively running over the beads. When dressed up in Mistwalker stuff, Daphne usually wore green, yellow, and white (Greenwood colours), with occasional bits of brown and blue for flavour, but she was going with something rather different this time. The cloth was striped, a band of white running down the middle, on either side of it a pair of narrower lines in deep earthy brown, twining rows of green and white beads down the middle, reminding Liz of the design marking the edge of the wards at the Greenwood's little post office. Past the brown parts, the rest of the square, making up maybe half of the total surface area, was in a deep purple, fading more toward blue in places, giving it a bit of texture, speckled here and there with more white beads for contrast. (Placed at varying distances almost like stars, but no recogniseable pattern.) Down the middle of the white part, stitched in with black thread, were runes. Not a proper enchantment, Liz didn't think, just words — the sample had beauty and harmony written on it, she assumed there'd be all kinds of things on the complete version.
Liz was really curious what the actual dress was going to end up looking like — specifically, what Daphne would look like in it — but it wouldn't do to get too distracted just now.
"...I think I'll go with something in purple. Maybe with black, and a paler colour, like lavender? Does that sound okay? I never know what the fuck I'm doing with this stuff..."
"That is what professionals are for — show them the sample, and they'll have ideas. I look forward to seeing whatever you choose." And that wasn't just being polite, Daphne was looking forward to the Yule Ball. She could be weirdly sentimental and romantic like that.
Liz thought the whole ordeal was going to be a massive fucking pain, personally, but since she was a Champion she didn't really have a choice in the matter. Of course, even if not going had been an option, she probably would have ended up roped into it anyway — Daphne would still want to go, after all. Liz didn't hate the idea of it badly enough she wasn't willing to humour her. Besides, maybe it wouldn't be so bad? Getting slightly high might be a good idea, she had a feeling that everyone staring at her for the opening dance would fucking suck...
Anyway, Liz tucked the sample in her bag, and then it was time to leave. She didn't leave immediately, Daphne pulling her in for a last quick kiss...which then dragged on for longer than it probably should have — she really did need to get going...
After finally extricating herself from Daphne — ugh, maybe that last kiss had been a bad idea, hopefully her body would cooperate and fucking stop it... — she took a few shortcuts to get down to the Entrance Hall in a fraction of the time it should normally take. She was still...barely on time, cutting it very close. There were few enough people in the Entrance Hall at the moment that she actually felt their group's minds before spotting them, walked over to find them waiting in the hollow to the right of the Grand Staircase, leading toward Hufflepuff. (Most of them were Hufflepuffs, and they were more or less out of the way over here.) The Hufflepuffs were mostly already here, but they were still waiting for a couple people, so Liz wasn't late late, at least.
Susan and Hannah were here, of course, along with all of the muggleborn girls in their year — Sophie, Sally-Anne, and Mandy, but Hermione wasn't here yet (surprisingly). Liz hadn't expected Chelsea, who was coming along with her friend Amber Watson, also muggleborn. A few minutes later, they were joined by Imogen Kelly — a Ravenclaw in Chelsea's year, another muggleborn, who Liz was completely unfamiliar with (at least Amber turned up at duelling club meetings sometimes) — and then Hermione finally showed up, a little flushed from running down the stairs, offering somewhat breathless apologies for being late.
Unexpectedly, Lily was tagging along with Hermione, rather red-faced and sheepish. Since Liz was a cheater mind mage, she knew immediately that Lily hadn't planned on going to the Yule Ball at all, for money reasons — her family was rather poor — and had been forced to turn down a boy who'd asked her because of it. Hermione had found out, and offered to 'lend' her the money (with no expectation of actually getting it back, that part implied but tactfully unstated), so Lily had gotten back to the boy, and now she was going. Felt rather embarrassed about it, but Hermione had promised not to tell anyone she was paying for her, they'd find a way to subtly pass the coins she needed so no one would notice.
...Lily was going to the Ball with Blaise, apparently, Liz would never have seen that coming...
I can spot you some if you don't have enough.
Hermione twitched at the thought slipped into her mind, glancing at Liz, but she felt a little knot of tension loosen with relief. The offer to pay for the things Lily would need for the Ball had been completely impulsive, she hadn't actually considered whether she'd have enough currency on her to pay for them both — a thought she'd kept to herself, though, not wanting to make Lily worry about it. She assumed she'd figure it out somehow, maybe pull Liz or Susan aside in private, but she guessed she didn't have to worry about that now. Hermione's mind sharpening, focussing on a thought very firmly to be sure Liz would see it, Thank you, Liz. Are you sure you have enough for all three of us?
She didn't have much in the way of currency on her, actually, she'd just brought her draft book — it might be a little trickier to hide it from the other girls, but they'd figure it out.
...Or, Liz could just offer to pay for everyone's stuff all at once with a single draft note, and they would all just pay her back after they were done. That seemed way more efficient, just for practical reasons — which was how she'd explain it to everyone else, making it so they didn't have to waste a bunch of time fiddling with the stupid coins at the till — and that way nobody had to know if whatever Hermione and Lily were giving her back was less than she'd paid in the first place...and she could refuse repayment for, like, a couple accessory things here and there, and call that people's Christmas present! She was always terrible at figuring out what to get people, so this would be that problem solved. This was a brilliant idea, actually, she'd bring it up over lunch.
Hermione was somewhat bemused with Liz's impulsive decision to pay for their whole group — not in a bad way, thought it was kind of sweet, just didn't know what to think of the abruptness of it — but didn't comment, just firmed up her occlumency and continued talking to everyone else like nothing had happened.
They'd ended up with eleven people total, which was a rather larger group than she'd expected. Lily hadn't planned on coming, and Liz hadn't known the fifth-years had been invited, so. More people than Liz was entirely comfortable dealing with at once, but it would be fine, she'd manage. The carriages seated six — and only four comfortably — so they needed to split themselves into three groups, crowding around the carriages with hoods pulled up against a cold December drizzle. Liz ended up in a carriage with just Hermione and Lily, which was the way she liked it — Lily could be a bit awkward around Liz sometimes, but just two other people in the enclosed space of the enchanted carriage was much more tolerable for her than trying to cram in five or six.
Once they were trundling down the path, Hermione told Lily about Liz's idea of paying for the whole group, because apparently they got to talk about this now. Lily was slightly creeped out that Liz had immediately figured out about her situation, and already had a conversation with Hermione about it with everyone around them none the wiser, but she didn't make a big deal about it. If Lily (or Hermione) never got around to paying Liz back, that was fine — she was filthy rich, and she never actually used any of it anyway, it didn't really make a difference. Just write off whatever they couldn't pay back as a Christmas present, it was fine, don't worry about it. Lily was being really awkward and embarrassed about it — Liz didn't see how it was Lily's fault that her family were poor, but people could be silly about these things sometimes — and the weird hero worship for Liz's parents Lily had grown up with probably wasn't helping matters. Liz just pretended not to notice, hoping that not drawing attention to Lily being uncomfortable would help her get over it quicker.
That all settled, Liz couldn't help asking, "So, you're going with Blaise Zabini? How did that happen?"
Somehow, Lily's face got even redder, seeming to sink into her seat a little. "Um. He asked?"
"Well, yeah, I was just wondering. I don't know if I've ever even seen you two talk before." Liz tactfully didn't mention that Blaise had asked her, thinking she wouldn't have gone with Daphne for political reasons...though, she didn't actually know what the timeline was like? It was possible Blaise had asked Lily, been turned down, and then asked Liz, before she'd gotten the offer from Hermione and had told him she could go. She was kind of curious how that had happened, exactly, but it felt like a bad thing to ask.
"We do, but, um, he's in the art club?"
Ooohhh, right, that made sense — Lily was the only one of their study group who went regularly, so she wouldn't be surrounded by her friends all the time, making it more likely she'd end up talking to someone else there. (She was pretty shy, so.) Liz had considered checking the club out herself, since she knew she'd liked drawing as a little kid but didn't remember how, but she was busy enough it'd never really seemed worth it. "You know, I didn't know Blaise could draw or anything. I know his mum makes him do theatre and music stuff over the summer, but..."
"He's okay. He wasn't..." Lily was about to say that he'd asked how she did...some drawing thing, Liz didn't get what she was thinking about exactly (too technical), which was how they'd first started talking, but then she got a flare of bashfulness and stopped herself. "He's nice."
...Liz would take her word for it, she guessed. Her impression of Blaise was that he was a snarky bastard — she thought he was funny, sure, but "nice" wasn't really the word she would use. (Also, his mother might or might not be a serial killer, let's not forget about that.) The story did make it seem way more likely that Blaise had only made his offer to Liz after Lily had turned him down, though. As odd as he could be at times, Liz didn't think he was just messing with Lily or something, and she seemed pleased about it, so she guessed it wasn't really her business.
"Do you know what he's wearing to the Ball?" Hermione asked. "For colour-matching, you know."
"Yeah, I have..." Lily fumbled in her bag for a moment, pulling out a scrap of glittery silk, dyed a deep dark blue, a bit of the edge in a brighter red. Feeling and seeing the scrap of cloth had Lily imagining Blaise all dressed up and handsome, the blush on her face intensifying again.
"Oh good — it was rather last minute, I wasn't sure if you would have managed it in time. It took at least a week for Neville to get a sample back."
Liz blinked. "Neville? You're going with Neville?"
"Yes? Did I never mention that? When the Gryffindors were being given dance lessons, I said something about wondering what events like these were like — I had gone to some formal events and the like with my parents growing up, but I was quite young the last time, and they're hardly the same thing. He suggested we go together, and I thought, why not."
"...You know he has a crush on you, right?" Hermione was just thinking that Neville was being a good friend like, helping her experience a cultural event properly, and just keeping her company. Which, it was probably perfectly innocent on his part — Neville was possibly the least devious person on the face of the planet — but this still...seemed like the sort of thing Hermione should know. If only so she wasn't taken by surprise if something did come up, and also so she didn't lead Neville on too much, she guessed...
Hermione was a little startled, even rearing back in her seat a little. "What? No he doesn't. We're just going as friends, it's not—"
"Hermione." Giving her a flat look, Liz pointedly tapped the side of her own forehead. "He does. I wasn't going to say anything, you know, let him get to it in his own time. But, since you're going to the Ball together now, I thought it's probably better to tell you? I don't know..."
"Oh, well..." Hermione was rather taken aback, which was honestly sort of ridiculous — Liz still didn't know what the deal was with Hermione's low opinion of herself, it was very strange. She contemplated that for a moment, eyes on the ceiling, her hyperactive mind clicking away. "...I guess it can be a date, then. He should have said something — boys, honestly..."
Liz was sceptical whether girls were really any better about that than boys were, but it was possible that Liz herself being shitty at feelings was throwing her off. Besides, Liz was pretty sure Hermione was commenting on the stereotype itself — like, oh of course Neville is shite at this, everyone's only been telling him he's supposed to be for his whole life — so it's not like saying so would be telling Hermione anything she didn't already know.
"Do you like him, then? I did wonder..." Hermione might not have noticed that Neville had a crush on her, but Lily had — she'd been wondering for a while whether there was something going on there and they were just keeping it private, for whatever reason. Neville was a pureblood, and from one of the Most Ancient Houses at that, it wasn't out of the question.
Hermione shrugged. "Well, I don't know. How do you tell?"
Lily thought that was an extremely strange question — she froze, just staring at Hermione in bafflement, Liz failed to hold in a laugh.
A couple minutes later, they reached the end of the track near the train station. The three of them stalled for a minute, waiting for the carriages with the rest of the group to catch up, before hitching up their cloaks and stepping back out into the slow frigid rain. Assuming this shite kept up for a while, it was probably going to snow tonight, at least a little — too early in the year for it to stick on the ground through the day, but. They rushed into the village and toward the Three Broomsticks, some of the Hufflepuffs once nearly running into another group of students on the way. After taking a minute to shake the water off their cloaks, Susan quick introduced everyone to a woman with short, messy red hair, her face dotted with freckles, dressed in nondescript trousers, tunic, and cloak. This was Íde (Susan didn't offer a last name), she'd be their adult escort for the day. Speaking with a very noticeable Gaelic accent, Íde promised she wouldn't be getting in the way, she'd just be hanging around to make sure they got through their shopping trip alright — if they needed help with something they could ask, of course, but they could just go ahead and ignore her the whole time if they liked.
Susan didn't explicitly explain this, but Íde was a Hit Wizard, was technically on-duty as Susan's bodyguard...and today possibly also doubling as Liz's, come to think of it. Susan's mother(/aunt) was super important in the government, and had a career of angering dangerous people, so when Susan was out in public (without Amelia) she was usually escorted by a Hit Wizard or Auror, just in case. Besides, Liz guessed normal responsible adults might also have a problem with a whole bunch of young people going out alone, so someone probably would have insisted on a chaperone anyway — Íde could conveniently take care of that without any extra effort, so.
Anyway, Íde went off to hand Rosmerta a few coins for use of the floo, while the muggleborns who hadn't done it before were given some tips on how to use the bloody thing. Liz grimaced at the direction to avoid channelling any magic whatsoever — yeah, she realised now that how she was technically always channelling magic was why floo travel sucked so badly for her, but there wasn't really anything she could do about that. If you just followed the rules, the risks of a major accident were really low, less dangerous than travelling by car, just took a little getting used to. Right, so who's going first?
Liz volunteered, just to get it out of the way and to have some time to recover on the other side. She was a little surprised when Susan told her to floo to the international hub in Calais — so they were going somewhere on the Continent, apparently. There was some protest from the muggleborns, while Susan started explained how international travel worked on the magical side Liz just went ahead and left.
She didn't go straight to Calais, though, instead first heading to the keyport in London — Susan wouldn't have told her to go straight to Calais if she didn't know you could go that far in a trip, but Liz would rather take the Channel crossing in a single leg, thanks. Instead of going up the stairs into the rest of the keyport, Liz crossed the domestic floo hall to the outgoing hearths, and continued straight on to Calais. (The Channel crossing was, in fact, awful.) Even with Liz's stop in the middle, she got there well before anyone else, had to wait a couple minutes before familiar faces started spilling out of floo grates. Some of the muggleborns had a rough time of it, Imogen even stumbling and falling flat on her face, but at least they'd all gotten to the right place.
The international floo hub in Calais was set up so there were outgoing floos you could use without needing to go through customs, but they only connected to other international floo hubs. (No, Liz had no idea how the hell that worked, she assumed there must actually be multiple different interconnected networks.) Once they were all gathered again, Susan coached them on the pronunciation of the password for their next destination, which was apparently a keyport in Utrecht — so they were doing their dress shopping in Holland, alright then.
When she had the reading time to spare, Liz had been looking into the rest of magical Europe some (in part to prepare for her transfer to a school on the Continent), and Holland was...sort of an odd place. By the time Secrecy came around, Britain had been kind of a mess, having just been through a nasty series of civil wars — which then quickly turned into an even worse mess shortly after going into Secrecy — but at the same time the Dutch had actually been at the peak of their power and influence, despite being a tiny little country. They'd been big-time early capitalists, basically, had been one of the early empire-builders before England and France got their shite together. The transition to Secrecy had also gone relatively smoothly (at least compared to Britain), due to complicated negotiations with the muggle side of the government and various other people all over the world that hadn't been thoroughly explained in the book she'd read. There had been some economic and social issues for a time, but pretty mild compared to a lot of other European countries.
The Dutch had already had an early republican government before Secrecy, run by various noble and merchant families in a complicated system Liz hadn't paid much attention to, which had included magical families — the core of the early magical Dutch economy was formed around the wealth these families brought with them, along with whatever trade relationships they managed to hold on to. Of course, the stress of the transition only made these families even more influential than they'd been before, power calcifying in the hands of a relatively tiny number of people. Like in Britain, they did have guilds and stuff which had some degree of political power, and were a good way for commoners to make a pretty good living for themselves, but the country was ultimately run by the same handful of old, absurdly wealthy pureblood families who'd been in charge from the beginning.
So, they were sort of like Britain in that way, but they were also...kind of weird in other ways. Like, magical Britain's population was mostly rural — all the big families had their own estates scattered all over the place, and there were all kinds of communes and tiny little villages and the like — but magical Holland was super urban, their population concentrated in just a few cities. Britain did a fair bit of farming, growing food and potions ingredients and all kinds of shite on huge plots hidden from muggle eyes, but Holland was mostly in manufacturing, all kinds of shite being made in workshops packed with dozens and dozens of artisans sitting elbow to elbow, and also trade, big Dutch concerns running other business or shipping shite all over the world. Because of the high labour demand for all the shite they made, Holland actually had the highest proportion of immigrants of any ICW country, and a surprisingly large proportion of them were from outside the ICW, mostly sub-Saharan Africa or southern Asia.
Of course, since Holland was a shitty aristocratic government, these immigrants didn't have a whole lot in the way of prospects...but they mostly knew that coming in. According to Tamsyn, Holland was known internationally as a pretty decent place for poor people to go to get some good on-the-job training in one craft or another, which they could then bring home with them and turn into a proper career. Holland was aware of this, actually, and considered it a kind of serious problem — these people were basically committing a weird magical world form of industrial espionage, and one that Holland couldn't really do anything about. (Not so long as they needed to keep exploiting their labour, at least.) When some business in another country were very blatantly stealing Dutch designs, they would sometimes try to retaliate with trade sanctions, but that could often hurt Holland just as badly as whoever they were annoyed with, so that didn't actually happen very often. Mostly they just complained about it. Dutch enchanters and alchemists were constantly working on coming up with new shite to keep ahead of the game, the government offering all kinds of incentives to try to poach promising scholars from other countries...but then the workers they hired to make the new shite would bring that home with them too, so, they were basically treading water, doing everything they could to just barely keep their economy afloat.
Holland might be a pretty wealthy country, all things considered, but their situation was rather precarious. According to Tamsyn, all it would really take was one serious economic downturn, and the population would almost immediately revolt — and since they were all mostly concentrated in a handful of cities, it wouldn't take them very long to overthrow the vastly outnumbered noble families either. So long as the current system continued to make everyone happy, or at least comfortable, it would continue to run as smoothly as it had since Secrecy, but it was extremely fragile.
Of course, what with all the international trade bringing materials in and all the workshops packed into the city, Liz guessed Holland was actually a very good place to go clothes shopping on the magical side, if you were the sort of person who had the time and money for that to be practical. Probably better than Paris, actually, at least after the Revolution...
The floo hub was somewhat more old-fashioned-looking than most Liz had seen in foreign countries, made mostly out of red and white brick and a bunch of stained glass all over the place — tinting the light all kinds of overlapping colours, it was actually really pretty — but it was structured about the same. They didn't actually have to go through customs — Íde waved over one of the attendants, had a quick whispered conversation, and they were all funnelled through a back hall, Susan pausing only briefly to sign something. (She'd later explain that British nobility got certain special privileges in Holland, because of course.) They continued on to the domestic floo grates, and took a short hop to Amsterdam.
Liz didn't actually get a very good look at the city. It was also raining in Holland, it turned out, and somewhat heavier than back in Scotland — they rushed right from the public floo to where they'd be having lunch, hoods pulled up and heads ducked against the wind. The streets were paved with tightly-fitted brick in different colours, probably forming a subtle mosaic of some kind she couldn't make out with her head down, and that was really all she made out of their surroundings. Susan had set up a reservation ahead of time, and apparently, since they were bothering to go to a foreign country anyway, she'd decided to bring them somewhere they wouldn't really get back in Britain. And, what with Holland doing a lot of international trade and getting workers coming in from all over the world, they had a surprising variety of stuff available. Often not super nice places, sure, since the foreign people who might want foreign food were mostly working-class types — Liz was sure that there were restaurants serving foreign cuisine targeted at more wealthy people, but that wasn't the sort of place Susan brought them.
Even ducking her head against the rain Liz could see that the façades of the buildings on this street were extra colourful, her first impression on stepping inside the restaurant that it was very colourful and very loud. There were several lanterns hanging from the... Well, looking closer, Liz could see they weren't hanging from the ceiling, were actually just floating there — the light came from enchanting of some kind, steady and unwavering, the fixtures with panes of coloured glass and/or shaded with thin sheets of dyed paper, filling the room with a soft, multicoloured glow, playing with the colours in the room. The walls had all been painted, seemingly by hand, murals of scenes with a bunch of people or complicated buildings with a lot of domes and spires poking up and animals (some of which Liz thought were mythical), the whole thing finely-detailed and extremely busy, and completely incomprehensible to Liz. She assumed it was all depicting things that would be identifiable to people familiar with the culture it was from, but to Liz it was pretty but meaningless. The place was absolutely packed with people, wearing an eclectic mix of somewhat odd and old-fashioned but familiar Western dress (a lot like working-class types in magical Britain) right alongside very foreign-looking clothing Liz didn't even know the names for — generally following the same scheme of trousers and jackets and dresses, but cut differently and with swirly patterns embroidered into the cloth, and a lot of the women's dresses only covered one shoulder, which seemed cold for this weather. The patrons were mostly all Asian-looking, with only a few exceptions dotted here and there, their group alone probably tripling the total number of white people in the room. Oddly enough, they were sitting in clumps right on the floor, little dishes scattered around between them, Liz didn't know what was going on with that.
Hermione somehow managed to correctly guess, on her first try, that this was a Thai restaurant — something about the decoration had tipped her off, apparently.
(Liz would ask Tamsyn later, out of curiosity, and apparently there were a lot of people from southeast Asia in Holland, including Thai people. (There were multiple magical countries where Thai people were the primary ethnic group, so there was no one Thailand, it was complicated.) They tended to have a pretty high standard of living over there, actually, but they often didn't have free higher education, so some people saved up money after school so they could go somewhere else for a few years to pick up a trade, before coming back and starting a career and settling down and everything. China was a common destination, but a lot of them went to Arab countries or, yes, Holland. Which was an interesting thing to know, Liz guessed.)
Not long after stepping inside, while they were still peeling off cloaks and drying off (trying not to splatter anyone sitting nearby), they were met by who Liz guessed must be a waitress or hostess or something, and Liz honestly had a lot of trouble not staring. She was all pretty and smiling, of course, her skin a warm light brown, black hair held up with pins glittering gold — not real gold, Liz somehow knew, but not like that mattered — exposing her neck, some kind of cosmetic something making glittery little speckles around her eyes and over her cheeks. She was wearing some kind of two-piece thing, the top a sort of peach-ish colour wrapped around her body and cinched up over her left shoulder, leaving a long trailing thing...almost like a half-cape or something she guessed? the end of the hanging cloth decorated with little tassels fluttering next to her hip. Her right arm was left completely uncovered, skin unbroken all the way from her fingertips to her hairline on that side, which was, um. The skirt was white, with wandering lines in gold thread stitched all over the place — Liz was pretty sure some of those were words, but she couldn't read the script — hung low over her hips and reaching nearly to her ankles, showing some kind of cloth sandals glittering with beads. And Liz could tell it sat low over her hips because the hem of her top didn't reach all the way down, leaving about a hand span of her middle visible all the way around and...
She was super fucking pretty, that was all.
It took a short awkward moment to get them started — the woman greeting them didn't speak English, and both she and Susan could speak a little Dutch, but neither very well — but before very long they were being led through the dining room, weaving between the groups of people sitting eating and chatting. They were brought to a door in the back-right of the big room, which led into a much smaller dining room, with more of the super-colourful murals on the walls and one big complicated lantern overhead. Walking through the threshold, Liz shivered — the press of all the minds in the main dining room had just suddenly vanished. Susan was busy with the hostess, so Hannah explained that Seers were kind of a big deal in a lot of Asian countries, for complicated cultural reasons, they were more used to making accommodations for them than most European countries. (Liz might have actually guessed that, from talking to Padma, but she hadn't known whether that was particular to India or not.) They'd bothered calling ahead because they had a big group, yes, but also to tell them that they'd have a Seer with, so they could get a private room.
In fact, Liz couldn't understand the conversation, but she was sure the hostess asked Susan to point out the Seer for her. Susan introduced them, the hostess doing what Liz assumed was a polite gesture of some kind, putting her hands together and her head dipping a few degrees — which made Liz feel a little awkward, because she doubted she could even pronounce the woman's name (she was told it, but didn't even try, she'd just fuck it up) — and then asking, translated through Susan, if the room was comfortable enough. And it was, it was really quiet in here, even more than it should be with this many people — Liz assumed there must be some kind of dampening wards, it was pretty nice. The hostess and Susan had another quick exchange back and forth in slightly awkward-sounding Dutch, and then the woman was slipping away back through the door, leaving them to get settled in.
Lunch was very different than Liz (along with most of the rest of them) was used to, but not bad. Sitting on the floor was a little odd, but it was covered in thick soft rugs, and there were cushions and stuff — Liz guessed it might be a problem for older people, but for their group it wasn't a big deal. The arrangements made ahead of time had included ordering the food, so that was just brought out fifteen minutes or so after they showed up, a dozen little dishes laid out on a straw mat in the middle of the room. (Liz obviously thought the men bringing in the stuff weren't worth staring at like the hostess was, but she could tell by the way some of the girls were watching them that that was going to be a minority opinion in this group.) The hostess had come back with them, leaning rather close to say something that Liz probably wouldn't have understood even if she did speak Dutch. That the food Susan had ordered was Seer-safe, apparently — no cane sugar, only bought from ethical producers, blah blah — but Liz was very distracted, barely even heard her talking.
By the time the hostess was walking out again, Liz could feel the warmth on her face — she just silently glared back at the teasing comments. She was pretty, okay, couldn't help it...
The dishes were completely unfamiliar to Liz, for the most part. Like, she knew what rice was, obviously, and prawns just looked like prawns, but. The different dishes weren't meant for any specific person, just grab bits out of whatever looked good to you — they did all have their own little bowls, but she was pretty sure that was just to avoid making a mess. There were a lot of vegetables — a couple of the serving dishes even just had raw greens, though oddly some of them were herbs (she recognised the basil immediately) — and sauces in a variety of colours, some with stuff cooked in them, you know, grab some rice and some greens, mix in one of the sauces, experiment and have fun, not difficult to figure out. Though it wasn't quite properly authentic, apparently — Holland did enough international trade in all kinds of things that they could get some of the stuff they had back home, but not everything.
Still authentic enough that it would seem extremely foreign to most British mages, and was even a bit weird to the muggleborns too — in particular, Sally-Anne and Amber didn't get out much, and Mandy was extremely English sometimes. The only people in their group who seemed completely comfortable with the food were Hermione — her family had once gone on holiday in Vietnam, of all places, and apparently it was similar enough — and Susan and Hannah, surprisingly. Muggle Britain was rather more cosmopolitan than the magical side, so you'd think the magically-raised people would be less likely to be familiar with this stuff, but Hannah's mum was muggleborn — apparently she got very bored with magical British food, so she would bring the girls all kinds of interesting places all the time growing up. They'd even been to this exact restaurant once, two summers ago, so.
Somewhat embarrassingly, Hermione offered to taste-test things for her — there might not be cane sugar in anything here, but some Asian food was sweetened with other things. That was a kind of awkward thing to come out and say, with their friends all around, but whatever, Liz guessed she appreciated it anyway.
So, the food was different, yes, but it was super flavourful, and trying new things was always interesting. In fact, it was giving her ideas about using fresh herbs in stuff more, and this one sauce was really good, she might have to steal it. (The chilis might be hard to get in Britain, unfortunately, and what the hell even was coconut milk?) A couple of the girls in their group weren't enjoying it much, but Liz thought it'd been a good choice, at least.
The conversation was a lot less interesting than the food, honestly. There was some pretty basic getting-to-know-new-people stuff, which Liz always found tedious. All of the fourth-years knew each other, of course, and Chelsea knew Liz and Susan, and the Hufflepuffs had all at least seen each other around, but none of the non-Hufflepuff fourth-years had met Amber at all — Liz had seen her around at duelling club meetings, but she didn't think they'd ever said a single word to each other — and Imogen was completely new to all of the fourth-years. Besides that, there was some talk about food and different magical countries and stuff (including why there were an oddly large proportion of foreigners in Holland), which was interesting enough...but they quickly moved into talking about the Yule Ball, which was less interesting. Liz didn't know what else she'd expected, since the Ball was kind of why they were all here in the first place, but it was still boring as hell.
All of the girls here had a date, of course — a couple of them, like Lily, were only going at all because someone had asked them. Most of them were going with new people they hadn't been seeing before they'd been asked to the Ball, the only exceptions being Susan and Hannah, Liz herself, and also Imogen, who was dating Cameron Peakes, apparently. (Liz hadn't known about that, but she also didn't care.) Talking about who they were going with immediately led into gossip about boys, and who they knew was going with who, and it was all extremely tedious. Liz just ignored most of it, focussing on her food. She hardly participated at all...and honestly, one of the few times she did she probably should have just kept her mouth shut.
"Isn't Dorea going?" Sophie asked, when it came up that Dorea was actually going back home for the holiday. (They'd been going through what they knew of the plans everyone in their year had, because people could be ridiculous sometimes.) "I thought she was asked by Dylan Smethwyck."
Amber blurted out, "Dylan, really?" As eyes flicked to her, Amber hunched down a little, her face pinking — hadn't meant to do that, apparently. Because Liz was a cheating mind mage, she knew Amber thought Smethwyck was really fanciable, and was surprised he was seemingly asking out fourth-years.
"Yes...? Just a week ago, I think."
Shaking her head, Mandy said, "She turned him down. I don't know why, she was really awkward about it when I asked, changed the subject."
"Yeah, I did wonder about that," Hermione said. "She seemed very flattered that he asked her — he is rather nice, I suppose—" There were flashes of bemusement from multiple directions for Hermione calling a boy who was apparently one of the more popular in the school simply rather nice. (Liz didn't pay attention to these things, but she guessed she had overheard gossip about Smethwyck now and then...) "—but she wouldn't answer any questions about it. It was quite peculiar, really."
"She's scared of Gail." It wasn't until she felt the eyes on her that Liz realised she'd said that out loud. "Um, that came out wrong. I mean, she's scared of being Gail — you know, getting pregnant like an idiot and dropping out of school."
A few of the girls glanced at each other, the air around her twisting with confusion. "...She knows that potions exist, right?"
Liz shrugged. She hadn't bothered learning those, because why would she need to — though she had copied down notes for one to abort a pregnancy, just in case one of her friends needed it — but she was aware there were a few different contraceptive potions floating around. There were also charms, but you might forget those in the heat of the moment, the potions were usually considered more reliable for that reason. "Also, I'm pretty sure you don't need to shag a chap to go to a bloody school dance together, but I'm hopelessly gay, so what do I know." There were a few giggles at that, because, as Liz had just demonstrated with the hostess maybe a half hour ago, "hopelessly gay" was in fact a good description.
Susan grinned across the not-table, gave Liz an exaggerated wink. "What's the point of getting all prettied up nice if you're not getting laid?" Hannah gave her a playful shove, nearly knocking her right into Chelsea's lap, the group erupting with giggles and comments overlapping too much to pick out, Liz just grimaced at the noise and turned back to her food.
She was pretty sure the point of getting all prettied up nice was that it was just fun by itself, but Liz could be weirdly girly sometimes, so she just let the conversation move on around her without saying anything. (Besides, Susan had obviously been joking, so that'd be a silly thing to do.) Honestly, she really didn't like the actual shopping part, especially letting herself be poked at by strangers to do the fitting properly, but she did like getting dressed up in pretty shite. The few things she needed to get prettied up for she'd mostly hated, of course, but that part was nice. She couldn't say why, just, one of those things, you know.
It didn't occur to her until a few minutes afterward that she'd just shared something private about Dorea, that she only knew in the first place because she'd accidentally seen it in her head. Oops? Sure, just, not being ready to do dating and stuff would be obvious from the outside — and wasn't worth making a fuss about, plenty of people their age weren't — but the specific bit of being weirdly paranoid about fucking up like her mum had wasn't something someone would just guess. That was probably the sort of thing Liz shouldn't tell people, she hadn't thought about it, it'd just happened. Oh well, too late to do anything about it now...
Anyway, blah blah, conversation going in circles, Liz only paying attention sometimes. (She was getting better at talking to people in small groups without being super weird and neurotic about it, but this was too big and messy for her.) Eventually they were mostly finished eating, and they transitioned into talking about the plan for the day. Susan had called ahead for this too, they'd be expected — that was just the polite thing to do when you had a group of eleven people who all needed fancy formalwear shite. There'd be display pieces hanging out, and seamstresses wandering around who could answer questions about specific things, Susan and Hannah would help them put together something that would work for them, and then they'd be handed off to the seamstresses for the measuring and fitting part. They'd only be able to do two to maybe four at a time, so, they'd probably be at the shop for a while (which was another reason it was polite to call ahead). It was possible they'd need to go to a second store, for shoes and the like, but if they needed, like, jewellery and shite, Susan recommended going somewhere in Charing or Edinburgh instead — the stuff around where they were going would probably be too expensive. Or they could just use whatever muggle stuff they had access to, it's not like anyone would be able to tell the difference.
After Susan had outlined the general plan, Liz made her offer to pay for everything with a single draft note, just to streamline the process, everyone could pay her back for it later — if it ended up going over the money they had on her, or they didn't have enough leftover for shoes or whatever, that was fine, call it a Christmas gift. (Amber and Imogen initially assumed that they weren't included in the offer, since they were practical strangers, Liz had to clarify that she was paying for the whole group with a single cheque for them to get it — it wasn't like Liz cared.) There was plenty of disbelief and confusion going around the group, but Susan just smirked back at her, said sure, they'd give her an itemised list of everything, and that did sound like a less messy way to take care of it. Susan didn't say out loud that she'd planned on doing the same thing herself — without the bit about the difference counting as a Christmas gift, just sort of trusting that people would pay her back eventually (Hufflepuffs) — but Liz had offered first, and it'd be silly to argue about it.
As Susan agreed to Liz's plan, Hannah gave her a glance, her mind simmering with confusion and concern — it turned out Susan had offered to pay for Hannah's things in the first place, since the Abbotts weren't exactly rolling in gold. Gently, just at the very edge of her mind, Liz pressed in, It's okay, Susan and I will be quiet about it. Hannah blinked, turning to stare wide-eyed at Liz. After a couple seconds, her lips flickered with a somewhat uncomfortable smile, she nodded back at Liz. It seemed that Hannah was a little embarrassed about her much wealthier girlfriend buying her dress for the event — kind of like Lily, but the money coming from her girlfriend gave it an extra layer of awkwardness — apparently all she'd needed was the reassurance that Liz would handle it tactfully. Mind magic made it really easy to silently coordinate things without anyone around noticing, but she guessed she couldn't blame normal people for not thinking of that.
So, that was two people's things for the Yule Ball she was probably going to end up paying for now. Not a big deal, it wasn't like she couldn't afford it, just saying, wouldn't have seen that coming.
Before too long they were done talking about that, Susan scrawled out a draft note to pay for lunch, and they were on their way.