CHAPTER TWELVE
"You should stay."
"What?" he looks up from tying his shoelaces, "Why?"
Nathaniel frowns.
"We all know Slytherin's going to win the cup," he says, "and you haven't slept in days. We can steal food from-"
"I'm fine. I can deal with a feast, Nate."
He stands, a little too quickly, and has to blink back darkness from the edge of his vision. Douglas stifles a laugh.
"It's not funny," Nathaniel grumbles, "sleep deprivation is-"
"Alright, mam," Sergei teases, copying Douglas' accent horribly, "let the stubborn fool be a stubborn fool, no?"
"What he said," Icarus agrees, swinging his arm over Nathaniel's shoulder to steer him towards the door.
"I hate you sometimes."
"No, you don't."
The Great Hall is packed when they arrive, decorated with banners of green and silver. He ignores Nathaniel's "see?" and squeezes into the seats across from Margaret and Esther. The plates glitter temptingly and remain empty.
Fortunately, it's not long after their arrival that Dumbledore appears from the hidden staff room and walks to his podium.
"And so ends another year," he says, as the chatter dies down, "of many long days, a ferocious quidditch season and a thousand little adventures. I shan't keep you all very long but, as I understand it, the House Cup still needs to be awarded. And the points stand as so: Hufflepuff, with three hundred and fifty six; Gryffindor, with three hundred and seventy; Ravenclaw, with four hundred and thirty four; and Slytherin, in first place, with four hundred and sixty eight!"
And although it was expected, the applause is deafening.
He winces a little at the sound but joins in, the crackle of excitement flowing under his skin just enough to keep him awake.
The food appears and, the minute it does, nothing else matters.
It takes all of his remaining energy to meander back to the dorms after the meal. He summons his pajamas wordlessly over to his bed, not noticing the way his roommates gape at it, and is only half-changed when the door bursts open and four girls topple through.
"We brought snacks," Ada declares, marching to the center of the room and dumping a bag by the heater, "and drinks."
"And face masks," Margaret adds, her hair done up in a loose bun, "Merlin knows what you boys use."
Arianna's terrified face peeks out from between Margaret and Esther.
Icarus blinks blearily at them, before pulling his pajama shirt over his head and yawning. Sergei goes over to the bag of snacks and starts rummaging.
"What -" Douglas splutters, "what are you -"
"I told them to come," Sergei says, pulling out a tin of biscuits, "girls are more observant than guys. So, no more sleepwalking incidents. Hopefully."
"But-"
"Oh, shut up," Esther says, walking over to one of the beds, "come help me with this."
A solid minute later, the mattresses are arranged in a circle around the heater and Margaret is applying a potion to Icarus' face.
"What's this supposed ter do?" he mumbles.
"Probably nothing, for you," she sighs enviously, "your skins so nice. Wish mine was."
"Yeh skin's fine."
"I still don't know what I'm doing here," Arianna says, sniffing at another jar curiously, "I don't even have pajamas."
"There's some spares in the bag," Ada pipes up from where she's attempting to read Nathaniel's tea leaves, "the bathroom's back there."
Douglas makes some sort of disgruntled grunt.
Esther jabs him in the side.
Somehow, Icarus stays awake long enough to wash the potion from his face. And he's not sure if it's because the chatter lulls him into an odd sense of comfort, or because he's been awake for days, but he's the first to fall asleep.
He wakes, for a moment, in the middle of the night.
The others snore gently around him. Arianna has an arm flung across his waist, and his left leg is tangled with Nathaniel's.
The shadow of the willow tree fades.
When he closes his eyes again, it doesn't come back.