It seemed to her that the more dramatic occurrences were going on outside their castle, the quicker the school year seemed to go. Worrying about what her students were walking out the doors into was never-ending, it seemed, only getting worse as years went on. This year in particular, Davina found herself incredibly concerned; as always, she kept herself informed of everything that was going on. She knew the exact status of her father and sister at the work camp, just as she knew that the aurors were questioning purebloods for ‘further information.’ Once again. She would be called in for that, as she always was. Being a member of a family well known for supporting Voldemort never worked in her favor. But she was used to that by now; she was much more worried about her students being questioned, knowing that there were quite a few pureblood students that could be brought it. The fact that the Minister deemed that as acceptable behavior was absolutely atrocious, really. Although her thoughts could get stuck on this precise subject for hours if she let it, now was not the time. Now was the last bit of carefree fun the students could have before being thrust into the real world for the summer, or in the case of the seventh years, for their adult life to begin. Everyone should be enjoying themselves, and she certainly hoped that everyone did.

She smiled at @samuel’s compliment, finding any manner of conversation the perfect distraction form her thoughts at the current time. @daisy speaking brought her focus back to the new professor, “Very nice to meet you as well,” she stated, before laughing lightly at Samuel’s comment. “It’s true, us innocent Hufflepuffs never get in a lick of trouble,” she replied, mischievously. Davina took that opportunity to gaze around the room, making sure that her students were behaving themselves. So far, nothing entirely dramatic seemed to be happening, so she moved her focus back to the conversation.

A smile grew across her face at @persephone, though she had heard that the woman had begun working there. Sweet Merlin, she had been too wrapped up in her work and thoughts that she hadn’t even greeted the former Slytherin when she had first begun working there. Granted, they hadn’t exactly been friends back in school, but of course, they had known each other. “Persephone, it’s been absolutely ages, and you look gorgeous,” she replied, smiling brightly. It was too bad the end of the year was filled with grading, meetings with students, and the like. She doubted that they would be able to get together to catch up before the year concluded. “We should catch up sometime. I know the end of the year is always swamped, but perhaps over the summer if you’re free,” Davina suggested, though she did know that sometimes the summer holidays were just as busy as the school year for some people. Clearly, she would understand if the woman couldn’t meet up, though Davina would welcome the distract that would provide from the rather depressing thoughts that filled her mind during the summer months.

But only moments her eyes narrowed slightly as she thought something through. Though she had heard the woman’s name before, this was the first time she was ever making even the slightest connection. She turned her glance back over to Daisy, realizing that Samuel had relocated to where the food and drinks were located. “Lowry,” she repeated, trying to place the surname. Finally, it came to her, which made a lot of sense, really, with the woman’s first name. “With your first name, it simply can’t be a coincidence. Is your sister Iris Lowry, by any chance?” Davina had known the girl at school, and although she had known that there were other Lowry sisters, she couldn’t recall if she’d ever met any of the other ones. Until now, if her assumption was correct.

It seemed that Samuel had chosen a good time to leave the group, as he would have been overwhelmingly outnumbered by women. This became particularly true as @kahina approached, and Davina smiled brightly at her. No matter what the woman wore, she seemed to look absolutely spectacular. Davina had no idea how she could pull off half of what she wore, but she certainly did. “Kahina, once again, you’re pulling off a dress that most of us could only dream of,” she told the divination professor, smiling. Once Kahina began to introduce herself to Persephone, Davina glanced around the room again, noting that two of her more troublesome students were present. She would need to keep a close eye on them, obviously, but she saw no need to keep them on a tight reign. It was the end of the year, after all. They had made it through without expulsion, and she deemed that a rousing success.

In some ways, the End of the Year ball was the most interesting day of the year. After all, everyone had a hell of a lot of expectations that they wanted to be met; the witches in this school spent hours getting needlessly ready, because clearly they all needed as much help as they could look to even look slightly decent. Watching everyone’s expectations not be met was always amusing, and something that simply seemed to happen like clockwork every single time. As of now, Sutton could see that everyone was having a good time, their expectations having not yet be met but the possibilities of that were still present. They would certainly be proven wrong soon… as something always went wrong at these things. It was inevitable, and it was all a matter of just how entertaining it would end up being. Sutton looked around the room with interest, making brief eye contact with her irritating head of house, though she mustered up a very believable if not slightly saccharine smile in return.

Finally, after what seemed like absolute hours of waiting, she saw @tinsley walking into the hall. An amused grin filled her features as she noted that her triplet was wearing the same color as her. How absolutely typical “And if it isn’t my slightly less attractive sister,” she replied, her smile widening. Sutton lifted her shoulder in a shrug, taking a slow look around the room as if to determine if anything of interest had even occurred thus far. “So far, it’s been unsurprisingly lackluster, but I expect that will be changing soon enough. It always does,” she said. With all of the witches expecting the best from their dates, there was bound to be drama. If she could lead a few dates astray and case some jealousy in their nights, then she would do that—creating drama of her own was always an option after all.

He was already regretting even thinking that making an appearance at this ball was a good idea. Well, he hadn’t even thought it was that damn great of an idea, it was just something to do. The promise of something even something alcoholic—if butterbeer could even bloody count as that, their bloody ridiculous classmates making fools of themselves, and seeing @mila in whatever tight dress she decided on. Those were the only reasons that had come to him, and while the latter of those options was proving to give him quite a good view, Finn was still thinking that it would just be better for them both if they left. They were running out of time to check off every location to shag in the castle, something that they needed to do by the end of the year since they would be ending this relationship afterwards. The time crunch had certainly bloody meant they were getting a lot of shagging in, which obviously was a bloody good thing in his opinion. If they had all next year to do it as well, then that would have given them a lot more time and opportunities—but this caring shit really did need to end.

Finn chuckled under his breath at her words, though the concept didn’t exact sound bad. However, even he didn’t think they could get away with shagging in the middle of a ball without getting expelled. Not that he would particularly care about that. All that would mean is getting away from this shit for good, and he wasn’t really planning on coming back next year in any case. Granted, having food every day was almost too good to pass up, but he was missing a hell of a lot of opportunities at home to make money. That was more important than sticking around here, at least next year when this arrangement was over. For now, it was sort of the only thing keeping him at Hogwarts at all. “That wouldn’t be that big of a challenge,” he replied, smirking. If they wanted to do it, they bloody would, as it wasn’t like they cared much about an audience. “We’re here to… well who bloody knows? To entertain ourselves before we find something way fucking better to do.” Finn continued, raising an eyebrow. This would probably last five minute tops before they decided to leave, and at least everyone being here gave them free reign of the majority of the castle to find a location.

Maybe they could stay at the ball for half an hour, tops, and then find their way somewhere else. If he had thought that being around Isabella dressed up would be even more tempting than being around her normally, then Evan might have prepared himself a bit better for the possibility that it would be impossible to focus on anything else. Of course, he had to prove to Isabella that he was probably a better dance than she was as well. Growing up in the kind of family that he did, going to ridiculous events had been something that he was used to. Even his aunt, who could barely stand being around him, had known that it was important to drag him to those. Obviously, Isabella had a similar reason for knowing how to do these dances, but it was going to be something else he would beat her at. Clearly. “A dance or two sounds acceptable enough,” he agreed, nodding, though he was realizing that leaving the ball was early and blatantly would probably catch the attention of her aunt… that could be an irritating problem.

“We all know that you’re the one with the two left feet, Belle,” Evan replied, getting to his feet as well. This would certainly be amusing—them once again trying to beat each other in something that most people wouldn’t even find the need to compete in. More than likely, this would just be another reason that he would want to leave sooner, but they could deal with that as well. Before they could move much over to dance, Cecilia was getting up and leaving and Evan noticed Isabella glancing behind her briefly to see where the Gryffindor was going. Perhaps Roman had decided to come, after all, which might actually be all right—or at least better than it would have gone a few weeks ago. But Evan saw as well that it was the other Rudolphi that she walked up to, oddly enough. “Not a damn clue,” he said in response to her quiet question. Evan couldn’t think of a single reason why she would be talking to the prat, as he was easily the most irritating bloke in their damn year, if not the entire school.

Honestly this was just getting boring at this point. Sure he liked a good game on occasion, but he was running short on the time he was willing to give her before just went with his original plan. He hadn’t been bluffing, and the more she spoke the more he felt it may be just a better option to walk away from her. ”I doubt you have any good qualities outside of laying on your back.” He said with a condescending laugh. She could have made this bloody easier on the both of them by making up her damn mind ahead of time. He had a suspicion that she may try to go to Roman first after their agreement and had been sure to be within earshot of them afterwards just in case. Then again even if she were the one to tell him he would still find out that the only reason she told him was because Trey was holding it over her head. As far as he was concerned that would look just as shitty on her part.

He glanced around lazily as she continued to speak, really paying no mind to her until he caught sight of him. His lips curled into a devilish smile as he watched just the bloke he had been hoping to see enter the hall. It seemed his cousin may have had a change of heart and decided to join his slag of a girlfriend at this little shindig. This was too good to be true, and this moment would be made all the sweeter to let him have a full view of what exactly was transpiring. The moment he saw his cousin’s eyes sweep in his direction he put his finger to the girl’s lips, before snaking an arm around her waist and bringing his lips down to hers. At least now she couldn’t go back, and the anger his cousin would feel would be too perfect not to enjoy.

The school year was coming to a close and Roman assumed it could be worse. He still hadn’t told his girlfriend about his father leaving, though talking to his once best friend had helped him realize that it did need to be said. While he knew that the friendship may never be completely fixed it did give him a light at the end of the tunnel. He still had his girlfriend and now he was working towards fixing everything else. He still wasn’t quite sure where he stood with the pureblood debate, but after the conversation he had overheard it had given him a lot to think about.

It wasn’t really fair for Cecilia to go to the ball by herself, especially when he knew most of her friends and acquaintances were going to be there with their dates. It just wouldn’t be right to make her deal with that, besides he really did need to force himself out of his little hidey hole if he was serious about putting things back in order. He put on one of the only suits he owned, just grateful that he had one after losing everything over the summer. This night would go well. It would be just what he needed to try to get back to the real him. This hateful, bitter person he had become was no longer welcomed.

Roman walked into the hall with a grin on his face, hoping to spot his girlfriend. His eyes first settled on a table with Bella, Evan, and a few others he really didn’t speak to. His brows furrowed a bit as he knew she would most likely stick close to the group seeing as she wasn’t typically the friendly type to just flit about a room and socialize. It was then that he looked off to the side to see Cecilia and his cousin. He felt the bile rise in his throat as the prick kissed her. So this was what she was up to. He could only see red as he stormed over to the pair grabbing her arm roughly and pulling her away from him. ”What the fuck do you think you’re doing?!” He growled at Trey before grabbing him by the throat and slamming him against the wall.

@caleb coming to the ball really did make Kiki’s day. She was sure she would haven’t had as much fun without him. Sure, she had other friends and Ezekiel was there, but Caleb was her best friend and almost like a big brother that made her laugh all the time. He may not talk much, but he always did around her, and it usually resulted in her smiling. Even now, with his jokes of making his pockets bigger to sneak out butterbeer next year, made her grin. Although, it faded a bit as she realized next year would be Caleb’s last ball as he was graduating, and she hated that she would have to go through her last school year without him. No, I am not thinking about that. Tonight is supposed to be fun.

It became very easy to snap out of her sentimental thoughts as she gave Caleb a sort of stern,but easy look as he commented on how her having the capability to be silent was like him being an uncle to Merlin, or whatever dumb thing he said. Still, she laughed at her fellow Hufflepuff, purposely refusing to respond to his comment to show him that she could, in fact, refrain from speaking if she so chose to. She did, however, give him a very smug look as she did.

The Ravenclaw girl did confirm that she was indeed, Ezekiel’s sister, @ruby, which sort of brought a bit of satisfaction to Kiki to know she had guessed correctly. It also gave her even greater satisfaction to see that Ruby seemed a little smitten with Caleb as she twirled her hair around her finger. Kiki suppressed a laugh. She knew she would have a lot to talk to Caleb about later, but now that she had approached @ezekiel, she was a bit distracted.

When the Gryffindor spoke to her at first, she almost allowed a frown to cross her face. She wondered briefly if he was completely disinterested or just playing. However, the smirk on his face and the softness in his voice let her know he was joking. If that wasn’t enough, his compliment of her looking “stunning” surely was. Kiki looked down at her dress almost as if she was in disbelief about his words. In really, it was just in case she had started blushing, she could hide it. Looking up at him, she smiled. “Thank you, Zeke.” He took her hand and raised it to his lips. When they touched her, she could feel shivers run up her spine. The fifteen-year-old almost felt that she was outwardly shaking with delight or nerves, she couldn’t decide which. “Well,” she finally managed to speak and breathe, “aren’t you the gentleman?” It wasn’t until she watched Zeke seem to back off of her and address Caleb that she remembered there were actually other people here, one being her best friend. The fifth year found it weird that her fellow fifth year started rambling off the need for some homework assistance to her best friend, so she turned to look at Caleb. She saw the look that the sixth year was giving the Gryffindor, which then, resulted in her giving the blonde boy a look of her own, one that seemed to be a warning to be nice.

Thankfully, the red-haired Ravenclaw girl seemed to be able to keep Caleb at bay, which was fine with Kiki as she turned back to the Gryffindor boy. The girl considered herself confident sure, but she didn’t possess near the charisma that Ezekiel did. He spoke with such charm that some part of Kiki tried to caution her and make sure this wasn’t some guy who said this to all of the girls he knew. But all rationality disbanded when he touched her again. Damn. If this were to continue, the poor Hufflepuff girl was going to forget what her face looked like without color or what it was like to have a fucking normal heart beat. She was brought back from trying to get her body to return to a stable state when Ezekiel stated that he had already promised the first dance to a young Gryffindor. At first, Kiki was taken aback and slightly hurt, but refused to outwardly show it. “Of course, by all means,” she smiled and then watched him disappear with a little first year Gryffindor. Relief swept over her, and she watched the two dance.

A Ravenclaw approached their small group that apparently knew Ruby, which didn’t surprise Kiki. She knew a fair amount of the Hufflepuffs herself. The girl seemed rather outgoing for a Ravenclaw. Surely, not all of them were stuck in books, but it still took the fifth year by surprise. “It’s nice to meet you, Hazel. I’m Kiki,” she said offering a hand to shake to @hazel. Sometimes, she felt like shaking hands was such an adult thing to do. It was, of course, the polite thing to do when introducing oneself, but it seemed like it was sort of out of place, wasn’t it? Kiki felt like she was too young to do it, but then again, maybe she was getting a bit older. She was starting to develop an interest in a guy and maybe wanting something more than a friendship. Oh holy shit, surely I don’t mean that. Scared of her own thoughts, she turned back to Hazel. “So are you a friend of Ruby’s?”

Before the conversation could continue, Kiki could hear some commotion coming from somewhere across the hall. She turned to see one of the Slytherin beaters, @roman, slamming the Slytherin seeker against the wall. “Merlin’s beard,” she exclaimed as she cupped her hand over her mouth. The young girl’s eyes darted so fast looking to see if someone, the professors or the headmistress was at all concerned enough to feel like intervention was necessary.

Cecilia could have gone to Roman anytime throughout this week and told him, she supposed. Perhaps that would have been the better thing to do, and it might have solved the situation a bit better than actually having to date his shitty cousin. But every time she had told herself she was going to do it, she backed out and changed her mind yet again. She had never been more indecisive than she had been the past week, and that could be blamed on her simply not even knowing that the worst option. Roman might be a bit less pissed hearing it from her, but finding out that she’d only told him because @trey had found out and that she’d been hiding it this long wouldn’t be that great either. And in true opposites of her Gryffindor stereotypes, she was bloody afraid to tell him—with was just ridiculous and it had been why she’d been avoiding just about everyone for the past week. And now, apparently, she’d stalled about as long as she possibly could. Rolling her eyes again, she wondered if any of Trey’s remarks were actually supposed to offend her. If that was his end goal, he was doing a rather poor job of it. “And you’ll never find that out for yourself,” she countered, smiling saccharinely.

She could tell that he was even getting bored of this already, which might work for her eventually; unfortunately for now, him getting bored would just mean him deciding it would be better to tell Roman and forget this entire idea. Cecilia may have hated it, and him, and just about everything happening, but Roman finding out about her father was a mental image horrible enough to keep her from completely melting down. Cecilia had just been contemplating walking away because clearly there wasn’t much for her to do here anymore, when the prat was pulling her closing and bringing his lips to hers. Well what the bloody fucking hell, she thought, immediately irritated. Before she could pull away and smack him upside the damn head for making any kind of ridiculous move before she’d officially ended things with Roman, she was being pulled abruptly back. Her heart practically dropped to her feet when she realized who was standing there, and wanted to shoot Trey a death glare that probably would kill him, but she really couldn’t even bring herself to even move. After all that @roman had bloody done for her, she now had to ruin it all at the whim of his possibly psychopathic cousin. She ran a hand through her hair, stepping forward completely unsure what to do as her soon-to-be ex-boyfriend slammed her soon-to-be boyfriend against the wall. “Roman,” she stated, attempting to step in and pull his arm away from Trey’s throat. So to top it all off, now she hopefully had to stop Roman from getting himself suspended for fighting at the end of the damn year. Because that was obviously something that would make her feel even bloody worse. “Please, just—stop,” Cecilia added, absolutely sure that she didn’t even have a damn clue what she was going to say after that.

Isabella grinned at Evan’s agreement, thankful that a dance or two was enough for him. Certainly they’d be able to leave this horrid place without much notice, in the hopes that her aunt would be distracted enough. This ball was already boring, not that Isabella ever enjoyed these things to begin with. It was terrible when she was at home and was forced into going, needing to put on a face as if these things were actually enjoyable. Couldn’t they just have Quidditch tournaments throughout the castle? That would be a far more entertaining concept, one of which she was certain all of the professors were simply too dull to embrace.

“That would imply that I am anything less than perfect, which is clearly not the case with me,” she shrugged, smirking cockily as she sent him a wink. Even before this year, Isabella wondered how it was even possible that she hadn’t developed a relationship of sorts with Evan years ago through Quidditch as clearly, some of their personality was completely the same, like with their extreme cockiness. Of course, Isabella knew her limitations and she knew she wasn’t perfect, but she was also fully confident that confidence was always the answer in succeeding. Isabella slipped her hand into Evan’s, intermingling her fingers with his as she nodded in the direction of the dance floor. Before they made their way much farther, Isabella stopped in her tracks, eyes widening in shock, her jaw dropping, as she saw Roman slamming Trey into the wall, his hand tight on the bloke’s throat.

To make matters worse, she saw her best friend trying to get in the middle of it, which was a horrible idea if two Rudolphi’s were involved in an altercation. Cecilia could get hurt, Trey could get hurt, Roman could kill someone or be expelled…so many options were pouring through Isabella’s mind as she pulled out her wand with her spare hand, not really thinking anything else through except stopping whatever the hell was going on before it got too carried away.

“Relashio!” she called out, pointing her wand in the direction of Roman, watching as a jet of fiery purple sparks flew towards him. There was no way her best friend or ex-best friend were going to be hurt, though she would have quite a few questions for them about what the hell was going on. Roman probably wouldn’t actually want to kill his cousin, as horrid as the bloke could be and she really would prefer to have Cecilia intact. She supposed she didn’t want Trey to be hurt, either, but only because he was a bloody good seeker, obviously.

The look Kiki shot him following the redhead’s reaction to his compliment said more than anything. No doubt she would scrutinise him later on but he would be doing the same to her in return. If anything Caleb was very comfortable with Ruby next to him as they walked over to the table. He of course had a few things he wanted to tell her but definitely not with his best friend right there and it was definite no-go with her older brother right there too. It wasn’t lost on the sixth year just how well Kiki and @ezekiel were interacting. He didn’t mind them speaking obviously, his friend was free to speak to whoever she wanted. However, Ezekiel kissed Kiki’s hand, his eyes narrowed and his first urge was to ask what the heck! But he stopped himself. But the constant thought in his head was ‘what the bloody hell is going on!'. “Oh sure we’ll chat tomorrow, I’ll meet you in the library” he confirmed. It was unlikely that any homework would actually get done when he spoke to Ezekiel the next day. He arched his brow at the glare the Gryffindor shot him, sure he would want to know what was going on between him and Ruby, but it was obviously nothing compared to what was going on with him and Kiki if he was already kissing her hand. Sure Caleb knew it was a formal greeting and this was a ball after all but he also knew it was something that happened between two people who fancied each other. The boy shifted his gaze from the other boy to @kiki still with his eyebrow raised. His expression relaxed at the silent request she was sending him with her look.


He chuckled at @ruby’s answer and leant in a little closer. “Like I said the last time we met, I would be there to catch you” he smiled at her softly as he drew back. The Hufflepuff looked around and saw that everyone at their table appeared to be talking amongst themselves. He looked in the direction of the buffet table as Ruby spoke to him. “Sure, let’s do that, I’m sure the elves have outdone themselves with the food too” he replied as he offered his arm to her. He turned and saw that Ezekiel had left Kiki on her own as he went off to dance with the first year Gryffindor. This left a sour taste in his mouth and he didn’t want his friend to feel ditched. But he was happy that a Ravenclaw who appeared to know Ruby came over and soon started speaking to his best friend.


As they arrived at the table where the food and drinks sat he turned to Ruby. “So I wasn’t completely honesty earlier when Kiki asked me about how nice you look, very nice doesn’t do you justice, you look beautiful” he told her honestly with a wide smile, now that there away from his friend and her brother. “And how is my favourite eagle?” he asked he girl at his side , smirking slightly.


Hearing some sort of commotion going on, Caleb looked over and saw two Slytherin blokes in his year in some sort of altercation, one appeared to have slammed the other guy against the wall. “Bloody hell” the Hufflepuff said to himself, only Ruby would have heard. He looked around to see if any staff would be stepping in before he saw @isabella go over and intervene. He turned to Ruby “Well….that was unexpected”