The Mudblood

Chapter 117 : Year 6

The artwork for this chapter was made by https://www.quotev.com/AudenIsAwesome :)

There was no Halloween feast this year. Desserts didn't appear, pumpkins didn't float around the Great Hall, and the other Houses were barely spared any food at all. The Slytherins didn't go hungry, though; we never did.

Since there wasn't a feast, Harper had insisted upon throwing a party for Melody's birthday, but she, of course, refused and locked herself in our dormitory with an oversized book about magical torture. Given that Harper had bedecked the entire common room with creepy skulls to celebrate Melody's morose existence, he didn't give into defeat so easily.

"I even got Vaisey to spike the punch with a potion that would make Mel fall in love with me," Harper complained, his arms crossed as he surveyed the Slytherin common room. A giant, glowing skull floated above the center of the room while other skeletons were suspended around the walls; the punch bowls were also fashioned like skulls, the liquid flowing magically out of the eye sockets when prompted, and the music playing was just a long string of incoherent screaming that no one felt inclined to dance to. If Melody hadn't retreated to our room, she probably would have enjoyed all of it.

"You mean a love potion?" I prompted, raising my eyebrows over at him. His tattoo of Melody's face was still dark against his hand because he was too afraid to confront her whenever it burned and she didn't care enough about his disloyalty to feel the burn on hers at all. I was almost jealous since my tattoo of Malfoy's face had been stinging nonstop for the past three weeks. Whether Malfoy was flirting with Pansy again or just constantly ruminating over how much he despised me, I didn't care to know.

Like September, the remainder of October had consisted of a mutual silence between Draco Malfoy and myself. Because of it I was failing Arithmancy, but I would have rather failed that useless class than face my feelings. I hadn't made a final decision on his ultimatum yet, though; I'd been ignoring him, but I hadn't necessarily talked to Fred either. Knowing Malfoy would physically feel it if I as much as thought about Fred, I'd tried to block all sentiments of him from my head for the past few weeks, hoping maybe that if Malfoy's tattoo didn't burn, he would take it as a sign of truce.

He hadn't, of course. He still glowered whenever our eyes met, hastily turning to speak with Pansy just to irk me. I didn't have it in me to feel envious when they laughed together; I deserved worse than that, not just for leading Malfoy on, but also for leading Fred on. Maybe the best option wasn't choosing one but choosing neither.

"He said it wasn't a love potion, actually," Harper said, watching absently as Ashley lovingly fed Crabbe a pastry across the room. I couldn't decide whether to be awed by their radiant affection or disgusted by the way Crabbe acted as if she were giving him sex instead of a dessert. "But I wonder if those two drank it..."

"Draco must have," Astoria said as she popped up beside us, sipping on a full bottle of firewhisky. She wore a black lacy dress for the occasion, accented by purple bracelets and nails. "Drank the love potion, I mean. Otherwise, I don't see any reason for him to be flirting with Pansy over Lainey."

"Surely you've noticed that Malfoy detests me now," I put in dryly, glancing across the room to where Malfoy and Pansy were snuggling on one of the couches. Little Sal was still perched on her shoulder, and that in itself made me want to break the glass bottle of butterbeer in my hand.

"Please," Astoria droned, waving a hand. "It's all a façade to hide his love."

"And you know this so well because you do the same with Anderson?" Harper suggested, and I nearly choked up the butterbeer I'd been sipping on. Astoria's cool expression quickly became appalled as she gaped at him.