I wake up on Saturday morning before anyone else so I can sneak off into the Room of Requirement all day. Or at least I thought I was awake before everyone else. Leaving the girl's bathroom and heading down the corridor into the common room I can hear someone at the piano.
I walk into the room, trying my best not to make any noise. Theseus of all people is sitting there. In black jeans and a black satin top. He stops playing, sensing that I am in the room I guess.
He turns around to look at me, "Cassiopeia."
"Theseus."
"How is your leg?"
"Why do you care?"
"I don't."
"Sounds like you do."
We look at each other for a moment. I catch myself thinking of his hands for some reason, sitting in his lap as he stares at me. I shake myself out of it, "Goodbye." I go towards the little staircase that leads up to the tunnel to get out of the common room.
Theseus stands, the piano bench scrapes against the floor, "Where are you off to?"
"Breakfast."
"Breakfast is not for another hour."
I stare at him hard, and without responding I head up the stairs and start the walk into the dungeons. I can feel him walking behind him, our footsteps echo off the stone walls. I stop and turn around to look at him, "Can I help you?"
"Are you truly related to Albus Potter and Scorpius Malfoy?" He asks coming up beside me.
"Yes, they're my cousins."
"And they are in a relationship? I mean with all the snogging that they do."
"Yeah?"
"Is that why you don't speak to them?"
I roll my eyes and start walking again, "You've been here two days and you're what? Memorizing my schedule? Who and who I don't talk to?"
"You're intriguing." Is all he responds with.
We walk in silence for the rest of the way out of the common room and out into the main corridor. "You can't come with me."
"And why is that? You have a plan to set the forest on fire again or something? Because last time you did that, you walked out with an injury."
"And I took care of it."
"I told you to go to your medical wing."
I stop and turn around, my face inches away from his, my blood rushing in my ears, "You're not my father. You don't tell me what I can and cannot do. Hell, I don't even know who you are."
He breathes out, his breath smells like coffee, "So you didn't go out of spite."
"I didn't go because I took care of it myself."
Theseus sucks on his teeth, "You did not go because you were not supposed to be practicing that type of magic. If you went, then the medic would have asked questions that you do not want to answer."
I turn back around and continue walking towards the staircase. Theseus laughs behind me and continues to follow.
"So tell me Cassiopeia. Where are your friends?"
He asks it in a way that makes me feel like he's attacking me, and suddenly I'm very aware that I don't have any of those anymore. Not since I told off Darcy. "They're around."
"Really? Because I've asked a few Slytherins. According to them, no one speaks to you. Not since your sister left school."
Anger rages inside me but I don't say anything. I start climbing the stairs fast, putting distance between Theseus and me.
He doesn't say anything else till I get to the tapestry that the Room of Requirement is behind, "This? This is what you woke up early for." He says crossing his arms over his chest. A button on his shirt pops open and I do my best not to stare.
"Why don't you run along and make some friends?" I snap at him. I look at him, he's quite a lot taller than me.
Theseus smirks, "Are we not friends Cassiopeia?"
"Definitely not."
"Ouch. I'm hurt."
I roll my eyes, "What is your problem? You've been here two days, and haven't hopped off my dick since."
"Feisty."
I turn so I am looking at him head-on, "Fuck off."
Theseus smirks at me again, "And miss all the fun? I'd rather not."
I do my best to not let my anger get the best of me. I decide it'll just be better if I ignore Theseus completely. I open the Room of Requirement the same way I always do and pull the tapestry aside and open the door. As I expected, Theseus follows right behind me and into my otherwise safe space.
"A personalized training facility?" He says looking around the room carefully. "You aren't supposed to be in here are you?"
"No, you're not supposed to be in here." I huff. I walk over to my desk and pull out my notebook. Theseus up behind me, nearly touching but not quite, and looks over my shoulder.
"The Dark Arts?" He asks, even though he fully knows the answer, "I suppose daddy Weasley won't be too keen to find out his daughter is a dark witch."
"I'm not a dark witch." I snap, looking through my notebook to find a spell that I have mastered so I can show off a little for Theseus. I don't know why, but I have the constant need to impress him whenever he's around me.
"Ah right. Because a light witch hexes the mouth off of one of her dormmates." He chuckles.
I step away from my desk and pull out my wand, pointing it at a dummy. Without saying anything, I flick my wrist and the dummy disintegrates in front of my eyes. I turn around and look at Theseus, waiting for him to say something about how impressive that was. Instead,
"have you ever duelled a real person? Or are dummies the best you can do?"
I stare at him, my eye twitches. He pulls out his wand. It's like nothing I've ever seen before. Made of a deep purple wood, longer than most wands found in England. He twirls it in his fingers. The handle has small gold detailing.
"I'm not going to duel you," I say matter of factly.
He stops twirling his wand, "And why's that?"
"I don't want to hurt anyone."
"Silly girl. You won't be able to hurt me."
I point my wand at him, "Stupefy!" I shout.
I swear to god, Theseus yawns before blocking my charm. "Is that really the best you have? What happened to the Cassiopeia from the forest?" He sends a charm towards me and I just manage to block it.
I send one back, he blocks, he sends one towards me, I block. With every hex that he sends towards me, he takes a step forward, I take a step backwards. Soon it's rapid-fire, different jinxes and hexes hitting different parts of the room, faster, faster, faster, till my back hits the wall.
Theseus lunges towards me and presses the tip of his wand right under my chin, "See?" He whispers, "You couldn't hurt a fly. I don't get why everyone is so scared of you darling."
We're so close that if I was the same height as him our noses would be touching. I look up into his cold, blue eyes. They're full of humour like he thinks this whole thing is a game. My breath gets stuck in my throat, looking up into his face. But I noticed as we were duelling, he only used verbal spells.
Theseus is breathing heavy, his wand still pressed into my chin. I'm feeling a lot of things but none of them are anger like I normally feel when I'm around him. All I know is that I've never felt this way before and I don't know if I like it or not. I calm myself down with deep breaths, it feels like an eternity, stuck between Theseus and the wall but I know it's only been a few seconds. I close my eyes and when I open them, the texture of Theseus's skin is changing from the perfect smoothness that it was and into rough corn-flake like scales.
He stumbles back from me, shock written all over his face. I stalk towards him, till his back hits the wall on the other side of the room. He looks at me with wide eyes, the first time I've seen an expression on his face that wasn't angry or a smirk. I stand on my tippy-toes so I can whisper into his ear.
"Boo," I whisper it so quietly and breathily that I watch Theseus stiffen up in front of me. I sink back down to my normal height and go over to the desk and pick up my bag and my notebook. Theseus is still standing by the wall, absolutely furious with me.
I smirk at him, "Go to the hospital wing Theseus, it would be a shame if that were to scar." I say before doing my best to put as much confidence in my walk as I head out of the room.
I walk until I turn the corner, away from the Room of Requirement. Then I allow myself to freak out a little. I lean back into the cold, stone wall and let my bag drop to the floor. Closing my eyes all I can see is Theseus, so close to me, a slight smirk dancing across his lips. Just thinking about it gets my heart beating fast again. I don't know what to do. I don't have anyone to talk about this to. Ophelia would probably tell Mum and Dad, Scorpius and Albus would make it into some big thing, Rose would tell Ophelia and that would defeat the purpose. I don't talk to Darcy anymore.
I hear a door open from down the hall. I look around the corner and Theseus is walking down the hall, looking absolutely pissed off. I pick up my bag and sprint down the corridor and down the stairs to the Great Hall so that he doesn't see me standing there.
I run into the Great hall, getting a few looks from people, one of those people being Freddie. I make eye contact with him before going over to where Albus, Scorpius, and Rose are sitting and sit down.
"So then I said, 'I'll run it past my mum' though Godric knows that Mum'll never bring back the Triwizard tournament. Not after what happened to Cedric and Uncle Harry." Rose says as I sit down beside her.
"Bruv where have you been?" Albus says looking at me, "I haven't seen you in months and we're in the same house."
"You're just not looking very hard. I've been around," I say.
Rose looks at me, "No you haven't. We've all noticed. No one ever sees you anymore."
"And Darcy said that you told him you don't want to be friends anymore?" Scorpius adds.
I shrug and take some toast off of one of the serving plates, "I grew out of that friendship. Hasn't that happened to any of you?"
I look at each of them respectfully, "I mean, yeah I guess... but he's Darcy. He grew up with us." Rose says.
"Fred grew up with James. Does that make them friends?" I say to her.
Albus changes the subject, "If Aunt Mione says no to the Triwizard tournament idea..."
"When she says no to the Triwizard tournament idea." Rose clarifies.
"Do you think she would agree to let the yule ball happen? I'd pay to see everyone in dresses drunk out of their minds." Albus continues.
Scorpius hums, "You don't have to pay to see me in a skimpy silk dress, stumbling around."
Rose and I stare at him. Scorpius realizes what he said and that he said it out loud and turns a bright shade of red, "Oh god... Don't tell my dad I said that."
Everyone bursts into laughter. Out of the corner of my eye, I spot Theseus, his skin back to normal, still royally pissed off. A few girls call him over to sit with them and he does exactly that. Sitting between two girls. I watch him look around the room. He makes eye contact with me before smirking and turning back to the girls he's sitting with.
I spin back around in my spot and look at my plate, not daring to look at my cousins right now. They'll be able to read my expression like I'm a copy of Beetle and the Bard.
I chat with my cousins for the rest of breakfast. I can feel Theseus staring at me but I don't give him the satisfaction of turning around. I'm still so confused as to what happened back in the Room of Requirement; the feelings that I felt. I know that I've snogged someone before, but it never gave me the same feeling as being pinned against the wall by Theseus.
"We're all going to meet up today, giving each other that tattoo that Freddie and Louis came up with. You're coming right?" Rose says snapping me out of my little bubble.
"Oh, yeah. Yeah, let's go."