Amortentia (OC / Draco / Fred Weasley Love Triangle) (A HP Francise Fan Fic)

Chapter Sixteen: Plain Parchment

"What are you reading?" Gwen pestered, sitting next to him.

"Isn't it obvious." Cedric replied, his nose still buried in the book.

"Let me rephrase. Why are you reading a spell book at 7:20 in the morning? Do you have a test or something?" She looked at the pages. The heading on the page read Water Charms.

"I'm preparing for the next task. It's in less than a month, and I'm not sure I'm ready."

"Well, isn't the point to be surprised, like if you knew what to do it wouldn't be much of a contest."

"I guess, but the next task has to do with water, so I'm studying."

"Can I help?"

"Sure." Cedric leaned over the edge of the couch into his bag. He pulled out two more books. "Look through these books for anything on merpeople, water, or lakes." He slapped the cover hard before handing them to Gwen.

"Merpeople?" Gwen flipped through the large book about magical creatures.

"Yes, Cho helped me figure out that part of the next task involves them, but I don't know how." Cedric returned his focus into his book. Gwen decided not to continue asking questions as Cedric looked completely enthralled with whichever charm he was now reading up on. Gwen helped Cedric look through the books for the next hour until Justin and Ernie had walked into the common room.

"Breakfast?" Ernie tapped the book in Gwens lap.

Gwen exchanged a look with Cedric. He nodded dismissing her.

"Yes, I'm starving." Gwen smiled.

The three made their way to breakfast. They were joined only a few minutes after by Hannah. Hannah, Ernie, Justin, and Gwen stayed in the Great Hall after breakfast to finish their potions work. The morning went by quite slowly, not only was Gwen dreading Potions that afternoon, but she had another detention with Snape. Snape was unsurprisingly Gwens least favorite professor, but after she was caught in his personal things with Fred she figured that she would no longer be on his good side, if he even had a good side.

"Do you have another piece of parchment, Gwen? I ran out of room on this one." Justin asked.

"Yeah," Gwen pulled out a few pieces of parchment from her bag. She handed the top piece to Justin, revealing a new message from Draco on the parchment below. Gwen pulled it close to her chest before reading.

Skip dinner tonight. Meet me in the dungeons.

Gwen picked up her quill and scribbled back.

What if I'm hungry?

She shuffled her parchment so Draco's piece would be on the bottom. Gwen did want to meet with him, but as much as she wanted him she was still angry about him avoiding her for a month. After a few minutes Gwen turned up the corner of her parchment to look for a new message. Nothing, it displayed the same message Gwen had written only a few minutes prior.

Draco had not written back by the time they were heading to their potions lesson. Hufflepuff had potions with Slytherin this year. When Gwen walked into the classroom with her friends Snape was at the head of the class writing Calming Draught and its ingredients on the board. Snape shot his head around when he heard them enter.

"Thatcher." Snape demanded.

"Yes, Professor." Gwen responded shyly.

"Take a seat at the front of the class today." Snape snarled. His remark was followed by a series of Oo's from the class.

"Yes, sir." She begrudgingly took a seat next to Millicent Bulstrode, a Slytherin girl in her year.

Snape began to drone on about the properties of calming draughts. Gwen had pulled out her parchment to begin taking notes when she noticed that her message from earlier had disappeared.