Halloween Arrangements

In the following days after Damocles Belby's funeral, the whispers of his death filled Hogwarts halls especially of those of the transfer students, who were grateful to their savior. They lit candles for him to remember him, while those like Severus lamented the loss of such genius. Still, those whispers were largely suppressed by the excitement of the Halloween Feast that was nearly upon them.

All too soon, All Hallows Eve arrived early that morning as the castle began to smell the sweet fragrance of pumpkins being baked. Shooing the last of the first years through the common room and towards the Great Hall for breakfast, Rowan's lips eyes flashed with some impatience as she was starving. Emerging from the Slytherin common room, she frowns and pulls her cloak tighter around her as the chill of the dungeon seeps into her bones. The only good thing about residing in the dungeons this time of year was that the cold, chilly air woke up even the sleepiest of students.

Emerging from the winding staircase, Rowan spots the tall, slender figure of Severus waiting for her at the entrance of the Great Hall. Some girls in their year and below titter shyly as they pass by him and cast Severus longing looks. Severus's newfound popularity with the girls of Hogwarts was not unfounded considering his appearance, but then again, the rest could be contributed to his great lineage. Many pureblood families were salivating over the Prince family line, but none dared to openly send their daughters at Severus and could only hope that their daughters would somehow manage to attract the attention of the sole male Prince heir.

On the other hand, the same could not be said the same for Rowan. The pureblood still seemed to be rather wary considering the incident with Barrett Boone on the Hogwarts express on their return trip home for the summer holidays. Apparently, it had left a lasting expression as she tended to be hurriedly avoided which was exactly what Rowan wanted.

Casting an amused look at Severus with a faint smirk, Rowan teasingly says, "My, my, what a glorious spring day! Why the bees are just buzzing around the lovely flowering blossoms."

Severus sends a fierce scowl at his twin sister for being compared to flowering blossoms, but still, the two of them entered together into the Great Hall and made their way to the Slytherin table. The first years and transfer students excitedly whisper about the Halloween Feast as they had all been regaled by tales of those who had been in attendance in the years before. Although, despite the first years and transfer student's excitement none chattered loudly as they saw it beneath them. They were Slytherins and were above such things.

Annoyed by his twin sister's earlier words, Severus takes a seat next to Terry leaving Rowan to sit on the other side of Terry, while Bethanie, Silvia, and Tiffany as usual sit across from them. Grabbing a raspberry scone, Rowan slices it open, before taking a spoonful of raspberry jam and dousing her scone in the tangy goodness.

Terry, Severus, and the girls shiver at Rowan's antics and make tsk-tsking sounds with their tongues, but do not mention the spectacle. There were some aspects of Rowan's personality that were frankly a bit too American to be perfectly honest. And where she had learned such atrocious habits was frankly beyond them.

Ignoring the perturbing sight of Rowan's eating habits, Terry shakes his floppy hair, before turning his innocent hazel eyes towards the others. His delicate-looking features lighten up like an angel instinctively making his friends doubly wary. "Mm, did you hear that Professor Dumbledore hired a Veela musical troop to perform?" He eagerly said.

"We've all heard the rumors," Bethanie tactfully replied causing her long, wavy auburn hair to sparkle in the peeks of sunlight that darted through the heavy dense clouds that could be seen on the enchanted ceiling of the Great Hall. And those casting Bethanie shy looks could only helplessly blush at the beauty, before hastily averting their eyes away at seeing her betrothed, Regulus Black's dark glares seated further down the table.

"Why do you ask?" Silvia asked through her narrowed bluish, gray eyes. Her dark sleek hair is pulled back from her face causing her sharp features to appear even sharper. Although slim without many curves, her chest had grown slightly over the course of the summer enough to create small, but noticeable mounds as she folded her arms rather pointedly over her chest.

Terry's grin grows, even more, Cheshire-like and replies, "Well, if you must know, they are my second cousins. They are the daughters of my great-grandmother's daughters, my great-aunts who all reside in France. My second cousins not only inherited my great-grandmother's beauty but have some of my great-grandmother's adventurous spirit. And considering that they are musically inclined, they gathered together to form a musical troupe called the Fiery Maidens."

"Well, that's an incredibly appropriate title," Tiffany muttered under her breath as she wrinkled her petite nose, before violently shuddering at the mere thought of said troupe losing their temper and throwing fireballs from their hands and causing her short, strawberry blonde bobbed hair to shake fiercely from the force.

Terry flashes Tiffany a disgruntled look, before perking up again. "Cousin Eponine said that I can join for her lunch in her office and catch up with our cousins, who should arrive during our first or second-period classes."

Upon hearing Terry's words, Severus looks up from his plate and states at Terry. With a deadpanned expression, he asks, "Exactly, how many direct descendants does your great-grandmother have, Terry?"

Terry scrunches up his face and mentally begins to count causing Silvia to further blanche as Bethanie in a consoling fashion pats Silvia on the back. "At least, you need not ever worry about your children warranting a lack of relatives nor playmates which to play with," Bethanie bluntly stated, before flushing at the faux pas and especially at the pointed glare that Silvia gave her.

Tiffany turns her gaze away from Bethanie and Silvia, who pointedly and rather child-like nudged each other with their elbows, while Terry still mentally counted to the shock of Severus. A flash of a smile appears on Tiffany's face as she sees that Rowan is determined to eat her food without being interrupted. "Mm, what do you think, Rowan?" Tiffany impishly inquired causing Rowan to cease eating much to her displeasure.

"About what?" Rowan asked after gulping and wiping her mouth clean of crumbs.

"About the Fiery Maidens?" Tiffany cheekily asked.

Rowan's face twitches for a moment, before gracefully going blank. "That is exactly, why I am eating right now, I am replenishing and gathering strength for later. No doubt, we Prefects will be docking points by the droves and assigning detentions to the entranced male population of Hogwarts."

Tiffany bursts out into loud laughter causing Terry to lose his count as all her friends turn to gaze at her. Tiffany sheepishly blinks at them as Rowan quietly says with a soft, rare smile. "I think that's the first real laugh I have heard from you since the start of the school year, Tiffany."

"Is it?" Tiffany asked as she scrunched up her face at them in an adorable fashion.

"Yes," Bethanie and Sylvia chimed together, while Terry and Severus nodded their heads at Tiffany.

"I had not realized," Tiffany truthfully answered as she touched her hand to her face. "I-, I guess I had forgotten how to for a bit."

Seeing their concerned expressions, Tiffany flashes them a genuine rueful smile. "It won't happen again, I promise."

"Mm, and I will hold you to your word," Rowan muttered causing the rest of their friends including Severus to hum in agreement.

Immediately after, Bethanie and Sylvia switch their attentions back to Tiffany, while Terry shrugs and gives up counting his family, before returning to his cooling brunch. He would never be able to eat if he counted up his entire family because truthfully there were almost too many of them to count.

"Can you believe it?!" Terry suddenly shrieked with vicious glee causing them all to wince as he triumphantly held up the early morning edition from the Daily Prophet before them. "Behold," he said as he set down the newspaper onto the table and causing a spoon to splatter them with oatmeal.

They all glared at him as they begin to clean themselves off as Terry eagerly begins to read the newspaper titles. "Who can be trusted?!" "Are their dark wizards among us?!" "Corpse of Damian Mulciber found at the site of the raid! DEAD!"

"Huh," Rowan mumbled with a gleam of pleasure before grabbing a forkful of food. The bastard was dead, and in turn, destroyed the deadly portion of the curse for the Defense Against the Dark Arts post. However, the curse would not entirely be destroyed away Riddle died and all his fragments, but still the severity of its effects should have lessened. Nor did not mean that it would permit the D.A. Professor to stay for more than one year of teaching.

Terry practically danced with joy as he murmured eagerly out loud, "I shall write to my sisters for details, but knowing his father, Mr. Mulciber will deny all allegation by the Daily Prophet, and scatter Damian's ashes to the wind rather than permit him to be buried in the family crypt. I wonder how he managed to keep it silent all this time. Mm, he must have been paid quite the galleons to keep it so tightly under wraps!"

"Fascinating," Severus drily said as he stuffed another forkful into his mouth.

Noticing a lack of audience, Terry begins to pout and mumbles that he is underappreciated under his breath. They all proceed to ignore him as they return to their meals after having wiped themselves clean. Being ignored by his friends and courting partner, Terry proceeds to eagerly read the words of Rita Skeeter and enjoys the gossip-filled article that sprouted all sorts of theories without any proof. Ironically, those theories would prove to be not so wild in the future. But that is a tale for another day.