Seeing is Believing

"BLOODY HELL!"

Blaise shot up into a sitting position from where he had been laying a moment ago. Sweat beaded upon his forehead, and damp sheets clung to his chest. Somehow during the night, he'd managed to pull his pajama tops off over his head, and they lay crumpled against the headboard.

"Zabini, if you don't shut up...I'm gonna have Goyle pound you senseless." Malfoy's sleepy voice drawled out this threat before trailing off into light snoring once more. The aforementioned Gregory Goyle hadn't stirred, and Vincent Crabbe merely turned over and made some snorking noises before lapsing back into the regular breathing patterns of unconsciousness.

Theodore Nott, however, slipped out of bed and came over to where Blaise sat staring at the green velvet curtains that hung around the perimeter of his bed. "You had another one of those dreams," Theodore remarked.

Zabini only gave a brief nod.

"Did you see her in it again?" Nott spoke sotto voce, so as not to disturb his dormmates from their slumbers and invite further threats and possibly a hexing.

Zabini nodded once more, and ran a hand through the dark, damp curls on his brow. "I saw her falling. I was going to catch her, but then..." He shook his head. "I don't know. I never see how they end. But they always give me the screaming willies, I swear. It makes me sick."

"Are you sure you don't know who she is?" Nott pressed further. "I mean, I've dreamed about people I've never met before, but not like this, every night."

Blaise looked again in the direction of his other dormmates, but Malfoy & Co. seemed dead to the world. "I think..." he started, then tried again. "It's not just someone I've made up in my head. She's real. Even if I don't recognize her. I think this is important, Nott. I think..."

"Maybe you should go to Madam Pomfrey," Theodore suggested. "She could give you some dreamless sleep potion to take, and you could forget all about these silly dreams."

"NO!" Blaise yelled, clearly louder than he intended. Both boys looked over to see if this had roused anyone, but Goyle only shifted in his bed without awakening. "No, I don't want to do that," Blaise said in a voice that Theodore had to lean in closer to hear. "I don't think it would be good. See here, Nott, I need to tell you something, but you have to keep it to yourself, all right?"

Theodore shrugged. "What is it?"

Blaise debated if he wanted to say anything at all, for a moment. "See...I don't think these are just dreams. I think they're Visions. There's something about them that's trying to tell me something."

Nott stared in the darkness. "What are you on about?"

"My mum's grandmum was a Seer," Blaise said ruefully, as if admitting something rather embarrassing. "And she thinks I have the gift. But see...I've never done very well at Divination, and it's only been this last summer that all this trouble started. I'm well nigh sick of it all." He punctuated this statement with a soft, glum sigh.

Theodore considered this new information. "So how old is this dream girl, anyway?"

Blaise shrugged. "Not sure. A bit younger than you and me."

"She's never spoke French in any of these dreams, has she?"

The shirtless boy smirked. "No, she speaks perfectly good English, as far as I know. Why are you asking all this?"

Nott held up a finger for Blaise's attention. "And you saw her flying a broom, so you're not dreaming about some muggle. If she's truly real and not some personal fantasy of yours..." Blaise winced, but Theodore continued. "...Then it sounds like she's not from some continental wizarding school, so more than likely she's a student here at Hogwarts in some other house and year. Do you think you could draw a picture of her?"

Blaise rolled his eyes in the darkness. "She isn't just someone I've imagined - this feels important, Nott. But you've seen me draw before. You'd not recognize anything about her even if I tried." He yawned in spite of himself.

Theodore stood up. "Well then, just keep your eyes open and check out the girls in the other houses. Maybe you'll see her, and you can get to the bottom of this. Great pickup line, I'd say - 'Scuse me, but could you tell me your name? I've been having these wild haunting dreams about you all summer, and I'm sure I'm due to save you from certain death...'"

Blaise snorted and laid back down on his pillow. "Just keep your mouth shut about this, okay? Sheesh, I shouldn't have said a thing..." And before he knew it, Blaise was fast asleep once more.

Theodore Nott was as good as his word and said nothing further about Blaise's dreams or the mysterious girl in them. The first month of the school year passed into the second, and matters like classes, clubs, house points and the impending quidditch season took precedence in the boys' minds. As Halloween approached, Hogwarts school seemed to quiver with plans for Hogsmeade Weekend, the grand holiday feast in the Great Hall, and various individual celebrations as well. Outside the weather was crisp, hinting at the soon arrival of a first snowfall.

Blaise and Theodore strolled through the school courtyard, past fellow pupils enjoying the Fall air. As they passed one coterie of students from various houses, an assertive female voice cut through Blaise's thoughts - "I don't care if it's appropriate for the season, Fawcett, if we have everything tasting like pumpkin, we're all going to be ruddy ill!"

The owner of the voice - a petite, pretty Gryffindor girl with a round face and dark glossy hair - turned about and caught sight of the older Slytherin boys walking by. "You two!" she accosted quickly. "If you came to a club party and everything was pumpkin juice, pumpkin pasties, candy corn pumpkins and pumpkin-flavored ices, wouldn't you think it was a bit much? We need an outside opinion here."

Nott shrugged his shoulders. "I suppose it might all get a bit boring..." He glanced over at Zabini, who seemed to have gone into a kind of odd, staring fit - as if it were a crumple-horned snorkack in front of him instead of a strange girl. Nott gave his friend a discreet jab to bring him back to the present.

"I..." Zabini continued to stare, and the Gryffindor girl raised an eyebrow expectantly at him. "I absolutely abhor pumpkin juice," Blaise blurted out. "Vile, rotten stuff."

"See!" The girl had turned back to her group, looking pointedly at a Hufflepuff boy holding a notebook that read Charms Club. "I'm not the only one who thinks that! I don't care if we all have to put out a few sickles to get some butterbeer or limeade fizz..."

Nott had tugged Zabini by his cloak to get him to move along, leaving the arguing group behind them. "What happened there?" he asked. "You look like you've been hit with a stunning spell. What's going on?"

Blaise pulled Nott off to one side, waiting for a trio of firsties to pass by before whispering fiercely. "That was HER!" he hissed.

Nott was clearly confused. "Who?"

"Her! The girl in my dreams! Who I keep trying to get to, who I have to save because...because something terrible is going to happen otherwise. That girl back there, I'm sure of it!"

Nott looked dubious, pausing to turn and look back towards where the Charms Club members seemed to be gathering up their things and heading inside again. "The Gryffindor with the brown hair?" he asked.

Zabini nodded, swallowing hard. "She's the one."

Theodore Nott chewed his lip thoughtfully. "Not bad looking, really. If you go for that type. Pity about her house - if Malfoy finds out, he's not going to give you any peace for ages."

"Malfoy's a prat," Zabini said fiercely. "What should I do about her, though? What would you do if you were me?"

Nott glanced at his wristwatch. "Hmm. I'd be getting along to Transfiguration before McGonagall decides to start docking points and giving detention. But later..."

"Yes?" Blaise asked, as the boys headed back into the castle.

"Later, I'd make it a point to find out what her name is, if she's seeing anyone..." Theodore remarked. "And if she's free on Hogsmeade Weekend."

Later that day in the library, Victoria Frobisher paused in the midst of her Arithmancy notetaking to let her thoughts wander a bit. She could still see, in her mind's eye, the two Slytherin boys she'd stopped back in the courtyard. One of them was kind of on the stringy side and not at all her type, but the other one...

Victoria grinned to herself. The other one was extremely cute, in kind of a clueless way. And that look he'd been giving her was the deer-in-headlights stare that boys got when they saw someone they thought attractive. Not to mention the fact that when he did speak, it was that tripping-over-his-tongue kind of speech that confirmed the stare. He liked her, Vicky was certain of it. But who was he?

A Slytherin, of course. And older than her, since she'd never seen him in any of her classes and he definitely wasn't younger. It was a bit of a hassle that he was Slytherin, what with all the stupid rivalry between the houses, but... "Not all the Slytherins are twits," Victoria mused. "Just some of them who really corner the market in twittiness now and then."

The challenge, however, was in finding out who he was. Perhaps she might ask one of her friends in Hufflepuff to help her find out - Victoria was sure she'd be ribbed like anything if she went to any of her own housemates...

A couple of days later, Nott came striding up to Blaise outside the quidditch pitch, a clever smile spread across his lips. "You owe me one, Zabini," he said smugly.

Blaise narrowed his eyes. "I owe you one? For what? I'm the one who loaned you that book for your History of Magic report..."

Theodore waved his hand as if swatting away a fly. "Oh, this is much more than that. This is payback for that and twice more. You owe me, believe me."

Blaise looked at Theodore as if he had suddenly turned purple. "What the bloody blazes are you talking about? Come along then, out with it..."

Nott perused his fingernails, then buffed them on his robe. "I know something about your dream girl that you don't. Like...her name, and..."

That got Zabini's attention, all right. "Her name? How did you find out? Wait...you're not just yanking my chain, are you?"

Theodore's expression looked hurt. "Would I lie to you? No, wait -- don't answer that. But I promise, this time I'm on the up and up. I have this on the very best of sources."

"What sources?" Blaise asked. "What's her name? Don't hold back on me now!"

Nott settled down onto a convenient bench nearby. "Victoria Frobisher, fourth year Gryffindor. Secretary of the Charms Club, Treasurer of the Hogwarts Gardening Society...and her fifteenth birthday's coming up in two weeks. Or so says her friend Mitzi Rolle." He looked over and gave Blaise a significant glance. "She's apparently been trying to find out who you are, interestingly enough."

Blaise stared. "She has? Why?"

Theodore rolled his eyes. "Because she's interested in you, or something. Both of you hate pumpkin juice, so it's a match made in beverage aversion Heaven. Anyway, she'd like to meet you."

Blaise suddenly felt queasy, and not a little bit nervous. He moved to sit down upon the ground in spite of the chill, and wrapped his cloak around his legs. "Maybe I shouldn't," he mumbled.

"What?!" Nott looked down at where Blaise was sitting. "Are you positively mental? You've been going on and on about nothing other than this since we started the term, and now that we've actually tracked this girl down you're calling the whole thing off?"

"I can't meet her, Nott, I can't." Blaise tugged the cloak closer about him. "I'd have to tell her about the dreams, and she'd laugh and say I was stupid. Great pickup line, didn't you say that? This was all a bad idea."

"Right," Theodore replied. He reached down and pushed aside Blaise's cloak, seizing his friend by the wrist and dragging him up into a standing position.

"What are you doing?" Blaise exclaimed in surprise. "Let me go!"

"You're being an idiot," Nott commented coolly. "You can't help it at times like this, and that's why you have me to intervene so that the idiocy doesn't become out and out stupidity. I think I saw this Frobisher girl coming in to talk to her friend when I was leaving. With any luck, they'll still be gabbing when we arrive."

"No!" Blaise yelled. "No, I'm not going...let me go, Nott! Gerroff!"

"People are staring, Zabini..." Theodore remarked in a quiet singsong voice. "Are you going to come along, or do I get to see if I'm up to carrying you kicking and screaming? That would be a highly impressive entrance, don't you think?"

"I don't want to go, Nott. I don't. This is a bad idea."

"You're nervous, Zabini," Theodore said calmly, while leading Blaise in the direction of the entrance to the quidditch pitch. "And that's fine. But you're lying if you're saying you're not interested in her. Not interested, my arse."

Blaise got a sullen look on his face and was silent for a few minutes while they walked. "Why are we going to the quidditch pitch, by the way?" he asked.

"Because that's where I left Frobisher's friend. Apparently she's just been named to Hufflepuff's quidditch team. She's kind of a small sort, I wonder if she's going to be their new seek..."

As Theodore and Blaise passed through the gates of the school quidditch arena and into the Slytherin stands, Blaise had stopped resisting Theodore's lead and looked skyward. He gasped, seeing the figures of Victoria and her friend Mitzi flying through the air on their brooms. "Oh NO!"

The wind whistled in Vicky's ears as she darted forward on her Comet 260, slipping past Mitzi high above the ground. "TAG!" she called laughingly, before flattening herself against the shaft of the Comet in order to get more speed.

"You wish!" Mitzi called towards Victoria's back, grasping her own broom tightly. Mitzi Rolle flew on a secondhand Nimbus 2000, which jerked forward as she moved to catch up with her friend...perhaps a bit too fast. The front end of her broom knocked against the twigs at the tail end of Victoria's broom, throwing the Gryffindor girl off kilter. Victoria let out a shriek of surprise and confusion, which took on a tone of genuine fear as she fell off of the broom and plummeted towards the earth.

As soon as Blaise saw Victoria in the air, he knew what was coming - he'd seen it in various versions in his dreams, but the end result of falling was always the same, no matter what steps led up to that result. He dashed past the confused Theodore Nott and hopped over the barrier at the front of the stands, landing on the pitch. Stumbling only a little, he continued to run in the direction of Frobisher and Rolle, pulling out his wand and holding it before him. "WINGARDIUM LEVIOSA!" he screamed, but clearly his aim was off - Victoria continued to plunge towards certain disaster.

Mitzi seemed to be frozen in the air, hovering on her broom and staring at her friend's fall. Theodore gaped as well, realizing that what was playing out in front of him was just as Zabini had described to him multiple times in the past. "Merlin..." he hissed breathlessly, powerless to move otherwise.

"WINGARDIUM LEVIOSA!" Blaise cried again, all the muscles in his arm stretched out towards the falling girl while he clutched his wand with all his might. His eyes were wide, and every ounce of his will poured into the spell. He could do this - he wasn't going to let her land on the grass like a broken marionette. He wasn't going to let that happen...

Victoria jerked in the air, as if an invisible hand had caught her and arrested her fall. She shrieked again in surprise, but there was less of a terrified edge to the sound than a moment before.

Blaise's hand had white knuckles as he clutched his wand, but he didn't notice. The spell had worked, and he'd stopped Victoria about fifteen feet above the pitch. He walked closer so that he was right underneath her, never losing visual contact with Victoria's dangling form. "Now to bring her down, slowly," he whispered to himself. "Slowly...don't drop..."

There was a noise behind Blaise, from the direction of the stands - the sound of running feet and students yelling, pointing in the direction of where Victoria hovered, and Blaise stood aiming his wand at her suspended form. He couldn't help it - Blaise glanced over his shoulder at the noise, before jerking his head back up at yet another yell from Victoria. The backward look had broken the spell, and she was falling again...then landing heavily upon Blaise and knocking him to the ground.

Blaise Zabini awoke in the Hospital Wing, amidst the scent of scrupulously cleaned cotton sheets and pillows, mixed faintly with an air of disinfectant. He started to say 'Where am I?', but it only came out as "Whuuuuuuhhh..."

"He's awake! Madam Pomfrey, he's waking up! Blaise, can you hear me?"

The high, excited voice that yelled these words was the same voice that had asked him about pumpkin pasties and candy corn out in the courtyard a day or so before. A pleasant, firm voice, he thought woosily. A lovely, feminine voice with brains and a will behind it. "Victoria?" Blaise asked.

A slim, soft hand reached out and clasped Blaise's wrist tightly. "I'm here," Victoria whispered. "You saved my life, Blaise Zabini. I could've died, but you caught me."

"I know," Blaise replied. "I've seen it..." He trailed off, not quite sure where to go at this point. He looked over and saw Victoria's dark eyes gazing at him, and felt unbelievably foolish.

"You saved my life," Victoria repeated. "And you hate pumpkin juice."

"I despise pumpkin juice," Blaise replied with fervor.

Victoria glanced behind her, making sure that the nurse was not yet upon them...and then she leaned forward impulsively, kissing the sixth year Slytherin boy on the lips. "And so do I," she whispered. "Would you like to take me out for my birthday luncheon, this coming Hogsmeade Weekend?"

Blaise felt lightheaded as he gave a wide grin. "That would be bloody fantastic."