Hello, all! We are transitioning to spring here in Illinois (still time for it to turn to 'second winter', truthfully, but fingers crossed it doesn't) and it is quite amazing the improvement warmer weather and sunny skies will do for a person's mood. Every update, we get closer and closer to the start of the tournament and I cannot even begin to explain my excitement.
I re-read this chapter 100 times, so if there's any errors, it's just because I'm blind. Sorry. Also, FF is not sending me emails, so if any of you reach out to me personally, I swear I am not ignoring you LOL. I have to check everything when I log in which is typically only once a week. I appreciate you all though!
Bookcozy: You are a saint as always! I remember how exhausted I was in college and I'm assuming OWL year would be similar in terms of stress given how much pressure they put on them. The transition to that level of work is the hardest part, honestly. Harry didn't care all that much about his as far as I remember, so it's a bit different to write from Nessa's perspective. Granted, Harry had other things to be concerned about as well LOL. And George…I just love him. The rockiness of their bickering is ending VERY soon (not this chapter though haha.) The tournament is SO CLOSE.
Chapter Thirteen
A week later brought an increased tension among all residents of the castle. The castle was cleaner than Nessa had ever seen it, the floors and ceilings sparkling so much that it almost made Nessa uncomfortable to walk on them. The portraits were still very upset at the deep cleaning they'd received, and flinched away from Filch any time that he passed by them with a bucket of soapy water or a bottle of cleaning product in hand.
The students were chattering excitedly about the new students that would be flooding their halls soon. Debates about where each school would sit at mealtimes, or if they spoke very good English, or if they learned the same subjects as them. Some of them had taken to asking professors if they knew of how many students would be visiting and for how long, if they knew what the tasks would be, how the judge picked a champion. The teachers were not particularly forthcoming with this information.
On the contrary, the teachers appeared to be just as tense as the rest of them. They were relying heavily on the prefects to help get the castle ready for the arrival of their foreign peers, and showing them around the castle. They'd had an hour-long meeting about it in the prefects' lounge the Wednesday before the delegations were set to arrive, going over specifics and trying to figure out who would help on which occasions. The language barrier between them and the delegations proved to make Tyler and Bethany a bit nervous, but some of the prefects traveled enough that they were familiar with French, Russian, or German in some capacity. Nessa had refrained from advising that she knew French — it was a rough understanding only because she'd found a copy of Les Miserables on her relative's bookshelf and had tried to teach herself how to read it. Harry had thought her very odd for trying to learn it, but she'd been so bored last summer that she had little else to do, and Hermione had been more than happy to help her with some of the phrases she'd learned while she'd been on holiday with her own parents in France.
As far as Russian and German went though, she was entirely useless. The Durmstrang students seemed to appeal to the interest of everyone more than the Beauxbatons delegations. Beauxbatons and Hogwarts had similar teachings and a healthy rivalry as far as Nessa could tell, but Durmstrang was something else entirely. They accepted a mix of students from several countries — classes were taught in English, supposedly, but there was a mixture of languages spoken by the students in the school. Beauxbatons spoke primarily French. Durmstrang was also well-known for being prejudiced —- they did not accept Muggle-borns within the school grounds at all — and they placed a heavy influence on the Dark Arts while they taught. It was not something Nessa found particularly interesting, but the Slytherins seemed almost giddy at the prospect of meeting people of like minds.
As far as Nessa was concerned, they could keep them.
The professors had also been so stressed about the appearance of their school that they'd become harsher and harsher in classes. Professor Sprout had asked one of the Hufflepuff fifth year students to refrain from advising that they could not distinguish their own hand from a carrot when feeding a Chinese Chomping Cabbage. Snape had been viciously insulting anyone who could not get their Draught of Peace to change from orange to white, stating that even a first-year Durmstrang student would be able to manage to brew this particular potion. This was highly unlikely as far as Nessa was concerned — she'd brewed a few for Madam Pomfrey when they'd been going over potions to help with different levels of anxiety. It had taken her four times to get the Potion right herself, and she had no issues brewing perfect potions under the worst of conditions.
It took a great deal of effort on her part to avoid snapping at him. Her anxiety was getting worse and worse by the day, and the snippiness of her professors was of no help to her. Madam Pomfrey had noticed it the night before and given her a vial of Draught of Peace, advising to take it whenever the Calming Draught was overpowered by the stress of O.W.L.s. Nessa had been offended at first by the insinuation that she was close to breaking, but Pomfrey had merely given her a hard look and said she could recognize the signs easily enough — half the school needed a Draught of Peace by the end of their O.W.L. year. The fact that there was no one in the school who found this fact disturbing was the reason she decided she hated every one of her professors, and the Ministry of Magic for good measure.
This grumpiness did not abate by the time she was subjected to Double DADA the Thursday before the delegations arrived. Tori had given up trying to cheer her up days before, and George — who had appeared to put their arguing on pause for more than just the one day on her birthday, although they hadn't had a serious conversation about their argument yet — had been forcing her to stop studying for at least an hour every night. She'd considered ripping his face off for the sheer audacity alone, but she quite liked the look of it, really, and it was the only hour of the day that she didn't feel on the verge of tears.
The fact that it was only the end of October and she still had seven months before her exams to survive was not lost on her.
So, it was no surprise really when she nearly wanted to scream when Moody growled, "Potter, you're up!"
She was sick of the Imperius Curse at this point, and more than slightly angry that she still hadn't managed to resist the spell. Nevermind the fact that the only person who had managed it in her year so far had been Tori, who was now being spared from being placed under the spell entirely. Harry was the only other person she knew that had managed it outside of their class — and on his first day under it, for fuck's sake — and she told herself that it did not bother her that he'd managed it so much easier than she had. Not at all.
She had far better things to be worried about.
Her irritation was so high by the time she stepped in front of Moody as the rest of the class circled around to watch the show that she could feel it burning in her chest. Murton shoved her way to the front of the class and smirked at her — she always seemed to find the most amusement in Nessa's attempts to throw off the curse, especially because she got so close to doing so that it almost always resulted in injury for her. Nessa didn't take it too personally — she at least could fight it enough that she didn't end up embarrassing herself every day; Murton could not say the same.
Tori, who had been ignoring the rest of the class in favor of reading for Muggle Studies — skimming, really, because she had no time to actually read it completely — unfolded her legs from the top of the desk they'd been occupying and leaned forward to watch in apprehension.
She'd been subjected to a great number of Nessa's frustrations about not being able to fight it off completely. She'd also been subjected to a number of rants about her distaste for Alastor Moody, although she had nothing but a gut feeling to go off of. She liked very little that he found it appropriate to cast an illegal curse on underage school children — she could give a rat's arse if Dumbledore had approved it either. It felt sick to her, something entirely twisted on its own, but made worse by the fact that she'd caught him smiling several times while he'd been "teaching" them to resist its power.
He'd been smiling, too, when he'd shown them all three curses on those spiders a month back as well. Each day she liked him less and less, even as her friend group appeared to like him more and more.
And, today, he was in a particularly sour mood, although no one quite knew why. He didn't seem to care all that much about the other schools staying with them, other than telling them to be constantly vigilante. Maybe the stress of his paranoia was getting to him with so many people coming to the school that he didn't know or trust. It was the only stress she'd seen him exert over their impending arrival, while the rest of their teachers seemed to be more concerned about whether or not they'd embarrass them by proving not to be able to do simple spells.
When she was standing directly in the middle of the classroom, in the space that Moody had cleared of desks, and surrounded by eager students, Moody raised his wand, pointed it directly at her, and said, "Imperio!"
She was struck by the feeling of the curse immediately. It was a wonderful sensation, like floating, where every thought and worry she'd ever had was wiped away as gently as a whisper. It left nothing in its wake except a vague, untraceable happiness. She stood there feeling immensely relaxed, only dimly aware of what was happening around her. Like a puppet waiting for its instructions from its master.
It was in this beginning portion that she felt the best she had in weeks. The only time that she'd been relaxed and worry-free. She half-suspected that this euphoria was the reason she hadn't beat the spell completely. The stress had accumulated on her shoulders so quickly that she could barely breathe through it, but in this moment…in this moment, there was nothing. Blank, calm emptiness. If she'd been a stronger human being, the feeling would disturb her more than it addicted her.
But then came the next part…the part that ruined it all for her.
Mad-Eye Moody's voice, echoing in some distant chamber of her empty, relaxed brain: Get on your knees and beg…get on your knees and beg…
Her knees bent immediately to respond, but there was something dark…something twisted about the request.
Don't you dare beg, Vanessa, another voice, barely perceptible.
Her brain was racing somewhere in the back of her conscience, and her legs were shaking now from the effort of attempting to kneel and stay standing all at once.
Get on your knees and beg…
Something about the request enraged her. She couldn't quite place what in her current state, but it felt sick, what he was asking her to do. She was aware of that at minimum. She'd been subjected to doing jumping jacks, singing Christmas carols every time Moody asked her a question, jumping from desk to desk…
But she'd never been told to beg before. She'd never even considered doing so in all her life.
Get on your knees and beg…
The voice in her head was firmer this time, much louder, angrier even: Don't beg. You beg no one. Don't you dare beg him, Vanessa.
Beg for your life! NOW!
She got pissed then, the rage and stress and frustration slamming into her all at once again, hitting her like a ton of bricks after a small moment of euphoria. She could tell in Moody's eyes that he'd watched her fight it. She could tell in his eyes the very moment he saw her throw the spell off, the moment her mind cleared and came back to reality. He was still smiling, something glinting in the back of his normal eye that made her want to cringe before it disappeared altogether.
But she was still pissed, so all she said, after straightening her knees again, was, "I will never do that. Not for you or anyone else."
There was a long, confused silence from the rest of the class, and Tori sat up straighter at the tone of warning in her friend's voice. She looked cautiously between her and Moody, who merely grinned twistedly at her.
"A real look into what they'll actually make you do, Potter," he said, sounding far too excited about the prospect. "That's more like it! You fought and beat it, look at that! I hope the rest of you were paying attention — Potter and Hastings are still the only ones who have succeeded. If you don't want to be controlled, you'll need to fight much harder than that! Very good, Potter! Murton, you're next!"
Nessa hesitated, glaring at him for a moment longer, before she moved out of the center of the class to sit next to Tori again. The moment had felt like mere minutes, but she was sweating from the effort of fighting for control, and her legs were shaking from how long she'd been holding herself in a half-squatting position.
"What did he ask you to do?" Tori said quietly when the class was distracted.
Nessa hesitated — Tori was the only one of their friend group who appeared to be wary of Moody, and likely because she had not quite forgiven him for his stunt with the Cruciatus Curse at the beginning of the year. Telling her may not be as bad as telling the twins, who would come up with some excuse for the man they thought was some sort of hero.
"He told me to beg," she said flatly.
Tori, who had been watching Murton hop around like a bunny with a half-smirk on her face, snapped her gaze to Nessa's in a way that surely hurt her neck.
"He what?" she said, her face twisting in horrified outrage. "To beg? Beg for what?"
Nessa didn't know how to answer that without having Tori throw a fit in the middle of the classroom, so she just shook her head and watched as the rest of her classmates were subjected to their own round of the spell. None of them came even close to resisting and were each subjected to a number of embarrassing things that would surely run over into their next few periods before the spell wore off.
That was one thing for her to be grateful for at least…singing Christmas carols in the middle of Potions class was a horror she wasn't likely to forget. Snape had never looked at her like he wanted to stuff a sock in her mouth, but he'd certainly been doing so then.
By the time the two hour period ended, no other student had managed to throw off the curse, and Moody made his disappointment known to all of them. He seemed to think that they should be trying harder to throw off the spell or that it spoke to their weaker characters, but Nessa found that a bit heavy-handed. She'd read up on resisting the Imperius Curse for a month and she'd only just now managed to throw it off — it took more effort than just thinking about resisting. If Moody hadn't asked her to do something that went so entirely against her nature, she wasn't sure she'd have been able to throw it off at all.
Tori did not seem to want to let the entire thing go either, as she consistently pestered her as they made their way to the courtyard before they had to be in Potions.
"Nessa, what did he make you beg for?" she snapped, glaring at some third-years who had taken her favorite spot on the bench that had been carved into the wall next to the cherry blossom tree in the center.
The third-years scrambled away immediately and Nessa glared at her best friend as she took a seat in the spots they'd vacated.
"Tori, stop scaring the younger students," she said in irritation. "You aren't entitled to this seat."
"If they're too cowardly to stay put, they're too cowardly to sit here," she said peevishly. "Now stop changing the subject and tell me what he made you beg for."
"What who made you beg for?"
Nessa sighed heavily as the twins appeared on either side of her. They'd taken to demonstrating and trying to sell their products in the courtyard when the students were on break. Now that they had their Ton-Tongue Toffees back, they'd made a lot of headway. Knowing that they'd been saved from their mother's clutches seemed to have boosted their mood a little.
"Moody made Nessa beg for something —"
"He did not!" Nessa said indignantly. "He tried to, which you very well know because you were there."
George sensed her annoyance, as he always did, and placed a consoling arm around her shoulder, pulling her into his side to place a kiss to the side of her head. She blew out a slow breath and relaxed a little against him. It was odd that she found the smell of him so comforting.
"Nessa, the fact that you're being so weird about this really freaks me out," Tori said. Nessa tried not to laugh because any time that Tori admitted concern, she wasn't lying, but the words had come out still sounding so waspish that it sounded more like she was berating her. "What did he want you to beg for?"
"You know what he wanted me to beg for or you wouldn't be jumping down my throat," Nessa said with an eye roll. "My life."
There was a long, tense silence as her three friends stared at her as if she'd just casually admitted to have buried a man alive. She tried not to shift from foot to foot at the sudden attention because she knew very well how backwards the request had been, but she didn't really want to listen to Tori's rampage on the issue. She was angry enough as it was, and Tori tended to be highly irrational at the best of times.
"That's sick, Nessa," Tori said, her voice trembling from anger. "He can't — he never asked any of us to do that! At worst, he told me to scream like a banshee —"
"Maybe he was channeling his inner Lockhart —"
"Don't make jokes!" Tori said, pointing a manicured finger at her. Nessa rolled her eyes. "There's no excuse for him asking you to do that."
"Tori, can you spare me the lecture?" she said tensely. "I know very well what he should or shouldn't be doing. And clearly it worked because I resisted it this time. However relieving that is."
Tori opened her mouth to say something when someone shouted her name and she was momentarily distracted, looking over Nessa's shoulder and rolling her eyes at some Hufflepuff fifth-year boy before dismissing him entirely. Fred found this amusing, grinning up at the sky, but he didn't say anything.
"You know what your problem is, Nessa?" Tori said as if she hadn't been interrupted at all.
"No, but I'm sure you're going to tell me."
"Your problem is that you think you have to take care of everything yourself," Tori snapped at her, eyes narrowing at her sarcastic quip. "You need to tell McGonagall he did that, but will you? No, of course not! Just like with Murton last year and Harry hearing voices and —"
"Are you done?" Nessa snapped at her. Fred and George shared a cautious look with each other, bewildered by their sudden anger toward each other. The two girls annoyed each other often, but it was rare for them to pick fights with each other. "You've been a real bitch lately, you know that?"
Fred and George gaped at her for the harsh word choice, but Tori merely snorted and rolled her eyes. They'd said much worse to each other, and she didn't like when Nessa beat around the bush. Nessa wasn't fond of using that sort of language with her best friend either, truth be told, but she preferred to be honest about how she felt with Tori. It was easier that way — she didn't judge her or take anything she said personally.
And Tori's behavior at this juncture was going past volatile and into callousness. She'd thought it had been the stress of classes, but Tori had never really taken classes as seriously as Nessa did — she was smart and she applied herself, but she didn't believe in letting classes ruin her mood or her fun. She'd expected the increased stress of O.W.L.s to impact Tori a little more than classes usually did, but this degree was surprising.
Aside from terrifying the younger students, which she did often these days over very trivial things, she'd also been snapping at people left and right, starting arguments with Fred for very trivial reasons (breathing too loud while she was trying to work or sitting too close to her on the couch), glaring at Snape and snapping back at him so viciously it earned her a week's worth of detention.
"I'm always a —"
"No, you are not," Nessa snapped at her, putting her hands on her hips and glaring at her harshly. "And quit saying that. It pisses me off when you say it."
"Well then why can you say it?" Tori said indignantly.
"Because I'm not saying it to hurt your feelings," she responded with an eye roll. "I'm saying it because your behavior is concerning and I want to know what the deal is."
"There's no deal," Tori scoffed. "Maybe I'm just sick of you at the moment."
Had Nessa not known Tori so well, the words would have been hurtful. But she'd grown very accustomed to Tori's dismissal tactics, and starting an argument was her favorite one. God only knew why because she only felt horrible after the fact, and it really just made a mess of everything. But Nessa did her best not to judge her friend for her lack of self-reflection.
"Nice try," she said flatly, crossing her arms and tapping a foot impatiently. "If you want to pick a fight, you can do that with Fred. What's your problem?"
"I'd rather you didn't, really," Fred said casually, despite the cautious look still on his face as his eyes bounced between the two of them. "I aim to please, of course, but I'm afraid of the both of you at the moment."
George snorted, but neither girl appeared to be listening to either of them. Instead they were glaring at each other, waiting to see which one would break first. It was Tori — because she was well aware that her behavior lately had been over the top and Nessa wouldn't give in when she was right.
"Nothing," Tori said, sighing heavily. "This stupid year is just never ending and —"
"Do you think I'm stupid?" Nessa snorted. "Don't try to blame it on classes."
Tori glared at her again.
"I can't tell you what the real problem is right now."
"What? Why not?"
"Because I can't."
"Is it Sirius?"
"No," Tori snapped. "Not everything is about him. I can have emotions outside of him, for Merlin's sake. And I don't want to talk about him so don't push."
Nessa huffed, but obliged. She didn't believe that Sirius wasn't at least part of the issue. He'd written to her once while they'd been back to school, but she'd not opened the letter yet. She'd stared at it for hours in their dormitory before hiding it under her pillow and going to sleep. But talking about it only stressed Tori out more about what she was supposed to be doing, and they were clearly on the tipping point for her. Classes probably took up a small portion of her stress, but she normally coped better than this and —
Nessa paused her trailing thoughts. Coping. That was the issue. Tori wasn't coping at all.
Tori had always been a little more aggressive, a little more angry, a little more…everything. She often needed an outlet — destroying the trophy room with a baseball bat, for example — for her emotions so she didn't explode irrationally. Typically she used Quidditch or snogging as an outlet for her stress. But she didn't have Quidditch anymore, so that really left snogging and —
Her eyes met Tori's again, as her mind reeled. They hadn't spoken about Fred at all since the World Cup, and the two of them seemed fine, outside of Tori's incessant frustration with him as of the last few weeks. But now that Nessa was thinking about it, she hadn't heard a single story from Tori this year about her sexual escapades. She'd not even thought about it with everything else she had going on at the moment, but now that she was, it was odd.
She hadn't even winked at the cute Hufflepuff earlier either…
Nessa's eyes flicked to Fred briefly, who raised an eyebrow at her in question, before she looked back at Tori, who still looked tense and jittery like she was six seconds away from hitting something.
"Tori," she said, trying to keep her voice neutral despite her growing amusement. "Did you ever talk to that person I told you to talk to?"
Tori gave her a hard look.
"No, I didn't," she said warningly. "And stop looking at me like that."
Nessa was grinning so largely at this point that her cheeks hurt a little.
"That's what you've been so pissy about lately? Not being able to —"
"Don't say it!" she said huffily. "If I don't think about it, then maybe it'll go away."
"That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard," Nessa snorted. "You're clearly…uh, frustrated, yes? There's a very simple solution to that."
"Easy for you to say," Tori glared, flicking her eyes to George pointedly and making Nessa glare at her again. Fred and George were gaping at the two of them in confusion.
"It'd be easy for you too if you'd quit snapping at hi — everyone," she recovered quickly when Tori gave her a wide-eyed look of warning. "Or are you doing that as a sort of repeat performance of last time? Because I'm sure if you just asked nicely then —-"
The warning bell rang immediately and Tori jumped up so hastily that George gave her an alarmed look. Fred, however, had gone totally still, tilting his head to the side and trying very hard to figure out whatever they were talking about. He didn't appear all that much closer to picking up on what was happening right in front of him as Tori rushed for the door before Nessa could pester her further.
"What the hell was that?" George said, bewildered.
Nessa laughed and raised on her tiptoes to kiss him goodbye before she had to leave for class, shaking her head at him when he opened his mouth to question her further.
She made eye contact with Fred and raised a singular eyebrow at him. She really shouldn't meddle, but…
"I think she just needs to talk things out," she said pointedly. "Isn't that right, Fred?"
Fred shared a bewildered look with his twin.
"Uh, sure? Whatever you say, Nessa —"
"Fredrick. I want you specifically to talk to her. Do you understand?"
Fred rolled his eyes and opened his mouth, looking like he might argue before he caught her pointed expression and went still again.
"Oh," he said. "Oh. Yes, right, I should talk to her."
"Soon."
"Yes, soon."
"What is happening?" George said, looking between the two of them in irritation. "You're barely even speaking English!"
The two minute bell rang, and she leaned up to kiss him again, grinned at Fred, and then took off for the dungeons.
"Sorry, I can't be late! I'll see you later! Don't say anything stupid, Fred!"
Tori had given her irritated looks through all of Potions class that afternoon. Not that Nessa paid it any particular mind; she was too busy trying to forget that she had prefect duties tonight. She'd forgotten about decorating the dungeons with Cormac and Cedric, but Snape had asked her — well, demanded might have been a better word — at what time they would be in the dungeons.
Truthfully, Nessa didn't understand why the entire castle needed to be decorated — the Great Hall and the courtyard, sure, but the rest of it felt asinine. It wasn't like they were going to be all that focused on the Potions classroom or the common rooms. It was almost as if the teachers were afraid that any of the students might wander and find themselves looking at an empty, undecorated room.
Ridiculous, really. But she'd told Snape they'd be there at eight o'clock that evening anyway. It was her severe hope that she would be able to avoid Snape at all costs while she was there for the evening. He typically retired to his quarters at seven, but she had a feeling that he was going to want to supervise the entire ordeal. He was very particular about his space and the dungeons were unequivocally his.
By the time she'd finished with dinner — spent thinking obsessively about how she really didn't want to decorate for the evening, and how much of a waste it was going to be when she could be doing homework — she was severely hoping that she had just pretended to have forgotten.
" — so I told him, I said, well, I could get it done in under an hour. No need to have Potter and Diggory there. He agreed, of course, but he seemed to want us all to have a hand in welcoming the schools."
Nessa was grateful to have been saved thinking of a response by the fact that she'd arrived at the dungeons, and Cedric was standing outside Snape's office, leaning casually against the stone wall.
"Nessa," he grinned, pulling her in for a hug. He merely smiled politely at McLaggen, keeping his arm around Nessa's shoulder. "McLaggen."
"Diggory," Cormac said with a nod, eyeing the arm he had around her shoulder with interest. "I didn't realize the two of you were…friends."
"That's because you never asked, McLaggen," Nessa said with an eye roll. She refrained from pointing out that he'd have to stop talking about himself long enough to have asked her anything. "Let's get this over with."
Cedric raised an eyebrow at her, but she ignored it, stepping out from under his arm and knocking three times on Snape's door. She didn't bother waiting for a response before she opened it. Cedric and Cormac shared a startled look behind her as Snape looked up from his desk to glower at them.
"Do come in, Miss Potter," he said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.
"You knew we were coming," she deadpanned, ignoring Cedric's pointed cough and McLaggen's nervous shifting. "Sorry to disturb you as always, sir," she said, smiling tightly at him, "but we need to know what sections of the dungeon we're supposed to be decorating."
Snape eyed her for a long moment, his black eyes impossibly blank. She refused to back down from his stare because she half-suspected that he enjoyed the thrill of students backing down from him. No matter that he was a thirty-year old man scaring school children.
"The corridors of the dungeon, outside the Slytherin common room, and…my classroom," he said the last part as if he'd spotted mold on his breakfast. She had to work hard to keep herself from laughing — he'd never been the sentimental type, even when it came to school pride. "The decorations are all already in the classroom."
"Thank you," she said cooly, turning on her heel.
He spoke again before she had left the room completely.
"If Diggory and McLaggen would like to keep themselves out of detention, I suggest they get your approval for all decorations," he said coldly, looking back down at whatever essays he was grading. "I've got plenty of newts that need their spleens removed."
She snorted, despite the strong suspicion that he was not at all joking, and refrained from pointing out that both Diggory and McLaggen were perfectly capable of hearing him themselves. Cedric blew out a breath when she exited the office and closed the door behind her.
"You're mental," he said, giving her a cautious look. "He might have given you a month's worth of detention for walking into his office like that."
Nessa rolled her eyes.
"He's not that bad if you aren't annoying," she said, stalking toward the classroom without waiting for a response, and trying to forget how much Snape annoyed her. "He wasn't kidding about the newt spleens though, so avoid putting decorations anywhere on his classroom desk or behind it. Nothing that will fall into any potions —" she said, looking at the silver and green confetti distastefully, "Just avoid the desks as a whole actually. Ceiling and walls only. And stay away from the store room, McLaggen!"
The last was snapped at the Gryffindor, who was nosily looking at everything behind Snape's desk. He rolled his eyes at her.
"Don't you want to know what he has in there?" he said, poking the door curiously with his wand.
"I know very well what he has in there, and it's of no use to you until you stop setting all of your potions on fire," she snapped. "You can focus on hanging the banner outside the door."
She stared at him harshly until he heaved a sigh, and came to grab the banner in question — green and silver with a snake running across its length. She rolled her eyes when he was finally outside the classroom, and grabbed some of the green streamers and eyed them distastefully.
"This looks like it's for a birthday party," she muttered to herself. "He's going to take these down by Monday, for God's sake."
Although, truthfully, she did find them somewhat interesting — when she held them in a particular light, they looked like snakes themselves, which was mildly intriguing. She was so distracted by moving them in every direction that she jumped when Cedric spoke to her again.
"Do I want to know what you're so upset about this evening?" he said, grinning at her in amusement when she startled. "What are we supposed to do with this?"
She eyed the silver streamers, which had much the same effect as their green counterparts, and spun slowly to view the room.
"We can cross them across the room," she said, pointing in a diagonal direction. "I don't want to spend too much time in here — he's not going to tolerate the decorations for long anyway."
"I'm surprised he's tolerating them at all," he said, using his wand to levitate one end of the long shimmery streamer and raising it to the ceiling on the right side of the door. "And you didn't answer my question. Are you and Weasley still arguing?"
Nessa didn't answer him for a long moment. They weren't arguing at the moment, actually, but they also weren't not arguing. Which wouldn't make sense to explain to him anyway, and she'd been trying to ignore the conversation of George altogether. As the tournament got closer and closer, she became more and more worried that the Ageing Potion might work and allow either him or Fred to enter. George had been very careful not to allow her to see them working on the potion — truthfully, she had no idea where they were even brewing it because she'd been to their dormitory and hadn't seen anything there — but she wasn't stupid enough to believe that they'd dropped the idea completely.
Not to mention, she typically avoided talking about her relationship with Cedric if she could. For one thing, she wasn't entirely sure that George would appreciate it, but for another, she was also aware that Cedric's interest in her relationship was more than just friendly. She'd not yet forgotten that Hermione had heard him and Devin speaking about her earlier in the month. Not to mention that Hermione had been right in assuming that Cedric would join S.P.E.W. if she had been the one to ask. A fact that still irritated her to no end, and sent Tori into fits of laughter when mentioned. And although she knew it wasn't her fault — or his, for that matter, because people didn't just stop fancying someone immediately — she still wasn't sure that she wanted to give him more information than was necessary. In case it came back to bite her later.
"It has nothing to do with George," she said eventually. "I'd just rather be doing homework than decorating Snape's classroom."
Cedric was silent for a long moment, using his wand to connect the other side of the silver streamer to the other side of the room.
"You've been very on edge this year," he said cautiously.
She knew she had been; everyone in her life had said as much, but she wasn't quite sure how to relax at this point. Her workload was atrocious, but there was nothing to be done for it and she had to push through it for the time being. The only comfort she really had was knowing that it wouldn't last forever. Not to mention, her tenuous relationship with Fred and George at the moment. And sure they weren't currently at each other's throats, but it would be much easier — more relaxing, even — if they could just return to normal. The two of them had such an uncanny ability to calm her fraying nerves and make her loosen up. Nowadays being around them only made her feel a little tense because she was waiting for the moment when they — or she — would say something that would send them back into another argument. The impending tournament also stressed her — the increased prefect duties, on top of the fact that Cedric planned on entering and could very well succeed in being Hogwarts champion, and the idea of watching him risk his life or serious disfigurement was not high on her list of priorities. Tori had also been in a horrid mood all week which hadn't particularly helped — it was rare when both of them were experiencing negative emotions at the same time, but when they did, it was like feeding off of each other's mentality. She severely hoped that Fred would manage to get through to her when he talked to her, but she had very little hopes.
As it stood though, Nessa was just trying to remain sane. It was harder and harder by the day, really. She was emotionally wrung out from the stress of her life, and mentally exhausted from the constant exertion required to complete all of her homework, studying, and classes. And somehow she was physically exhausted not just from lack of sleep, but also from the same mental exhaustion, as if her body were responding to her constant intellectual stimulation by giving up on her entirely. She had never in her life wanted to sleep as much as she did now. Never in her life had such a difficult time forcing herself out of bed in the morning because she just wanted to sleep for another five minutes before she had to push herself again.
She was spread far too thin at the moment, and that stress had made her horribly irritable. She hated it for herself, but also for everyone else around her because she felt like she was constantly ready to snap at anyone who struck a nerve, which had become much easier than it normally had. She'd always been particularly proud of being able to remain rational in most situations, but it was feeling less and less within her capacity at the current moment.
Explaining that all to Cedric though felt like she was complaining as if there weren't thousands of other students before her who had managed to survive their fifth year. She felt horribly dramatic about the entire thing, really.
She was saved from answering, however, by a drawling voice from behind her.
"Mr. Diggory, if you could help McLaggen with the banner outside my classroom," Snape said coolly. "Before his ineptitude causes him to slip and break his neck."
"Sure, professor," Cedric said politely, shooting Nessa an apologetic look before leaving the room.
"I'd have thought McLaggen breaking his neck would have been pleasing to you." Nessa drawled when the door shut behind her.
She refused to turn to face her greasy-haired professor as he walked across the room, deliberately ignoring her remark. She had no idea what exactly he needed at the current moment, and she suspected that he didn't either because he shuffled through his desk for a long moment before looking up at the ceiling with distaste. It took a great deal of effort on her part not to laugh at the expression on his face.
"You have been avoiding my classroom," he said snarkily, flipping through a pile of parchment on his desk.
"Have I?" she said.
The feigned ignorance would irritate him, she knew, but she wasn't prepared to have it out with him at the moment. She should let it go. Remus had told her to let it go — as far as he was concerned, Snape had a reason to hate him, even if he refused to specify what exactly that reason was. But Remus also told her that Mad-Eye Moody was someone she could trust, so what did he know?
"Do not play dumb, Miss Potter," he said silkily. "I had to ask Madam Pomfrey to have you brew a few vials of a Draught of Peace for me because you keep making up asinine excuses to avoid helping me otherwise."
It was her indignance that had her whirling to face him fully with a ridiculous swirly decoration in her hand. He ignored the outrage on her face in favor of scowling at what she was holding instead.
"I hope you weren't planning to hang that in here," he drawled, rolling his eyes.
She ignored him.
"You told Madam Pomfrey to have me brew those?" she snapped. "She said she needed them for students!"
"She does," he said simply. "I merely needed a few myself to keep on hand, and I told her that you wouldn't mind brewing them —"
"Wouldn't mind is a stretch, professor," she replied snarkily, glaring at him harshly. It was of no surprise to her when he was not at all intimidated by her anger and instead stared back at her as if he were bored. "This is ridiculous," she muttered to herself, chucking the decoration he disliked back onto the desk and grabbing something far safer to line the walls with. "I have no interest in helping you this year. I have O.W.L.s to be worried about —"
"Your exams have hardly stopped you from helping before."
"My previous exams didn't have a huge impact on my future career —"
"Yes," he drawled, his lip curling in distaste. "A Healer, is it?"
She huffed in irritation.
"Does no one in this school know how to keep their mouths shut?" she snapped back.
"Not particularly," he said, and she could have sworn his lips twitched at the corners, but she was so irritated that she barely noticed it. "It is a…selfless career choice."
"Thanks," she said, rolling her eyes to the ceiling. "Now try saying it like you haven't swallowed a jar of toenails."
She nearly dropped her wand when he snorted behind her, but managed to keep hold of it before she could drop the decoration she was levitating.
"At any rate, I am not stupid, Vanessa," he said as if nothing odd had happened at all. She turned slowly to face him — he'd always been nicer to her than others, but he'd never called her by her first name before. She'd never quite figured out why either; he called all of his other favorite students by their first names — Draco being a prime example — but she'd always been Potter. As if he was maintaining a boundary between them somehow. "I know very well that you are upset with me for my involvement in Lupin's resignation —"
"Don't," she snapped at him, her previous surprise overshadowed by the roiling anger she now felt at his mention of her godfather. "If you're going to act like you did nothing wrong, then I'm not interested."
"Did I do something wrong?" he said, raising an eyebrow at her, his expression cool. "Parents have the right to know who is teaching their children —"
Both of them startled when a glass vial on his desk exploded without warning. There was a moment of shock before she hastily met his eyes again and schooled her features into calm disregard. He wasn't looking at her, however; he stared for a long moment at that vial before looking back at her, the blackness of his eyes clouded with curiosity.
"You've been practicing," he said slowly, watching her face intently.
She refused to make any comments on this, although she was unsure how he knew anything about her attempts to push her limits.
"You didn't tell them out of a concern for their well-being," she said instead, bringing them back to the original conversation. "You did it because you were upset about Sirius getting free and because you hate him. Don't pretend it was anything other than that."
He stared at her a moment longer before his face shuttered.
"Did you have something to do with Black getting free, Miss Potter?"
"No, of course not," she said calmly, despite the fact that the question made her heart race. "Perhaps he's a better wizard than you give him credit for."
His lip curled again, but he made no comment on this.
"Do not take me for a fool, Vanessa —"
"Then don't take me for one, Professor."
They stared at each other for a long moment, his own temper met evenly with her own. She was well aware that his pride would allow him very little room to apologize — which meant, none at all — and she had no intention of pretending that she wasn't bothered by his inability to think about anyone other than himself. It was an impasse she was not entirely sure they would be able to bridge.
"Shall I admit, then, that I did it out of cruelty?" he drawled, bored. "Is that what you wish of me, Miss Potter?"
"What I wish of you doesn't matter —"
"It does to me."
She tried to control her reaction to this statement, but her mouth still opened partially to gape at him. She almost thought that maybe she'd hit her head or something on the way down here. This was merely some sort of dream conjured up by a concussion while she slept in the Hospital Wing.
"I — I already know that that's why you did it —"
"Then what do you need?" he said, his eyes sparking dangerously. She huffed at him in response. "I have need of your skill set, Miss Potter, and I grow tired of this game you're playing."
She refrained from pointing out that brewing potions was supposed to be his job, not hers. Or that she wasn't playing a game, despite the enjoyment she got in watching him get so irritated by her refusal to give him what he wanted.
At any rate, she wasn't sure what she could do to level the ground between them again. He'd done something horrible, and there was no excuse for it, but she was not ignorant enough to believe that whatever fondness he held for her would get him to agree to make an apology. Regardless of how much it was deserved.
She didn't have any particular use of anything from him at the current moment, but even if she did, it wouldn't help Remus at all —
"You can brew a Wolfsbane Potion for Remus every month," she said, smirking at the look of distaste that overtook his features immediately.
"You must be joking."
"No," she said, raising an eyebrow and crossing her arms across her chest. "The way I see it, you're the reason he can't afford to do it himself. And you've already admitted that you did it out of cruelty —"
"I did no such thing," he said. "I merely asked if that's what you would like for me to do."
"Don't play dumb," she said in irritation. "It was an admission. Or as close as you're ever going to give to one. So that's the solution. You send him his monthly potion — before each full moon and at no charge, might I add — and I'll stop looking at you like you're one of Hagrid's Blast-Ended Skrewts."
There was a long, tedious silence, in which the both of them stared at each other in an attempt to figure out who would back down first. She found it amusing that he thought he would win in the first place. As far as she was concerned, she occupied the moral high ground. Not to mention, she did this nearly every day with either Tori or the twins. She'd had plenty of practice in not breaking.
"I expect you in my office Monday morning," he said finally. She smirked, despite his obvious attempt to avoid saying that he was giving in. "I need someone to take inventory of my stores before the delegations get comfortable."
"Fine," she said simply, turning around to get back to her task at hand as he swept out of the room behind her without another word.
Her smug amusement lasted for the rest of their time in the dungeons. The corridors were lined with green and silver carpet, banners taking up residence over the Slytherin common room and the Potions classroom, and she used what streamers they had to cover the rest of the ceiling. She refused outright to use the confetti. Filch would be pissed, for one thing, and it was ridiculous looking. Not that the rest of it wasn't ridiculous looking — it was.
By the time they'd finished with the dungeons, it was ten o'clock, McLaggen was still talking too much — to Cedric mostly, trying to give him tips for the Hufflepuff Quidditch team — and she was exhausted enough that she had every intention of going straight to bed rather than working on homework. Cedric gave her a hasty hug in the Entrance Hall before racing off for the Hufflepuff common room with an exasperated expression back at her that sent her into giggles. If McLaggen had noticed, he certainly didn't seem to care that Cedric was clearly trying to escape him because his spiel hardly faltered as they made their way up to the common room.
She was working very hard to zone him out entirely, and was thankful that her random noises of affirmation were enough to get him to leave her alone without any additional socialization on her part. She truly could not stand him —
"What are you three doing out after curfew?"
Nessa sucked in a breath of surprise and tried to look like she was doing her job, even though she'd not have noticed anyone out after curfew if McLaggen hadn't said something. Her surprise only grew at the sight of Fred, George, and Lee sneaking out of an empty classroom.
Nessa was familiar with the look Fred and George were sharing because he'd done the same thing with her when they'd gotten caught two weeks ago. Although pity for him now, because she could tell who they were from the back when those other prefects couldn't.
"Don't even think about it!" she snapped before either one of them could make a run for it.
The two of them swore when they recognized her voice, and spun on their heels to grin winningly at her. She narrowed her eyes at them and placed her hands on her hips.
"Nessa, fancy seeing you here!" Fred said jauntily, hiding something behind his back carefully.
"How was decorating for Snape?" Lee said casually.
She raised an eyebrow at him.
"Fine," she said smoothly. "McLaggen asked you a question."
The three of them gaped at her momentarily before grimacing at each other.
"Just taking a stroll," George said, shrugging nonchalantly. "Didn't realize how late it had gotten."
"What's that behind his back then?" McLaggen said suspiciously.
"Nose out, McLaggen," Fred snapped. "Or I'll —"
"Accio," Nessa muttered boredly, waving her wand lazily.
Fred, George, and Lee all swore simultaneously, making a grab for the vial that came flying out from behind Fred's back. Nessa stared at it for a moment, the green contents within it shimmering brightly under the torchlight. There was a long, heavy silence between the five of them before Nessa looked up to glare at them.
"What is it?" McLaggen whispered to her conspiratorially, clearly not aware of what she was holding.
"An Ageing Potion," she snapped viciously. "Because clearly, I've not made myself very clear about them being too young to enter the tournament."
"Munchkin, look, it's —"
"Don't even start," she snapped at Fred immediately. "Is this all of it?"
"Yes," Lee said cautiously. She vanished it immediately and he cried out in outrage. "Hey, it took us ages to brew that!"
"I don't care!" she said, pulling at her hair in irritation. "God, it's like talking to a wall with you three! Entering the tournament isn't up for debate!"
"Yes, you've made that very clear," George said lowly. "You haven't talked to us about it at all."
"Don't pretend like you've made any effort to start the conversation, George!"
"What do I need to start the conversation for?" he exclaimed indignantly. "You're the one with the problem! What do you expect me to be saying?"
"Well, the three of you can think about it in detention," she snapped back. "I'm tired of this argument."
Fred laughed incredulously, giving his brother a gaping look.
"You can't be serious!" he said eventually. "You're giving us detention?"
"Love, don't —"
"I'm not interested," she snapped at the both of them. "You can meet Snape Monday morning. He needs someone to do inventory of his stores."
And before any of them could do anything other than gape at her, she'd stormed off for the common room.
Ohhhhh, Nessa…
It is the denial for me, folks. Did I draw out the bickering both because George and Nessa are so stubborn AND because I wanted to add the drama of Nessa abusing her prefect powers? Potentially. Maybe. Absolutely. The problem is really me, lovelies.
The resolution to this fight is coming so soon, so hang in there!
Also, I have made another mistake in writing this because —I despise Snape, always — but I am beginning to enjoy writing about his relationship with Nessa. Their mutual snark is just unmatched.
See you next week!
Up next: Schools arrive (TOURNAMENT!) and Tori is the rational one for a change.