Flames (Dorcas)
Dorcas sat at the end of the table dark braids littering over her shoulders. She was alone simply due to the fact that Slytherin was full of bigots, and she was a halfblood. Normally she thought they didn’t mind much but she didn’t believe in the same bullshit they did so they tended not to speak to her.
Then all of a sudden a boy who she believed just got sorted sat next to her.
He had a wide grin and crazy eyes.
“Why are You sitting here?”
“you know why is everyone so un-social? That’s the second time someones said that to me today.”
She gave him a pointer look as if asking the question again, causing him to roll his eyes.
“You look interesting, I’m barty crouch jr”
“Dorcas meadowes, is that really your name?” She said with a small smile.
All of a sudden two people sat across from her, both with light blond hair and medium skin.
Barty turned to them, “are the quiet ones always so mean?”
“I don’t think regulus was that mean he just likes to be alone, I mean all the terrible gatherings I’ve been to he was either alone or with his brother.” The girl said looking over towards the middle of the table,
Dorcas looked over and saw a boy with black hair and a bored look on his face sitting next to an older girl with black and blonde hair who seemed to be in the middle of a conversation with a boy with blonde hair.
She turned back and the girl was looking at her, “sorry I haven’t introduced myself in pandora and this is Evan, I’m assuming you’ve already met barty.”
Dorcas nodded. “Yeah I have, I’m Dorcas “
Pandora nodded slowly, “it’s nice to meet you, Evan I’m going over to the ravenclaw table I’ll see you later.” She left with a small smile on her face.
Dorcas woke up the next morning and looked over to the clock realizing she missed her first class and it was in the middle of her next one.
She rushed up and quickly changed into her uniform, grabbing her bag she left still finishing putting on her tie as she rushed to the green house.
As she opened the door everyone turned to look at her. “Ah miss meadowes, you can sit next to Sirius he doesn’t have a partner.”
She quickly sat next to the boy who looked so similar to regulus but so different at the same time it was appalling.
“I’m going to be honest I haven’t really been paying attention, but I think we’re supposed to plant these then write notes on how they’ll grow and everything they’ll need which is in the textbook.”
Dorcas nodded stiffly looking through her bag before realizing she had forgotten to grab the book.
She groaned before turning to look at the boy. “If you let me borrow your book I’ll write the notes, you can copy them after you plant the actual plants?”
Sirius looked over before shrugging his shoulders. “Works for me.” She watched as he put the first small seed into the pot putting dirt over it.
She opened the textbook looking for the first plant, she skimmed through the pages eventually finding it. Gillyweed.
She quickly jotted down a similar summary of each of the plants, when she turned over Sirius was just finished planting the last one before moving over to look at her. She passed him the notes silently.
“God you write like my brother, why is it so fancy I want to dig my eyes out of my school.”
Dorcas smirked, “is it too hard for you to read black?”
Sirius paused looking over them, “actually yeah kind of just read it out loud for me.”
Dorcas rolled her eyes.
“Gilly weed, makes it so you can breathe under water, it basically grows gills and shit helping you swim as well. It should be grown with partial shade and watered everyday starting with half of an ounce adding another half every week. It’s done growing anywhere between four to seven months, you’ll be able to tell it’s done when the water stops absorbing as well and the ends of the leaves are slightly darker.”
She continued on like this for most of the class Sirius writing notes and muttering things under his breath when she talked too fast.
Once class was over she slung her bag over her shoulder and walked next to Sirius until they got to the door.
“You know for a Slytherin you’re not that bad.”
Dorcas laughed lowly, “yeah trust me they get a lot worse than me.”
Sirius made a weird face before letting out a small bye and walking off.
Dorcas was confused for a moment before realizing that his whole family was in Slytherin, the guilt hit her in waves but she pushed it away and walked off to her next class.
Soon enough it was time for lunch and she sat down across from barty and next to evan.
She looked over and suddenly grey eyes met hers. Regulus black stared at her blankly before turning back to his book.
Barty looked over at her. “Regulus here shares a dorm with me and evan so I’m forcing him to socialize.” He turned to look at him before whispering, “it’s not really working.”
She heard a stomping sound before barty spoke, “ow, you know Dorcas didn’t hit me when I forced her to talk to people.”
“Does Dorcas also shine your shoes and worship you?” Regulus asked glaring at the boy.
“I actually call him lord and wash his clothes but close enough.” She said with a smirk.
Regulus rolled his eyes and turned back to his book.
Pandora sat down next to him and grabbed his book. “Hello regulus how are you doing.”
“I was doing fine” he said glaring at the girl.
Pandora hummed holding his book up with a small grin plastered on her face. Regulus rolled his eyes before speaking again.
“After every chapter I’ll say two sentences.” He held his hand out expectantly,
“There’s only a little bit more than twenty minutes of lunch.”
“I’m a fast reader.”
She seemed to go over it in her head for a moment before handing the book back to the boy.
Dorcas looked at the two of them skeptically, they seemed like an odd pair. Not only being complete opposites but also how that was the most she had seen the pale boy talk. He looked up and saw her looking at him which in turn made him look at her with a confused face before going back to his book.
She turned to Evan who sat to her right and whispered. “What’s his deal?”
Evan who was more focused on his food than the conversation scrunched his eyebrows, she turned her head over to regulus before he seemed to understand.
“His family is the oldest pureblood family in England, all Slytherins besides Sirius. I’ve seen him at gatherings but I’ve only actually spoken to him twice when we had to sit next to eachother, he’s not like shy or anything he just doesn’t see the point in talking to people he doesn’t know.” Evan said in a quiet whisper then going back to eating like he hadn’t said anything.
Her eyes drifted to the young boy then to his book and realized it was on the next chapter.
He glanced up at pandora who was looking at him expectantly.
Sighing he sat up a little straighter and looked directly at Dorcas and Evan, she turned to Evan very obviously confused and heard him mutter a small shit under his breath.
“One, I’m not deaf if you want to know something ask. Two-“
“How the fuck did you hear that?” Dorcas said interrupting him before he said his next sentence.
“Two, i just have good hearing.” He turned back to his book just in time for barty to suddenly start talking again. She tried to remember what his was doing before and summed it up to him being zoned out.
“There’s a spell I think, but it can’t be used once your over the age of five due to development and shit” then he stared at regulus and whispered something under his breath causing regulus’ eyes to flash with a hint of emotion before returning to a glare.
Next thing Dorcas knew regulus sent a stinging hex at barty and left.
“What the bloody hell did you say to him?” Dorcas asked once she was sure he was gone.
“It’s his buisness not yours, goodbye ladies and gentleman I have to go to the library so I don’t have to study for the rest of term.”
Dorcas looked at him confused, “what do you even mean?”
“I’m going to study like all month the subjects we’re taking so I don’t have to be stressed about it all year.”
She watched as he walked off and decided she should actually eat before her next class.
Dorcas sat down on an empty couch in the common room. It was late Friday night, and her dorm mates were talking about boys. It’s not that she didn’t like them, they were just too different to get along. She didn’t understand why all the girls were so obsessed with boys, there wasn’t anything really special about them.
She turned around when she heard the sounds of footsteps, first she saw dark joggers, a black sweatshirt, and then she realized it was regulus.
He looked over at her before sighing and finishing his walk over to a chair next to her.
Dorcas looked at him, he was okay looking? She still didn’t get it. She watched the way his eyes darted around the room and How his posture seemed to straighten when she looked at him.
“Why are You up?” She asked, not one to break the silence usually but it was awkward and she didn’t intend on going back upstairs to the girls giggling about some guy.
“Can’t sleep” he said looking at her curiously.
“You look pretty tired” and the truth was he did, he had dark rings under his eyes and his skin was slightly paler than normal.
He ignored her which sadly made her more curious so she changed the topic to something else.
“What did barty say to you the other day?”
His eyes snapped up to meet hers. He watched her carefully before responding.
“The spell is painful. That’s it.” Then he turned his head slightly over to look at the fireplace.
“How painful?” Her thoughts flickered threw fast, who would purposely cast a spell on a small child just for them to be able to hear better? It made no sense.
He breathed in deeply, “I can’t remember very well but it lasted for a few weeks, I remember Sirius giving me pain potions but that’s it.”
She stared at his grey eyes that seemed to be more soft than they were before.
“Who did it?” She knew the answer before she asked, perhaps she hadn’t thought about how rude that could sound, similar to when she made that comment to Sirius days before. But she always let her curiosity get the better of her.
He turned away and glared at the fire, she jumped back suddenly the fire was almost twice as big. She looked to regulus who seemed to realize what he did and stared at the fire for a few more moments as it calmed down.
“Are you okay?”
He stared at her blankly, “I’m going back to bed.”
She watched him leave and stared back at the fire. How could he do that? She thought about accidental magic for a bit and came to the conclusion that that must be it. She came to another conclusion, the black brothers definitely don’t like to talk about their family.
She sighed and made her way back to the dorm and was glad that the other girls had finally fallen asleep.
She laid down in her bed after tying her braids into a bun at the top of her head. She fell asleep seconds after her head hit the pillow.