I sat on the fountain in the courtyard waiting for Malfoy and our “date.” I was finally getting this horrible meeting over with. All I could think about was making amends with Cedric (again) after my lunch with Malfoy. I still hadn’t figured out what I was going to talk about with Malfoy, whether or not to reveal I’m a spy for the Dark Lord. Hopefully he had an idea on what to discuss already.
As I was waiting I saw Cedric pass by, only pausing to give me a wary look. I gave him a small smile but then froze when I saw Gia a few paces behind him, glaring at me. She and I still hadn’t spoken to each other since her last burst of anger about the Cedric situation. It still baffled me, I have never even seen her talk to Cedric, so what could she have possibly had against him?
“Ready?” I looked up from my seat and saw Malfoy smirking in the sunlight.
“Sure, you could say that,” I got up and brushed myself off.
We walked in silence for a few minutes on our way to Hogsmeade, which was honestly a little bit awkward. I mean, what were we supposed to talk about? “Hey…You’re from Slytherin…that’s cool…potions class…yeah.” No, I wasn’t going to start anything to continue the awkwardness. In fact, I kind of enjoyed the silence for once.
As we made it to the entrance to Hogsmeade, Malfoy finally broke the silence, “Welcome to Hogsmeade! Don’t get too excited.”
I chuckled silently to myself and looked around in awe. Hogsmeade was beautiful. The shops and vendors were scattered everywhere, filled with a bustle of anxious students exploring the town for the first time this year. As we walked through the pathway, I was able to glance through some of the shop’s windows, noticing robes, candy, and interesting prank material. Eventually Malfoy lead us into a small pub called The Three Broomsticks. It was quite crowded, but considering the topic Malfoy might want to talk about it was a good thing there was a constant dull roar of voices throughout the room.
As we sat down in a small booth off to the side, Malfoy ordered two butterbeers without asking for my opinion. I didn’t really care since it was either that or pumpkin juice, so I decided to shrug it off. After a few more awkward moments of twiddling thumbs and shifting weight in our seats, Malfoy decided to finally break the ice.
“Okay,” he started. “How do we know each other?”
I sighed, here it goes, “Your parents are death eaters, correct?”
Malfoy looked a little taken aback by the frankness of the question. It’s not like you’re asked something like this everyday at Hogwarts.
“Yes, they are, but they haven’t talked to the Dark Lord since a couple years after the Potter incident. He’s kind of disappeared since the horrid event,” he replied with a sneer. You could sense his distaste towards Harry in an instant. “But what does that have to do with knowing you?”
“Remember when you were younger, some of the Dark Lord’s meetings were held at your house? My parents are Sebastian and Madelia Silenda. Death Eaters like yours. I used to go to some of those meetings.”
Malfoy looked impressed, “Well, everything makes sense now I guess you could say.”
Our drinks came and I took a huge gulp before Malfoy asked any more questions. To my dismay, he still looked unsatisfied.
“So, have you talked to the Dark Lord lately?” he questioned.
I choked on my butterbeer, which resulted in a large fit of unattractive coughing and spattering. I knew this was going to pop up…and I still hadn’t figured out how to respond. I had to wing it, “Well my parents haven’t really talked to him much since the Potter incident too.” I took a deep breath to calm myself, “So I haven’t talked to him directly either.”
Malfoy looked a little bit disappointed, and a tad unconvinced. It was the best lie I had at the time, and I hoped he didn’t pry any more. I didn’t know how much more I could convincingly cover up.
He took a sip of his butterbeer and sat in silence for a few seconds. Just as the awkward cloud was starting to shade our presence, I saw Cedric out of the corner of my eye. He had just walked in with a group of buddies, smiling and laughing with a twinkle in his gorgeous eyes like always. A Ravenclaw girl decided to sit next to him in their booth, madly giggling and flirting with Cedric. It was disgusting. After a few moments of jetting green jealous glares at the repulsive scene, Cedric turned and looked at me. Crap…I hope he didn’t see me. I thought to myself as I shifted my gaze back at Malfoy, who was looking at me with an expression of You have GOT to be kidding me.
“What?” I questioned innocently, hoping he didn’t actually catch on.
“Seriously? Diggory? He’s a fruit,” Malfoy said matter-of-factly. “Don’t waste your time on him. He goes through girls like bees pollinating flowers.”
I considered this statement, whether to believe it or not. It was Malfoy talking, but it also made sense. Cedric was extremely popular, it would seem logical that he would date plenty of girls.
“Just look at that one, Melanie Roux, hanging on his every word. She can’t stop touching his arms, and he’s not doing anything about it.” Malfoy pointed out, then turned back to me. “It’s kind of disgusting, but every guy wishes they had that effect on women.”
I couldn’t help but agree with Malfoy, surprisingly. He has a point. Why should I even try anymore? He gets mad at me easily and obviously has moved on.
Malfoy decides our meeting is finished, and gets up to leave. As we go to the register to pay for our butterbeers, I see Cedric stand up and walk towards us. I tried to look more interested in our bill, but Malfoy wasn’t paying any attention to me. Soon enough, Cedric was standing right next to me.
“Er…hey,” he said uncomfortably.
“Hey,” I replied simply, trying to come off indifferent.
“Malfoy…” Cedric attempted to acknowledge his presence.
Malfoy came off cold, as usual, “Diggory.” He spat.
Cedric brushed off his snide greeting and turned back to me, “Trista, I’m sorry about my reaction before, it was out of line. It seems like your homework date is done, so would you like to hang with us?” He made a gesture towards his friends at his table. All of them seems nice and welcoming, except for Melanie, who had a look of severe impatience and disapproval.
I considered his offer for a second, but then made a decision I would have slapped myself for if it had been any other day, “No thanks Cedric, I think I’m going to explore the town a bit more with Malfoy.”
Both Malfoy and Cedric looked shocked, but then Malfoy put on a smug look to gloat that he had a girl over Cedric. Honestly, my intentions weren’t to actually spend more time with Malfoy, I just needed to distance myself from Cedric.
“Oh, well, okay then. If you change you’re mind we’ll be around,” Cedric offered with a slight look of disappointment. I opened my mouth to almost shout No! Cedric! I’m sorry! I want to be with you! while he was walking away, but decided against it. I’m no damsel in distress.
Melanie’s face lit up with joy as she saw Cedric leaving me behind with Malfoy. She gave me a smug “HAH!” expression as I just rolled my eyes and turned back to Malfoy.
“Can we please leave? I can’t take it anymore.”
“Sure,” Malfoy finished paying the clerk and we walked out to explore Hogsmeade.
We strolled down the streets in silence, not expecting any significant conversation to develop. I looked around in awe as the ringing of bells from doors opening and closing filled the air, along with the chatter, laughs, and smiles of the students exploring the town for the first time this year. The aura of excitement and joy was contagious.
My head was filled with awe until I roughly ran into a mysterious hooded man on the road, nearly falling over onto the cobblestone walkway. Malfoy looked a little stunned as he helped me stabilize my stance. I glared at the dark figure until I took a breath in shock.
“The Dark Lord’s not happy,” he said in a low rough voice, only audible for my ears. “Fulfill your duties or else consequences will be ensued.”
He stormed off in a hunched and unpleasant fashion, leaving Malfoy and me in disbelief.
“What the hell was that about? Did he say anything to you?” Malfoy questioned.
“Um, nothing, just that I should watch where I’m going,” I was shaking slightly, unable to concentrate on anything besides the threat. It made my skin crawl to think of what the Dark Lord had done to his unloyal followers in the past. Why me? Why was I sucked into this whole mess?
As you can see in my avatar, I also love Malfoy. I thought you did an okay job of capturing him. However, I just have a hard time picturing him in the Three Broomsticks drinking butterbeer and discussing his allegiance to the darkest wizard in the world. Do you know what I mean? I picture him more in the Slytherin common room or somewhere like that- but not with common folk. Too poor and good for him. I also don't see him just casually responding to questions about his parent's allegiance to Voldemort. I more see him freaking out when asked and pulling his wand on the questioner. Not just sipping at his drink and looking bored.
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