Lumos

“I can’t believe him.”

Everyone jumped as Ulric slammed his books down on the table. Neville dropped his toast on the floor, George accidentally stuck Fred with his fork, and Felicity pressed a hole in her parchment with the tip of her quill.

“Er...can’t believe who?” Felicity asked as Ulric sank, sulking, into the seat opposite her.

“Kyne!” he exclaimed. “I thought I’d finally talked him out of it, but he still went to Quidditch tryouts.”

“What’s wrong with that?” Fred demanded.

“Yeah, Fred and I are on the Gryffindor team,” George pointed out.

“I don’t have a problem with Quidditch,” said Ulric hotly. “He’s just doing it because he wants to be stupid!”

Ulric turned in his seat to glare at the Ravenclaw table. Kyne was leaning across the aisle, chatting with Cedric Diggory at the Hufflepuff table, both of them talking rather animatedly. He was obviously excited and Felicity wasn’t sure Ulric was quite justified in his argument.

Tentatively, she said, “I think he just wants to have fun.”

“No, he just wants to be a daredevil because ‘you only live once.’ And he uses Landon and Charity as justification.”

Felicity, having never really heard Ulric talk about his late siblings, put her chin in her hand and asked gently, “Is it really so wrong for him to have some fun?”

Ulric sighed. “Sure. If he thinks getting his neck broken is fun, then he can go ahead and do it for all I care.”

“Relax, Ric,” said Fred.

George, of course, spoke next, “No one’s died at Quidditch in years.”

“Sure, there’s the occasional disappearance…”

“But everyone turns up eventually.”

“Thanks,” said Ulric irritably.

“So he made the team?”

“Chaser.”

“Brilliant,” George grinned.

“Now we get to flatten him when we play Ravenclaw.”

Ulric just glared darkly at his empty plate. His dark mood persisted through the week and wasn’t made any better by the arrival of a letter that landed on Felicity’s plate Wednesday morning.


We need to talk. Meet me in the entrance hall during lunch?


“He’s mad,” Felicity said, voice riddled with disbelief. “Absolutely barking.”

“Wand me to hex him?” Ulric asked, sounding uncharacteristically eager. Felicity didn’t answer - she held out the letter where she was sure Sebastian could see it and ripped it to shreds.

Felicity avoided Sebastian for the rest of that week, spending all her free time in the common room, immersed in her homework and learning how to play Wizard Chess with Harry and Ron. She wouldn’t have called them the best of friends, but she enjoyed the occasional chat with Harry. With Neville, again, she couldn’t call them best friends, although she and Ulric dedicated much time to attempting to better his Potion-making skills - to no avail.

All of Saturday Felicity spent out on the grounds, where she learned to play Exploding Snap with Fred and George, worked on her Charms with Ulric, and spent several hours lounging in the soft grass by the lake, watching the giant squid drift lazily across the glassy surface.

With her newfound friends, talents, and turmoils - Transfiguration, to be specific - Felicity hardly noticed time slipping away. Soon enough, it was October and everyone was anticipating the Halloween feast.

“They let zombies wander the corridor,” Fred had told Felicity one evening. She’d responded by igniting his Potions essay. At least she could do some spells competently.

Halloween morning, Felicity and Ulric walked into the Charms classroom in high spirits. They froze in their tracks, however, when they saw Sebastian standing by Professor Flitwick, looking particularly tall next to the tiny wizard.

“Felicity!” Sebastian called when he spotted her.

Felicity ignored him, taking a seat in the back row between Ulric and Neville, who was barely visible slumped down in his chair. To Felicity’s dismay, Sebastian wove his way through the desks and came to a stop by hers.

“I need to talk to you,” he said.

“Talk to Filch,” said Felicity shortly, trying to look decisive as she dug parchment and ink from her bag.

“I could, you know.”

“You already did, didn’t you? Enough to let him know some stupid first year would be wandering around the dungeons at midnight.”

Sebastian looked taken aback. “What?”

“Don’t play dumb,” Felicity snapped. “You know what you did. Now leave, before I call Flitwick to send you away.”

“I’m not leaving until you-”

Sebastian stopped mid-sentence as he speech turned to gibberish. His eyebrows knitted together and he tried to speak again, but all that came out was indecipherable babble. After several failed attempts to make a coherent sentence, Sebastian turned and stormed from the classroom, muttering gibberish.

Felicity, stunned, looked at Ulric for answers. He shrugged, removing his arms from beneath the desk - giving his wand a spin in the process. Neville, sitting up a little, said, “Blimey, Ulric.”

“What did I do?” Ulric asked innocently, stowing his wand as Professor Flitwick began today’s lesson - levitation. After a demonstration, he paired them up and set them to practicing. Felicity and Ulric worked quietly over their feather, but neither managed to make it do more than twitch. Hermione Granger was the only one who managed to make her feather float, although something she’d said to Ron just before seemed to have put him in a very bad mood.

Felicity’s suspicions were confirmed when, walking with Ulric behind Ron and Harry, she heard him say, “It’s no wonder no one can stand her. She’s a nightmare, honestly.”

Hermione, who had been only a short distance away and, unfortunately, out of Ron’s line of sight, burst into tears and shoved past him. Giving Ulric an apologetic look, Felicity hurried after Hermione and caught up with her in the girls’ bathroom.

“I’m sure he didn’t mean that,” Felicity began, but Hermione just slammed the bathroom door in her face. Try as she might, Felicity couldn’t talk Hermione into coming out and eventually had to leave - that, or face the wrath of Professor McGonagall for being late.

By the time dinner came around, Felicity was too frustrated with her terrible Transfiguration to spare Hermione a second thought. “How’m I ever going to pass this year if I can’t do any spells?” she asked miserably as she and Ulric made their way down to the Great Hall.

“You just need more practice,” Ulric encouraged. “And you could be worse, you know. You’re not as bad as Neville.”

This did not make Felicity feel any better. Just as they’d reached the doors, they heard a magnificent tearing sound and all of Felicity’s books suddenly fell out of a large rip in the bottom of her bag. “Damn,” she muttered, crouching down and beginning to stack up her books. “No, go on,” she said when Ulric stooped to help. “I’ll just repair this and then I’ll be in. Go, and get us a good spot.”

Obviously eager to secure a decent seat, Ulric nodded and headed through the doors into the Great Hall. Cursing her own luck, Felicity pulled out her wand and tapped the rip in her bag. “Reparo.” When nothing happened, Felicity cursed again and muttered, “Where’s Hermione when you need her?”

This reminded her of exactly where Hermione was and she felt a tendril of guilt claw at her stomach. Carrying her books and useless bag in her arms, Felicity hurried off toward the bathroom where she’d last seen her woebegone classmate.

But, as she hurried down the abandoned corridor, Felicity thought her footsteps sounded unusually loud. They were too loud and she turned on the spot, finding herself nose-to-nose with Sebastian.

“Oh, no more! Please!” Felicity exclaimed, trying to storm away but finding herself held back as Sebastian grabbed her elbow. The movement jerked her arm and she dropped her books again.

“Felicity, just hear me out,” said Sebastian breathlessly.

“I heard you the last time we talked, before you tried to get me expelled.”

“That’s just it - I didn’t. I have no idea who told Filch we’d be there, or who even knew. I just wanted to talk and to show you the house elves and where Hufflepuff is. Just for some fun.”

“And it just had to be after hours, where anyone might find us?” Felicity demanded, still struggling to free her elbow from Sebastian’s grasp.

Sebastian chewed his lower lip, looking thoughtful. Felicity knew he would lie even before he said, “I wanted to impress you.”

“By getting me into trouble? I was almost caught! Gryffindor would’ve lost so many points! And I know why - so no one would see us together. Ulric was right - all you Slytherins are the same.” Felicity took a step back, dragging Sebastian with her. He stumbled as he stepped on her copy of A Beginner’s Guide to Transfiguration and she took the opportunity to twist her arm free.

“Felicity, just listen-”

“No!” she shouted, her voice starting to sound slightly hysteric. “All you care about is your stupid reputation. You let it be everything about you - how you act, who you hang out with, what you’re called... or am I wrong, Bastian?”

“Come off it,” Sebastian said irritably, stooping down and picking up Felicity’s bag. He repaired it with a tap of his wand and Felicity snatched it away from him. “I just wanted to spend time together. Obviously picking nighttime was a misstep-”

“Stop lying to me!” Felicity shrieked, starting to step away when her eyes landed on her books, still scattered over the floor. She couldn’t leave them, casting a damper over what would have been a very dramatic exit as she stormed away.

Stooping, Felicity began to hastily gather up all her books. But, when she stood, she saw Sebastian grinning at her, her copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them clutched in his hand.

Felicity reached for it, but he held it up high. “Just hear me out.”

“Give me my book!” Felicity demanded. “It’s-”

“Your favorite,” he said, changing her sentence. “You couldn’t put it down when we got back from Diagon Alley. I’ll hand it over if you’ll just listen to me.”

“No!” she said furiously, stepping on Sebastian’s foot. He dropped the book and she clumsily caught it, then tried to flee.

Sebastian was cleverer than that and, before she had taken three steps, he’d drawn his wand and barked, “Immobulus!”

Felicity froze in place, her arms and legs feeling as if they’d turned to stone. As hard as she tried, she couldn’t move. She couldn’t even speak. To top it all off, her bag slipped off her shoulder and her books went spilling over the floor again.

“Ah, so there,” Sebastian said triumphantly. He slowly strolled around her, twirling his wand lazily between his long fingers. “Will you listen now?”

Unable to answer, Felicity just glared.

With a sigh, Sebastian asked, “Why would I betray family for anything? My reputation? The stupid House Cup? I would never. You honestly think that little of me?”

A flurry of thoughts rushed through Felicity’s head, most of them suggestions as to where he could stick that wand he was twirling. Unfortunately, she couldn’t voice any of those thoughts.

“Believe what you want,” Sebastian continued, “but don’t lump me in with the rest of the petty and the entitled Slytherins. I’ll admit I didn’t want to be seen with you by a few people, but I did not set you up. Hell, you’d think to be a little more open - I did save your life, you know. Without me, you’d have gotten flattened standing there staring while that manor crumbled around you. You owe me.”

Just as Felicity was struggling for speech, their one-sided discussion was cut short as something shifted in the air around them.

Sebastian’s nose crinkled and he muttered, “What the ruddy hell-?”

Felicity smelled it, too, a stench so disgusting she doubted even the contents of one of Snape’s pickling jars could rival it. She squinted to find the sourse of it, but could only see down the main corridor. Sebastian’s eyes were focused down one of the side corridors that led to the dungeons.

“No way,” he breathed, starting to stumble backward. Then his eyes fell on Felicity, still frozen. “Oh, damn.”

What? What is it? Felicity thought desperately.

“Oh, counter spell, counter spell,” Sebastian muttered, tapping his wand on Felicity’s shoulder.

You forgot the counter spell?!

A sound had reached them now - the shuffling of enormous feet, something huge moving toward them from the dungeon corridor.

Sebastian looked torn between fight or flight. Then, cursing under his breath, he dove to the floor and snatched up Felicity’s Transfiguration book. The shuffling footsteps were getting closer. Felicity struggled to move, but her limbs were like stone. Her eyes were watering from the unbearable smell filling her nostrils.

“There,” Sebastian muttered, seizing his wand and tapping Felicity’s shoulder.

The feeling rushed painfully back into Felicity’s limbs and her legs instantly buckled. Her knees hit the floor and yet, mindlessly, she began to reach for her fallen books, sweeping them into her bag with shaking hands.

Grabbing her arm, Sebastian hissed, “Hide, you bloody idiot!” and dragged her into the shadows. They shrank back against the wall, Felicity still clutching Fantastic Beasts to her chest.

Her heart pounding in her ears, Felicity looked up, now with a perfect view down the dungeons corridor. Moonlight cast everything into high relief and illuminated a huge, grotesque figure trudging toward them.

As it stepped into a beam of moonlight, Felicity’s hands went numb. Her book tumbled to the floor.

There, twenty feet in front of them, stood a troll. It was twelve feet tall, lumpy and gray, and had a tiny head and beady eyes. Eyes that were looking right at them, drawn by the sound of the dropped book that seemed to echo forever in the long corridor.

“Run!” Felicity exclaimed, grabbing Sebastian’s wrist and trying to drag him away. But, petrified by the full attention of the troll, Sebastian had frozen as though he’d been victim to one of his own immobilization spells.

Felicity’s sudden movement had fully alerted the troll to their presence and, with a bellow that rattled the windows and suits of armor lining the corridor, it charged at them.

“Move!” Felicity screamed, shoving Sebastian with all of her weight. They fell and rolled, barely escaping the blow of the troll’s club, which took a sizeable chunk out of the wall they’d been standing against.

The troll turned, its eyes locking on Sebastian, and raised the club again.

“Incendio!” Felicity cried, rolling onto her back and pointing her wand between Sebastian and the troll. There was another bellow and thundering footsteps as the troll recoiled from the jet of flames that scattered through the air.

Felicity crawled over to Sebastian, who had pulled himself into a sitting position and was staring stupidly up at the troll. Seizing what might be their only chance, Felicity slapped him across the face. He blinked, seemed to regain control of himself, and bolted to his feet, dragging Felicity with him as they put as much space between themselves and the troll as they could.

They didn’t stop running until they’d made it all the way to the seventh floor.

Out of breath and clutching a stitch in her side, Felicity wrenched her hand free from Sebastian’s and hobbled toward the Gryffindor common room. She ignored Sebastian until, the Fat Lady’s portrait in sight, he said, “Thanks. You know...for slapping some sense into me.”

Felicity opened her mouth, not entirely sure what she intended to say, but was interrupted by the portrait swinging open and Neville scrambling out of the common room. At the sight of Felicity and Sebastian sweaty, out of breath, and looking ready to swing at the first person that frightened them, Neville said timidly, “I was just going to the feast. I forgot about my Potions essay and had to finish… Are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” Felicity replied, holding her head high and marching toward the common room. Over her shoulder, she said stiffly, “Now I owe you nothing.”

Then she let the portrait swing shut behind her.