Funny Looks
October 21, 1991, Sunday
7:38 PM
Rabastan's Home
Office
Rabastan was still pissed off. His family sucked right now to say the least. His parents were trying to get in contact with him, most likely about the portfolios of his suitors, so he kept ignoring them. He didn't plan on talking to Rudolphus for a while unless made to by his lord specifically.
Drowning in family angst, Rabastan pulled out his most expensive bottle of Ogden's finest and started drinking straight from the bottle. How the hell did he always get screwed over. First of all he was the spare and he has to learn how to deal with that. Then when he gets in a position in life where he doesn't need a marriage or children he's now forced too? His brothers a dick head and now he's ignoring his family. Yep! Life was great. Rabastan finished the bottle.
Surprised he reached the end of the bottle he looked down at it. Almost in disbelief he just drank all that. Seeing the bottle actually empty he sighs and shrugs his shoulders very undignified. His mother would've screamed at him if she saw him do that.
Instead of getting up and ready for bed, Rabastan sleeps right there in his office.
October 24, 1991, Wednesday
12:00 AM
Slytherin Castle
Meeting Room
Next week this time is Samhain Eve, and the beginning of the downfall of Minister Fudge. Lucius, who works very close to him, caught him having an affair with his secretary. While this is not enough to get someone out of office it is useful to discredit him and ruin his reputation. It’s also enough for his wife to divorce him. Further ruining his reputation.
The Death Eaters were all celebrating! This was amazing for their cause! Of course they weren’t in the inner circle so they didn’t know the exact details but they had a general idea. According to some members higher up than them, there was to be an exposé on him written by none other than Rita Skeeter. She wasn’t in their ranks but she’d do anything for money and juicy gossip.
October 31, 1991, Wednesday
7:02 AM
Hogwarts
The Great Hall
Hadrian and his friends were eating breakfast when the post came. A series of loud gasps are heard around the room after the papers are opened. Immediately gossip starts. Hadrian and his friends stare around in confusion for a while. They normally finish breakfast and THEN read the papers. It gives them time to wake up before they have serious conversations. Finally, annoyed with the gossip and being nosey, Hadrian sits his fork down and grabs a paper.
Unexpected for himself, he gasps and his eyes bug open.
“Rian’ That is not a good look on you”. Draco states unprompted.
“Shush Draco let me read.” Hadrian shushes him and continues reading the article that had caused so much fuss. Draco’s jaw drops at being spoken that way by Hadrian. It makes him a little worried about the article.
“What is it Hadrian?” Daphne, who is finally awake enough, asks.
“Listen to this everyone” the group all looks up from their plates and stares at Hadrian expectedly. “ ‘Minister Fudge caught in affair in this crazy Sex Scandal?’” He looks up to gauge their reactions only to see their jaws wide open. “Yea I know! It says here ‘Lucius Malfoy entered Minister Fudge’s office early for their meeting only to see Minister Fudge and his Muggle-Born secretary in a compromising position on his desk. Lord Malfoy came to me out of respect for Lady Fudge, as he’s had many meetings with her over the years and respects her immensely’”. Older students down the table look at him and gasp as well. The group all turn to Draco expectedly.
“Why are you looking at me? My father most certainly didn’t tell his 11 year old son about a sex scandal! It’s very un proper. He did mentionFudge was in trouble, but fathers always complaining about him so I didn’t see the significance of the name drop”.
“Hm this is so weird… Why put this out on Samhain? This was obviously planned…” Theo muses.m
“If it was planned it wasn’t just my father… it certainly has that flair with the scandal but my father prefers to stay out of mention at all with his plans. So he had help.”
“A new political party?” Blaise asks,
“I haven’t heard anything about one…” the others agree with him.
“Well what a nice way to start off Samhain!” Pansy says genuinely happy with the gossip (Fudge was saying the opposite about the same time of the day).
A couple hours later the group has just finished classes and are getting ready for their rituals.
“What are you bringing Rian?”
“Bones… the forbidden forest has a lot of them…”
“That’s...nice I guess..” Draco gives him a funny look.
“What’s wrong with bones?”
“Nothing! Just…why are you going to the forbidden forest for bones?”
“There’s a lot of bones there!”
“Alone?”
“No! Neville Longbottom comes with me.”
“No way! He’s scared of his own shadow!”
“His interest in the plants in the forest outweighs that fear” he answers diplomatically.
“Wow…”
“Yeah it’s kinda weird but very interesting!”
After that weird conversation they all make their way down to the forest clearing. Again the area is covered by Hogwarts students of all ages. There’s even a couple Gryffindors this time.
“Huh that’s weird” Hadrian says after observing this.
“What's weird?” Pansy asks.
“There’s actually Gryffindors here..?”
“Oh! That is a little weird…but it might be because Samhain is more known than Mabon…”.
“Isn’t Mabon more important though? It’s the Autumn Equinox”
“Yes but Samhain is more commercialized…”
“Oh, like how Valentine is with Hallmark?”
“What?”
“Never mind.” Pansy shrugs and walks away.
The magic is so potent in the air that night that Hadrian can smell it, not only taste it. Not to mention it tastes like he has put a bunch of American Pennie’s in his mouth and ate them. And no he doesn’t want to tell you how he knows what pennies taste like.
He starts and finishes his rituals and sacrifices but doesn’t feel the positive way he felt during Mabon. It’s like a pit of dread in his stomach. His rituals didn’t even last that long either. He didn’t feel connected to his magic at all. He waited for over an hour for his friends to be finished with their rituals and to do the group rituals. Once his friends were finished with their rituals, this feeling worsened.
“All you alright Hadrian?” Blaise asked. “I noticed you weren’t having the best time earlier” his cheeks reddened when Blaise tells him that he’s noticed him.
“Oh. Uhm yea no. I’m not feeling the best. I didn’t feel connected to my magic at all. It feels like something bad's going to happen, you know?”
“Really? When did you start feeling that way?”
“When I started my rituals…”
“That’s so weird..”. While they're talking Draco yells for them to come on. They start following the group back up to the castle. The two boys keep talking, moving in from topic to topic. They hadn’t been able to speak a lot because they were studying for first quarter tests, which were on the 3rd of November. They speak about their families and how they’re grades were going. They also spoke about their friends out of their house.
While they’re speaking they hear a commotion further ahead. “Hmm wonder what’s that about?” Hadrian says.
“Want to go see?”
“Haven’t you heard that curiosity kills the cat?” Blaise looks at him funny. “Never mind. Lead the way.”. Blaise smiles and pulls him up towards the noise. They pass by Draco and Pansy, who are also slowly making their way up towards the noise. Which is typical because they're just as nosey as Blaise is.
When they get up towards the noise, they notice it’s a couple Gryffindors fighting. Two of which were at the Rituals.
“Wait! Is that the Weasley’s twins! They were at the rituals?!”
“Woah! It is!” Blaise exclaims.
“Who are they fighting with?”
“Come on, let's get closer?”
“What if it turns into a duel?
Blaise rolls his eyes. “Really? Come on!”.
Hadrian let’s put a sigh but follows along anyways. Once they get closer they see the other boy is tan with dark brown hair.
“Hadrian…isn’t that your brother?”
“Is it?”. It is. Evans is yelling at the Weasley twins about their outside of class activities. He’s screaming things about how their dark wizards and how disappointed their parents would be. He’s also threatening to break off his betrothal contract with Ginny. Which Hadrian thinks is his best idea yet!
Evans finally loses his breath after screaming about how the twins would get to the common room if they knew any better. Surprisingly they listen and walk straight past him. Now that the twins aren’t here, Evans takes a look around the group that gathered. His eyes roam until they spot Hadrian. Who is still holding hands with Blaise.
“Oh shit.”
“What?” Blaise asks, confused at the sudden profanity.
“My brother spotted me”.
“Fuck.”
“Yea.” His brother starts towards him. “Go get the others. I’ll be fine.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, go!” Blaise lets go of him and sprints off towards the back of the groups.
“Hadrian!”
“Yes Evans” he says sweetly.
“Don’t pull that shit with me!”
“What?”
“Come here”. Evans makes a move to go grab him. In his panic Hadrian sends off a quick stinging hex, which pisses his brother off more.
“Ow!” He growls and sends off the worst curse he knows back in retaliation. Hadrian screamed before falling towards the ground in pain. His screams get worse and worse and blisters start forming along his skin. He sees his brothers smiling before he closes his eyes and passes out because of pain.
November 4, 1991, Sunday
12:40 AM
Hogwarts
Hospital Wing
When Hadrian first comes to, it’s to the sound of muffled arguing. He can’t really tell what they're saying but he knows it’s a serious argument either way. He falls back into unconsciousness.
When he actually wakes up, the hospital wing is very quiet. He sits up slowly still in a little pain and runs his eyes and takes the sleep crust off. He looks over to see Sirius asleep beside him.
“Sirius…?” He reaches over and attempts to wake him up. “Sirius!” He whispers.
Sirius jolts up panicked only to calm down at the sight of Hadrian awake.
“Oh pup! You’re awake!”
“Yea… What day is it?”
“It’s the fourth..?”
Hadrian’s eyes widened. “Exams were yesterday…” he whines.
Sirius laughs. “Of course that’s what you're worried about nerd.” His face drops into a serious scowl. “Your brother didn’t get in trouble for doing this to you.”
“I didn’t figure he would.”
“You got in trouble for going to Samhain and for hitting him with a stinging curse. You're grounded for a month again”.
“Are you serious!?” He yells out.
“Yep. I had an argument with your parents because of it. Safe to say I’m not going to be invited around for a couple days”.
Hadrian laughs. "I'm so upset about my exams!”
“Of course you are. That Blaise and Draco kid have been here a couple times". Hadrian blushes. "ooohh~ You like one of them"
"No! Definitely don't!" Hadrian reddens more when Sirius gives him a knowing look.
November 24, 1991, Saturday
9:37 AM
Black Manor
Master Bedroom
“Sirius” Remus yells. “Lily and James sent you a letter”
“Oh really? They’re talking to me again.”
“Yeah, it’s about Hadrian”. Sirius sighs. He was a little tired of the Potter family drama right now. He's only really putting up with them for the kids.He loved them too much just to walk out. He said as much to Remus.
“Yes I know Sirius.”
“Wow, this is something that caused me a lot of pain to admit and you're just going to reply like that?” Sirius huffs.
“Babe, I've known you since we were eleven. I know how you work. You often say whatever comes to mind.”
“Yeahhh… You're right.”
“Normally am”.
“Wow, you're cocky.” Remus raises his eyebrows suggestively. Sirius laughs and pushes him playfully. “Hand me that letter.”. Sirius reads the letter quickly.
“What the fuck!”.
“What?”
“He's betrothed to that freaky bug girl!?”
“Sirius.” Remus stares at him with a blank face.
“What?! She is!” Remus shakes his head. "Theyre trying to get me to help convince Bambi that this is going to be a good thing or whatever" Sirius rolls his eyes.