A/N: Heeeeyyyyy… how've y'all been? I know it's been almost five months since I updated this story- but I'M STILL ALIVE, and there is never a day where I'm not thinking about Rose, Scorpius, and their story.
I wish I could give you a longer chapter after not updating for so long, but it just didn't work out that way this time around :/.
Another thing to note about this chapter is that it doesn't necessarily "continue" the plot, or begin where the last chapter left off-though it does definitely add to the story as a whole! ! So in a way, this chapter really is a bit of a filler…
BUT at the same time, it isn't in that it offers significant insight into Rose and Scorpius' relationship at Hogwarts.
The next chapter (which will definitely come sooner than five months I PROMISE), will pick up from where Chapter Nine left off, and will be set in the "present day."
Thank you to everyone who has read/reviewed this story so far, and has continued to follow it despite my slow updates.
Please R/R!
Love,
Everlasting Faerie Light
—January 24th, 2023 - Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Sixth Year—
Rose couldn't see anything.
Which was rather alarming given that she was almost one hundred percent positive that her eyes were open.
A few disorienting seconds passed before the dizziness slammed against her head like a sledgehammer, and a strangled gasp escaped the redhead's lips.
Her chest constricted violently, the beginnings of a full-blown panic attack creeping up her esophagus.
Why can't I fucking see?
The sound of her own labored breathing filled her eardrums. Rose blinked, desperately pleading with the gods for her vision be restored.
But all she saw was darkness.
Her shallow breaths transformed into hoarse, strangled cries of panic. She attempted to move her limbs, but they were as heavy as lead.
Was she dreaming?
Did she die in her sleep?
Had she officially dissolved into nothingness?
If not, then why couldn't she see?
She just needed to see.
If she could only fucking see—
"Weasley?"
The sound of a sharp voice enunciating her last name broke the spell.
As if someone had oh-so-casually flipped a light switch, Rose could suddenly see everything all at once.
The first thing her eyes took in was a vast, black sky littered with a dazzling array of stars.
The second thing that came into existence was the shimmering surface of the black lake, its rippling waves reflecting the intricate constellations that dotted the heavens.
The third thing that came to fruition was a pair of cold, silver eyes slicing into her with the intensity of a thousand suns. And the boy that those eyes belonged to, who happened to be standing right in front of her, a bewildered expression on his otherwise stoic face.
Why the fuck am I standing at the shore of the black lake with the likes of Scorpius Malfoy?
All of the sudden, Rose wished that she couldn't see again.
Everything was too vibrant, too disorienting, too intense, too much.
A violent ringing filled her ears, and all she could comprehend was the utter dizziness that seemed to engulf her vision, distorting everything into a nonsensical blur of colors.
And then she saw nothing but darkness once more.
*CRACK*
Scorpius Malfoy grunted as Rose Weasley's enclosed fist made direct contact with his face. He stumbled backwards from the blow; his nose was definitely broken.
Malfoy couldn't help but emit a dark chuckle as he regained his balance, his hand reaching up to carefully prod his demolished nasal cavity. His fingertips were immediately soaked in blood.
This had to be the… oh, he wanted to say the twentieth time the crazy bitch had broken his nose in their five and a half years of coexistence.
Malfoy had little time to recover, however, for in her current state of mania, Rose kept swinging relentlessly, her usually sharp blue eyes glazed over in what looked like terror.
"Argh—-fuck! Weasley!"
Malfoy held his arms up in an attempt to shield himself from her relentless striking. He felt like they were entangled in some sort of twisted dance as a series of strangled cries escaped her lips in sync with her close-fisted blows, many of which managed to hit their target.
He could tell that something wasn't quite right.
Scorpius Malfoy was definitely accustomed to Rose Weasley's bouts of violent hysteria, especially when it was aimed at him—
But this was different.
The usual malice that stained those cold, calculating blue eyes of hers was missing.
In fact— Malfoy was almost positive that Rose Weasley was barely brushing the brink of consciousness.
Emitting another ungodly screech that permeated the dark space around them, Rose blindly hurled herself at the blonde teen, only to trip over a thick, gnarled tree root sticking up out of the ground.
Malfoy used this opportunity to grab hold of Rose's swinging wrists, his iron-like grip effectively preventing her from falling on her face while also restraining the flailing witch.
"Weasley," he barked her surname in a clear, commanding tone.
Though Malfoy was strong for his build and age, he had to admit that Rose Weasley put up quite the fight as she unconsciously squirmed against his unrelenting grip.
No surprise there— she is a beater after all.
She tried kicking him, spitting at him, even biting at the bare skin of his forearms, her fingers curling and uncurling in agitation as he squeezed the life out of her small wrists. But Malfoy refused to let her go, lest she go back to striking him repeatedly— or worse— striking herself in such a state.
Given their sordid history, Malfoy knew that he shouldn't care whether or not the abusive bitch beat herself to a bloody pulp in her sleep.
But as he looked at the bane of his existence, her red mess of curls falling into her glazed over eyes, her freckled lips curled into a feral snarl, her wildly escalating heartbeat thrumming against the skin of his fingers—
—he knew that he couldn't just leave her here alone.
Just like she couldn't leave him alone in that blood-stained bathroom stall last week.
Why did she stay with me?
"You need to wake up."
Just as the words rolled off of his sharp tongue, Rose jerked herself free from Malfoy's grasp, the aggressive motion causing her to lose balance and fall backwards onto the uneven earth.
It was the sharp impact of the ground against her spine that brought the barely-conscious Weasley back to the land of the living.
Rose could see the stars once again.
An inky black sky dotted with pinpoints of brilliant light- a swirling, endless vortex that threatened to swallow her whole.
She blinked once. Twice. Three times.
So many stars.
And they were spinning.
She was spinning.
Once she could feel the heaviness of her limbs and the consistent twisting in her gut, Rose immediately rolled over on her stomach and proceeded to vomit all over the icy ground.
"I may not be your healer, but I don't think hypnosis is treating you very well."
To Rose's surprise, the distinct sound of Malfoy's condescending voice seemed to stop the world from spinning.
She forced herself to look away from her pool of sick and up at the blonde boy, his face covered in blood.
Why is he covered in blood?
"Go fuck yourself," she hissed venomously before rolling back over and slowly repositioning herself so that she sat upright.
An amused smirk graced Malfoy's pale features.
Sometimes… just sometimes—- he found Rose Weasley's blatant callousness endearing.
It was just so… familiar somehow.
"Go fuck myself? What a novel idea," he replied with a sarcastic drawl, marred by a heavy lisp that came with his shattered nasal cavity. "I've already got plenty of beautiful women to do that for me, but thanks for the suggestion anyways, Weasel-bee."
Malfoy winced at the all-too-familiar, but intense pain that spread across his face. He whipped out his wand and pointed it at his nose, uttering a quiet "Episkey!" under his breath.
Rose blinked a few times, slowly coming to terms with the fact that she was outside by the black lake in the middle of an extremely cold January night wearing nothing but her pyjamas.
With none other than Scorpius Malfoy.
Why the fuck do we always catch each other at our worst moments?
As if suddenly aware of the frigid temperature against her skin, she started to tremble violently.
And as the cold seeped through the thin fabric of her pyjamas with a relentless ferocity. Rose felt herself falling further and further into a pit of shame and embarrassment.
These sleepwalking spells were getting progressively worse.
So much so that she actually managed to exit the castle unnoticed and wander the grounds fully unconscious.
Malfoy was right about one thing-
Hypnosis was not treating her very well.
As the thought crossed her ever-swirling brain, Rose bristled and immediately shot the still-smirking Malfoy an accusatory glare.
"How the fuck do you know about my hypnosis treatment?" she snapped at him, her eyes flashing dangerously as she beheld the boy with blood all over his face.
Malfoy shrugged nonchalantly. "When my mum got sick the first time, she underwent hypnosis as a treatment for two years to help with the anxiety attacks. I am all too familiar with the side effects- sleepwalking and vomiting are dead giveaways, and you seem to do a lot of both."
Rose's guard immediately melted away, her next scathing insult dying on her freckled lips.
Choppy, yet crystal clear memories from last week's night-time run-in with Malfoy flooded her brain- the bathroom stall with the bloody fingerprints, the wild look of pain on his pale face, the surprising warmth of his body as she held him close to her, the strangely electric silence that cut through the grief hat hung so heavily around them…
She had an odd impulse to ask him if he was alright. She wanted to ask him If he needed anything- as if Scorpius Malfoy wanting anything from the likes of Rose fucking Weasley was a normal concept.
As if Rose Weasley comforting Scorpius Malfoy was the most natural thing in the world.
She wondered if him being out at this secluded edge of the black lake by himself in the middle of a frigid winter night had anything to do with his mother's recent death.
She wondered how he had been handling his grief this past week-if he consistently smashed his knuckles against the inside of bathroom stalls until they were black, blue, and bleeding.
She wondered if he cried himself to sleep every night.
Or if he managed to sleep at all.
Did he open up about his grief to his best mates? To his soulless bitch of a girlfriend? Or did he let his grief stew deep within his frigid heart before unleashing it in the dead of night when no one was looking?
She remembered how he melted into her arms— how she could feel the warmth of his skin deep through the fabric of her clothing, how his erratic heartbeat slowed to an even pulse the longer she held him…
… how he seemed to just fit there so perfectly, his presence seeping through and smoothing out the ragged cracks that tainted the dark silence around them like a warm flame.
"Why the fuck is there blood all over your face?" Rose spat out instead, inwardly scolding herself for wanting to ask Malfoy such awkwardly personal questions. "Did you challenge the whomping willow and lose?"
She hoped that she sounded scathing enough to uphold her reputation as a ruthless bitch. This was Malfoy after all.
But then again… he did just wake her up from a very deep sleepwalking episode before watching her vomit all over the place like a sick dog.
Maybe her ruthless bitch reputation didn't mean shit to Malfoy anymore.
Maybe it never did in the first place.
Dignity be damned (at least for now), Rose really was curious as to what sort of explanation he would give regarding his current physical state.
Malfoy laughed out loud at the suspicious look etched on her freckled face.
The sinister, yet oddly velvety sound made the hairs on Rose's arms stand on end.
"You went berserk like the bloody banshee you are, and broke my nose in your beauty sleep," he shot at her in a voice mixed with both bitterness and mirth.
Malfoy couldn't help it. He was actually amused by Rose-psychotic-cunt-Weasley and her ability to thoroughly destroy his face while completely unconscious.
It just seemed so - in character for her.
Rose blinked a few times before pulling her knees up to her chest and wrapping her arms around her folded legs, her lips twisting into a wicked smile.
She couldn't help it.
Despite how fucked up this situation was regarding her overall health and well-being; and the fact that the universe had once again thrown her and Scorpius bane-of-her-existence Malfoy into some fever dream-like predicament that resulted in them being oddly amicable with each other- Rose was also amused.
"Oh come now, Malfoy," she mused, resting her chin on top of her folded knees, her head tilted ever so slightly to the side as she gazed at her so-called arch nemesis. "Don't act like you didn't deserve it."
"I never do," Malfoy deadpanned in response, his sharp silver eyes narrowing in on the curly-haired redhead.
He noted how prominent the dimples on her freckle-blasted cheeks were— how they made their presence known even with the smallest of smiles.
A dark smirk formed on his lips.
"I'm just a victim of your violent projections."
It was Rose's turn to throw her head back and laugh out loud.
Not just at Malfoy's ridiculous "I'm-the-victim-*sob*" claims, but also at the absurdity of this whole clusterfuck of an interaction.
Maybe she was still asleep, and this was just another strange dream.
"You're so full of shit," she managed to choke out through her peals of laughter.
"If you're the victim here, then my name is Gellert Fucking Grindelwald. You enjoy fighting with me and you damn well know it."
There was a beat of silence in which Malfoy met Rose's condescending stare. His blood-stained cheeks somehow increased the wickedness of his smile.
Her accusation was affirmed by the mischievous glint in his steely gray eyes as they engulfed her whole.
He really does enjoy fighting with me. The motherfucker.
The tension hanging in the cold winter air seemed to thicken considerably, and Rose couldn't help the plethora of butterflies— no, moths mercilessly skittering about her stomach.
"As you probably already know, Weasley…" Malfoy started with a coy tilt of his head. His voice was calm and collected, yet possessed a sinister undertone that left Rose's skin crawling.
"I very well could have left you out here all alone in the cold so that you could beat yourself to a bloody pulp in your sleep, or better get, drown in the black lake. Either scenario seems entirely feasible given the years of bad karma you've racked up from purposely breaking so many bones that aren't your own, don't you think?"
Rose scowled at him, her wild curls resembling fiendfyre.
"Go choke on a dick, Malfoy."
"Mind your manners, Weasel-bee. Is that any way to talk to the person who saved you from a well-deserved, self-inflicted doom?"
He was taunting her.
She could see it in his evil smile, in the way his head was tilted oh-so-innocently to the side, in the way he mockingly blinked his charcoal grey eyes at her, in the way he smugly crossed his arms and held himself— as if he was superior to her in every way possible.
As if he were the dominant enemy in this rivalry.
Rose was infuriated.
And, oddly enough, exhilarated.
"Says the arrogant piece of shit who just had his sorry arse handed to him by a sleepwalking bitch half his size. I wouldn't be talking about other people's 'bad karma' with a family history as fucked as yours."
The words rolled off of her tongue like poisonous honey.
His smile twisted into a grimace at her words.
"Pulling the 'family name' card already, eh? How unoriginal. And pathetic. I expected better from you, Weasel."
"What's pathetic is you rudely waking me up from my blissful slumber and then sticking around even after I smashed your fucking face in just so that you can insult me. You're a fucking mental case, Malfoy."
"Blissful slumber?" Malfoy snorted as mirth flooded his face. "If that was you 'blissfully slumbering,' then I'd hate to see you have a rough night. I feel sorry for your dorm mates."
Rose slammed her fists against the cold earth on either side of her, a tidal wave of anger quickly building in her bosom.
"What the fuck do you want from me? Why are you still even here?!"
Malfoy laughed humorlessly, the mirth on his face steadily slipping away. He swiftly uncrossed his arms, letting them fall to his sides, before taking a few steps towards Rose.
"If I weren't here, there is a very good chance that you would have broken several of your own bones, or you know— died."
Rose couldn't help but flinch ever so slightly at his sudden close proximity. She hoped that he didn't notice.
"Why do you even give a fuck?" she growled, suddenly unable to make direct eye contact with him.
"I could ask you the same question," he countered quickly.
"What are you even talking about?"
"Last week. When you found me in the bathroom."
Rose's stomach dropped to her knees.
So it wasn't a dream after all.
She honestly didn't think that Malfoy would have the balls to bring it up.
"What about it?"
Her voice shook ever so slightly.
Again, she hoped that he didn't notice.
"Why did you stay?"
He asked the question simply and directly— with just the mildest hint of curiosity lingering beneath his voice.
Despite the chill that lingered in the January air, Rose felt a violent rush of heat flood her cheeks.
How was she supposed to answer that?
Hell, she wasn't even sure if she knew the answer to that question.
Why did she stay behind to comfort Scorpius Malfoy? Why did she envelop him in her arms so tenderly? So naturally?
Fuck.
"I'm not daft. I can tell when it's unsafe for a person to be left alone."
She managed to sound nothing more than annoyed; but Rose could hear her heartbeat thrumming violently against her eardrums.
Though there was truth behind her answer, she knew that there was so much more behind the dream-like embrace they shared last week while the rest of the world slept.
She just didn't know what.
Malfoy smirked.
"When have you ever given a fuck about my safety?"
Rose gritted her teeth. Leave it to the pretentious arsehole to completely flip the script on her.
"I asked you first," she retorted stubbornly. "When have you ever given a fuck about my safety, Malfoy?"
He shrugged.
"I never have. But I guess I was feeling like a good samaritan tonight. Or maybe I was just trying to get even with you. I don't really know yet."
"Get even with me?"
"You stayed with me, so now I stay with you."
"Why would you want to get even with me?"
"I would literally rather die than be indebted to you, Weasley."
Rose was caught off guard by how much his words actually stung.
How strange.
She tore her sharp blue eyes away from his silhouette, and instead studied the star-kissed surface of the black lake.
If she squinted her eyes hard enough, Rose could trick herself Into thinking she was falling through space— peacefully, weightlessly, devoid of all emotion.
"I never expected you to return the favor, Malfoy."
Her voice was barely above a whisper.
Despite there being no real logical reason for it, Rose's heart felt heavy.
How strange, indeed.
Malfoy gaze was fixated on her— his eyes outlined her silhouette over and over again, drinking in the way the opalescent starlight cascaded over her abundant mess of red curls.
He felt something stir in the deep recesses of his chest.
But he didn't have the time, nor the energy to come to terms with this certain something.
That characteristic smirk reappeared on his face.
"How very generous of you; hypnosis seems to be working after all."
Rose couldn't tell if he was taunting her or not.
But Malfoy was somewhat correct in his observation.
Hypnosis was working for Rose in that she was significantly less prone to violent, rage-fueled outbursts than she was in previous years.
But the constant sleepwalking, the nausea, the vomiting, the night terrors—
It almost wasn't worth it.
Keyword: almost.
Rose sniffed, a rather glum expression clouding her usually sharp features. Her blue eyes flitted down to the frost-bitten rocks jutting from the earth.
"Contrary to popular belief, I'm not an absolute monster."
She hated how her voice shook ever so slightly— how a note of uncertainty tainted the words tumbling from her freckled lips.
Malfoy's smirk never left his face— though it softened considerably.
"I wouldn't consider my beliefs popular," he mused with an air of mirth.
Rose's gaze snapped back up to the boy she usually hated with a burning passion.
She quirked an eyebrow.
"And what the bloody hell is that supposed to mean?"
"I don't think that you're a monster."
He said it quietly— as if the words were meant only for her.
There was something intimate about the way the statement rolled off his tongue— gentle, almost. Completely devoid of its usual bite.
Sincere.
That's the word she was looking for.
Rose's heart skipped a beat.
She immediately went back to studying the earth around her, determined to look at absolutely anything but Scorpius Malfoy.
Through the violent heat that erupted below the surface of her freckled cheeks, Rose's usually sharp mind desperately searched for some sort of witty, or at least socially appropriate response.
But she was drawing a blank.
The silence was almost deafening, broken only by the sound of a distant stream flowing into the black lake.
The air around them was electric.
They could both feel the hairs on the back of their necks stand on end.
Malfoy cleared his throat, a small chuckle simultaneously escaping his lips.
He ran a blood-stained hand through his blonde locks, his lips once again curling into an amused smile.
"Though… I do admit that your resemblance to a banshee is uncanny at times."
Rose couldn't help it.
She laughed out loud.
For once, it was a rich, warm laugh, completely devoid of malice or sarcasm. It melted across the space between the two teens like a mixture of velvet and caramel—rich and fluid in its timbre.
Malfoy noted that when Rose Weasley laughed— actually laughed, the sharpness in her blue eyes disappeared, only to be replaced by a soft, yet vibrant twinkle.
His mouth had suddenly gone dry.
After she recovered, Rose fixed the blonde with an amused expression, a mischievous smirk playing on her lips.
"Banshee my arse. Everybody knows that I'm actually a harpy. Or a veela stuck in its bird form."
"Speaking of veela," chimed Malfoy, fluidly changing the direction of the conversation. "Your cousin Dominique has really been laying it on thick these past few weeks."
Rose bristled at his sudden change of topic.
Her cousin was an ignorant, self-absorbed bitch with big tits and an uncanny lack of respect for both herself and everyone around her. It was no secret that she had been trying to get into Scorpius Malfoy's trousers for the last two years.
Keyword: trying.
"When is she not?" she snapped with an eye roll.
Rose didn't have a problem with slags, nor did she believe in slut-shaming, but Dominique Weasley was about as classless and embarrassing as one could get.
"She's been doubling down, and it's creating unwanted attention. If you tell her to back off, she might actually listen," he responded with a shrug. "Plus, Al is about ready to hex me, and Octavia is about ready to kill her."
She fixed Malfoy with an icy glare.
"If that disgusting piece of trash you call a fucking girlfriend lays one finger on my cousin, I will gut that bitch. I fucking mean it, Malfoy. You better keep her in check."
If there was someone that Rose disliked even more than Scorpius Malfoy himself (despite their rather amicable interactions as of late), it was Octavia Montague.
Everything about Malfoy's less-than-faithful, pureblood girlfriend made her blood run cold.
There was something very wrong with Montague. Rose could literally feel it in her gut every time she so much as glanced at her.
And she wasn't the only one.
Albus hated her too.
Instead of defending the supposed love-of-his-life, or reacting in anger at Rose's threatening insults, Scorpius Malfoy smirked.
"I've already received an earful of threats from Al regarding Octavia. I can assure you both that she won't lay a finger on your cousin."
He sounded so confident, so sure of himself.
Rose couldn't help but feel comforted by his words.
But she couldn't afford to let the sod know that.
So instead of dropping the matter, she pressed on with a stubbornness that could only be rivaled by her father's.
"And you, you fucking ponce. If you so much as breathe in Dominique's direction, I will stick my wand so far up your—"
"We've already been over this, Weasley," said Malfoy, gracefully cutting her off. "You already know that I won't go anywhere near your cousin."
Rose shut her mouth.
Once again, she found herself believing him.
Unfortunately for Dominique "cum-dumpster" Weasley, Albus made it very clear to both Malfoy and Zabini that when it came to dating, shagging, and/or anything in between, all of his female family members were off-limits— a boundary that both of his best mates adamantly respected.
Despite the general distrust she held for him, Rose highly doubted that he would betray Al's trust.
A beat of silence passed, and Rose, once again, suddenly found it very hard to maintain eye contact with Malfoy.
Why does my heart feel like this?
Why did it feel like it would pop out of her chest at any second? That it would rip through the confines of her ribcage and explode?
She dared a glance at Malfoy, and was suddenly slammed with an overwhelming sense of deja-vu.
He caught her eye, and the softest of smiles graced his lips.
"Funny isn't it?" he mused.
"What's funny?" Rose inquired breathlessly.
"That under times of great distress, we have a knack for running into each other. And here of all places. It's… uncanny, to say the least."
And in that exact moment, Rose came to terms with her surroundings for the first time since she regained consciousness.
She immediately looked over her shoulder, and could make out the familiar silhouette of the crabapple tree, its gnarled, twisting branches bathed in starlight. The stream, whose current was heavy from snowmelt, glistened merrily as it cut a crevice in the earth before dispersing into the black lake.
Rose could almost see a slightly younger Scorpius Malfoy leaning against the trunk of the tree with dark circles under his eyes.
Perpetually miserable.
Once again, she wondered if this was all some odd, nonsensical fever dream that came as a result of her hypnosis and inconsistent sleeping patterns.
This can't be real.
The sudden sound of feet shuffling against earth caught Rose's attention.
She turned her head to look back at Malfoy.
He sat on the frost-bitten earth facing her, legs crossed and palms resting on his knees.
There was an unreadable expression on his face, but his charcoal grey eyes shimmered with an intensity that made Rose's breath hitch.
"What are you doing?" she asked with a guarded voice.
He smirked in response.
"Sitting."
"Why?"
"My legs were getting tired."
Rose scowled.
What an insufferable prick.
"I thought you were leaving," she growled in response- though her voice lacked the usual venom she reserved only for him.
He shrugged nonchalantly. "You thought wrong."
Rose stared at him with a hard expression on her face, her lips pressed together in a flat line.
Maybe if she pinched herself hard enough, she'd wake up from this strange, never-ending dream that seemed to repeatedly jump between the realms of fantasy and reality.
Malfoy tilted his head ever so slightly to the side, the intensity of his silver gaze unrelenting.
"Unless you want me to leave."
His voice was almost expressionsless.
Key word: almost.
"No."
Rose's heart was beating so furiously against her eardrums that she almost didn't hear herself speak.
"Please stay."
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