Chapter Text
“Which Potion did you pick for the analysis question?”
Grace, who’s sitting in the armchair across from the low table Draco is seated at, answers. “Sleekeazy’s, so I could talk about the effect on women’s beauty standards.”
Draco just hums in response, and you can feel the vibration of his entire body on your neck from your place in his lap. You open your eyes to look up at him. For anyone else, this angle up from the bottom of his chin would look atrocious, but somehow Draco still manages to look attractive as he taps his pinky nail against his teeth in concentration. Tucked under your arm at Draco’s side, Sophie stretches and purrs while you scratch her belly.
This was your idea of a perfect evening: your boyfriend, your cat, and a quiet common room with the scratching of Draco’s quill to soothe you.
All of this was broken, however, when Stella burst through the door. “GUYS! Stop what you’re doing right now and look at what I found.”
Reluctantly, you lift your head from Draco’s lap, careful to pull your arm from around Sophie so as not to disturb her as you sit up. Grace closes her book, and Draco pauses in his writing. Stella kneels at the end of the table and smoothes out a tiny piece of parchment that is sparkling with glitter, and it takes you a moment to register the particles that stick to her fingers as Pixie dust.
“What is that?” Grace questions, joining you all on the floor at table level.
Stella’s eyes are reflecting the Pixie shimmer. “It's a clue about the Lunar Promenade.” You and Grace both gasp, and Grace takes the parchment from Stella. “Careful, I want to save all that Pixie dust! Don’t let it get all on your fingers.”
“Where did you find that?” You ask.
“Where else? On a Pixie, obviously. It was perched on one of the windows as I was coming here. I almost didn’t see it because it was so high up. I just looked at it, and it flew off and dropped the note to me. And I was right about what it was.” She says proudly.
“Can we perhaps backtrack to what the Lunar Promenade is?” Draco taps his finger on the table.
“It’s just this dance we have here,” you say, taking the parchment from Grace by the corner to touch it as little as possible. “It’s always held in a secret location and you have to solve these clues and bring a special object to get in. Overrated, in my opinion.”
Draco looks over your shoulder as you read the parchment. In tiny writing, it says:
Angel month, angel day at the angel hour,
Your heart can grow fonder, or more sour.
One to one, as you may arrive,
And be aware, what pulls the tide.
“‘What pulls the tide’, that’s how you knew it was about the dance?” Draco asks.
“I mean, yeah. That and it was being carried by a freaking Pixie.”
“What did the middle lines say again?” Grace asks. You read it out to her. “Okay, so ‘one to one’ means a date right? You can use one object for two people.”
“What if your date is the object?” You muse.
“Too easy,” Stella says. “There will probably be something else.”
“All that ‘angel’ stuff though… no ideas about.” Grace furrows her brow, thinking.
“It’s eleven, isn’t it?” Draco says. “When does this usually take place?”
“Uh, like November. What do you mean, ‘it’s eleven’?” Stella asks.
“Sequential numbers are often referred to as angel numbers,” Draco explains. “In this case it’s probably eleven. One-one. November is the eleventh month.”
“And so it’s probably taking place on November eleventh,” Grace says, catching on.
“At eleven o’clock!” You finish.
Stella claps her hands together. “Look at us go, Horned Serpent excellence.”
“Sick.” Grace whips out her journal and scribbles it down. “We can tell everyone at breakfast tomorrow. And we’ll just have to keep our eyes peeled for another clue.”
“What happened to this being a secret?” Draco asks.
“This is just the first clue,” you say. “It doesn’t matter who knows this one, really. The object is the only thing that can get you in. Besides, if you don’t tell at least some people, it won’t really be a dance.”
“And if we don’t tell Alex, she’ll murder us,” Stella adds.
“Mostly we keep it secret from the younger ones.” Grace elaborates. “When we were fifteen a bunch of firsties showed up– it was horrible.”
Stella heads off to your room to extract and save as much pixie dust as she can from the parchment scrap, and Grace decides to follow her and get ready for bed. You settle back into Draco’s lap while he finishes off his essay, the common room falling back into silence.
“Do you actually want to go to this thing?” You ask him, your hand returning to scratch behind Sophie’s ears.
“Do you not?” He responds.
You shrug then realize he’s not looking at you. “I mean, I’ve skipped a few years. Once you’ve gone you’ve gone, you know? The clues are fun and all but the dance itself is kinda meh.”
“I’d like to go with you, though.” Draco looks down at you, a little deflated, giving his best pout.
“Then we can go!” You backpedal. “It’s not like I’m majorly against it or anything. I just didn’t really peg you as that kind of person.”
“Well, believe me, I've had my share of formal events at home. But it’s much more fun at school. With, you know… people… you enjoy being around.” Draco hastily returns to his essay.
“You mean friends?” You smirk.
“Shut up,” Draco growls in a tone that would make most people shrink back, but to you feels like no more than a huffy grumble. You close your eyes again to return to your nap, a content smile playing on your lips.
༄
The next clue is found in mid-October, by Sarah. She comes up to you and Alex in the library, who are “studying” for Astrology, and shows you a piece of paper that's sopping wet, miraculously still intact, with another riddle across the front of it.
“I found it in one of the fountains near the rotunda,” she says.
Vaults with no money,
And stones that fortify.
Take stairs towards the heart,
Where windows show no sky.
“Ooh, the location.” You and Alex peer over Sarah’s shoulders at the paper carefully smoothed onto the library desk. “What could it mean? This makes it sound like it could be anywhere in the interior of the castle, where there’s no windows to the outside. That’s a bunch of places!” Alex says.
“Yeah, and this entire castle is made of stone,” Sarah adds. “This one is going to be a little harder.”
You copy down the clue on the page of notes you’d been studying from, and instead spend the rest of the night meditating on it and not your Astrology unit.
Later that week you’re in History of Magical Painting and Photography, taking a detour through architecture. As you’re scratching away in your scrapbook, labeling the diagrams you’ve drawn of buttresses and pillars, your eyes float back to your previous notes on types of ceiling structures. Vaulted ceilings; ribbed, barrel or fan shaped...
Vaults with no money.
Your heart starts beating a little faster. When Ms. Bell dismisses the class, you grab Draco and Stella by the wrists and pull them into a secluded corner of the hallway outside. “Guys, I think I might’ve figured out the clue.” You open your scrapbook up and point to your carefully drawn diagrams of the types on vaulted ceilings. “I think this is what the line in the clue about vaults is about!”
“Vaulted ceilings?” Stella asks.
“Y/N, this entire castle has vaulted ceilings. Ms. Bell said that in class when we were going over it,” Draco points out.
“Yeah, yeah, I know.” You wave him off. “But put it into context. The dance isn’t going to take place in a hallway. And there’s very few rooms in the castle that have vaulted ceilings. One is the Great Hall, but that’s probably out of the question. We just need to think and explore what rooms in the castle are big enough to have the dance in, have vaulted ceilings, and no windows to the outside.”
Draco and Stella exchange a look of thought. “I guess it’s possible. Let’s discuss at dinner,” Stella says.
In the great hall that night, the topic inevitably shifts to that of the dance. You and Stella are quick to let out twin gasps as you remember your possible discovery from earlier. “We have a theory about the clue,” Stella says as you rummage around in your knapsack for your notebook.
“In Art History today we were discussing castle construction,” You begin, flipping through the pages to find your illustrations. “The way a lot of the ceilings are shaped in this castle are called vaulted ceilings. We have to think of a room that has this construction that can also fit with the rest of the clue!”
Alex taps her fork against her teeth, stretching out her hand for your notebook. “What’s the rest of the clue again?”
Sarah helpfully gets out the paper from her bag and recites it for everyone.
“Oh, easy,” She says simply. “ Probably the basement.”
“This castle has a basement?” Ginny quirks her head.
“Yeah,” Grace chimes in. “It’s just below here, more towards the central tower where the teachers live. ‘Take stairs toward the heart’, it must mean near Isolt Sayre’s original room that the castle was built around. And the no windows line? Gotta be basement.”
Alex and Grace high-five across the table, satisfied in their assessment.
“How does everyone know about these basements? You mean I’ve been here seven years and I didn’t know we had basements?!” You cry.
“Babes. Maybe you’d know if you ever did some sneaking around,” Alex waves you off as she puts another fork of mashed potato into her mouth.
You sigh, deciding to bite your tongue and let it go.
༄
With the confirmation of the dance’s date and now the location, word was spreading through the castle. Upper years kept the information close and between friends, but even hints have been dropped to lower years that had them peeking around corners, perking up watching their seniors whisper in the library, and teachers were giving knowing looks to students as they scoured dark corners for the next clue.
Now that Draco had dropped the hint that he’d like to take you to the dance you hadn’t bothered with since you and James split, you had other things to think about.
You rifled through your stash of formalwear in your trunk, but nothing was really looking suitable. All your nicest gowns were ones you’d worn to Ilvermonry dances before, and everything else was too plain, too short, or didn’t look like it would fit you anymore. “Grace, can I have that magazine you were looking at?”
Grace flings the magazine across the room like a frisbee, and you barely catch it. Feeling a little defeated, you sit inside your trunk, dangling your legs over the side as you crack open the magazine.
“Ugh, these are so pretty, but they’re so expensive,” you bemoan. A shimmery white one that’s covered in beading catches your eye, but it’s nearly thirty galleons– way too much.
“Just ask your parents to buy it for you. It’s your last year, I’m sure they’d be willing to let you get something a little fancy,” Stella says. At your returning sigh, she drags her own trunk out from under her bed. “Come look through mine, you can borrow something if you want. I’ve got plenty of dresses from all the times mom got married.”
“Would they even fit me? Our boobs are completely different sizes.”
Stella shrugs. “We could probably have it altered. Ms. Angeles can do some enchanting, or whatever.”
“Thanks, Stell.” You pull yourself out of your own trunk and walk across the room. Stella’s trunk has been cast with the Expansion Charm, and you can basically walk into it completely. An entire section has nice dresses hung up, and you start pulling out ones that catch your eye. Above, you hear someone knock at the door of your room. “Come in,” Stella and Grace say at the same time.
“Oh, hey, Draco,” you hear Grace say.
You pop your head out of the top of the trunk. Draco has let himself in and is tearing through your side of the dorm. “Uh, what are you doing?” You ask. “I’m over here.”
“I’m not here for you,” Draco says, already halfway under your bed. “I’m here for my son.”
“What?”
In answer, Draco shimmies out from under the bed with a limp Benedict in his arms, whom he stuffs up the front of his Quidditch team sweatshirt. You hear Benny’s voice in your head.
‘Ah! So dark! Help!’ Benny begins to wriggle inside Draco’s shirt.
You giggle at the sight. “He can’t see in there! Let him put his head out.”
Draco winces as he maneuvers the cat further up, and you can only assume Benny is digging in with his claws. Benny pokes his head out of the sweatshirt collar, right under Draco’s chin, with wide eyes. ‘Ah, much better.’ Draco gives his head a little awkward and appreciative pat.
“Hey, while you’re here, tell me which of these you like best.”
“Don’t distract me, I have to go finish my stupid bloody Transfiguration essay,” Draco wines, throwing his head back.
“Then why are you busy stealing my cat if you have work? And don’t forget, you’re the one who wanted to go in the first place.” You throw your hands up. “Two seconds.” You dip back down into the trunk to pull out some of the dresses you like.
“Gao and Will are gone and it’s lonely in my room,” Draco pouts.
You emerge from Stella’s trunk with three dresses– one pink, that’s light and fluffy. Another is silver and shifts in the light to be pale blue. The last is sparkling green, which you know Draco likes. You lay them out on the floor in front of him and rest your head on your arms on the lip of the trunk. “What do you think?”
Draco considers. “I like this one.” He points to the silver one. “It looks like the moon.”
You are a bit surprised by his choice. “Alright. I liked this one a lot, too.”
Draco crouches down to your level. Despite being wide awake barely a minute ago, Benny is falling fast asleep, his head hammocked on Draco’s collar. Draco brushes his chin across the soft fur on the top of your cat’s head. “And you’ll go with the theme. But pick whichever one you want, you’ll look nice in any of them.”
Between his words and his little subconscious act of affection, your heart squeezes a little in your chest. “Aw, thanks babe.” You drag the pink and green dresses back into the trunk to put them back. “Okay, go finish your essay.”
“No ‘goodbye, thank you for being so sweet to me, Draco’ kiss?” He leans over the edge of the trunk to yell.
“Get out of my room!”
Draco leaves as you hang up the dresses in their proper spot and clamber out of Stella’s trunk, closing the lid behind you. “Thanks, Stell,” you say again as you pick up the silver dress and toss it on your bed, beginning to unbutton your shirt. Instead of responding, Stella watches you with interest, and you catch her gaze in the reflection of your mirror. “What?”
“You guys are the weirdest couple.”
“Well, Y/N did say they weren’t serious,” Grace supplies.
“Uhm, what? Please elaborate.” Stella sits up on her bed, scooting to the edge to look between the two of you with interest.
Now in just your underwear and socks, you pull the dress off the hanger and step into the pool of shimmery fabric. “It’s… hard to explain. We like each other. Neither of us are gonna see other people. We just don’t put too much stock in it, really.” You pull the dress up around your shoulders, noting the fit is a little tight around your butt, where Stella is on the skinnier side. Your hands flap uselessly across your middle back, seeking the zipper, and Stella gets up to help you.
“Yeah, you might need this part adjusted.” Stella pulls at the area where the neckline doesn’t quite fit right around your boobs. Other than that it looks to be the right length with some heels. You turn to your own trunk to find a pair to test it with.
Stella leans against the poster of your bed as you rummage around. “Y/N,” she begins delicately. “Does this have anything to do with James?”
You cease your shuffle of your own clothes briefly, taken a bit aback. “Erm,” you start, grabbing the straps of your black high heels. You sit on your bed and busy yourself with putting them on. “What do you mean?”
“Just that James really hurt you. It was screwed up what he said, and I know that you were upset for a really long time after. It messes you up wheh people say they don’t like you anymore and move on fast, it’s happened to me.” Stella shares a quick glance with Grace. “I’m your friend and… I just get this feeling you’re being a little overcompensating with the detachment with Draco.”
You shuffle around with the straps to avoid looking at your friends. “I’m not,” You reply, voice small.
“You’re allowed to like him, Y/N” Grace adds gently. “You haven’t dated anyone since James. It’s scary to be vulnerable to people again after you’ve been burned, but you deserve to have something like that again.”
A sigh escapes your lips, and you fold your hands together in your lap. “I know. I mean, I know it deep down. But it’s hard. You guys didn’t get to see how much we fought at the beginning of last year. It’s not hard to remember how easily and often we fought, all the things he’s said to me. Even though we’re just playing and I do it too, I just can’t help but wonder if he’d go back to thinking those things if we ever broke up.”
Stella reaches out and grabs one of your hands, pulling you to your feet and facing you towards the mirror. The hem of the dress falls down perfectly skimming the floor. “Y/N, listen to us. The man came all the way to Ilvermorny for you–”
“He said there were a number of academic reasons–”
“–Picked your house–” Grace buts in.
“Again, a number of reasons!”
“–Called your cat his child–” Stella says over you.
“...”
“–And, in my opinion, says all the right things.” Grace finishes. “You look hot in this dress. Draco has a hot girlfriend. Draco has a smart girlfriend. Draco’s girlfriend is one of the best witches of her year. He’d be dim as James to drop you, and something tells me he’s way more bright.”
“I know it, I’ve seen his exam grades!” Stella sweeps your hair off your shoulder and rests her chin on you, wrapping you in a hug. “We want to see you happy, Y/N.”
Grace slides off her bed and joins your hug. “Quit being dumb and let him love you! And if all that shit from before you dated is still on your mind, say something! You owe it to him and to you to be totally honest.”
You look in the mirror at your friends embracing you, and you can’t help but smile. “Thanks guys. And yeah, you’re right. Maybe I’ll bring it up to him.”
“I think that would be a good idea.”
༄
The next day, you make up your mind to take your friends advice. Breakfast comes and goes as usual, and you decide you’ll either catch Draco again in your free block that afternoon after lunch, or in the evening. However, between your first two blocks Draco doesn’t shoot you his usual mischievous grin he does when you encounter one another on the stairs.
“Draco looks pissed.” Alex remarks bluntly.
“You always say that,” you mumble back, but watch his retreating figure down the stairs just long enough to catch the way he brushes everyone aside without a glance, intent on getting to his next class. Something twists in your stomach, remembering your conversation from last night. I just can’t help but wonder if he’d go back to those things if we ever broke up.
Lunch doesn’t look any more optimistic either. The midday meal hour is sparse already, with some classes overlapping that leads to a less populated Great Hall. It’s a Thursday, so you’re eating with Alex, Ginny, and Chris, where Draco might join you for a few minutes. But today, you watch him hustle in, speak to Robert briefly who’s several tables over with the other Horned Serpent Quidditch boys, and leave again without eating. The other girls continue their interested discussion about the third clue that has yet to make its appearance, with the dance only a week and a half away, but you can’t find it in you to engage with the conversation.
Since it doesn’t look like Draco will be joining you for your free block, you head to the library with Chris to make use of your time. Well, it honestly meant to start that way, especially with Chris’s advanced wandwork knowledge, but ten minutes in you’ve devolved from the worksheet you were picking away at.
“Draco’s been weird all day, and I don’t know what’s gotten into him.” You scratch a pattern in the corner of your parchment with your quill absentmindedly.
“I’m pretty sure it’s about what happened in History of Magic class,” Chris says.
“Oh?” You lift your head back up. “What happened?”
“We got to talking about the Sacred Twenty-Eight.”
Ah . That would definitely do it.
“He was pretty uncomfortable, I could tell,” Chris goes on. “And he was really holding back. I’m surprised he didn’t walk out after someone said some insensitive thing about British Purebloods.”
You feel bad for Draco, but there’s nothing much to be done. “I told him people can be like that here.”
“I know. We talked about it after class.”
You blink in surprise. “You got him to talk to you about it?”
“Yeah,” Chris says. “I mean, I get it. I don’t go around telling people either. I talked to him about how mom and dad got divorced, and how I’m the only Pureblood sibling, all that shit.” Chris pushes his ink bottle around on the desk. “It’s definitely different, because of how my parents are separated. I don’t think he’d ever heard of any Purebloods getting a divorce before.”
“I honestly don’t know what those sort of situations are like over there,” you say. “But I’m glad you talked to him.”
“I think it helped him feel a little better. But I’m sure he’s still angry, I can’t imagine what I’d do if I found my name in a textbook. And James was really harsh with what he said.”
You stiffen. “...James?”
Chris pales. Clearly he’d meant to keep that piece of information between him and Draco. “Um, yeah. He was the one who said the insensitive thing.”
You rub the heels of your hands against your eyes. “I don’t even want to know what he said,” you groan.
“I’m sure Draco will tell you if he wants to,” Chris reasons. “I mean, it was just the same old shit.”
You rest your cheek on your palm, dejected. It was barely over a month into school, and you knew the situation that was brewing between James, Draco, and you was delicate, even if neither boy was really noticing. “I told Draco the first week to try and leave James be, but if he’s gonna make it difficult I don’t know how much I can do.”
Chris grimaces. “Yeah. I mean, I can run interference as much as I can. Like I said, I was able to talk to Draco about it after class. But Y/N, honestly, I don’t think anyone is super keen to hold Draco back from ripping into him the next time he does something stupid.”
“I can’t really blame you.”
“Also, Dracos hella scary.”
That gets a chuckle out of you. “Believe me, if I was any bit of a lesser person I would tell Draco to have at him. I just don’t have time to do drama this year.”
“Tell me about it,” Chris sighs. “Quidditch shit, family shit, graduation shit… it’s a lot.”
“Family shit?”
Chris widens his eyes and nods to that. “Family shit. My dad’s having another baby. With his girlfriend.”
“Oh, shit,” you breathe. Chris looks distraught. “The No-Maj girlfriend?”
“Yeah. I told Draco about that, too. He was the first person I told. And now you, I guess.”
You reach across the table to put your hand on top Chris’s. “I’m sorry, Chris. I know that must be hard.”
“Yeah. It sucks major dick, actually.” Chris lets out a short laugh. “I’m almost eighteen. The age gap between me and Adrianna and Lina is big enough,” Chris says, referring to his twin, eight year old sisters. “I feel like… I can never see this new baby as my sibling. By the time they’ll be old enough to come to Ilvermorny, I’m going to be, like, fucking thirty!”
You rub your thumb on his hands sympathetically.
“I’m trying not to get too upset over it,” he says. “Nothing to be done. I’m just going to mom’s house for breaks, and then we’ll be done with school, and I can move to wherever I want and that’ll be that.”
“Yeah.” You shrug. “Seventh year kind of sucks, huh?”
“Why are we all so stressed!” Chris groans, flopping down onto the table. He slides his arms out, knocking over his ink bottle with a clink. “Oh shit oh shit oh fuck–”
“Chris!”
Chris starts to make flustered rapid breathing noises, then lets out a silent scream when he notices ink has gotten all over the cuff of his sleeve. You grab your wand, pointing it at Chris’s sleeve and the desk, desperately trying to cast the cleaning charm but the two of you have collapsed into such giggles you can’t even cast straight.
Dinner feels tense. Draco has come to join your usual group for the evening meal, and even though he’s acting reserved, at least he showed up. When everyone is getting up to go their separate ways for the evening, you trap Draco into walking with you and coerce him into joining you on the turret balcony.
“Chris told me what happened today in History of Magic.” You decide to cut to the chase when Draco sees past your attempts at small talk on the way there.
Draco just closes his eyes and takes a breath. The light breeze ruffles his hair. “Yes.” Is all he says.
You cuddle up next to him, and you can feel his appreciation in the way his arms wrap around you and squeeze tight. “Chris didn’t tell me everything but… I just wanted to say I’m sorry you had to deal with that. People here–”
“Are just like that, I know. I remember you telling me,” he cuts in, but it sounds more resigned than angry if anything. He runs a hand over your hair. “It’s weird to feel the tables turned. It’s not like this in England.”
You bite your lip. You want to make a comment about how Harry and Ron used to go on about all of Draco’s past offenses when you first met them last year, but you have a feeling that's already going through Draco’s head and bringing it up wouldn’t be very helpful. You love Draco now, and know he’s different, but your mixed feelings about the different discrimination that you’d seen your own freinds go through growing up and the type that you’d been informed about while abroad where very hard to reconcile in your mind. Draco deserved a taste of his own potion, you supposed? Then again, this was exactly the sort of thing you and Alex would get into a duel with someone over if they dared make fun of Chris.
Silence stretched on as you both processed things unspoken. “And just that it was him .” Draco finally acquiesces.
“Yeah.” This time you don’t bother jumping to James’s defense. “I”m sure no one would’ve batted an eyelash if you’d exploded. Even me. That’s very justifiable.”
“Well, I was just keeping what you said in mind,” Draco sighed. “Except being well behaved is not really my area.”
You chuckle, squeezing him a little tighter and rubbing your hands across his back. The October chill is beginning to set in as the sun goes down. “I’m proud of you.”
“Thank you.” Draco’s voice sounds a little more satisfied. “Also, it was nice to speak with Chris. Someone who understands.”
“I know!” You say happily, looking up at him. “I’m glad he reached out. That means a lot to me that he did that for you and that you got to have that.”
“Yes. And it felt a little more productive and less angry than any discussion me and Pansy ever had about something like that. Now, can we please go back inside, I’m getting cold .”
“Fine, fine.” You clamber back down through the trapdoor and back into the hallway, clasping hands as you walk back to the dorm. You pass the rotunda that Lucy is situated in, and she acts looking smitten as you pass hand in hand.
“A little evening rendezvous?” She teases, blinking her empty eyes.
“Sure,” you indulge her as you pause on your path. “How are you, Lucy?”
“Splendid!” She cries, throwing up her hands. “And you two are maybe just the two lovebirds I wanted to see!”
“Us?” Asks Draco.
“Yes,” Lucy says with a wink. “I mean, it could be anyone really, but it would be especially exciting to give to one of my favorite people on the year of her graduation!”
“Oh?” You startle. What could Lucy be talking about?
“Well, I can’t really give too many hints,” she wrings her marble hands apologetically. “But is there anything you’re curious about? Anything you… notice?” She leans forward off her rock, a little exaggerated.
You pour your gaze over Lucy the statue, examining her marble figure in the last rays of sunlight coming through the opposite windows. She’s just as bright as ever, her stony ringlets of hair falling all about. But the way she’s leaning, purposely to the left–
“What’s that?” You gasp, pointing to behind Lucy’s ear, where a bit of navy blue is peeking out.
Lucy giggles. “Oh, this? Here you go!” She pulls an envelope, tiny in her large hands, out from her hair and reaches down. You take it from her and tear it open. The final clue for the dance.
Like a puzzle piece,
Or socks in the same hue,
All you need to enter
Is right in front of you.
You and Draco stare at the paper and then at each other. “What? That’s so ambiguous! Socks?” You say.
Draco wrinkles his nose. “Well, it sort of sounds like two things.”
Lucy rests her chin on her hands as she watches the two of you with bated breath.
Draco thinks for another moment. “Wait… what was it you just said, Lucy?”
She looks startled. “Oh! Anything you’re curious about?”
Draco shakes his head. “No, before that.”
“Y/N being my favorite?”
“No, the other thing!”
“Oh!” You swear you see her marble eyes twinkle. “You two were just the lovebirds I wanted to see!”
Draco turns to you again and points at the clue. “Two things. I think you just have to bring a date.”
“That’s it!” You jump, throwing your arms around Draco’s neck. “The object is someone you love!”