Murder to Malfoy - D.MALFOY

[12]

Halloween seems a perfect day to kill someone, does it not?

Ivy walked downstairs two hours before anyone would wake for the day. With her observations, she noticed that the elves tended to set the dishes for breakfast straight after dinner - so they didn't have to do it in the morning she suspected. And that gave her the perfect opportunity. She dressed head to toe in black (jumper stolen from Fin's wardrobe as it was baggier and covered her figure) so it was easier to hide in the shadows when needed. She quickly walked all the way to the great hall, listening to every creak and tiny sound that the castle made for footsteps before they got too close and discovered her.

She made it to the great hall without running into a singular person. She slipped in through the closed doors and gently shut the door behind herself, bringing her hood down so she could have a greater peripheral vision just in case something was in the hall. She paused at the door for a moment, waiting for someone to make themselves known if they happened to be present. Once she was sure that no one was in there, she smirked with excitement flooding in her stomach to mix with the adrenaline.

She walked over to where Malfoy usually sat, shoes clacking against the floor, and picked his mug up with her gloved hand - latex gloves to make sure her fingerprints were not found on it. Hair did not matter, for she had a plan for an excuse to use if that happened to be a part of the questioning for the murder. She, with eyes full of such focus, took the clasp of her necklace apart and then poured a bead of the clear poison (that would turn brown with the addition of another liquid) onto her finger. Ivy stared at it for a moment, hoping this would work before she ran it around the very lip of the mug. She poured a little more and watched it drip down the edge, pooling in the very bottom of the porcelain. She moved the mug around, making sure to get it onto every crevice before she used the spell she created so it hugged the sides. With a prideful smile, she set the mug back onto the table and corrected its position with the edge of her finger. Then she pulled her gloves off, putting them straight into a pocket of her jeans, before she put on a new pair for the door. She re-clasped her necklace and then double-checked that the mug did not look suspicious or different to any of the ones around it. Happy with what she had done, Ivy turned and walked back out of the hall with the sound of her shoes echoing through the hall like before.

She smiled all the way back to the common room, quickly climbing the stairs to her room as people could be waking up relatively soon - she took a little too long in the hall as she admired her work. She snuck past two early risers, still yawning and blurry-eyed. Ivy quickly put her pyjamas back on, putting Fin's jumper back where it had been before and snuck into bed for about an hour's sleep.

Ivy had just managed to still her mind to sleep when Fin's annoyingly loud alarm clock decided to ring without consideration for the people that had been far too exhilarated to sleep at all that night. Ivy groaned, covering her head with a pillow as sleep that she desperately needed was stolen from her. She had been so ready to just pass out that she forgot all about the laced coffee mug downstairs, "I am going to throw that out of the window."

Fin laughed, annoyingly awake for that time in the morning, "Good morning to you too." As Fin walked to the bathroom, they pulled off Ivy's covers like usual and shocked her system into working again with the bitter October air that had swallowed the room. She practically leapt from the bed and threw on her clothes (it was a Saturday) haphazardly tying her hair up and out of the way so she could easily see Malfoy's death and revel in the sight.

"I'm going to go down early, get us all decent food before all the Halloween stuff comes out. I am not eating pumpkin pancakes covered in green syrup for another year," Ivy announced after she had thrown herself together somewhat decently, she couldn't look too suspicious after all.

"Oh good idea," Fin replied as they began putting on their makeup, spending extra time changing out their piercings. Ivy left the room with a rather excited grin on her face, which was instantly wiped away as soon as she came into contact with other people. She still skipped down the stairs though, taking two at a time in order to get there quicker. She didn't want to miss the ingestion, it was a rather slow working poison so she may not get to see the actual death. That was another precaution against anyone finding out it was her, so then the poisoning could have happened at any time if they did manage to figure out that he had been poisoned. Also, she had concocted a resistance potion for truth-telling serum, as her brother used to call it, just in case.

Ivy walked into the dining all and forced herself to wipe her smile away when she saw that Malfoy was already sitting there, alone. Where she normally sat, there were no plates of regular food but instead piles and piles of sickly looking Halloween food - almost as if someone had moved all the plates to populate that one area just to annoy her. She looked over to the other tables and then spotted something she could steal. She walked over to Malfoy and plucked a plate of eggs, bacon and hash browns (since they were Fin's favourites) straight from his hand. She used that opportunity to turn a little too quickly, hair flicking out behind her and giving the perfect opportunity for one of them to fall out. There were witnesses now, after all. "Cadieux!" he blurted out of shock, watching her walk away with his hand still positioned as if he was holding it.

"What? It's not like you're going to miss it," she shrugged over her shoulder, revelling in the deepest confusion that took over his face - almost like the one he got during Muggle studies in first year. She sat back down just as Fin and Blaise arrived. They each took their portions of the breakfast, Ivy letting Fin have her hashbrowns, and they began the usual breakfast chatter. Blaise had weirdly vivid dreams and could almost edit them as he slept, changing the course of his subconscious with very little effort. Those were the type of stories that she loved to hear, except today she was far too busy watching as Draco poured his coffee into the very mug that she had poisoned.

"Ivy!" Blaise called for the third time, finally catching her attention as he waved a hand in front of her face.

"Sorry what?" she asked, bewilderment flooding through her eyes as she focused all her attention on the conversation. She had been stupid to let herself get so distracted, so suspiciously distracted.

Blaise looked to Fin then back to her, concern pouring from his gaze, "I asked if you were going to the party tonight..."

"Oh, uh maybe I don't know," she shrugged, smiling at Luna as she sat down next to Blaise and started to dig into the dessert-themed breakfast around her.

"What are you staring at?" Fin asked, brow raised as they tried to move into the direct path that Ivy had been staring at previously.

"Nothing, well the window technically," she replied, glancing back to the 'window' just as he brought the coffee to his lips to sip. Then, just as adrenaline tugged at her stomach and made her think she could see her breakfast again, he laughed at something and set the mug back down. She frowned deeply, watching the steam flood from the top of the mug. It taunted her, practically laughing in her face at her incapability of poisoning someone. "Is it a costume party?" Ivy asked, feigning interest in the conversation as to get rid of the frown on her face and the overwhelming dread that this was not going to go to plan.

"Yeah, Luna and I are going together."

"That's so cute," she smiled softly, meaning every word. He and Luna were a near-perfect couple and pairing. Her smile fell as she saw Malfoy lift the cup out of the corner of her eye. She turned all her attention to him, watching his every move as the entire hall blurred out into white noise. The mug moved to be near millimetres from his lips and she could taste her victory, could taste the relief on the very tip of her tastebuds.

It clattered away as soon as Pansy swatted a fly away from her face, elbowing the mug straight out of his hand. Her mind screamed at her as the mug clattered to the floor, sending coffee absolutely everywhere. "Fuck," she muttered, looking to the food on her plate as an overwhelming loss feeling slunk its way through her veins. The adrenaline got replaced with grief once more. Her necklace handing empty now, only taunted her more. She looked up when the hair on the back of her neck stood up, seeing all three people looking at her with such confusion. She chuckled, "I hit my foot on the table."

"Idiot," Blaise laughed and with that, she knew that they weren't suspicious at all.

The poisoning plan and death on Halloween plan crumbed. So she moved on to plan number two. After all, there were multiple ways to kill someone. She just had to look for the one that would stick.