The Conquest of the Ember Heart | F! OC x S.S. x O.G. x G.W.

The calm before the storm

My long black hair fell in big curls over my shoulders, it reached my hips and I decided to wear it loose. As I looked at myself in the mirror I wondered if I wasn't overdressed.

The question only came up, of course, because I've never attended a ball, not even a party. I had no idea what to wear.

My hands slid over the blue velvety fabric of my corset dress, which reached to my knees. I wore black stockings and a white dress shirt underneath.

„Is that too much?" I asked Samantha Dale who happened to be in my dorm room. She had said that she liked staying in my room because I didn't have a roommate and I was almost never there. So it was quiet and comfortable to study and I didn't know what to think of it.

„I rather think it's too casual for a Slytherin party. But you don't need a fancy dress, you enchant everyone with your looks anyway." she said looking up from her book on magical plants.

An owl flew through the window and threw me a letter. Samantha didn't seem to care and went back to her book. Luckily for me, because it was another letter from my admirer.

I didn't want anyone else to find out about it. In my opinion, too many already knew about it.

My fingers touched the golden decorations and opened the brown envelope. I sighed, they were the most beautiful letters I had ever received, I had to admit that.

———
Beloved Vera,

I have never been good at anything.
But I've never wanted
anything so much as
I want to hold you
every waking minute.
And every night
while I sleep.
The question has ceased to be
‚How do I love you?'
and has become
‚How would I ever stop?'

Your heart knows the way, return to me.

- your secret admirer
———

I took a deep breath. I almost forgot that I wasn't alone and put the letter in my jinxed drawer. The question of who it was that wrote me these letters came up more and more often. It made me curious to the point that I wanted to get to the bottom of it.

Was it someone I knew? In my opinion no one was as profound and romantic as the sender of these letters.

Even if I acted as if the subject of love made me want to gag, I often felt hope for it. The flames that burned in me longed for affection and tenderness. And yet it did not feel entirely voluntary.

„Don't you have to be somewhere?" Samantha asked me and I exhaled in frustration.

„All right, I'm going. I can't believe I'm being shooed out of my own room." I snorted while I gathered my bag and walked out.

„You're the best, have fun" She sounded sweet and cute.

As I walked down to the dungeons, another issue occupied my mind. Part of why I felt so lonely in my house was probably because we were all very alike. Loners who were only interested in their own progress. We were friendly and open, but when push came to shove, we did our own thing.

Last year I would have done anything to be in Slytherin, mostly to spend more time with my closest friends. But now I knew that everything had a reason. Who knows what would have happened if we lived so close together.

Would we have gotten closer?

I walked down the last flight of stairs to the Slytherin common room entrance. Behind me, on the right, was the secret entrance to the Scriptorium. As I looked at the adorned indentation, goosebumps spread over my body.