𝓥𝓲𝓬𝓽𝓸𝓲𝓻𝓮 𝓦𝓮𝓪𝓼𝓵𝓮𝔂 ⋆ 𝒞𝒽𝒶𝓅𝓉𝑒𝓇 𝒯𝒽𝓇𝑒𝑒

[scorpio]

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ .:・° ☆ °・:. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ☆ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

𝓥𝓲𝓬𝓽𝓸𝓲𝓻𝓮 𝓦𝓮𝓪𝓼𝓵𝓮𝔂
𝒮𝑒𝓅𝓉𝑒𝓂𝒷𝑒𝓇 𝒮𝑒𝓋𝑒𝓃𝓉𝒽

𝓘𝓷𝓬𝓵𝓾𝓭𝓮𝓭
ꜰʀᴇᴅ, ᴊᴀᴍᴇꜱ, ᴄᴇᴅʀɪᴄ, ᴀɴᴅ ᴇᴅᴡᴀʀᴅ
𝓜𝓮𝓷𝓽𝓲𝓸𝓷𝓮𝓭
ʟɪʟʏ, ᴊᴀᴄǫᴜᴇʟɪɴᴇ, ᴄʏʙɪʟʟ, ᴀɴᴅ ᴍᴜʟᴛɪᴘʟᴇ ᴜɴɴᴀᴍᴇᴅ ᴏᴛʜᴇʀꜱ
𝓢𝓮𝓽 ⋆ 𝓟𝓻𝓮𝓿𝓲𝓸𝓾𝓼 𝓒𝓱𝓪𝓹𝓽𝓮𝓻 ⋆ 𝓝𝓮𝔁𝓽 𝓒𝓱𝓪𝓹𝓽𝓮𝓻

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ .:・° ☆ °・:. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

𝐻𝑜𝑔𝓌𝒶𝓇𝓉𝓈 𝓈𝓉𝓊𝒹𝑒𝓃𝓉𝓈, 𝒻𝒶𝒾𝓇 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝓌𝒾𝓈𝑒
𝐹𝓇𝑜𝓂 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒽𝑒𝒾𝓇𝓈 𝓌𝒾𝓁𝓁 𝑔𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓉 𝓉𝓇𝑜𝓊𝒷𝓁𝑒 𝒶𝓇𝒾𝓈𝑒,
𝒞𝒶𝓈𝓉 𝑜𝒻𝒻 𝓎𝑜𝓊𝓇 𝓂𝒶𝓃𝒽𝑜𝑜𝒹 𝓁𝒾𝓀𝑒 𝒶 𝓉𝓇𝑜𝓊𝒷𝓁𝑒𝒹 𝒻𝑜𝑒
𝐹𝑜𝓇 𝒾𝓉 𝒾𝓈 𝑜𝓃𝓁𝓎 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝓌𝒶𝓁𝓁𝓈' 𝓌𝒽𝒾𝓈𝓅𝑒𝓇𝓈 𝓉𝒽𝒶𝓉 𝓈𝑒𝒸𝓇𝑒𝓉𝓈 𝓀𝓃𝑜𝓌

━━━━━━━━ ♟ ━━━━━━━━

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀The infamous James Sirius Potter is living up to his namesakes by throwing his annual 𝔀𝓮𝓵𝓬𝓸𝓶𝓮 𝓫𝓪𝓬𝓴 𝓫𝓪𝓼𝓱. After all, he is not the type to be worried about what a few stupid rumors from a phone can do to a man when his 𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑙 reputation of best party host is at stake. Given that it is his first year as an upper-level student { and might also be his last, if he's being honest }, he has decided to make it bigger than ever before.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀In order to get to the party, you have to solve a riddle and find it. James also isn't too keen on completely ruining his own little sister with his troublesome ways just yet; he's paid a hefty price to have her be the party's bouncer. And don't you dare laugh. After all, you need a Potter to get in. Though the Horcrux was destroyed within Harry, it somehow didn't change his or his children's ability to speak Parseltongue. { Best to not overthink it. }

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀That's right, everyone. The welcome bash is in the infamous Chamber of Secrets, with charmed decorations glittering on the remains of the Basilisk bones and twirling across every creepy surface. An eerie, terrible sight. Yet it is the perfect place to hide from those who might try to stop this from being the craziest party Hogwarts has ever seen. Perhaps, if James cared to think that far ahead, he might notice his creation of a foreboding metaphor. A twisted joke. An invitation for the darkness to come to this new school year. But why worry about the future when there is firewhiskey and fun to be had?

---

[scorpio]

---

𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄

---

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀The Upper-Level Common Room, once a haven for intellectual pursuits, has erupted into chaos. Most bookshelves are toppled over, their priceless contents spewed in heaps around the floor. Pillows and blankets flutter about in charmed dances to the egregious techno music blaring from a wand. And, of course, in the center of the storm are the two boys everyone expects. Somehow Fred has managed to accompany his older cousin James into the restricted area, and they are joyfully 𝓰𝓮𝓽𝓽𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓾𝓹 𝓽𝓸 𝓷𝓸 𝓰𝓸𝓸𝓭. Any student who dares to come through the room only becomes their next victim. James’ party does not start for hours, but his idea of hosting starts and ends with checking the quality of the booze. Rose already managed to cover his ass by charming the decorations to perfection. Isn’t it his sacred duty to ensure the jungle juice is up to par too?

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“MY ANGEL!” James swoons the moment the front door opens. “What in the fuc —” The rest of Victoire’s protest is cut off by the crippling hug Potter wraps her in. “I ‘ave seen the light, and its name is Victoire! All ‘ail our queen!”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“FOR — ‘UCK — SA’ — ‘MES!” she desperately protests, but he is muffling her screams with the full force of his bulky jumper and drunk ambition. If her make-up weren’t magically charmed to stay in place, she may have sent him through the wall by now. She hates herself for not having her wand in her hand, and he is grasping her so firmly that her hands can’t manage any magic either. Fred’s cackling closes in from behind, and soon Victoire finds herself helplessly between the two of them. They reek of alcohol, and the keep muttering sweet nothings about how much they love her, though it's clear the only purpose is to annoy the hell out of her.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀The panic begins to set in. The secret darkness she refuses to acknowledge is never strong enough to break through her mold of 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓹𝓮𝓻𝓯𝓮𝓬𝓽, 𝓹𝓸𝓼𝓱 𝓵𝓪𝓭𝔂. But with such a surprising bombardment, it takes the opportunity to seize control. The boys are just being silly, just having fun, she tells herself. The anxiety gnawing at her control says otherwise, and she finally unravels. Victoire desperately wiggles her head to freedom, and all her anger roars through the room.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“GET OFF ME OR I’LL KILL YOU!”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Even Fred’s music-playing wand falls silent in reply, but its owner isn’t interested in listening. “Well, aren’t you just in a bloody good mood? Here we are, being so wonderfully kind, and all you do in return is threaten us. What kind of role model does that make you? Should I go punch some puppies now, with the kind of attitude you’re trying to spread?”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀The only reply Victoire deigns to give him is a staggering glare, to which he arrogantly winks. She can’t deal with this. Not today. Not when they already reminded her of something she was trying to pretend never happened.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Defusing the tension building in the cousins’ intense eye contact, the mediator steps elegantly in between them. “‘Ave you ‘eard? ‘Bout the party? As the Ravenclaws-s-s-s s-s-s-s-say, it’ll be a rea’ bloody —” James is cackling at himself. He can’t even get out his punchline. “I’m throwin’ a bloody party, Victoire! Will I s-s-s-s-see you there?”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“James, everyone knows your hosting it in the Chamber. You don’t have to make a ridiculous noise every time a word has an s.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Yes-s-s-s-s-s-s-s, I mus-s-s-s-s-s-s-s-st,” he beams. She told him the joke wasn’t funny over breakfast in the morning, but six-drinks James certainly is proud of himself for continuing 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓮𝔁𝓽𝓻𝓪 𝓱𝓲𝓷𝓽. As if the first person who cared enough to solve the riddle didn’t share the news with everyone else. As if Lily didn’t just tell everyone about the location without the riddle after one day anyway.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“It doesn’t matter because I’m not going,” Victoire huffs. Fred collapses dramatically on the cushion behind him in a faint. “Oh, unicorn turd! Victoire? Victoire Weasley? She’s too good to have fun? I would have never guessed! Call the Ministry! Call the press! An outrage!”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“You’re not even supposed to be in the upper levels dorm,” she growls to her troublesome cousin.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Yeah well, we aren’t supposed to be impolite to our loving relatives, but when has that stopped you?”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Just clean this up and get to your stupid thing already,” the blonde hisses. 𝓗𝓸𝔀 𝓬𝓪𝓷 𝓽𝓱𝓮𝔂 𝓪𝓵𝓵 𝓫𝓮 𝓲𝓷 𝓖𝓻𝔂𝓯𝓯𝓲𝓷𝓭𝓸𝓻 𝓪𝓷𝓭 𝔂𝓮𝓽 𝓱𝓪𝓿𝓮 𝓼𝓸 𝓵𝓲𝓽𝓽𝓵𝓮 𝓲𝓷 𝓬𝓸𝓶𝓶𝓸𝓷 ?

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Fred shakes his head from side to side and nonchalantly picks at his fingers. “What are the odds Victoire doesn’t just not go to your party, James? What are the odds she even tries to ruin it for everyone else? Wanna make a bet on it? I know a guy.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀James drunkenly giggles, but the words burn straight through Victoire’s heart. “Fred, aren’t you the guy?!” As they begin to banter, she takes it as an excuse to slip away. Potter’s constant chit chat saves her from a conversation she doesn’t want to be in, yet again.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Merlin, James, just laugh at the joke. Don’t explain it.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀The door barely makes a sound when it clicks behind her, but she cannot leave her guilt behind as easily as the room. Would showing her face at a party really be so bad?

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ .:・° ☆ °・:. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“𝑁𝑒𝑤 𝑖𝑛 𝑡𝑜𝑤𝑛 ? ”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝐻𝑒 𝑟𝑒𝑒𝑘𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝑐𝑖𝑔𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑡𝑡𝑒𝑠, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑠𝑛’𝑡 𝑠𝑢𝑟𝑝𝑟𝑖𝑠𝑒𝑑 𝑏𝑦 ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑎𝑡𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛. 𝐸𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑦𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑖𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑏𝑎𝑟 𝑖𝑠 𝑙𝑜𝑜𝑘𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟. 𝐼𝑡 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑜𝑛𝑙𝑦 𝑎 𝑚𝑎𝑡𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝑡𝑖𝑚𝑒 𝑏𝑒𝑓𝑜𝑟𝑒 𝑜𝑛𝑒 ℎ𝑎𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑎𝑔𝑒, 𝑜𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑡𝑢𝑝𝑖𝑑𝑖𝑡𝑦, 𝑡𝑜 𝑓𝑖𝑛𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑠𝑎𝑦 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“𝑆𝑜𝑚𝑒𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑙𝑖𝑘𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡,” 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑎𝑦𝑠 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑓𝑒𝑐𝑡 𝑒𝑙𝑒𝑔𝑎𝑛𝑡 𝑠𝑚𝑖𝑙𝑒. 𝐻𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑜𝑝𝑝𝑜𝑠𝑖𝑡𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑦𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑜𝑛 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑚𝑖𝑛𝑑. 𝐴 𝑚𝑎𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑖𝑡𝑦 𝑎𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑑 ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑎𝑙𝑚𝑜𝑛𝑑 𝑒𝑦𝑒𝑠. 𝐴 𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑓𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑙𝑦-𝑡𝑎𝑖𝑙𝑜𝑟𝑒𝑑 𝑠𝑢𝑖𝑡. 𝐷𝑎𝑟𝑘 ℎ𝑎𝑖𝑟 𝑠𝑝𝑖𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡𝑜 ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑠ℎ𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑𝑒𝑟𝑠 𝑖𝑛 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒 𝑠𝑚𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑎𝑐𝑡 𝑡𝑜 𝑠𝑒𝑒𝑚 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑔 . . . 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑎 𝑏𝑖𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑡𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑏𝑙𝑒. 𝑊𝑒𝑙𝑙, 𝑙𝑢𝑐𝑘𝑖𝑙𝑦 𝑓𝑜𝑟 ℎ𝑖𝑚, 𝑡𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑏𝑙𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑒𝑥𝑎𝑐𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑙𝑜𝑜𝑘𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑓𝑜𝑟.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“𝑀𝑦 𝑛𝑎𝑚𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑀𝑎𝑟𝑦,” 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑟𝑜𝑑𝑢𝑐𝑒𝑠, 𝑎𝑠 𝑖𝑡 𝑖𝑠 𝑐𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑖𝑛𝑔 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑓𝑢𝑙𝑙 𝑎𝑡𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 ℎ𝑎𝑠 𝑟𝑒𝑛𝑑𝑒𝑟𝑒𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑚𝑢𝑔𝑔𝑙𝑒 𝑚𝑢𝑡𝑒. 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐹𝑟𝑒𝑛𝑐ℎ 𝑙𝑖𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑜 𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒𝑑 𝑖𝑛 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑠𝑝𝑒𝑒𝑐ℎ ℎ𝑎𝑠 𝑏𝑒𝑒𝑛 𝑓𝑜𝑟𝑐𝑒𝑓𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑡𝑢𝑐𝑘𝑒𝑑 𝑎𝑤𝑎𝑦. 𝑊ℎ𝑎𝑡 ℎ𝑒 𝑟𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑚𝑏𝑒𝑟𝑠 𝑤𝑖𝑙𝑙 𝑏𝑒 𝑎 𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑟𝑖𝑐ℎ 𝑟𝑒𝑑 ℎ𝑎𝑖𝑟, ℎ𝑦𝑝𝑛𝑜𝑡𝑖𝑐 𝑔𝑟𝑒𝑒𝑛 𝑒𝑦𝑒𝑠, 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑏𝑒𝑠𝑡 𝑛𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡 𝑜𝑓 ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑙𝑖𝑓𝑒. 𝑆ℎ𝑎𝑚𝑒 ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑛𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟 𝑟𝑒𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑓𝑎𝑣𝑜𝑟.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ .:・° ☆ °・:. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Is that Victoire?”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀The question is snaking itself around the party, as sinister and foreboding as the Basilisk bones.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Are there two Victoires? Surely, that can’t be Weasley?” another responds. It happens again and again. No one can believe their eyes. Their elegant princess is nowhere to be found.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀The girl before them is dripping with chaos and reckless abandon. The black wrap around her top can barely be called a shirt, especially with the light pink of her lacy bra teasing around the edges for extra attention. The glitter on her skirt swirls like galaxies. She's intoxicating . . . and intoxicated. Her ballet training makes her confident on the dance floor, and Godric Corner is all too willing to bask in her attention. While she normally knows better than to play with fire, he is a little too tempting under the haze of everything she’s been drinking. Why could Jacqueline always be the irresponsible one who goes home with the bad boy? Couldn’t Victoire do it just once?

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Her hips spin in time with his. The beat matches the pounding intensity of her heart. She doesn’t even notice the curiosity she has peaked. For the first time in years, she doesn’t care what everyone else is looking at when they see her. She is just . . . being herself. The Veela magic takes over, free from the intense control usually wielded by its master. She’s practically glowing.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“You look so beautiful, Vic,” Godric hums from behind in her ear, but the compliment has the opposite effect. His words repulse her. 𝓣𝓱𝓪𝓽 𝓷𝓲𝓬𝓴𝓷𝓪𝓶𝓮 repulses her. She breaks free from his touch, but the transition is jarring. She has had far too much to drink to be prepared for sudden movements. Her head spins. She can’t tell the floor lights from the ceiling stars, as it all splays across her vision in colliding colors. Her hands wobble about for balance, which seems all too much like an invite closer. Godric misunderstands and moves in to kiss her. As his lips press to hers, she feels another wave of helplessness wash over here.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ .:・° ☆ °・:. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝐽𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑑𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑘. 𝐹𝑎𝑚𝑜𝑢𝑠 𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑡 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑑𝑠. 𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑦 ℎ𝑎𝑑 𝑠𝑢𝑟𝑝𝑎𝑠𝑠𝑒𝑑 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑎𝑔𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑔𝑜. 𝐽𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑓𝑖𝑣𝑒, 𝑚𝑎𝑦𝑏𝑒 ? 𝐶𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑𝑛’𝑡 𝑏𝑒 𝑚𝑜𝑟𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑛 𝑒𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡, 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑖𝑡 ? 𝐵𝑢𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑤ℎ𝑦 𝑤𝑒𝑟𝑒𝑛’𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑓𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑑𝑠 𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑙 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 ? 𝑊ℎ𝑦 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑏𝑎𝑟 𝑐𝑙𝑜𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑠𝑜𝑜𝑛 ? 𝑊𝑎𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑎𝑚𝑒 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑡𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑎𝑡 ?

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝑆ℎ𝑒’𝑠 𝑛𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟 𝑠𝑒𝑒𝑛 𝑎 𝑓𝑎𝑐𝑒 𝑠𝑜 𝑏𝑒𝑎𝑢𝑡𝑖𝑓𝑢𝑙, 𝑒𝑥𝑐𝑒𝑝𝑡 𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑙𝑜𝑜𝑘𝑠 𝑖𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑚𝑖𝑟𝑟𝑜𝑟. 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑑𝑟𝑢𝑛𝑘𝑒𝑛 𝑣𝑎𝑛𝑖𝑡𝑦 𝑔𝑒𝑡𝑠 𝑎𝑤𝑎𝑦 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 ℎ𝑒𝑟. “𝐷𝑖𝑑 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑗𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑠𝑎𝑦 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑙𝑜𝑢𝑑 ? ” 𝐻𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑡𝑎𝑘𝑒𝑛 𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑟 𝑖𝑛 𝑎 𝑓𝑖𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑙𝑎𝑢𝑔ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑙 𝑠𝑚𝑖𝑙𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟. 𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑦’𝑟𝑒 𝑎𝑙𝑤𝑎𝑦𝑠 𝑠𝑚𝑖𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟, 𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑛’𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑦 ?

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“𝑊ℎ𝑦 𝑑𝑜𝑛’𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑙𝑒𝑡 𝑚𝑒 𝑠ℎ𝑜𝑤 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 ? 𝑂𝑛𝑒 𝑚𝑜𝑟𝑒 𝑑𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑘 𝑏𝑎𝑐𝑘 𝑎𝑡 𝑚𝑦 𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑐𝑒 ? ”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“𝐽𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑜𝑛𝑒,” 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑝𝑢𝑟𝑟𝑠 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑜 ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑒𝑎𝑟. 𝐴 𝑝𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑎𝑙 ℎ𝑢𝑛𝑔𝑒𝑟 𝑎𝑤𝑎𝑘𝑒𝑛𝑠 𝑖𝑛 ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑒𝑦𝑒𝑠. 𝐴𝑛𝑑 𝑠𝑢𝑑𝑑𝑒𝑛𝑙𝑦 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑟𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑚𝑏𝑒𝑟𝑠 𝑤ℎ𝑦 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑛𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟 𝑑𝑖𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠. 𝑊ℎ𝑦 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑛𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟 𝑑𝑜 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑖𝑡 𝑖𝑠 𝑎𝑔𝑎𝑖𝑛.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“𝐼, 𝑢ℎ, 𝑎𝑐𝑡𝑢𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 . . . 𝑚𝑦 𝑓𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑑. 𝑆ℎ𝑒 . . . 𝑤𝑒 . . . ”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝐻𝑖𝑠 𝑓𝑖𝑛𝑔𝑒𝑟𝑠 𝑤𝑟𝑎𝑝 𝑎𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑑 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑤𝑟𝑖𝑠𝑡. 𝐴 𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑡𝑙𝑒 𝑡𝑜𝑜 𝑡𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡. “𝑌𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑓𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑑𝑠 𝑎𝑟𝑒 𝑔𝑜𝑛𝑒, 𝑏𝑎𝑏𝑦. 𝐿𝑒𝑡 𝑚𝑒 ℎ𝑒𝑙𝑝 𝑦𝑜𝑢.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝑆ℎ𝑒 𝑑𝑜𝑒𝑠𝑛’𝑡 𝑤𝑎𝑛𝑡 ℎ𝑖𝑠 ℎ𝑒𝑙𝑝, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑎𝑠 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑝𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑠 𝑎𝑤𝑎𝑦, 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑔𝑟𝑎𝑠𝑝 𝑜𝑛𝑙𝑦 𝑡𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑠.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“𝐽𝑢𝑠𝑡 . . . 𝑜𝑛𝑒 . . . ”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ .:・° ☆ °・:. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Stop!” she screeches. It can barely be heard among the bellowing speakers, but nobody has to hear her to know what happened. Godric is splayed out on his ass, either from wandless magic or an adrenaline-fueled shove. It is all too fast to be sure. Did she even do that? He looks at her, mouth agape and eyes spinning with horror, as his own intoxicated mind tries to piece together what is happening.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀The murmurs are already spreading rumors. The blonde hardly notices.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Victoire’s shaking hand fixes the bra strap that has been falling obstinately down her shoulder all night. She is still in a haze. None of the world makes sense. Why does Godric have his arms up in some kind of surrender?

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“What the . . . ”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Only then does she realize that her hand is gripping her wand, threatening to fire in his direction. Put it down, she thinks to herself, but the limb doesn’t respond. Her eyes travel up the arm. Wait. That’s not her . . .

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Wait. She isn’t wearing a jumper. What is happening?

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀It doesn’t belong to her. It belongs to . . . Teddy?

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀He is at this party? When did he get by her side?

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Stop!” she screams again. Her sudden words surprise herself, but this time it is not the Slytherin boy at the end of her command. She rubs at her eyes, and the world grows slightly more clear. A crowd is clearing around them on the dance floor. All the confused faces are beginning to take shape. But only one of them matters. She locks eyes with the professor fearlessly.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Stop it,” she repeats, deliberate and quiet. It doesn’t have to be louder than the music for her order to be understood. It is . . . her wand that is flourished to attack. He is only there to hold her back. To stop her from making a mistake. His hand drifts away from her, hesitantly back to his side, but he keeps glancing over her shoulder to Godric. { Why does her skin have to burn where his fingers brushed? Why does he have this effect on her, even now? } The other boy feels trapped on the floor like any sudden movement will provoke the two predators having a stand-off.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“I’m trying to help,” he huffs. Another brilliant intro sentence from Professor Lupin. What, are damsels supposed to be grateful when someone comes to their distress call? Is that what he thinks this is?

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Victoire grinds her teeth and pushes past him. He isn’t expecting her to charge by so forcefully. She enjoys his slight stumble back enough to crack a secret smile. The part of her brain recovering some slight semblance of sobriety begs her to keep walking, but her heart tugs her feet back around to face him square on. He has dared to follow her off the dance floor, after all.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“You think I need you? Or your pathetic help?”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀There it is. The breaking point.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Three years she has held her emotions in, shoved them so far beneath the surface that no one even knew to suspect. Three years, two months, and nine days. But not a moment longer. Victoire can’t control her tirade, and with her balled fists and boiling rage taking over, she knows that she doesn’t want to.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“I’ve spent THREE YEARS without you, Teddy. I picked myself up off the ground after being ABANDONED. I found happiness and security ALL BY MYSELF. If you think, for one FUCKING SECOND, THAT I NEED YOUR HELP, FOR ABSOLUTELY ANYTHING AT ALL —”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“That’s it.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Victoire’s world is spinning as he grabs her and pulls her forward. Everything in her body screams in protest, but her panic cannot get out fast enough to cry out. He’s not . . . it’s not . . . he’s gentle. It’s not the same. But her body doesn’t seem to care. Tears begin to well in her eyes.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝓟𝓞𝓟 ! They’re apparating before she can even make sense of him and this world and what is happening. It’s a terrible thing to do to a drunk. She wants to vomit from such shit transport; apparition is like a curse.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Anything you have to say to me you can say it right here. But not in front of my students. Understood?”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀He’s breathless. Each exhale clouds around her in the cold night air just outside the greenhouses. It envelops her in a way he never has. At least, not for years. But the command still surprises her. At least some part of him had grown into manhood while he was away. She is too busy fighting her own desire to break down to give him a reply. At least her eyes are no longer threatening to spill over. Victoire can feel the steely gaze taking over, her defense mechanism against showing any emotion. Especially in front of 𝓱𝓲𝓶. But it is her humanity, not her Veela or Merlin-knows-what-else that wins the fight. Cold runs up and down her spine, giving her a small but uncontrollable shiver. 𝓐𝓷𝓭 𝓮𝓿𝓮𝓻𝔂𝓸𝓷𝓮 𝓴𝓷𝓸𝔀𝓼 𝓱𝓸𝔀 𝓶𝓾𝓬𝓱 𝓥𝓲𝓬𝓽𝓸𝓲𝓻𝓮 𝓱𝓪𝓽𝓮𝓼 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓾𝓷𝓬𝓸𝓷𝓽𝓻𝓸𝓵𝓵𝓪𝓫𝓵𝓮.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ .:・° ☆ °・:. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑛𝑜 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑏𝑙𝑎𝑚𝑒 𝑏𝑢𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑠𝑒𝑙𝑓. 𝑆ℎ𝑒 𝑘𝑛𝑒𝑤 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑖𝑔𝑛𝑠. 𝑆ℎ𝑒 𝑘𝑛𝑒𝑤 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑜𝑠𝑡𝑠. 𝐴𝑛𝑑 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑝𝑎𝑖𝑑 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑚 𝑎𝑛𝑦𝑤𝑎𝑦. 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑢𝑛𝑑𝑒𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑠 𝑟𝑜𝑎𝑟 𝑏𝑒𝑙𝑙𝑜𝑤𝑠 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑣𝑒 ℎ𝑒𝑟. 𝐴𝑛𝑦𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑒𝑙𝑠𝑒 𝑤𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑏𝑒 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑧𝑒𝑛 𝑖𝑛 𝑓𝑒𝑎𝑟, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑎𝑛𝑦𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑒𝑙𝑠𝑒.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“𝐻𝑒𝑟𝑒, 𝑝𝑟𝑒𝑡𝑡𝑦, 𝑝𝑟𝑒𝑡𝑡𝑦,” 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑜𝑜𝑠. 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑚𝑜𝑛𝑠𝑡𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑠 𝑐𝑎𝑐𝑜𝑝ℎ𝑜𝑛𝑦 𝑠ℎ𝑎𝑘𝑒𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑔𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑑 𝑜𝑛𝑐𝑒 𝑎𝑔𝑎𝑖𝑛, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑚𝑎𝑔𝑖𝑐𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦-𝑐ℎ𝑎𝑟𝑔𝑒𝑑 𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑝𝑙𝑢𝑔𝑠 𝑘𝑒𝑒𝑝 𝑖𝑡 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑤𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑘𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡ℎ𝑒 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑜𝑐 𝑖𝑡 𝑠𝑜 𝑑𝑒𝑠𝑖𝑟𝑒𝑠. “𝐻𝑒𝑒𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑜𝑜𝑜𝑜𝑜,” 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑜𝑓𝑡𝑙𝑦 𝑐𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑠. 𝑇ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑡𝑖𝑚𝑒, ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑜𝑛𝑙𝑦 𝑟𝑒𝑝𝑙𝑦 𝑖𝑠 𝑠𝑖𝑙𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑒.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝐻𝑒 𝑑𝑜𝑒𝑠𝑛’𝑡 𝑡𝑟𝑢𝑠𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑦𝑒𝑡.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝑊ℎ𝑦 𝑠ℎ𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 ℎ𝑒, 𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑜𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑠 𝑤ℎ𝑜 ℎ𝑎𝑑 𝑐𝑜𝑚𝑒 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑏𝑒𝑓𝑜𝑟𝑒 ℎ𝑎𝑑 𝑏𝑒𝑒𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑤𝑟𝑜𝑛𝑔 𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑜𝑛𝑠 ? 𝑆ℎ𝑒 𝑑𝑜𝑒𝑠𝑛’𝑡 𝑏𝑙𝑎𝑚𝑒 ℎ𝑖𝑚.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝐻𝑒 𝑎𝑙𝑠𝑜 𝑑𝑜𝑒𝑠𝑛’𝑡 ℎ𝑎𝑡𝑒 ℎ𝑒𝑟.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝑆ℎ𝑒 𝑤𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝑏𝑒𝑒𝑛 𝑖𝑛𝑐𝑖𝑛𝑒𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑏𝑦 𝑛𝑜𝑤 𝑖𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑤𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑎𝑠𝑒. 𝐻𝑒 ℎ𝑎𝑠 𝑠𝑒𝑛𝑠𝑒𝑑 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑚𝑜𝑛𝑡ℎ𝑠 𝑛𝑜𝑤, 𝑎𝑠 𝑝𝑒𝑟 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑛. 𝐺𝑖𝑣𝑖𝑛𝑔 ℎ𝑖𝑚 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑜𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑡𝑜 𝑔𝑒𝑡 𝑡𝑜 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑎𝑓𝑎𝑟.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“𝐼 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑡𝑙𝑒 𝑠𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡.” 𝐻𝑒𝑟 𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑡𝑙𝑒 𝑡𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑒 𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑔𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑔ℎ 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑡𝑟𝑒𝑒𝑠.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝐵𝑢𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑡𝑤𝑖𝑔 𝑠𝑛𝑎𝑝𝑝𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑏𝑒ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑑 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑖𝑠 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑙𝑎𝑛𝑑𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑜𝑓 𝑎 𝑓𝑖𝑒𝑟𝑐𝑒, 𝑚𝑎𝑗𝑒𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑐 𝑏𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑡.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝐴 𝑘𝑛𝑖𝑓𝑒 𝑝𝑟𝑖𝑐𝑘𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑚𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑜𝑓 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑏𝑎𝑐𝑘. “𝐴𝑛𝑑 𝐼 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑠.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ .:・° ☆ °・:. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“You’re shaking.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝓣𝓱𝓪𝓷𝓴 𝔂𝓸𝓾, 𝓬𝓪𝓹𝓽𝓪𝓲𝓷 𝓸𝓫𝓿𝓲𝓸𝓾𝓼. But his simple words have one benefit because her blood starts to simmer in rage. “You’re cold. Here.” He takes off his tan jumper. Victoire hates that she catches the hint of surprisingly tanned, chiseled skin when he reaches above his head. The memory of it is so distracting she actually accepts the item being handed to her. “Take it. Can’t let you freeze to death, now can I?” A small chuckle escapes his lips.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀His small laugh doesn’t get matched by her own softening. It only solidifies her disappointment in him. He still doesn’t get it.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Really, Teddy? I can’t be cold now, but you were happy to freeze me out of your life completely? And now you just want to force me to play nice so a few little kids think you’re still cool?”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀She is drunk. She is . . . weightless. The cold is starting to clear her mind, but the anger is more intoxicating than any shot could be. She is getting carried away now. The fury. The heartbreak. It’s too much. Either she is going to stumble in her stupid heels or the words are gonna fall out of her mouth. She can only control one thing at a time. And as Victoire moves to steady her body, her mind can’t stop the words from lashing out:

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Fuck you for what you did to me.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀She doesn’t even mean it. Not like that. But now it’s been said. She balls the stupid, incredibly soft . . . comforting . . . wonderful jumper in her fist. She isn’t going to put it on. She won’t do him the favor. He doesn’t get to be her knight in shining armor, especially when it’s yet another problem that he caused. Things were perfectly warm inside. They could have stayed. The guilt over her words eats her alive, but she shoves it down. Her retort is nothing compared to what he did. They both know his actions said far worse.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Shivers gnaw at her control. Goosebumps run up her legs and arms. Her power and control are lost. The pain in his gaze . . . “T-t-teddy.” Victoire wants it to sound confident; the fury still lights her up from inside. But it can’t truly keep her warm. Her chattering teeth shroud his name in layers of hesitation and apology. She hates how good it feels to say it again. “Why did you do that to me?”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀He steps closer, but he won’t look her in the eyes. Only down, down, down . . . at the pathetic jumper he was clearly wearing as a security blanket anyway. He tries to take it back from her, but she knows why. He can’t force her to put it on so he can have some sense of closure. Their tug of war stretches the poor stitches, until . . . “I’m sorry.” Her whole body goes rigid.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“You have no idea . . . ” he hesitates, like the words are swallowing him, stopping him from saying anything more. “I’ve tried.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Out of nowhere, he looks her in the eyes. They’re a hypnotic icy blue, like the waters by shell cottage. Like home. “Gods, Vic – you have no idea how much I’ve tried. To reach out, to apologize. To tell you how —” Her grip around his jumper loosens and Teddy takes this as an opportunity to gently wrap it around her shoulders. “Truth is, I’m not good with words.” His hands tighten around the sleeves, lingering only a second too long. “I’m just not. Probably never will be, which is such an awful thing about me, because you deserve so much more than a sorry . . . ”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀His gaze and hands and body leave her as he takes a step back. 𝓐 𝓬𝓸𝔀𝓪𝓻𝓭, her first reaction hisses. But the way he looks at her. From all the ways men have looked at her, desired her, his has always been different.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Victoire, you deserve . . . you deserve the best things. Because you’re the best and because that’s just who you are. And I’m afraid that I can’t . . . and that’s why I left . . . and I’m sorry. I really am and I will apologize to you with my last dying breath, probably.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Is it her anger or her love that makes her want to punch him? She hates him for leaving, but she hates the reason why even more. It strikes a chill deep within her, further than the crisp air can reach. Her heart nearly stops in her chest. How could he ever think he wasn’t good enough for her? How could he think so highly of her own position — especially when she’s the fool who pulled a wand on a boy at a party, when she’s the one wearing next to nothing on a cold September night? He won’t look her way again, but she can’t keep her eyes off of him. After so long, he only makes her speechless. Her mind is whirling, trying to put the pieces of his confession together. None of it makes sense. Didn’t he leave because she wasn’t enough for him?

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀The quiet eats away at them. It’s an apology she has waited years for, but all of her rehearsed replies are rendered useless by his brokenness. She believes him. She wants to forgive him. The anger finally collapses from her lungs. Time stands still. There is only Teddy. And he’s finally back.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“I didn’t want the best. I just wanted you.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀It burns. It’s a thought she wanted to keep inside that somehow snakes out in a whisper. He finally looks in her eyes again, and they’re both hurting with the weight of her words.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝓦𝓪𝓷𝓽𝓮𝓭.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Past tense.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀But it’s the truth. The world is so complicated. She doesn’t know what she wants anymore. Where has he been these past three years? What has he done? What kind of man has he become? She won’t lie and say she still wants him. She doesn’t know him. But, fuck . . . even when he looks like that, tousled hair and crippled with despair, she 𝔀𝓪𝓷𝓽𝓼 to know again.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Victoire doesn’t say, 𝓘 𝓯𝓸𝓻𝓰𝓲𝓿𝓮 𝔂𝓸𝓾. She knows how to speak without words, and she dares to cross the small space between them. The warmth she feels all over is not from the jumper tucked gently around her. 𝓢𝓽𝓪𝔂 𝓱𝓮𝓻𝓮 𝓯𝓸𝓻𝓮𝓿𝓮𝓻. 𝓨𝓸𝓾 𝓭𝓸𝓷'𝓽 𝔀𝓪𝓷𝓽 𝓱𝓲𝓶 𝓽𝓸 𝓮𝓿𝓮𝓻 𝓵𝓮𝓪𝓿𝓮 𝓪𝓰𝓪𝓲𝓷. Her hands are on his chest, inching their way up to his neck. The world melts away. Her heart finally finds life again, pounding in her chest. Every inch of her skin on his is burning with temptation. She wants him.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“I don’t want to fight you, Teddy, but I don’t know how to trust you. Show me how to trust you again.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Her world sets on fire when his hands wrap around her waist. “Vic . . . ” He breathes out her name as his hands have now made their way to her hair. Everything is humming with the intensity of the sun, craving him in every inch of her. Now and forever. This moment is everything they’ve been waiting for. They’re back along the shore of the Great Lake. The two of them. Nothing else in the entire universe. But her kiss doesn’t ignite their passion; it falls uselessly against his cheek. She’d like to think it is his minty aftershave, and not her shame, that tingles so. His hands drop from her hair as he takes an agonizingly slow step away from her.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Vic, we can’t do this. You’re drunk. And I’m seeing someone. It’s not fair. It’s not fair to either of us.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝓢𝓮𝓮𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓼𝓸𝓶𝓮𝓸𝓷𝓮.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀She knows it. Sort of. She has seen his Instagram, not that he has ever actually tagged another woman. But of course Victoire has seen the existence of some beautiful, dark-haired enigma gracing his photos and captions alike. She enjoys Italy more than Paris, though, so what in Merlin’s beard . . .

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀She always knew he would tell her no. Drunk, disheveled, in the middle of the night . . . This isn’t what she wants. This isn’t the Teddy she wants. But it still stings. Rejection has been her biggest fear since her time at Beauxbatons. It is the very knife he plunged through her heart when he once abandoned her. And here it is again, only she gets to be the one to run this time. Something snaps within her. Victoire is not a foolish drama queen who shoved a boy on the dance floor or screamed at her professor. She is better than that.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀But he said it himself already. He is no good with words. How does he think this blank stare is any better? Every second he waits distances them further and further. It is though the moment they shared was only a hallucination. Just like that, everything had changed again. Pulling herself to her full height, she shows the mighty Gryffindor courage that has always flowed through her veins as she defiantly looks him in the eyes.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Actually, Edward, you’re quite right. I should be getting back to the party with . . . ” She’s forgotten his bloody name. “With Godric. He deserves an explanation. And you, well, you have someone to 𝓼𝓮𝓮, don’t you?”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀But he said it himself already. He is no good with words. How does he think this blank stare is any better? Every second he waits distances them further and further. It is though the moment they shared is only a hallucination. Just like that, everything has changed again.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀If he was smart, he would leave. “Vic . . . ” Her name escapes his lips, but unlike last time, he sounds a bit more confident in the way he’s calling after her. Does he know how much it kills her to hear that name? Is that why he keeps dropping it like a curse? Of course he doesn’t know. He can’t know something about her because he doesn’t know 𝓱𝓮𝓻. Not anymore.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“At least let me walk you back to the party?”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀She scoffs at his offer, but she can’t tell if her physical repulsion is at the idea of being treated like a child or the apparition nausea catching up to her again. “Professor, I certainly don’t need an escort across the place I’ve been living for the last seven years of my life.” His protest is written all over his face; it is his fault that she is all the way out here, after all. “Let’s face it: we both have people waiting for us. We both have other places to be. The only real choice we have here is to . . . is to say goodbye.”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Victoire, I really think that —”

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“Don’t worry, Professor. I already know.” Why does he have to look at her like that? The conflict flashes through his eyes. He has been so unreadable since his arrival, but in this moment, it is like he never left. Teddy looks like an open book to her, and she isn’t surprised by the question brushing off his lips. “What do you already know?” But that glint in his eyes says he already knows what she is going to say too.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“I already know that I have to be the one to say goodbye, since you never will.” And for all the moments that night where he stopped her from getting away from him, this time he finally caves in. Teddy lets her walk away.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ .:・° ☆ °・:. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝑇ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑚𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑏𝑒 𝑤ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑑𝑟𝑜𝑤𝑛𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑓𝑒𝑒𝑙𝑠 𝑙𝑖𝑘𝑒.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝐿𝑢𝑛𝑔𝑠 𝑓𝑖𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑤𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑖𝑛𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑎𝑑 𝑜𝑓 𝑎𝑖𝑟. 𝐹𝑒𝑒𝑡 𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑛𝑒𝑑 𝑡𝑜 𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑑. 𝑉𝑖𝑠𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑔𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑏𝑙𝑎𝑐𝑘. 𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑜𝑛𝑙𝑦 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑣𝑜𝑖𝑑. 𝑆𝑐𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑚𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑚𝑎𝑘𝑒𝑠 𝑖𝑡 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑠𝑒.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀“𝑃-𝑝-𝑝𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑒,” 𝑎 𝑓𝑒𝑚𝑎𝑙𝑒’𝑠 𝑣𝑜𝑖𝑐𝑒 𝑤ℎ𝑖𝑚𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑠. 𝐼𝑡 𝑠𝑒𝑒𝑚𝑠 𝑙𝑖𝑘𝑒 𝑛𝑜 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑎𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑑 𝑡𝑜 ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑟 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑐𝑟𝑦 𝑢𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑙 𝑎 𝑤ℎ𝑖𝑝 𝑠𝑛𝑎𝑝𝑠 𝑎𝑐𝑟𝑜𝑠𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑑𝑎𝑟𝑘𝑛𝑒𝑠𝑠. 𝐼𝑛𝑐ℎ𝑒𝑠 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑚𝑎𝑘𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑎𝑐𝑡. 𝐵𝑢𝑡 𝑖𝑡 𝑤𝑎𝑠𝑛’𝑡 𝑠𝑢𝑝𝑝𝑜𝑠𝑒𝑑 𝑡𝑜. 𝑁𝑜𝑡 𝑎𝑛𝑦𝑚𝑜𝑟𝑒. 𝑁𝑜𝑡 𝑦𝑒𝑡. 𝑆ℎ𝑒 𝑓𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑐ℎ𝑒𝑠 𝑜𝑛 𝑖𝑛𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑐𝑡. 𝑇𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑠 𝑤𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑓𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑑𝑜𝑤𝑛 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑓𝑎𝑐𝑒 𝑖𝑓 𝑠ℎ𝑒 ℎ𝑎𝑑 𝑎𝑛𝑦 𝑐𝑎𝑝𝑎𝑐𝑖𝑡𝑦 𝑡𝑜 𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑙 𝑚𝑎𝑘𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑚.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀𝐻𝑜𝑤 𝑙𝑜𝑛𝑔 ℎ𝑎𝑠 𝑖𝑡 𝑏𝑒𝑒𝑛? 𝐻𝑜𝑤 𝑙𝑜𝑛𝑔 𝑤𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑖𝑡 𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑙 𝑏𝑒 ?

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ .:・° ☆ °・:. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Broken glass and spilled booze devour every inch of the floor. Students are milling about in the chaos of the 𝓻𝓮𝓪𝓵 𝓹𝓻𝓸𝓯𝓮𝓼𝓼𝓸𝓻𝓼’ arrival. Well, isn’t that something? James is being strung up by his ear on one end of the room. Fred fights his urge to cower in the other. She supposes it was bound to happen.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Victoire does not care about the party getting busted. She doesn’t care about the detention slip falling into her hands. At some point, it would have been the end of her world. But that Victoire also never would have come to this in the first place. And what she knows now . . . what she has seen, experienced. The consequence of detention pales in comparison to the world outside.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀She is practically a zombie going through the motions. Although not quite mindless, her thoughts are far from focusing on reality. Solemn nod to the groundskeeper that she knows better. Half-smile to her friends who probably had a good night and don’t care enough to check in with her. Not that she checks in either. Apologetic wave to the Godric boy she never should have danced with. It’s all so meaningless.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Despite the pain in her heart, Victoire cannot hide the relief as she collapses, finally, under the canopy of her bed. Even with her party clothes slipped off, there is still a certain tan jumper curling down her shoulders and around her waist. Right where his hands have been. The charmed stars twinkling on her bed’s ceiling seem to wink at her. They’re in on her secret.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀For all the time she has spent in denial, she is helpless against the pull of softness and the smell that makes her too afraid to brew amortentia. A truth she can no longer hide from.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀In all her travels and adventures, there have only been two things that make her feel truly alive.

⠀⠀⠀ ⠀Dragons. 𝓐𝓷𝓭 𝓣𝓮𝓭𝓭𝔂 𝓛𝓾𝓹𝓲𝓷.