Aurélie woke bright and early the following morning with a steely resolve to never utter the name Sebastian Sallow again unless it was to curse it to the wind. She also, quite alarmingly, woke to find silvery ribbons of magic twisting around her fingers.
She bolted upright, bumped her head on Samantha's bunk and cursed so emphatically in French that she half-expected to hear her mother scolding her from down the hall.
'Oh, stop that, would you?' she said to her hands, giving them a frantic but ultimately useless shake that did nothing to dispel the energy stuck to her fingers.
Talking to one's hands as if they were sentient was never a good sign, but even worse was when those same hands, pulsing with forbidden magic, only glowed brighter and more defiant when told to stop.
She groaned aloud, wearily rubbing the bump on her head with fingers that made her brain tingle as she considered her options.
From her limited experience with her sporadic gift, she knew that once the magic was out, it could not go back in; much like trying to force-feed water back into a pipe, once conjured, it had to flow on.
At home in France, she'd had quick access to a backyard garden, where, on very rare occasions, she'd been forced to covertly feed magic to a plant or a tree and hope that her father wouldn't notice its inexplicable growth spurt the following day (he always did, of course, but he never said a word about it). At Beauxbatons, where she'd had a private bedroom and an ocean at her doorstep, she'd been able to slip out, unseen, to hand it over to the waves to sort out. But there was no ocean at Hogwarts, no secret garden, nowhere to go where she wouldn't be caught in the act of siphoning off magic like a thief in the night.
Well, that wasn't entirely true, but she'd sooner blow the school to smithereens than ever step foot in Sebastian's stupid Undercroft.
Peeking through her velvet bed curtains and hoping fiercely that her roommates were still asleep, Aurélie scanned the room for an acceptable vessel that might benefit from a little magical encouragement.
The solution came to her in the form Samantha Dale's potted Dittany that she kept on the nightstand by their bunk bed: a sad, wilted plant that sorely needed more sunlight but on whose behalf Aurélie had been too shy to speak to save it. Reaching through the curtains, she tentatively lifted the pot from its stand and set it on her lap. It was only a wee little thing, half-dead and neglected, but perhaps if she just gently - very gently - gave it a magical boost, Samantha might attribute it's miraculous recovery to an improvement in her herbology skills.
Alright, then, she said silently, her fingers hovering over the dry soil, if you insist on doing something, please help this plant.
For a startling moment, the Dittany glowed bright, its wilted leaves bristling with sudden vitality. It pulsed once, twice and then -
Exploded.
She squeaked in surprise as plant, pot and soil vanished with a wet-sounding pop and a swirl of fading magic. For a long, long time, she stared down at her now-empty hands, quietly dismayed.
Help the plant, she lamented inwardly. I said help the plant, not blow it up.
She dressed quickly after that, braiding her hair with shaky fingers and trying not to think about her innate ability for destruction. Finally, exhausted and stressed, she traipsed down to the Great Hall for breakfast, making a mental note to seek out a new half-dead Dittany before days end.
Being rather early, the hall was mostly deserted. Above her, the enchanted ceiling reflected another dreary sky, and as she poked unenthusiastically at her eggs and toast, she marveled at how many different shades of grey the Scottish sky was capable of producing. So absorbing was this little exercise of hers that it left very little attention to spare for the figure sitting alone at the Slytherin table, whose wild brown curls were falling across his eyes as he poured over a book.
A covert peek through her lashes revealed that the book was a huge, old tome not unlike the one he'd shown her in the Undercroft. She narrowed her eyes. Surely Sebastian wasn't still reading up on Obscuri and other such spooky Slytherin nonsense? Surely he didn't really believe she was dangerous? Unstable? The idea was ludicrous.
Ridiculous.
Unbelievable.
Wasn't it?
Without warning, Sebastian looked up and caught her eye, and - oh, look, was that a hint of stormy purple amongst the palette of greys above? Yes, definitely purple. And some deep blue, too, if she squinted really hard. She kept her eyes fixed skyward, absolutely captivated, and did not so much as glance across the hall again.
For the rest of the day, Aurélie remained steadfast in her commitment to forgetting she'd ever heard the name Sebastian Sallow. In classes, she focused on her studies, clenched her fists and ignored him for whoever happened to be sitting next to her. At lunch, she ignored him. In the corridors, she ignored him. In fact, so thoroughly did she reject his entire existence that if ignoring Sebastian Sallow was a N.E.W.T subject, she'd pass with top marks, graduate with honours and go on to establish a Department of Ignoring Sebastian at the Ministry.
By the time she all but collapsed at the Ravenclaw table for dinner, with very sore fists and a pounding headache, she wondered if it wouldn't be easier to let her magic loose on the whole bloody school and be done with it.
She was just spearing a boiled potato onto her fork when a tiny presence made itself known behind her shoulder. Turning in her seat, she came face to face with - a mouse.
Well, no, not a mouse, exactly, but a boy. A very small boy with mousey hair, bucky teeth and wide, darting eyes. Aurélie had never seen a human being look more like an animal in her entire life.
'Um,' squeaked the mouse as he thrust a roll of parchment toward her, 'this is for you.'
'For me?' she asked, blinking in surprise. 'Who is it from?'
The boy - who was a first year, judging by the size of him - simply stared at her with his unblinking eyes and shifted restlessly from foot to foot.
Aurélie unfurled the parchment, glanced at the untidy message scrawled across it (will you just let me explain?), and immediately thought about setting it on fire.
'It's from Sebastian,' piped up her tiny companion, rather unhelpfully. 'Sebastian Sallow. From Slytherin. He told me to tell you that, um' - the boy screwed his little face up in concentration - 'that I'm not to return without your reply and that you must reply and that I'm to employ any means necessary in order to obtain your reply.'
Aurélie simply couldn't stifle her laughter at that.
'Goodness,' she said, not unkindly. 'Well, I'd rather not bear the brunt of your wrath. Consider me duly warned. But there's just one problem.'
She arched a brow at the boy, whose eyes, if possible, widened even further.
'You'll need to tell this Sebastian Sallow from Slytherin that if he expects a reply, he ought provide me a quill so I can write it.'
The boy looked quite alarmed at this unexpected turn of events, and for a moment seemed not to know what to do with himself. He took a small shuffle to the left, then to the right, and then, in a whirl of anxious energy, scurried away to where Sebastian Sallow from Slytherin was watching them with a shrewd expression.
After a short but animated conversation, in which Sebastian rolled his eyes and sent her the most exasperated look he could muster, Mouse came hurrying back, quill in hand.
'Thank you,' she said, fighting back giggles. 'But - oh, I have no ink.'
Off went the mouse again.
Sebastian, whose look of incredulity made her giggle even harder, dug through his satchel and procured a small ink pot, which was promptly deposited into Aurélie's waiting hand a moment later by the very out-of-breath first-year. She considered sending him back to ask for black ink, not green (just to see the look on Sebastian's face), but she took pity on the small flustered face of her little mousey friend and motioned instead for him to sit.
'Have you eaten yet, petite souris?' she asked, pushing her plate away to make a space for the parchment.
She was quite aware of the stares and whispers they were garnering as Mouse scrambled up onto the bench beside her. She supposed it wasn't common for seventh year Ravenclaw's to sit with first year Slytherin's - or indeed, for any Slytherin of any age to venture beyond the comfort of their own table - but she didn't care; she was quite enjoying this little distraction. It wasn't often she found reason to giggle any more.
As Mouse set to loading his plate with food, Aurélie set to penning a reply - though admittedly, Mouse ate far more enthusiastically than Aurélie wrote.
'Is he your boyfriend?' he piped up after a time, his mouth chock full of potatoes.
Aurélie's hand twitched. Ink blotted across the page.
'Who? Sebastian? No! Merlin, no, I -'
"It's just' - he swallowed his mouthful of food with difficulty - 'he said you were pretty and that's what mama says boys are supposed to tell their girlfriends to get kisses.'
Another twitch. Another ink blotch. Well, your mama is wrong, she wanted to say, grinding her teeth.
'Well, no,' she said instead, cleaning away the ink blotches with a wave of her wand. 'Besides, I'm not... And he's not... Anyway, that's not important. Just finish your dinner.'
Mouse eventually did finish his dinner, but not without a thorough rundown of his personal history, all of which he told her while fidgeting restlessly in his seat.
As it turned out, Mouse's name was not Mouse, but Michael. He was the eldest son of a wealthy pureblood family who was in the goblin metal business, the specifics of which he was most disinterested in despite being expected to inherit it when he was older. He also had a younger sister who was due to start Hogwarts the following year, a pet cat named Rabbit and an owl named Owl, and his favourite colour was orange - no, blue - no, green. Aurélie listened with delighted amusement as she penned her reply to Sebastian, which she composed entirely and unapologetically in French.
Finally, after he'd licked his plate clean and finished explaining, in great detail, the interior of the Slytherin common room, Mouse took her finished note and leapt to his feet to deliver it.
'Wait, Mouse!' she said, reaching out to catch his sleeve before he could scamper away. 'Tell Sebastian if he can translate it, I'll let him explain himself.'
Moments later across the hall, Sebastian unfurled the note, took one look at her reply, and burst into laughter.
-x-
The first choir practice took place on a Saturday so blustery and wet that every student, professor and ghost had taken refuge under the stormy ceiling of the Great Hall. Or at least, that's how it had felt to Aurélie, who was certain she'd never get used to dining as a Hogwarts student and wondered how much she'd have to bribe the house elves to fill her goblet with wine rather than pumpkin juice.
Among the hoard of restless students had been Mouse, who'd appeared at her shoulder, as tiny and breathless as he'd been the first time, to remind her that choir practice took place in the bell tower wing and that she'd be best to take the staircase via the Ravenclaw tower to get there and not the staircase from the third floor because that'll take her 'twice as long and you don't want to get lost and risk losing a spot in the choir because you couldn't find your way.'
Evidently, he'd been sent on behalf of a certain Slytherin boy, who was taking her challenge to translate her note so seriously that he hadn't spoken a word to her since she had written it. In fact, every morning for the last three days, Sebastian had sat alone at the Slytherin table, her note laid flat next to his plate and a French-to-English dictionary propped up against a milk jug, scribbling determinedly and snapping at anyone who dared break his concentration. And despite her staunch commitment to hating him with every fibre of her being, Aurélie had to fight very hard not to smile about it.
And when his proxy directions to the music chamber inevitably proved both accurate and efficient, she had to remind herself, very firmly, that he was a no good rotten snakey liar who had at least one girlfriend if not several more.
Stupid, helpful Slytherin.
To Aurélie's delight, the music room was not the dank, draughty chamber she'd been envisioning, but a magnificent auditorium set high up in the castle's bell tower. Large and circular, with wood-panelled walls and deep-red carpet, it was undeniably the most beautiful room Aurélie had seen at Hogwarts thus far.
Tall leadlight windows stretched up to the ceiling, jewel-toned and brilliant even against the dull sky and howling rain beyond them, each of them telling a different story: a group of dancing children depicted in reds and golds, a choir of wood nymphs singing in greens and blues, and a multicoloured band of musicians playing instruments. And through each scene, music was woven around human and creature alike, represented as a gleaming golden thread around young and old, magical and Muggle.
It made Aurélie smile to see it.
Rows of cushioned seats descended to meet a magnificent grand piano at the bottom, around which the assemblage of choir hopefuls were waiting, anxious and silent. Though only small in number, the group was comprised of students from every house and every year level, each of them bound together by that same golden thread of music that transcended the systems that usually kept them apart.
Aurélie sat next to a fidgety Ravenclaw girl she didn't know and thought of her mother.
If gardens and trees were where her father's spirit dwelt, then her mother's lived in music; in piano keys and falsetto, majors and minors, in beauty that was structured, refined, well-practiced. Where her father had found beauty in things gnarled and natural, her mother had created it: writing it into song, spinning it into silk, bottling it as French perfume.
Her mother's presence was harder to feel than her father's, but she was hopeful that maybe she'd find her here, alive again in music.
Unfortunately, her hopeful illusions were shattered when the stiff, haughty form of Ominis Gaunt swept into the room, following his blinking wand down the steeply descending stairs until, with a rather dramatic swish of his all-black robes, he whirled around to face them. Behind him, the windows rattled and the wind howled, and the entire group stiffened as one. The nervous Ravenclaw next to her made a small noise in the back of her throat. Aurélie sat up straighter.
'Small turnout,' sniffed Ominis, sweeping a sightless gaze over the nervous group. 'Only eight this year. Disappointing.'
With a frightened squeak, the Ravenclaw jumped up, muttered something about being in the wrong room, and fled. Aurélie thought about following her but remained seated.
'Seven,' Ominis corrected himself without inflection. 'Very well. I assume you can all sing, then.'
Exchanging nervous glances, and looking like they'd rather do anything but, the group muttered their assent that they could indeed sing. Ominis took to the piano, laying his wand across its polished surface while his long pale fingers rested lightly on the keys.
'Very well, let's begin,' he said, striking a resonant G-major that echoed up to the ceiling and filled the chamber with life. 'We shall start with the youngest to the oldest. I only need to hear your vocal range and I will tell you immediately whether there is place for you here or not.'
It took some coaxing to convince the youngest member of the group, a second year Slytherin boy, to get up and sing, but eventually, with shaking voices and nervous glances, every hopeful singer was granted a place in Ominis' choir. Even Aurélie, whose voice was soft but clear, was given a curt nod of something close to approval and assigned as a soprano.
Having been the eldest, and thus the last to audition, Aurélie was not keen on being alone with a Gaunt at the top of a deserted tower. Mumbling her thanks, she hastily collected her things and turned to leave —but Ominis stopped her.
'New girl, a word.'
Up close, Ominis Gaunt cut an imposing figure in all his all-black robes. Tall, lean and perpetually bothered, he was every bit as proud and disdainful as an Heir of Slytherin ought to be. Aurélie couldn't blame the nervous Ravenclaw girl for fleeing before him, for she had half a mind to flee herself.
'I don't know how to broach the subject delicately,' he said curtly, 'so I'm going to come right out and say it. Whatever is going on between you and Sebastian needs to stop. Immediately.'
Aurélie almost choked on air.
'Wh -'
'I know something happened at Hogsmeade,' he snapped, cutting her off mid-objection. 'I don't know what, for he refuses to divulge a single detail to me, but given his...behaviour since, I know that it was something significant. I also know he showed you the Undercroft.' Aurélie froze as Ominis' voice rose slightly in pitch. 'That was not his decision to make. We all swore in our first year never to share its whereabouts with another living soul and him showing you is a betrayal of not only my trust but also that of -' He cut himself off with a sharp inhale through his nose.
'Regardless,' he began again, composing himself with obvious difficulty, 'that is beside the point. I don't know how much he's told you about his past, but let me be plain: Sebastian isn't good for you. He isn't good for anybody. I made a promise to his sister to keep him out of trouble, and for two long and arduous years I have been committed to keeping that promise.'
'You think I'm trouble?' Aurélie frowned, affronted; she hadn't spent her entire life trying to be the exact opposite of trouble only to be accosted by some contentious Slytherin.
'You don't know Sebastian the way I do. Our sixth year was a nightmare, and if it weren't for honouring Anne's wishes, I'm not sure I would have put myself through the trouble. Whoever you think he is, I assure you, you're only seeing what he wants you to see. He is loyal to a fault. His sister was the same; I suppose it's a Sallow trait, only Sebastian takes it too far. When he wants something, he will go to great lengths to get it. He will take the kind of risks most others won't. He loses sight of himself, of everything, and I don't know what it is about you, but he hasn't been the same since you arrived.'
'But I -'
'He's secretive. Distracted. I've seen him this way several times before and it has never once ended well for anybody.'
When Ominis paused to take a long breath, Aurélie finally felt her mother's spirit in the surge of French indignation boiling inside her.
'I've tried to avoid him!' she argued. 'But he's... It's not that easy!'
'Well try harder!' Ominis spat in return, his pale eyes snapping to hers. Aurélie faltered: there was something about his eyes that unsettled her - not because they couldn't see, but because she felt like they could.
'Trust me, you are better off not being a part of Sebastian's life. And if that is not enough to dissuade you...' His tone turned cold, venomous. 'Sebastian is better off without you.'