Harry Potter, beginning of the party

Harry, Hermione, and Ron snuck towards the dungeons under Harry's invisibility cloak. Unfortunately, due to their growth spurts, they no longer fit cleanly inside. This meant that the three friends had to huddle next to each other and shuffle forward whilst squatting. It was a strenuous exercise that tested Hermione and Ron's thigh strength to the maximum. Luckily for him, Harry was the best prepared for their little crab walk through the dungeons. Constantly having to squeeze his firebolt between his legs while pressing on the footrests to control his broom as a Quidditch player had attuned his leg muscles to the constant flexing and minor movements that the three Gryffindors were now struggling through.

Ron, heavier than the other two and never having exercised his legs before, was having the most trouble. "Remind me, why are we doing this again?" he whispered.

Hermione sighed. "You were so excited for the food just an hour ago, and now you want to quit? Didn't you say that you would do 'anything' to be able to taste Madame Payet's pastries?"

"Yes, of course I want to try them!" Ron protested.

"Well, stop complaining! You don't see Harry and me whining all the time!" said Hermione harshly.

Chastised, Ron attempted to change the topic. "Hey Harry, I think Hermione's right. You should try and look at other girls other than Cho."

Ron tried to appease Hermione by agreeing with her. His next words undid any effect that this effort may have had. "After all, our appetites for women are meant to be explored, not restricted. At a feast, don't pine for any singular dish. Enjoy the appetizers first! Only then can you truly savor the main course." Hermione's glare could have been a laser, but it wasn't strong enough to affect Ron's thick head.

Harry was similarly oblivious. "I don't know, mate. The smell from the main course is enough to drown out any desire I may have for the sides. Partaking in them would ruin the purity of the experience that I will have when I finally devour the entrée!"

"But what if the main course is never served? Will you leave the feast a hungry man?"

"I suppose so," replied Harry. "My anticipation for the entrée has enraptured me. There can be no other that can serve its purpose. I will not try the appetizers, for my anticipation drowns out any taste they could have. The sides will not fill me because my stomach is reserved for one and one alone. I have been enchanted by the one that I cannot have. Cho is my all and my everything!"

"Alas!" cried Ron. "My dearest companion has been downed! Struck with Cupid's arrow, he has fallen in the field of battle. The shaft has pierced his heart!"

"If only I could fall into her arms," Harry lamented, "if only my shaft could pierce her…"

Hermione looked scandalized. "Harry James Potter!" she admonished. "And Ron, you can't speak this way about girls; you're a prefect! You're meant to be a role model, and yet you're comparing girls to food at a restaurant!

"Watch out!" interrupted Harry. An unknown Ravenclaw was walking down the corridor, likely also heading towards the party. As quickly as possible, the trio threw themselves against the wall. They could not be discovered, otherwise Malfoy would know that he had party crashers, and their plans would be foiled.

"You know," whispered Harry, "I had a bad dream last night about today. I dreamt that attending this party would irrevocably change my fate: in a good or bad way, I wasn't able to tell. To be honest, I'm having second thoughts about this operation."

Ron snickered, mocking Hermione's earlier statement. "'You don't see Harry and me whining all the time!' Who's whining now? Man up a little, mate! You're a Gryffindor! Don't let some dream scare you." He paused, thinking back to the previous night. "Although come to think of it, I also had a dream."

Harry nodded. He had faced a basilisk, dementors, and Voldemort. What was a dream compared to those? Besides, foretelling the future was a load of crock; Trelawney had convinced him of that. However, that didn't stop him from being a bit nervous.

"Could you tell me your dream?" he asked, "I hope you can help me take my mind off mine."

Ron rubbed his chin, trying to recall the details. "I dreamt of Harry being served by the house elf king."

"House elf king?" said Hermione, suddenly interested. It seemed that she still hadn't given up her crusade to free every house elf. "They have their own kingdom?"

"Nah," said Ron, shaking his head as they stumbled forward. "It's a legend, told to little children in the wizarding world to get them to refuse overindulgence."

"How does it go?" said Harry.

"Well, the way my dad told it was like this. The house elf king lived in an empty castle in the middle of the woods, with all the food and drink anyone would ever need. However, since he lived alone, the house elf king always desired a companion: someone for him to share the joys of his home with…"

Crouched down in front of him, Hermione was angry. "This is just going to be a story that perpetuates the slavery of house elves, isn't it?" she interrupted. "Let me guess… he left the castle and found a nice pureblood family to enslave him and realized that serving others was better than ruling over an empty kingdom."

"That's not how it goes," said Ron, a bit irritated at the interruption. "There wouldn't be any moral to the story, would there?"

Hermione's cheeks flushed red. It didn't stop her from getting the last word, though. "Just like there are no morals involved when enslaving an entire race!"

Ron looked exasperatedly at Harry. The two boys were both tired of Hermione's stubbornness regarding the house elf issue. Harry, interested in the story and eager to keep the peace between his two friends, offered Hermione an apologetic look and urged Ron to continue.

He nodded and began again. "Anyway, the king waited for years before another person came across the castle deep in the forest. It was a little boy, the son of a hunter who had been separated from his father during the previous night.

"The boy was hungry and cold, so when he saw the castle, he used all his remaining strength to run to the entrance of the castle. When the king found the boy, fainted upon the threshold, he was overjoyed. He nursed the boy back to health and showed him every part of the castle, hoping he would stay. However, while the boy was thankful towards the house elf king for saving him and feeding him, he still missed his father and yearned to find him again.

"Upon learning the boy's greatest desire, the king became jealous. He began spending most of his time in the kitchens, creating massive meals, each more delicious than the last, all to entice the boy to remain with him. He created works of art, arranged flowers, and rid his castle of all references to humans, but is was useless. The boy would not give up on his love for his father. At last, the day had come for the boy to leave, but the king told his friend that he should stay for one final breakfast. The boy agreed, not seeing the harm in indulging his benefactor's request. Unknown to him, however, the house elf king had put a potion into his food, meant to suppress any memory the boy had of his father."

Hermione couldn't bear it any longer. "So the elves are villains, and that's why they should be slaves? I'll have you know that any house elf is far kinder than most of the students in Hogwarts!"

"Maybe you should swap places with Sirius and live alone with Kreacher then," said Ron, snidely.

"Fine! The average house elf is far kinder than most of the students in Hogwarts. Happy?"

"Not really."

Harry was starting to get tired of his friends' bickering. It was starting to sap at his energy, making his legs feel tired as they continued to crouch and shuffle under the cloak. "Please, Hermione, let Ron finish his story before you say your piece," he said. Hermione looked mutinous but nodded, nevertheless.

"Ahem, where was I? Oh yeah, putting potions in the meals. Well, upon eating the food, the boy forgot about his father. He didn't know why he had ever wanted to leave the castle, so he decided that he would stay forever. The house elf king was pleased, but not for long. The boy's mind was strong and his love for his father even more powerful. Soon, he began to remember the purpose he had lost. Frightened once more that he would lose his only friend, the king dosed the boy with a larger amount of potion. The boy forgot his father once more.

"This cycle repeated over and over, but each time the boy needed more and more of the potion to keep his memories suppressed. The potion was beginning to run out. The house elf king began working day and night, making more potions and more meals to put the potions in. The boy trusted his friend completely and hated to hurt his feelings, so he ate every meal without complaint. Over the months, the boy grew fatter and fatter, eventually losing the ability to move.

"This didn't bother the king, who did not mind if the boy could never walk again. He placed the boy on a bed and continued feeding him, all the while changing his sheets and removing his waste. But all this labor was beginning to take a toll on the king. He shrank in size, becoming skinnier and shorter. He began hunching over, and the skin on his emaciated frame stretched tight, giving him a skeletal appearance. But he kept working.

"Years later, the boy had finally refused the king's meal for the first time. The king, concerned, asked the boy what the problem was, but he never answered. He had died from overeating. To the king, however, this didn't matter. He had been making food for and cleaning up after the boy for so long that he forgot how not to serve. Even the boy's death was unable to break his habit. It is said that even now, the house elf king serves food to a skeleton, unable to do anything else out of habit. It is said that all house elves were cursed by magic for the sin of their king, becoming as gaunt and servile as their ruler. Now, their race is forever bound to obey others, unable to imagine a fate other than servitude." Ron finished the tale, leaving a thoughtful Harry and a furious Hermione.

"So, I was right! The wizards made up this story to explain why house elves deserve to be enslaved. Is this little fable the impetus behind this perpetual cruelty?" Hermione began to blast Ron with question after whispered question, not even bothering to let him respond.

Harry, meanwhile, wondered about the moral of the story and how it pertained to his situation. Was he like the boy, driven by true love, or was he more like the king, who discarded morals to be with his companion forever? He also thought about the role of food in the story. Food was generally a good thing, both necessary and pleasurable to have. However, in massive amounts, it led to the boy's immobility and death. Was his affection for Cho the same? Was it stagnating his life?

On and on they crept, Hermione arguing with Ron and Harry pondering the story, until blessedly, Goyle came into view sitting behind a rickety wooden desk (Harry had never thought that he would ever be relieved at the sight of Malfoy's goon, but these were strange times indeed). After double-checking the final hallway for any other partygoers, the trio got to their feet at last, massaging their aching knees and sore calves. Harry stowed away the invisibility cloak, and the three stumbled out in front of Goyle.

"Granger, Potter, Weasley," grunted the burly boy in acknowledgement. Clumsily, he grabbed a brown leather bag from under the desk and took out three ivory masks intricately carved and painted in animal forms. Spreading them out, the Gryffindors saw a lion, a rabbit, and a pig.

"I'll take the lion!" said Ron, putting the mask on his head before Harry and Hermione had a chance to react. To their surprise, the lion's face promptly expanded, wrapping around the back of Ron's head until he looked like a man with the head of a lion. The lion's head turned comically, first left and right, then up and down. "Woah! I feel like I'm wearing that muggle 'hemmit' that Dad showed me!"

"Helmet," corrected Harry and Hermione simultaneously, before looking disdainfully at the other masks.

"These animals are awful!" exclaimed Harry, glaring at Ron for taking the singular good choice. "I can't talk to Cho while wearing a pig mask!"

"What's wrong with the rabbit?" asked Hermione.

"The rabbit's got implications," said Harry, using logic only a lovesick boy could come up with. "She'll think I'm 'fast'."

"Isn't that a good thing?" wondered Hermione, but Ron, for once, had understood something faster than she.

"No, Harry is right. He should have the lion mask." He pulled at his head, trying to take the mask off, but the lion refused to budge. "What the… Hey, get off!"

Goyle chose this moment to intercede. "Um, sorry guys. I forgot to say that the masks can't come off until the party's done. So, um, Potter. You'll have to choose between these ones."

"Don't you have other ones in that bag of yours?" asked Harry desperately.

Goyle scratched his head. "Hmm, yes. I forgot about that." He stuck his arm inside, feeling around for another mask. His hand sunk much further than what should have been possible given the bag's outside appearance. At last, he brought out a fourth mask, this time a rat. "How about this one?"

"Absolutely not!"

Hermione shushed him, looking down the corridor behind them. "Dang! I hear footsteps. We must choose now!"

Regretfully, Harry picked up the pig mask, pressing it to his face. Hermione took the rabbit, and soon enough, their heads were replaced with the ivory faces of their chosen animals. The trio looked at Goyle, who was staring at Hermione for some reason.

Feeling three pairs of eyes on him, the large boy nodded and turned around. "Greatness," he said, and with a rumble, the door to the Slytherin common room opened. Taking a deep breath, the three Gryffindors walked into the party. Behind them, they could hear an indignant voice.

"What? I have to be a rat?"