Adjudication

Methuselah

She could barely make him out; he shifted, and she caught the curve of his upper lip and the fine line of his nose, and the shine of his pale hair in the dying light was the colour of the moon.

She lay naked and open, wholly unabashed, on his bed, snaking her foot up and down his calf. "I love you," she said, for the millionth time.

He reached through the shadows and touched his fingertips to her face, trailing them lightly over the bridge of her nose and down her cheek to brush them lightly over her bottom lip, traveling downward over her breasts, down her belly, between her legs, where she was a tangled, sticky mess from their leisurely day of skivving class and fucking. The heady scent wafted around them as he stroked her and made her come yet again, his breath warm and sweet and alive at her ear, her mouth, the fine ends of his fringe tickling at her forehead as he kissed her . . . loved her back.

They lay there, the darkness spreading over them silently and neither moved, not wanting to disturb this one pristine moment in time and a magnificent serpentine shadow rose slowly from between them, casting an invisible mist of perfection against the inner folds of his darkened canopies, infusing them, silent and beautiful.

"Oi, 'yup!"

Pansy Parkinson woke with a start, her arm flailing involuntarily and smacking lightly against the smooth granite wall of her prison cell, and she discovered with a shiver that her left eye was glued shut with sticky sleep. Sodding hell, she thought, kneading at it lightly. Eye infection. Rolling onto her back she drew her knees up, her right hand resting on the slight rise of her belly as she picked cautiously at her crusty eye with her left, definitely not wanting to pull any of her lashes out.

"Prisoner 22621!" The guard's voice echoed down the pod's stony corridor, ricocheting with a tinny starkness so bleak she often wondered if it were a spell or ward put in place by the warden to increase his prisoners' despair. It bothered her more than the dementors.

She managed to pry her lids apart with her fingers and her vision kalaidescoped -- grey, white, and yellow-green tessellated dully in her periphery, and she gently rolled her lashes between her thumb and forefinger, removing the gunk.

"Prisoner 22621!" The voice boomed forth again, irritated now. Pansy swung her legs over the side of her cot, the cold granite floor a vivid contrast against the warm soles of her feet. She stuffed them into her prison-issue slides and rose. Shuffling across the bare floor, she brought her toes in perfect line with the straight edge carved into the floor, and she stood there, her eyes forward, a stray bit of hair caught in the corner of her mouth. She blew it away as the guard stepped into her line of vision. She trained a hard gaze on him, flat and unflinching.

His face split into a cruel grin. "You've got a visitor." Pansy remained silent, staring straight ahead. He drew his wand, poising it just above the handle of the cell door. "What, not excited? No one's been t'see you in days." The door clanged open and the guard stepped in, fully engulfing her personal space. She lifted her hand as if to block his approach -- she couldn't help herself. "Arms down!" he admonished gruffly. "In front, right there . . . that's right. Now cross them." Cold steel encircled her wrists, and she turned her head avoidantly as he leaned in to send a series of winding steel belts around her waist with a flick of his wand; she sucked in her breath as the second round of metal restraints cooled against her, chilling her from the inside out, and her teeth began to chatter. The guard grabbed her chin, tilting her head up, and Pansy flexed her hands in protest of his touch, unable to move them from where they were anchored at her waist.

Prick, she thought, staring past him, her eyes dull and unreadable.

"Now, now," he tutted, flicking his wand toward her feet; her ankles chilled as the metal closed around them, and she refused to wince as the steel bands conjured themselves, slick and hard, over the raw, chafed skin there. "Mind your thoughts, missy."

"Fuck you, Mudblood."

His eyes darkened and he gave an imperceptible flick of his wrist; the leg irons tightened painfully, squeezing the beginnings of reddish, streaky bruises into her flesh right away. "Mudblood, eh?" He circled her leisurely, adjusting her restraints here and there, tightening them uncomfortably. "Yes, well. This Mudblood walks out of Azkaban every night a free man." He again prodded at her waist with the tip of his wand. "This Mudblood gets to feel the wind in his hair and the rain on his face, and he gets to smell the damp, fresh earth every morning. This Mudblood has scones and clotted cream at whim, and steak and kidney pie. Mmm, and treacle and nosh. This Mudblood answers only to himself. This Mudblood has magic." She could feel his breath against her neck, a warm contrast to the horrid damp cold of her cell. "I'd wager, given the chance, you'd trade places with this Mudblood faster than you could say 'Bob's your uncle.'"

Pansy turned her head contemptuously, the tip of her nose brushing against his chin. "Bob's. Your. Uncle," she drawled coldly. "And yet I still don't want to trade. Imagine." The corner of her mouth lifted. "Of course you, being a Mudblood yourself, wouldn't know any better." She let her eyes drift upward, deigning to hold his gaze for a fraction of a second. "Really, anything's better than being a Mudblood. Even this." She shifted her gaze, dismissing him from her awareness.

"You're a little cunt." She could hear the tiniest hint of involuntary strain in his voice, and this pleased her. He leaned in, his lips brushing against the shell of her ear. "And just so you know? Pureblood's just as dingy in the mop water as the other kind. If you don't believe me, you're welcome to watch later, when we mop up what's left of Malfoy."

"You mentioned I've a visitor," she observed numbly, having expended her sanity ration for the day. "Do lead the way."

When I walk all alone in the street
People stop and stare at me
and look for my whole beauty
from head to feet

And then I taste the slight yearning
which transpires from their eyes
and which is able to perceive from manifest charms
to most hidden beauties.
So the scent of desire is all around me,
it makes me happy!

And you, while knowing, reminding and longing,
you shrink from me?
I know it very well:
you don't want to express your anguish,
but you feel as if you're dying . . .

---

"Mademoiselle Musette was a pretty girl of twenty who shortly after her arrival in Paris had become what many pretty girls become when they have a neat figure, plenty of coquettishness, a dash of ambition, and hardly any education. After having for a long time shone as the star of the supper parties of the Latin Quarter, at which she used to sing in a voice still very fresh if not very true, a number of country ditties, which earned her the nickname under which she has since been immortalised by one of our neatest rhymsters, Mademoiselle Musette suddenly left the Rue de la Harpe to go and dwell upon the Cytherean heights of the Breda district . . . " Pansy Parkinson took a breath then, pausing to turn the page. A half-dozen Slytherins surrounded her, each of them working on potions essays as she read to them aloud.

Ron was scrubbing the dungeon floors with a toothbrush.

No. Seriously.

It was his fourth night of detention in the potions classroom, and Snape had graduated to a new, never-before-seen level of petty vindictiveness. The day before Ron had been made to polish one hundred and thirty potions beakers; when he'd finished and lined them up for Snape to inspect, the potions master had taken one look at them, pronounced them 'adequate', and had promptly filled them with Grindylow shite. It was an antic so like . . . well, so like something he himself would have pulled as a first year, that Ron's initial urge had been to laugh in Snape's face. Reckoning that wasn't such a good idea, Ron had snorted audibly, and had been forced into feigning a coughing spell, and the Fizzing Whizbee he'd been surreptitiously cheeking had propelled itself right into his sinus cavity. He'd subsequently expelled rainbow-coloured foam from his nostrils, and Snape'd given him an extra half day of detention for sullying the dungeon floors. He was quite sure it was how the toothbrush idea occurred to Snape in the first place.

"You're joking!" Ron'd said, as Snape handed him the sea-foam green toothbrush.

"Am I man of humour, Mr. Weasley?"

Sure, if being mocked by three-quarters of the school counts toward humour. "No, Sir."

"I am, however," Snape said, his lip curling slightly, "appreciative of patterns and themes. Consider your work this week a theme of sorts."

"Er?"

"A theme," Snape drawled slowly, as if Ron were mentally retarded. "That which shares a specific and distinctive quality, characteristic, or concern."

"Um, okay. Right, then." Ron again knew he was not engaged in a winning battle. "So I'm -- this is a theme? Detention?"

"Indeed. Your particular theme is 'cliches'. As but one unexceptional gosling from a mundane and overpopulated gaggle, you should find it apropos."

Ron kept his eyes on Snape warily, saying nothing.

"You shall scrub the dungeon floor with the toothbrush which you now hold in your hand, Mr. Weasley," Snape had said, gesturing to the dull stones with a flick of his fingers as he turned away, remanding Ron to his duty. "And should you elect to perform inadequately or without gusto, perhaps a less advanced assignment should find its way to you, which would be -- how do my Slytherin prefects put it?" He steepled his fingers malevolently. "Ah, yes. Cleaning the loo with your tongue."

So, here Ron was, desperately avoiding the porcelain throne of doom, working at the chinks and cracks in the masonry with Snape's detention toothbrush, wishing for nothing more than to be scrubbing away with the real thing. Not that the miserable arsehole even uses a toothbrush, he had groused, as a group of Slytherins had crowded into the classroom. Ignoring them, Ron had continued scrubbing, keeping his eyes fixed to the mottled surface of the ancient stone comprising the dungeon floors. His ears burnt shortly, though, when a exaggeratedly whispered rendition of Weasley Is Our King floated around the classroom, and then when Malfoy entered several minutes behind the others, dragging his fingers across the back of Pansy's neck, Ron truly wished he could be anywhere but here, as he was re-traumatised by the memory of the two of them . . . ugh.

"Hey Weasel!" Malfoy'd heckled him. "Learning your trade properly, then?"

"He has to, or else his bin of a house'll go dirty, what with his Mum always laid up from popping sprogs!" Crabbe muttered, his voice gravelly and mean.

"Maybe the oven turned itself inside out with the girl," Goyle'd said, shoving a Cauldron Cake into his mouth whole. "'Spect that's why there's not another baker's dozen of Weasley buns running about."

"Draco," Pansy admonished, tapping the top of his head with the book's spine. "I'm reading. Forget him." Malfoy pulled a chair against the back of hers and rested his chin on her shoulder, sliding his hands down her arms to rest them at her waist. "Very good. Now, then . . . " She resumed reading, her voice smooth and aristocratic. "Mademoiselle Musette was an exception to the women amongst whom she lived. Of a nature instinctively elegant and poetical, like all women who are really such, she loved luxury and the many enjoyments which it procures; her coquetry warmly coveted all that was handsome and distinguished. A daughter of the people, she would not have been in any way out of her element amidst the most regal sumptuosity. But Mademoiselle Musette, who was young and pretty, had never consented to be the mistress of any man who was not like herself -- young and handsome. She had been known bravely to refuse the magnificient offers of an old man so rich that he was styled by the Peru of the Chaussee d'Antin, and who had offered a golden ladder to the gratification of her fancies. Intelligent and witty, she had also a repugnance for fools and simpletons, whatever might be their age, their title, or their name."

"Hear that, Weasel?" Malfoy called out again. "Ladies have a repugnance for fools and simpletons. Bum's the luck for you!"

The group tittered loudly, and Ron ignored them as best he could.

"Honestly, Draco! This part's important! Forget him -- I mean it." Pansy re-found her place. "Musette, therefore, was an honest and pretty girl, who in love adopted half of Champfort's famous amphoris, 'Love is the interchange of two caprices.' Thus her connection had never been preceded by one of those shameful bargains which dishonour modern gallantry. As she herself said, Musette played fair and insisted that she should receive full change for her sincerity . . . "

Ron didn't know what the sod Parkinson was reading, nor did he care for the pretentious air of the Slytherin revising group. Who could concentrate when someone was ruddy blathering on about Mademoiselle Musette and her coquetry, or whatever the feck Pansy was going on about? He scrubbed viciously at the floor, an angry feeling of unjustness rising in his chest. He shouldn't be subjected to this crap! Although Hermione wouldn't know it, he did think about his impending N.E.W.T.s, and he worried about his eligibility for the Auror program post-Hogwarts, and he actually thought earning an 'O' or two or seven wouldn't be such a bad thing. Ron had better things to do than spend his seventh year serving detention in the Slytherin dungeons, with Snape at his desk on one side of him, and Pansy Parkinson and her Book of the Sodding Month club on the other.

It was all too formal, he decided. A circle of Slytherins sitting 'round Pansy, Malfoy at her side, listening dutifully as she read from the pages of some book that was so boring it likely wouldn't hold the attention of a captive bibliophile bound to a chair. Ron utterly hated formal discussions like these. Read a page, discuss. Read a page, discuss. He didn't fancy himself a recreational reader per se, but the few times he'd found himself genuinely discussing a book or something else he'd read with another person, it'd been a spontaneous occurrence, unplanned and animated and exciting, and he'd found he'd really cared about making his point. But he hated required reading, hated being forced to pretend to understand or appreciate a 'classic' story, and he now only occasionally endured Hermione's formal book or revising discussions, and even that was usually only when he had some adolescent urge to just sit next to her for no particular reason, without wanting to explain his motivation -- he always let her cajole him into the sessions, let her harp on him for his lack of revising, until he would grudgingly agree to her suggestion of a study session, protesting all the while, while secretly he was always a bit chuffed. It was a dynamic that worked for them both.

Bill used to read to him -- to all of them, actually -- when Ron was very young. He remembered it fondly, for Bill had always picked stories of adventure and action, chock full of exotic locales, zombies, beautiful imagery, and quirky, interesting characters who wore hats with mosquito netting and carried Muggle machetes and whatnot. And how Bill could ever regale them -- he was a fine storyteller. These particular memories of Ron's were spun from rich, chocolate vapours, which rose from Molly's crockery, fires the colour of their hair, and myriad squares of calico from piles and piles of patchwork quilts. These memories smelt of popcorn and creme de menthe, and Ron slowed the toothbrush against the dungeon floor as he allowed himself to revisit it for just a moment.

Bill -- Head Boy, stellar Cursebreaker. Charlie -- greatest Seeker in aeons, before Harry, and Dragon Keeper. Percy -- Head Boy, exacting, precise, and very much an enigma. Fred and George -- the two most resourceful blokes ever born, with the kind of keen smarts a person could never learn from any book. Ginny -- thoughtful and poised and kind, but fucking ruthless in battle, as she'd shown at the Department of Mysteries his fifth year. Ron wasn't the kind of bloke to assess his own attributes, but he remembered the Mirror of Erised incident his first year, Harry there beside him, and he suddenly realised -- on hand and knee, scrubbing the dungeon floor with Snape's toothbrush -- that perhaps he had been the happiest person alive, and had seen himself as he truly was -- with the Head Boy badge, as the Quidditch player, as tall and strong and formidable himself -- and that he was lucky, because each of his siblings were a part of him, and he a part of them, and that was inherently bolstering. He opened his eyes to find Snape staring at him, his plume poised and still over the essay he was grading; slowly Ron began scrubbing again, but he kept his gaze to Snape's for a long moment, a warm feeling spreading through him, rich and invigorating and utterly impenetrable.

---

"At a time when she was the mistress of a young Counsellor of State, who had gallantly placed in her hands the key of his ancestral coffers, Mademoiselle Musette was in the habit of receiving once a week in her pretty drawing room in the Rue de la Bruyere. These evenings resembled most Parisian evenings, with the difference that people amused themselves. When there was not enough room they sat on one another's knees, and it often happened that the same glass served for two. Rodolphe, who was a friend of Musette -- and never anything more than a friend, without either of them knowing why. Rodolphe asked leave to bring his friend, the painter Marcel. 'A young fellow of talent,' he added, 'for whom the future is embroidering his Academician's coat.' 'Bring him,' said Musette. The evening they were to go together to Musette's Rodolphe called on Marcel to fetch him. The artist was at his toilet. 'What!' said Rodolphe, 'you are going into society in a coloured shirt?' 'Does that shock custom?' observed Marcel quietly. 'Shock custom? It stuns it!' 'The deuce,' said Marcel, looking at his shirt, which displayed a pattern of boars pursued by dogs, on a blue ground. 'I have not another here. Oh! Bah! So much the worse, I will put on a collar, and as 'Methuselah' buttons to the neck no one will see the color of my lines.' 'What!' said Rodolphe uneasy, 'you are going to wear 'Methuselah'?' 'Alas!' replied Marcel, 'I must, God wills it and my tailor too; besides it has a new set of buttons and I have just touched it up with ivory black--"

"What's Me-- Messatoolah?" Goyle interrupted, his brow furrowing as he reached for another Cauldron Cake.

"Shush!" Pansy tutted. "I'm getting there." She shifted in her chair primly, continuing. "'Methuselah' was merely Marcel's dress coat. He called it so because it was the oldest garment of his wardrobe. 'Methuselah' was cut in the fashion of four years before and was, besides of a hideous green, but Marcel adamantly declared that it looked black by candlelight--"

"Well," Draco interrupted further, his eyes sparkling dangerously. "I do believe the author has written of the Weasel's dressrobes from fourth year! Who knew they were that old."

Ron rolled his eyes as the dungeon echoed with open laughter, and once again he focused all his attention on the cobbled floor. His arms ached and his back burned between his shoulder blades, and a quick glance up showed that Snape was no longer in the room. Seizing the moment, he pushed up from the floor. Ignoring the Slytherins, he stretched, rolling his shoulders back until his spine crackled in relief, and then shuffled over to one of the storerooms just off the classroom floor, where the water fountain was. He drank long and deep, and drug the back of his hand across his mouth as he straightened again.

"Draco's right about your dressrobes, you know."

Ron turned. Catherine Parkinson stood in the open doorway, her tiny arms crossed over her chest. "What's it to you?" he retorted.

"Is it true they had lace on the sleeves?" she asked, clearly disturbed by the notion. "What kind of a boy wears lace?"

"Sod off, Parkinson!" he said gruffly. "And move it!"

She didn't budge. "Draco says your Mum must not love you really. What kind of a mother'd let her son go to the Yule Ball in tatty robes?"

A chill washed over him, and he rubbed his upper arms briskly, the flesh there pricking up. "Yeah, well, wouldn't've mattered what kind of robes I had, you barmy little pisspot. The Yule Ball would've been right crappy anyway." It bothered him, what she said about the robes, because it wasn't like he hadn't wondered the exact same thing privately here and there. It wasn't that Molly hadn't loved him, he'd concluded. He knew she loved him. It was just that she didn't have time to really think sometimes. She acted, she didn't spend an inordinate amount of time planning or considering things on an individual level. Molly Weasley was a woman of action -- she simply took care of business. Aesthetics were always an afterthought, not to mention financially unfeasible more often than not. That's just the way it was. However, there was that little part of him that had been incredibly resentful, and he'd made a mental note to himself: Go to the ends of the bloody earth to find robes without lace, should he ever find himself in the position of having to dress his fourteen-year-old son for his first formal event. Ron didn't openly begrudge his Mum, though. He understood how she operated. Harry had money; the Weasleys didn't. Molly was far to busy a woman and mother to assuage Ron's fragile ego by making separate trips to separate clothing stores on different occasions, one trip to Madam Malkin's for Harry's bottle-green robes, and another to a thrift shoppe at the far end of Diagon Alley.

It bothered him more that an eleven-year-old had the ability to vex him so. "Piss off," he repeated. "I'm busy. Don't have time to stand around-- hey, shouldn't you be in bed? You're a firstie!"

"Nepotism," she said, simply, stepping sideways slightly at last. "Isn't it brilliant?"

Ron's eyes swept over her head toward the table where Pansy was holding court. "Bloody brilliant," he said crankily. "'Spose it's not my concern if you're dead in class for lack of sleep, if Snape doesn't care."

"As a prefect, you're to care for the welfare of all Hogwarts students, regardless of house," she said knowingly. "But Snape wouldn't care if I'm dead in class."

"Put a sock in it, you little shite!" At least Malfoy was gone now he noticed, as he peeked around Catherine, as were Crabbe and Goyle. He couldn't help but feel a sense of relief, especially as it appeared Pansy was now fully absorbed in her reading, and her Slytherin friends were dutifully focused on their schoolwork as she droned on and on. Chilling again, he brushed through Catherine without concern for propriety, intent on pulling on his jumper to ward against the cold while he finished his assignment.

---

"Vervain," Professor Sprout intoned in Greenhouse Eleven the next day, her charges shivering at their tables, "is otherwise known as what? Mr. Potter?"

"Eu--european vervain, Enchanter's Plant, Herb of the Cross, Holy Herb, Juno's Tears, Pigeon's Grass, Pigeonweed, Simpler's Joy, Herb of Grace," Harry said, his teeth chattering slightly.

"Oi, I'll take me some Holy Herb," Crabbe guffawed from the next table over; Malfoy, Goyle, and Zabini sniggered. "Right-o!"

"You're bloody fat enough that I thought you've likely been taking the Holy Herb for yonks," Ron said, pulling his cloak tighter around him. "No wonder you're not shivering, you git. Got a nice blubber cloak going on there -- better watch out for Eskimos." It was unbelievably cold today, and the bitter Scottish chill was bearing down on them full-force, completely unhindered by the thick greenhouse windows. Outside the snow swirled fiercely, and Ron thought he heard a hint of wutherin' in the wind, even though that was usually reserved for the Spring.

"Feeling chatty, Mr. Weasley?" Professor Sprout enquired, after restraining Crabbe to his chair with a quick flick of her wand, keeping the Slytherin from lunging at Ron. "Certainly. The German name for vervain, if you please?"

"Um," Ron shifted in his seat, thinking. "Eisenkraut?"

"Indeed. The Spanish name?"

"Verbena," he answered, feeling more confident after having gotten the first one right. "And I think that's the--" He flicked a glare at Blaise Zabini across the way. "Italian name too."

"You are correct. Excellent." She moved on, and a tossed note landed on Ron's Herbology text as soon as her back was to them. He opened it and found a picture of himself with a black eye, hanging from the Slytherin Quidditch stands by his tie. Other than that, he was totally starkers, and he appeared to be wanking himself off. He grabbed his quill and scrawled hurriedly -- Quit thinking about my dick, poofs -- and tossed it without care over his shoulder toward Crabbe and Malfoy.

"Miss Parkinson," Sprout continued. "Explain the properties of vervain."

"Vervain, or verbena as I prefer to call it, is a slender perennial herb, thirty to ninety centimetres tall, with a woody stalk and several stiffly erect stems," Pansy recited knowingly; she was perfectly relaxed sitting at her table, not shivering at all. Ron rolled his eyes and sunk lower in his chair as her voice grated against his ears. "The lower leaves are obovate, deeply divided and stalked, the upper ones lanceolate, slender, sessile and toothed. Tiny blue flowers appear in long slender spikes in the axis of a bract, becoming denser higher up each spike. The fruit comprises four cylindrical nutlets enclosed in the calyx. Verbena is indigenous to England, central and southern Europe, North Africa and Asia, and has been introduced into North America. It grows in waysides and waste places."

Behind him, Crabbe and Goyle were sniggering again, and Ron could hear them whispering amongst themselves. "Pansy can tend to my stiffly erect nutlets . . ." Fucking cretins, he thought, rewinding his scarf and pulling on his gloves; his cloak was arse-ugly, but it was unbelievably warm. Molly'd made it for him when he'd been a first year; it was the only bit of clothing he'd ever owned that he'd never outgrown. Why this was, he wasn't sure; however, he never remembered to ask his Mum about the cloak and how she'd charmed it when he was actually face-to-face with her. The urge only struck him when he was clearly warm when others were not, and he couldn't help at those moments but enjoy a rare sense of smugness over his classmates, sentiments which he was quite certain Molly wouldn't approve of.

"Brilliant, Miss Parkinson. Five points to Slytherin." Sprout called out a bit more loudly then, clapping her hands together smartly. "Two choices, then. It's a bit brisk here in the greenhouse today, so those of you less acclimated to the cold may move to the library, and finish the remaining hour and a half of class doing research, or you braver folk may look about the castle grounds for vervain -- the magical varieties thrive on cold, so in actuality it's a prime opportunity today to find excellent specimins."

They all stood, hurrying to pack their things and make for the warmth of the castle.

"Better fucking watch your back, Weasel," a voice growled from behind him. He didn't even bother turning around.

"Fuck off, Crabbe," he said easily, falling into the queue to get out of the greenhouse, ignoring the Slytherins pushing at him from behind, and their attempts to step on his shoelaces. He leaned into Harry. "Library, yeah?" Harry looked startled as Ron spoke, almost as if he'd been jarred from a reverie of some kind. He looked at Ron and Ron immediately saw that his eyes were tired, blank even. He furrowed his brow at his best mate. "All right, Harry?" he asked questioningly, worried.

"Er, yeah," Harry said. "Yeah. Didn't sleep well last night."

"Did you-- are you having--"

"No," Harry said, reading into Ron's questioning tone correctly. "No dreams."

"Um," Ron said, not knowing how to proceed. "Are you--"

"Well," Hermione interrupted, sliding neatly in between Ron and Harry in the queue. "The library, shall we?" She could hardly contain her exuberance at the prospect of hours and hours spent buried under a teetering stack of books. They edged out the door and began slogging through the snow toward the castle. "Quite brilliant of Professor Sprout to let us substitute a bit of text revising for our practical assignments, especially on a day like today!" Hermione rubbed at her upper arms briskly, her rucksack swinging down dangerously. "Ooo, but it's cold!"

"Yeah," Ron said, automatically tugging her bag back in place for her, returning it to the small of her back. "Right grand of her. Reckon even I'd rather bury myself in the library than dig for vervain in the snow." He shot a dark look over his shoulder as the Slytherins approached from behind, chattering loudly as usual.

"It'll do you good to catch up on your reading, Ron," Hermione said with finality; the castle was within their sight. The snow was blowing so fiercely, and the clouds hung so low, the spiralling towers of the castle were partially hidden from their view as they looked up.

"Stubborn bint," a voice came, directly behind them. It sounded a touch worried. Ron instantly recognised it as Malfoy's. "Only she'd go looking for vervain in this kind of weather!" The Slytherins pushed past Harry, Ron, and Hermione without notice, which was exceptionally unusual. The voices trailed back as they made their way up the stairs to the main entrance.

"--wouldn't worry about her, Malfoy. She's tough."

"She'll freeze to death!" Malfoy whinged imperiously.

"Naw, not Pansy. She's never cold--"

"If she's not in the library in thirty minutes, I'll fetch her--"

Ron turned and scanned the blurring whiteness; a lone black figure was making its way from the rest of them, trudging slowly out toward the moor in the direction of the jagged pile of rocks which jutted randomly from the ground in a remote section of the school grounds. He stopped, watching as Pansy waded through the snow, her inky spectre growing smaller as put further distance between herself and the rest of the class.

"How can Malfoy just let his bird trudge out into a blizzard?" he asked, despite himself; he came to a stop. He was feeling distressed for a reason he couldn't place. He couldn't for the life of him imagine allowing Harry or Hermione to endanger themselves so greatly. Turning quickly, he opened his mouth, meaning to call after Malfoy, but the Slytherins were nowhere to be found. He turned back, lifting his hand to shield his eyes from the blinding snow, his arm jostling as Hermione came up behind him.

"Is that Parkinson?" she enquired, pulling a disbelieving look. "Parkinson's braving the blizzard for verbena?" Ron glanced down at her, and he instantly recognised Hermione's inner umbrage at the notion that Pansy Parkinson would demonstrate any kind of superiour committment to academia than she. "Well," she tutted, "Parkinson's never been the brightest cow in the barn, that's for sure." She looked at Ron.

"What?" he said, lifting his shoulders. "Dunno what's gotten into her. Fucking mental, that one." He squinted across the whiteness yet again. "It's her business anyway. We should just leave her be."

Even so, the three of them stood there, not moving.

"It's not safe today . . . " Hermione mused, clearly conflicted. On one hand, this was Parkinson -- she'd love nothing more than to see the foul bint blue and frozen and hit with a bit of come-uppance. Yet, she wouldn't wish her dead. Not truly. Even though she privately felt that Pansy would never return the same sentiment to her herself. Mudblood . . . . Hermione glanced at Ron expectantly.

"What?" Ron asked, feeling hot under her gaze, scrutinised.

"Well, she is your Herbology partner," Hermione said carefully, a note of expectation heavy in her tone.

"So?" Ron protested. "You're Head Girl. And Parkinson's a girl. Under your Head Girlship, or whatever. Yeah."

Hermione glanced at Harry; Ron followed suit by rote. Harry caught them looking and put up his hands. "Oh no," he said firmly. "Forget it."

"But, Harry--"

"No. Absolutely not." And with that Harry turned and slogged the rest of the way toward the castle's entrance, without so much as a backwards glance. "I'll meet up with you in the library."

Hermione shivered, her teeth beginning to chatter. She pulled her winter cloak around her tightly and stomped her feet gently in place, attempting to warm herself. "I suppose I could go find Professor Snape," she said, looking most unenthused by the idea. "Although . . . . " she trailed off, looking at him expectantly.

"Although what?" Ron did not have a good feeling about this at all.

"Well, you've your cloak, is all." She reached over and brushed her gloved fingers over the sleeve of Ron's cloak. "Its magic is better than any of ours'."

"Yeah, well, that's not my fault!"

"Ron," she said severely. "You're a prefect! How can you let a fellow student -- even Pansy Parkinson -- trot off into a blinding blizzard?"

"I don't see you ruddy chasing her!" he shot back, hating his bloody stupid cloak at that moment -- he always ended up doing all the crappy snow-related stuff.

"All right, then," Hermione said, pushing her rucksack into his arms; the weight of it caused him to lose his balance, and he stumbled, toppling over into a snow drift.

"Bloody hell, Hermione!" he winced, climbing up. "What the sod've you got in here?" He brushed at his cloak, powdery snow misting over Hermione. "Forget it," he continued, resigned. "Fine. I'll go." He started in the direction he'd last seen Pansy, muttering bitterly to himself about the unfairness of it all. "So help me, when I catch up to that dumb bint, I'm gonna--"

"Ron!" Hermione caught up with him, and tugged at her rucksack, which in his haste he'd slung over his shoulder. She pulled it from him and let it rest on the ground. "Be careful. It's frightfully cold. And," she continued, looking up at him. "I'll owe you a favour, all right?" She backed away. "I'll be with Harry in the Herbology section of the library. Meet up with us there."

"Yeah, yeah," he groused, wading through the snow with only his own bag to burden him.

"Look out by those rock caves," she called out after him.

"Those are too far, don't you reckon?"

"I'd wager there's fantastic verbena there right now, so perhaps not. Say, perhaps you could collect some for us, since you'll be out there . . . "

"Put a cork in it, Hermione." Shaking his head, he couldn't help but grin a touch as he set out toward the moor.

---

As Ron was slogging through the snow, Pansy Parkinson was perched atop the icy crags of the jagged rock caves, flat on her stomach, reaching into a crevasse which sliced through the top of the rock. Her arm was too short to reach the verbena she could see growing from the tiny juts of rock planing out from the crevasse's side; turning her head sideways, she rested her cheek against the frigid stone, trying to give herself an extra inch of reach. She thought she could feel something -- verbena? -- brushing against her fingertips, but last she'd checked her fingers themselve were practically blue with cold, as she'd removed her gloves to get a better feel for the terrain.

"Come on," she cajoled, under her breath. "Come on, come on, come on . . . Crap." She just couldn't reach it, and she found herself wishing Draco had agreed to come along with her, for his arms were nicely long and he had a nimble touch when it came to collecting Herbology specimins. Pansy pulled her arm back and fumbled in the pocket of her cloak for her wand. Pulling it she directed it downward, and poked about in the split rock; the slight deposits of earth were frozen solid, and she couldn't tell the difference between the rock itself or the pockets of earth and verbena hidden there. "Come on, that's right . . . " She could feel something prying loose with a frozen tearing sensation, and her senses heightened with the success of it all, and without thinking she opened her fingers and reached for her prize. With a hollow clattering sound, her wand dropped down the length of the crevasse, bouncing from side to side until it was finally silent.

"No!" she cried, horrified at her stupidity. "Oh, hells!" She retracted her arm, gripping the side of the crevasse with her frozen fingers, and peered downward, the snow swirling round her madly, and the wind howling into her ear. "No," she repeated, a fierce sense of anger and frustration rising in her, and for a moment she didn't know what to do. A flushing wave of humiliation at her dumb mistake washed through her, and she suddenly found herself very glad that Draco wasn't around to have witnessed her stupidity.

She'd jumped at the chance to harvest magical verbena at the heighth of its potency, so it was with a rather impulsive excitedness that she'd decided to brave the moor instead of taking the expected jaunt to the library with her friends. She'd become almost hyper-focused on the project she and Blaise were working on; a tonne of time and committment had gone into their planning, and, if nothing else, Pansy was a girl of high expectations and the most exquisite of tastes -- only the best would do. For this particular endeavour, she knew that the project's ultimate success lay within the freshness and potency of the ingredients involved, and she would stop at nothing in order to produce the uttmost in quality. Potions, poisons, combinations thereof -- it didn't matter. She wanted all her brews to be pristine, pure, and powerful.

And now, in a smugly irrational fit of chutzpah, she'd lost her wand down a rock crevasse in the middle of a freezing blizzard; angry tears stung at her eyes, unbidden. She lifted her head and squinted into the whirling snow, and realised with a start that she honestly couldn't see more than about two metres in front of her; the weather was now blinding and completely occluding. Wiggling, she inched backward, clutching numbly at bits of the rock as she manoeuvered her way down the side of the rock pile, thinking perhaps she might reach her wand if she went in by the side of the crack.

"Parkinson?" An exasperated voice came from behind her, startling her, and her fingers slipped from the rock. With a tumble she fell into the snow, the intense cold of the drift cutting straight into her. She sucked in a deep breath and flailed about for a moment, getting her bearings. Standing, she brushed angrily at her cloak, and then her hair, glaring at Ron as he looked down at her. "What the sod're you doing?"

"Fuck off, Weasel," she said cattily, the blowing sting of the snow pricking at her cheeks. "What are you doing following me? I don't recall asking for your help!"

"Who said I was here to help?" he asked, raising an eyebrow at her questioningly. "But really, don't you need help?"

"No," she said defensively, taking laboured steps through the knee-high drifts toward where her wand had fallen. "Not your help anyway!"

"Oh? Being particular, are you? Colour me shocked," Ron said, amazed at her impossibility under the circumstances. "Yeah, well, Malfoy and his goons aren't coming. They're happy to leave you out here to freeze. Bloody cowards."

She wrinkled her noise at him, frowning, and dropped to all fours, sinking into the snow, and snaked her hand as best she could into the frozen rock, feeling for her wand.

"What're you doing?" Ron boggled, stepping around the side of her, trying to get a better look.

Her voice was muffled. "--my wand--"

"Your wand?" He cocked his head, crossing his arms over his chest. "You've lost your wand? You've come out to the moor in the middle of a bloody blizzard to collect some ruddy dumb old plant, and now you've lost your wand to boot? Oh, good show, Parkinson. Brilliant."

"--fuck you, you fucking--"

"Look, just get your ruddy wand, and let's get out of here. It's freezing!"

"Obviously." She looked back over her shoulder at him. "I can't reach it, dolt!"

He reached down and hauled her up by the back of her robes, ignoring her indignant cry as he plopped her down to his side. "Move over," he said impatiently, drawing his wand. "Accio, wand!" A faint clattering sound came from within the rocks, but Pansy's wand did not appear. "Something's blocking it," Ron said. "Bloody fantastic. We can come back for it later . . . ."

"I'm not leaving my wand!" she said, quite put out by the suggestion. "Go on, then. Go back yourself. I'm staying right here."

He turned to her, irritated. "Don't be an idiot, Parkinson! You'll get lost and freeze to death!" He fixed a bitter gaze on her. "Not that that'd be such a bad thing. At least your mouth'd shut up for a spell!"

She snorted. "Death would do no such thing!" she sniffed haughtily, fixing a cross gaze on him. "You think I'm loud now? Just wait until I'm dead and I've nothing to lose! You'll never hear the end of it."

"Yeah, well, that's just fantastic of you," Ron said, wondering if his fingers would actually fall from his hand, leaving bloody, frozen stumps. "Get on with it, would you?"

"You're the one with the wand," she said sulkily, pointing out the obvious.

"Huh? Oh. Right." He directed his wand once again. "Accio, wand!" Nothing. "Good going, Parkinson," he said.

"I'm not leaving it here!"

"Oh, for sod's sake!" He took a moment to try and control himself, lest he give her a nice shove into the snowbank. "Which side'd you go up, then?"

"I don't know! This's the set of rocks that's perfectly symmetric on each quadrant -- I've no idea where I am!"

Kill! He pocketed his wand, and stepped over to the rock's side. Hoisting himself up, he navigated its icy face, finally reaching the top. "Where were you?"

"I said I don't know," she called back. "I was there on top, and I was reaching into the crevasse."

"Well, that's no help, because the crack's equal across all four planes!"

"Well, I'm so sorry," she said, feeling huffy and defeated. "Fuck this. Whatever. I'm going back." And with that she stalked into the blinding storm.

---

Ron realised what she was doing and practically lunged from the top of the massive rock in his effort to stop her. Falling from its rough top, he landed with a whoof in the piled snow, and scrambled to his feet. "Parkinson!" he called out, into the howling wind. "Don't!" He could barely make out the deep grooves left in the snow by her feet. He caught up with her almost instantly, his stride being twice as long as hers. "What the hell are you doing? You can't go out onto the moor! You'll never be found!"

"I'm going back to the castle," she said stubbornly, shivering like a wet animal in her tiny cloak and boots. "I can find my way back!"

He'd had enough. "Like bloody hell you can in this weather," he growled, totally out of patience. Grabbing her wrist he jerked her toward him, and turned back. He hauled her through the snow, not bothering to stop when she called out that her boot'd come loose, and was lost somewhere. "God, shut up . . . " She dug her foot into his arse, digging the heel of her booted foot into the ground, trying to stop him.

"Let go of me, Weasel! Fuck you, and fuck your fucking noble Gryffindor theatrics, and fuck your stupid Gryffindor friends, and fuck Harry Potter, and--"

He tugged at her, yanking her along mercilessly. "Are you always this vile?" he called back at her; the snow was falling harder and an unnatural darkness was beginning to creep up on them. The storm was thickening. "Potty-mouth much? Sheesh, just shut it already!" The rock loomed into his vision, and Ron was relieved. He could hardly see, and he knew there was no way they'd be able to walk back safely; a frisson of fear shot through him for a moment. Roughly, he dropped Pansy's hand and moved around the side of the rock a bit, looking, as Pansy balanced on one leg, like some kind of wretched, sodden snow flamingo. Ron much preferred Hannah Abbott's pink, fluffy variety.

"Oh sod it all," Pansy moaned, clutching at the great stone's side. "See that smaller rock there?" she pointed shakily at a perfectly round boulder resting at the base of its mother rock. "Roll it aside!"

"Huh?"

Her teeth were chattering ferociously, and dark circles were beginning to smudge under her eyes; Ron was reminded of her cousin Catherine. "R-r-roll the rock aside," she commanded. "I'd do it myself, but I can't!"

Ron looked at the boulder, drawing his wand, and then back at Pansy questioningly. "Um?"

"A-Accio will w-work," she answered, too cold to muster any further bitchiness.

He took careful aim. "Accio, rock," he incanted, instantly unsure. "Small rock," he clarified quickly. "Not the big one . . . yeah." The rock gave a shudder, and shifted sideways, but didn't roll. He incanted again, and this time the rock rolled smoothly away from the base of the giant, and a small hole carved into the giant's side was revealed. Before he could even register this, Pansy darted by him, and dropped to the ground, and crawled inside. "Oi, Parkinson!" he shouted, surprised as all get out. "Be careful! It could be-- you don't know what's in there!" He could hear her shrill voice echoing from inside the massive . . . he guessed it was a cave or somesuch. He tried again. "Parkinson?" Silence. "For crap's sake," he cursed, under his breath. "All right, hang on . . . "

---

It was completely dark inside the rock, and Ron lit his wand immediately, dropping his rucksack to the ground. "Lumos," he said, holding his arm slightly aloft, and turning on his knees in a circular manner. They were indeed in a cave of sorts, and the light from his wand bounced eerily from the rock walls, finally falling over Pansy, who was sitting against the wall, as far from the opening of the cave as possible. She was shaking like a wet cat, her hair wet and stringy and hanging down, her legs stretched out in front of her, with only one boot. A surge of rage coursed through him. "What the fuck were you thinking? This is dangerous!" he barked at her, seriously hacked off. "There's no way we can head back now! We'd get lost on the moor and freeze to death! Might bloody well anyway," he finished, looking about. She didn't answer, for her chattering teeth, but instead turned and began feeling along the side of the rock wall, scooting over as she did so. "What're--"

"M-my w-and," she chattered, and her fingers disappeared into the stone face. Ron shook his head, certain he'd seen it incorrectly, but as his eyes adjusted to the dim light further, he realised there was an open crevice of sorts toward the bottom of the wall there, and she was feeling around in it, presumably looking for her wand.

He sighed heavily, the feeling of anger washing away as fast as it had come. "I'll get it." He crawled forward. It took four tries, but finally he felt the smooth wood against his fingers as he Accioed Pansy's wand from the depths of the rock, the cold blizzard air swirling against his fingers as he fumbled about. "Here." He handed it over.

She snatched it from him, incanting immediately. "I-Incendium," she said. A glowing red light lit the tip of her wand, radiating heat, and she drew her fingers up the length of her wand, her eyes closing. "Oh God. So cold . . . . "

"Where'd you learn that?" Ron asked, wondering how he'd never come across this particular simple spell before.

"P-professor Snape," she answered, sinking to the ground, her wand still clutched protectively in her grasp. "Survival skills."

"Survival skills?"

"He teaches us," she said, shaking madly.

Ron scooted over to where she sat, maintaining an amply respectible distance as he settled in and leaned against the hard rock, wincing slightly as it dug into his back.

"C-close it," she chattered; her lips were blueish.

"Huh?"

She pointed to the open hole, where the angry grey light was filtering in. "Close it. Keep the heat in."

"Oh. Right." Ron rolled sideways, aiming his wand toward the opening. "Accio, rock," he said firmly, and he was satisfied when it rolled in front of the cave's entrance, closing them in.

Pansy pulled her sodden cloak around her thin body and huddled against the rock wall of the cave, and a long silence fell over them.

"They won't be able to find us now." Ron noted this rather glumly, looking around.

"Um, they won't come tonight," she said, jerking her stiff, frozen fingers through her clumped hair. "Um."

"Sh'yeah, right," Ron scoffed, his lip curling slightly. "Soon as Dumbledore does a locating charm on us, he'll pop over with a portkey." Dumb bint, he thought bitterly. Sodding Slytherins, always underestimating Dumbledore.

"No," she said, so calmly that Ron jerked his gaze over in suspicion. "No, he can't do that. Charms won't work here--" Her wand fell from her grip, clattering lightly, and rolled across the rock floor.

Something was wrong. "Parkinson?" Ron asked nervously, lifting his wand toward her. Her eyes were half-closed, and she was ghostly white under the light of his Lumos. She was still as he'd ever seen her, which inexplicably bothered him. "Sod," he muttered, and crawled over to her. "Ruddy mental freak." He looked at her, helpless. Think, he urged himself. She's too cold. Been out in the blizzard too long. Awkwardly he reached out and touched his fingers to her cheek, which was cold as marble under his touch. "Parkinson?" He paused. "Pansy?" Her lids didn't open further, but he could see her eyes shift at the sound of his voice. He patted her cheek firmly, grimacing inwardly. "Pansy? C'mon . . . . " She was too cold, Ron knew. Fucking shite, he thought, totally unclear as to how to proceed. After all the Gryffindors weren't getting any sodding Survival lessons!

"M-m-my," she mumbled thickly, her fingers twitching once.

"Your what?" he asked.

"My cloak is wet," she said finally.

"Do you-- Should I--" Her fingers twitched again, and he swallowed. "Do you want it off?" She nodded slightly, silently.

"M-m-my boot."

Son of a twat-arsed bitch, he thought, George's favourite expletive popping into his mind as he stared down at her. She opened her lids a fraction, her dark eyes glittering at him from underneath, her lips silently forming the word: Please? "Fuck," he burst out, and yanked angrily at her boot. It flew easily from her foot and whacked him in the chin. Angrily he flung it aside, laying right into her. "Fuck you and your stupid Herbology crap," he said, reaching for the clasp of her cloak. "You've been a damn pain in the arse since day one, Parkinson, I hope you know!" He pushed the cloak open and tugged at her wrist, prompting her forward not-so-gently; she fell against him, limp like a ragdoll. "I hate you and your ruddy house, you know that? I hate Snape, that fucking weak arsehole. You're inbred and mental -- the lot of you!" He tossed her drenched cloak aside and leaned her back; her fingers came up to clutch at his wrist. Ron was on a roll now; reaching down, he peeled her socks from her legs and winged them over his shoulder, satisfied by the wet slapping sound they made as they hit the rock floor of the cave. He shook free of her grip and unfastened her school robes next, again tipping her forward so he could work her arms free of them -- they were soaked, and as her school uniform appeared from under the black folds of her Slytherin robes, his worst fears were realised as he saw the pink of her skin glowing faintly through the saturated fabric of her standard uniform blouse. "And I fucking hate you for Umbridge," he finished viciously, grasping roughly at the knot of her green and silver tie.

She looked at him dully. "--don't understand--"

He narrowed his eyes. "Oh, I fucking understand all right," he said coldly, hating her miserable sodding guts. "I know what you're about." Her eyes closed again, and Ron sat kneeling in front of her, feeling suddenly refreshed, and as if he'd been relieved of a long-standing burden. He'd said it. And she'd heard him. Bloody brilliant! A sense of calm came over him then, and he eased away from her and moved over to his rucksack, not noticing as she disappeared into the shadows when he moved his wand away. "Heat," he mumbled to himself. "Heat, heat, heat . . . " He extracted his largest bottle of ink and wracked his brain for a moment, thinking back over the years. "Yeah," he said, remembering finally. "Here's hoping it works with ink as well as with water." He waved his wand, incanting, and a brilliant blackish flame sprung from the ink, as if it were petrol. "Duplico." The jar and flame increased in size, hot against Ron's palm already. Carefully he set it down, taking care to ensure it was evenly set. "Duplico," he repeated, holding his breath slightly as it again doubled in size. The blueish-black flame burned silently in the frigid belly of the rock.

"Good . . . " Pansy whispered, her eyes closed fully now; she opened her mouth as if she wanted to say something else and Ron waited silently, but no sound came forth. He looked up and wagered he could stand upright without braining himself, so he got to his feet and swept her clothing up, laying the garments out across several larger rocks dotting the cave's floor. Then, he sat back down and watched, and waited for her to get better.

---

Except she didn't. Get better, that is. Within thirty minutes she was shivering again, so severely that Ron was surprised she hadn't given the rock around them cause to crumble; however, he recognised she was truly in danger when the shivering agains stopped abruptly, and that her body temperature was probably dangerously low. She was by far the most petite seventh year he'd ever encountered -- she was small and fiery, and did things with gusto and abandon, with little care for repercussions of any sort. He'd discovered this over numerous prefect rounds with her, the present matter aside. Pansy Parkinson didn't do anything half-arsed; everything she did was executed with fierce tenacity and an almost vicious over-exactedness, whether it be school work or the rampant bullying she fancied. Maybe she liked to be loud and pushy as a way to make up for her stature, Ron'd often wondered. But the truth was Pansy had been a little bitch when they'd all been pint-sized, so he couldn't very well use that as an explanation for her perfectly shitty behaviour.

Tentatively he touched her clothing he'd laid out. Still soaked, but that was no surprise. It hadn't even been an hour yet, he assumed. He again knelt in front of her. "Parkinson," he whispered fiercely, jostling her. "Parkinson?" She didn't respond, but her lids budged up a touch at his voice, and Ron was suddenly quite frightened. "Fuck, fuck, fuck," he chanted, reaching for her uniform tie and averting his gaze. His Mum often told the story of how his Uncle Bilius -- before he'd died, of course -- had fallen into a frozen pond, right through the ice, and his wife'd almost let him freeze to death! I'm telling you, Ida May? Not the sharpest wand in the shoppe, that's for sure! Molly liked to tut, whenever the subject came up. She left his soaked clothes on him for four hours! They ended up having to rent a medical dragon from St. Mungo's, to warm him from the inside out . . . And she'd drawn pictures in the air with her wand, of Uncle Bilius and the dragon, the dragon breathing gently over Uncle Bilius, tightly controlled and wrangled by the medical Dragon Handlers. He'd breathed in the dragon's hot breath, and had heated himself from the inside out, as well as being wrapped head to toe in thick, wool blankets and tucked into a pile of feather duvets. Charlie and Bill remembered it; Charlie'd been enamoured of dragons ever since, and he still loved to tell the tale of the magnificent Horntail's head easing through an upper window at the Burrow, barely fitting into the room, and huffing its steamy breath all over Uncle Bilius. First time I ever saw a dragon up close, Charlie'd often told Ron when they'd gone off together for walks in the expanse of fields behind the Burrow, or whilst degnoming. Beautiful . . .

Clumsily, Ron fumbled with the buttons on Pansy's blouse, pulling at the wet cotton. Finally he had it, and he did his best to not stare as he drew her out of her damp uniform blouse. He drew the line at removing her skirt, though, and he let her alone for a moment as he glanced about the cave. Against the wall furthest from the small entrance hole was a smooth, hollowed-out groove in the rock, just big enough for a person to settle into. Ron moved the ink flame over, cast a series of cushioning charms, and then went back for Pansy. Scooping her wand from the rock floor, he stuck it into his pocket and loosened his own winter cloak, which was barely damp anymore. Gingerly he gathered Pansy from the ground, lifting her surprisingly easily, and awkwardly shifted her against his chest for leverage as he headed across to the space he'd made up. Carefully, he lowered himself to the ground, sinking into the carved groove in the floor, immediately sensing the soft warmth of the cushioning charm, his winter cloak billowing out around him. He shifted and squirmed until he was fully comfortable, leaning back against the wall of the cave, his knees bent. Pansy was in his lap, facing him; he pulled her toward him so she rested against his chest, her arms dangling uselessly at his sides, her cheek pressed against the wool of his uniform jumper. Hunkering down, he brought his cloak over his head, draping it over them both, and tied it shut as best he could. Finally, he fished both their wands from his pocket. "Incendium," he incanted, more confidently than he'd intended, and both wands lit up. Within minutes a hint of heat caressed his face. Cringing with distaste, he circled one arm around Pansy's bare back and pulled her to him as best he could; their bellies squashed together as he did so, and he lifted the lit wand tips toward her mouth, which was slightly open, willing her to breath in the heat. It was no dragon, he realised, but it was better than nothing, and he'd be goddamned if the first corpse he had to deal with was going to be PansyfuckingParkinson's.

"Wake up, you dumb bint," he whispered into her still face, tipping his head back and resting it against the rock behind him. He knew Harry and Hermione would've gone for help by now, and that a search party would be sent out as soon as possible; he just had to keep her alive until they got here. Dumbledore'd know what to do, how to find them. Ron was confident in this fact. He was just concerned that Pansy's stupidity would cost her her life, or her health in the long-term. He glanced down the length of his nose at her, not moving his head. "Think a bloody posh bitch like you'd have a better winter cloak."

---

Two hours crawled by with nothing but the howling wind moaning outside the cave, and Ron's hypervigilance over the rise and fall of Pansy's chest. As long as she kept breathing, all was well. He felt like his arm would fall off any moment now, as he'd been holding the lit wandtips to her mouth, hoping she'd warm from the inside out. He wasn't sure how long was long enough, but she was breathing, and she seemed like she was sleeping -- was she sleeping? Ron couldn't tell -- against his chest, breathing long and deep. Her breath rebounded onto his own face, blowing the heat from their wands against him, drying his eyes. He closed them, the warm sensations luring him toward sleep himself. With a jerk he shook his head slightly as he felt himself nodding off, and Pansy breathed in sharply and shifted, moving her face upward slightly.

"Draco?" she whispered, barely audibly.

"No," Ron whispered. "Erm, just . . . no." He patted her back automatically. "Malfoy'll be here soon. Go back to sleep, Parkinson."

"Who's it?" She sounded confused, and Ron saw her brow tick, as if she were trying to furrow it.

"Er . . . It's Weasley. Right, then."

She twitched, but didn't move otherwise. "Weasley?" she mumbled, definitely out of sorts and nowhere near consciousness. She drew her arm up and clutched at his bicep weakly.

"Yeah. Look, help's on its way, so just hang on--bloody hell, Parkinson, knock that off!" Her fingers were now poking lightly at his eyeballs; he closed them against the invasive prodding, and turned his face away; he felt her little hand slide up the side of his face and into his hair. "Ow!" he objected, as her fingers curled shut tightly there. "What the sod!? Only you'd manage a physical assault when you're knocking at death's door!" Her fingers loosened then, and he could feel her rolling a lock of his hair around.

"You're not Draco," she slurred haltingly. "Weasel?" she asked again, the tip of her tongue touching her bottom lip for a moment.

"It's Weasley, thanks," Ron said tightly, suddenly tempted to do something irrational like bite her ear or something as equally anti-social.

She drew her hand back, and before he knew what she was doing, she'd burrowed both her hands under his jumper. He jumped as her cold fingers slid across the smooth skin of his back, recoiling reflexively. "Oi, stop that!" But her hands were searching, moving under the jumper, until she tucked them into the waistband of his trousers, down against his lower back. Ron felt as if someone had slipped a slab of ice into his shorts, and a thousand invisible spiders scurried up his spine as she settled back against his chest, content to warm her hands in the small of his back.

---

Ron woke with a start God only knew how much later, disoriented and hungry, the weight of Pansy against his chest odd and vaguely comforting. He looked down at her. She was totally relaxed against him, deeply asleep, her hands still tucked against the small of his back. He ventured a peek outside his cloak, pulling it down over his head and looking about the cave. Next to him the ink bottle flame was still burning, and while it was chilly, the temperature would be at least tolerable for brief periods of time.

He was still for several long moments, his stomach growling and his bladder painfully full. Tentatively he brought his hand up; his fingers brushed the side of Pansy's calf. He poked her, not especially hard. "Parkinson?" She didn't stir, so he tried again. "Parkinson! Er . . . Pansy? I gotta get up."

"Hmm?" She moved her head slightly, but that was all.

"My back-- look, just let me up will you?" Carefully he grasped her upper arms and drew her away from his chest, leaning forward as he did so. Her eyes opened partially and then she was blinking at him as he drew his cloak down over her head; he figured they must look odd -- two heads poking out from a single tied cloak. It took Ron exactly half a second to figure out that she had no idea what had transpired; her eyes hardened and within seconds he felt her slender fingers around his throat, squeezing painfully. He half-gagged at her touch as her fingers dug into his windpipe. "Pansy . . . " he croaked helplessly, his eyes bulging painfully.

"What've you done?!" she hissed, low and predatory. "What's this?" She squeezed even tighter and Ron was in utter disbelief that such small hands could wreak so much pain. "Where the fuck are my clothes?"

"Ack . . . " he sputtered, finally clawing at her hands, gripping her wrists firmly. "Let up!" he managed, pinching his thumbs into the undersides of her wrists. "Bloody hell, Parkinson, don't you remember what happened?"

She writhed under his grip, discombobulated and instantly paranoid. "Oh, no," she protested, struggling in his lap. "Don't even try it! There's no way in bloody hell I would have gotten that pissed--"

Ron rolled his eyes, managing to pry her hands from around his neck. "As if, you fucking cow!" he sneered, offended by her suggestion. "There's not firewhiskey goggles thick enough for me to touch you, even if you were the last bint on the ruddy earth!"

She was working at the tie to Ron's cloak, her fingers clumsy and unnimble in her disorientation. Finally she managed to undo the cloak, and she flung it back rather unceremoniously, then pushed up from Ron and stepped backward over his long legs. Ron stared up at her as she stood up from him, pale and ethereal in the blackish-purple light of the ink flame. His eyes were glued to the line of her stomach, and then to the curve of her breast in the second it took her to turn away from him -- he couldn't help himself. He was a boy and she was, well, a girl, and the unbidden thought of having seen this exact silhouette once before, under a different context of course, flitted through his mind. "Don't even look at me," she growled, just standing there.

"I'm not," he said, defensively, averting his eyes immediately.

"Where are my clothes?"

"Over there," he said, pointing, disregarding the fact that she wasn't facing him.

She picked her way across the rock floor of the cave, then stopped. "Toss me my wand." Ron did, and she lit it and held it out in front of her, looking. Spotting her stockings she stalked over and grabbed them up. "Fucking hell," she muttered. "They're wet." She turned and faced him straight on, hands at her hips.

Ron's ears began to smoulder and he shielded his eyes, feeling horribly uncomfortable. "For sod's sake, cover up!"

She was shaking out her uniform blouse now, inspecting it. "At least this is dry, thank God." Ron snuck another peek at her through his fingers, watching as her torso disappeared into the white cotton button-down. "What time is it?"

"Dunno. Don't have a watch." He lumbered stiffly to his feet, putting his hands to his lower back for support and stretching backward.

"Naturally," she said, a sardonic tone creeping into her voice. "Perhaps you've an ancestral family sundial carved from limestone that you strap to your wrist? No wonder your knuckles drag on the ground."

"Ever so funny. Ha ha." Ron ran his hands through his hair, mussing it unconsciously. "Look, I'm going for a piss." He grabbed up his wand and Accioed the rock away from the cave's entrance and dropped to hand and knee.

"Get my rucksack while you're out there," Pansy ordered, searching in vain for her second boot.

It was effin' cold outside, and pitch black to boot. It's nighttime. He noted the obvious, feeling an acute sense of disorientation at not knowing the time. Bet Dumbledore's firechatted to Mum and Dad by now, he thought, as he took a piss in the snow. Bet they're watching the clock something awful. At least his hand on the clock wouldn't be pointing to 'Mortal Peril'. He gave himself a shake and zipped up, wondering vaguely if Parkinson's parents had a clock or some kind of similar device -- did it say 'Mortal Peril: In Vicinity of Weasley and/or Gryffindor'? She hadn't mentioned exactly where she'd dropped her rucksack, and Ron was only willing to make one trip around the massive rock's perimeter; after all, he'd left his cloak inside the cave.

---

He actually ended up taking two trips around the rock, and finally found her rucksack buried in snow. A small section of strap was protruding from the drift, and he fished it out, his fingers red and numbing quickly. It was powder snow, so it fell away easily, and as he gathered Pansy's rucksack into his arms he was suddenly struck with the thought that she meant to play a horrible joke on him, and that she'd likely rolled the rock back over the opening to the cave, which was all well and good 'cos he had his wand on him, but she'd probably sealed it up with some super secret evil Slytherin spell, and he's surely be left to freeze to death.

He dashed around the rock, skidding to a halt in front of the entrance, finding it exactly as he'd left it -- open and glowing slightly from the ink fire. Genuinely surprised, he pushed her rucksack through the hole there and crawled in after it. His eyes adjusted and he found Pansy sitting on his cloak, shirt on, her Slytherin tie hanging loosely around her neck, and he noted she was quite methodically doing an inventory on his rucksack. "Hey!" he objected, not remembering the last time he'd actually cleaned the damn thing out. "Get outta my stuff!"

Pansy was unfazed. Carefully she was laying out his things, unwrinkling balls of parchment and inspecting them, either laying them aside or tossing them over her shoulder. There was a row of ink bottles, two quills, two textbooks, the organiser Hermione'd gotten him, a Sneakascope, owl treats, four chocolate frogs, a package of Ice Mice, one of Dean's trainers (he'd forgotten why), a picture of him and Harry taken after the second task fourth year (Ron noticed Pansy looked at this photograph very carefully before putting it aside), a golden Snitch, a Muggle yo-yo that his father'd given him, a bottle of butterbeer, a petrified banana peel, a single Muggle photograph of Hermione, a copy of the Quality Quidditch Supplies catalogue from four months back, four rolls of parchment, his potions notes from last week, a half-finished essay for Defence, a Howler from Molly that was still smoking -- still unopened, a Chudley Cannons button, an incomplete letter to Bill he'd started but never finished, his Quidditch strategy notebook, a bag of taffy, a Muggle penknife Arthur had given him for Christmas, a torn swatch of moleskin from Hagrid's coat, two Cauldron Cakes, a smashed Pumpkin Pasty, a pair of Extendable Ears from Fred and George, one of Ginny's hairties, a note to Luna regarding a hat for Ginny, a variety of biscuits, a dead and petrified Flobberworm, and two packages of Droobles he'd been meaning to give to Neville. Ron gaped at Pansy's presumptuousness, and stalked over to where she sat; he nicked the Quidditch notebook from her hands.

"Give that back," he growled, "you ruddy Quidditch-spying cow! Treasonous bint!"

She looked up at him, unimpressed. "Who needs your dumb Quidditch strategies anyway?" She looked smug. "Slytherin's ahead of Gryffindor this year."

"Only because Harry's--" he caught himself, falling silent.

"Harry's what," she enquired, overly sweetly.

Preoccupied. "None of your fecking business!"

"So," she drawled, fingering his quill absentmindedly. "Enjoying being a Beater this year? You were a dismal Keeper. I'd of switched too, if I were as crappy at Keeping as you are."

He refused to rise to her incitement. "Beater's good. You know, lots of action."

"Feel free to sort out my rucksack, then," she said, surprising him.

"Huh?"

"Go ahead, Weasley," she said breezily. "This is your one chance for--" she looked at him dramatically; Ron was unsure if she was being . . . humourous? -- "reconnaissance!"

"Excuse me?"

"You can report back to your stupid friends what a Slytherin keeps in her rucksack. Don't tell me you haven't a thousand conspiracy theories about that."

He looked at her carefully for a moment. She was challenging him in some way, he was sure of it. "Fine," he said. "But I'm closing the cave up first. It's getting cold in here again. Where's your scarf?"

"My scarf? Why?"

"'Cos your scarf's likely still wet. Mine's not." He pointed toward the entrance to the cave. "There's a bit of an overhang, yeah? Thought I'd lay your scarf down the length of the entrance, half in, half out. That way, when they come for us, they'll see it sticking out, but they'll know it wasn't just dropped, and that it's leading into the rock itself." He paused, feeling like he'd said too much.

She was staring at him. "All right," she said finally, simply. "It's over by my boot."

"Before I close it up? Do you--I mean, I had to--" His ears were warm again. "Um, do you have to go?"

"Go?"

"Yeah, go."

"Oh!" She got his meaning. "I already did. Over there." She pointed toward the furthest end of the cave. "And before you get all bent out of shape, there was no way I was going outside for a pee, and I Evanescoed it, and I dare you to find the spot I used, because you won't!" she said defensively.

"Parkinson, I wager you'd piss your own bed if it suited you." Ron was rather revolted. "Is that part of Snape's 'Survival Skills' package, huh? Pissing in the corner of a dark cave to avoid getting your arse frostbit?"

"Oh, do fuck off." She gave him a haughty look. "Besides, there's a reason to do anything, Weasley, given the right circumstances."

"Whatever," he said, proceding with her scarf. Once the rock was back in place, he dragged her rucksack over to where she'd parked herself, and sat across from her. He made to dump the contents onto the rock, but she raised an eyebrow pre-emptively, giving him pause. Grudgingly he stuck his hand into her bag, and fished around for one item at a time.

Twenty minutes later they sat, still facing one another, their belongings lined up like some kind of strange chess set. Ron had laid out Pansy's organiser, four quills, her Herbology text, her Arithmancy text, a pile of notes to her from Malfoy, a strawberry Sugar Quill, a picture of her and Malfoy together (Malfoy was smiling -- how weird was that?), a picture of all the seventh-year Slytherins posing in their Quidditch stands, waving madly, and a stationery set with the Slytherin house crest.

"Can I have an Ice Mice?" Pansy asked, breaking the silence.

"I guess. Is this all you carry with you?"

"Yes. That's all. Do you want one of my chocolates?"

"Why?" Ron was highly suspicious of her. "What's in them?"

"Um, chocolate?" she said witheringly, popping one of his Ice Mice into her mouth and chewing away.

"No."

"What's this for?" She spoke through the gummy sweet, picking up the yo-yo gingerly. "Is it a dark detector?"

"It's--" He paused, his brain whirling. The running catalogue of offences she'd subjected him to over the years ran through his mind like a ticker-tape. "Yeah," he said after careful deliberation. "A dark detector, yeah. It's a . . . very, very special dark detector!"

Her brow furrowed suspiciously. "I've never seen a dark detector like this." She fixed a flat gaze on him, the yo-yo dangling from her fingers. "Are you having me on, Weasley?"

He looked at her, wide-eyed. "Having you on? No!" He drew the word out, feigning complete innocence.

"My father's never told me of these," she said, still questioning. Ron stared at her, not knowing what to say to this, and totally unclear as to why Pansy Parkinson's sodding father would be discussing dark detectors with her. He figured her ilk would avoid such things at all costs. "My father's an Auror," she said finally, and Ron thought he detected a note of hesitancy in her voice.

"Bullshite!" He challenged her automatically, incensed that she would proport such an egregious lie. Her father, an Auror? Like bloody fuck!

"He is," she insisted, offended. "So sod off."

They fell into another heavy silence with Ron resentfully watching Pansy eat all his Ice Mice without saying a word, unwilling to even skirt the issue of quantity, for it would inevitably lead to comments regarding his financial status, and by God, he'd rather starve. As she chewed away, he picked up the paperback book he'd pulled from her rucksack.

"Read it?" she asked, after several minutes had passed, and he'd flipped through it.

"Nope."

"It's a fantastic story."

He thought of Blaise Zabini and his sodding Italian with a stab of dislike as he traced the title letters on the cover with his finger. "Don't speak French."

"Just the title's French," she said, swallowing, and adjusting herself primly. Sitting cross-legged, she draped her skirt over her knees and watched him. "La Bohème."

"Yeah, well, can't say I bloody well care--" A word caught his attention as he flipped through the pages. "This is that book you were reading during my detention." A line had popped out at him: Mademoiselle Musette was a pretty girl of twenty who shortly after her arrival in Paris had become what many pretty girls become when they have a neat figure, plenty of coquettishness, a dash of ambition, and hardly any education . . . "This book sucks," he pronounced. "It's boring."

"No, it's not!"

"Is so," he countered, opening a chocolate frog. "Who cares about snobby people anyway? There's no fun in going out to a place if you can't just go as yourself."

"Ah," she said cunningly, with a knowing glance. "Methuselah, right?" Ron said nothing, but watched her warily, chewing his frog. She reached sideways and drug his cloak across the rock floor. "Is this your Methuselah, Weasley?" She inspected it closely. "It looks to be. Ancient, no doubt, and . . . " She lifted her eyes to his. "You charm it, don't you? You charm it to look black. But it's not black, is it?" She gave the cloak a shake and it settled over the contents of their respective rucksacks. "It's not black. Why, it's patchwork!"

Ron was quiet for a long time, taking his merry sweet time with the chocolate frog. Finally he shrugged, so used to catching shite from the Slytherins that he hardly cared that Pansy had discovered the truth about his cloak, especially in light of the fact that it was just him and her trapped in here together, and somehow, one-on-one, she didn't seem even remotely intimidating. "Looks black by candlelight," he noted.

"Or by the flame of ink," she said, surprising him with her . . . normalcy.

"It's better than that piece of shite cloak you were wearing," he said truthfully, slightly bolstered by her lack of viciousness. "You nearly died from the cold! Not me, though."

She considered this. "I'll wager you have more than a few stone on me, though. It could have been that."

"Could've been, but it wasn't. Your shite's soaked through, isn't it? Mine's not." He felt the familiar sense of smugness creeping up on him now that they were discussing his cloak. He fingered it for a moment. Methuselah. "It's a right dumb name, though. Methuselah." The corner of her mouth lifted slightly and Ron found himself genuinely wondering if she even had teeth -- he'd never seen her smile, not a single time, and he was beginning to suspect her innate crossness was perhaps some kind of sly fodder for hiding an especially appalling orthodontia condition.

"Do you know what 'Methuselah' means, Weasley?" she asked lightly, reaching for his bottle of butterbeer. He clamped down on her wrist again, pushing her hand away.

"Forget it, thief." He tucked the butterbeer deep into his trousers. "And no. Don't reckon I bloody well care about that either."

"It means 'longevity,'" she continued, as if he hadn't spoken at all. "It's from the Muggle bible book -- you've heard of that, right? Well, the author of the book of Genesis traces the patriarch Methuselah, who lived a term of nine hundred and sixty-nine years. It follows thus that his death occurred in the year of the Deluge. There is no record of any other human being having lived as long as this, for which reason the name 'Methuselah' has become a synonym for longevity."

"Are you mental?" He couldn't help himself! What the sod was this? Pansy Parkinson speaking at him like . . . like Hermione. "And I know what the fucking bible is, 'course! I'm not daft."

"That's debatable," she said, looking at him bemusedly.

"Well, like I said, it's a ruddy dumb name, and I'll thank you not to-- Parkinson, are you shivering again?" He groaned inwardly, his back still aching a bit, but she was clearly trembling, and she'd wrapped her arms around her thin little body. "Bloody fabulous. Come on, then." He grabbed up . . . Methuselah, sod it . . . and scooted over to the carved-out groove, recasting the cushioning charm for good measure. He glanced over his shoulder; she hadn't moved. "Don't be stupid. I don't like it any more than you do, but what'd'you want to do? You'll only get colder, and if you think I'm hauling your dead arse back to Hogwarts after this is all over, you're sodding wrong--"

"I'm coming," she said irritatedly, picking and choosing amongst the items they'd laid out. "Here." She tossed her ink to him. "See if it'll light even though it's frozen." She was stuffing her pockets with all the edibles.

"Don't hoard the food," he warned, as the frozen ink combusted; the flame was weaker than that from the liquid ink, though. He enlarged the ink pots as much as he could, placing them in a triangular setting around their spot. He settled himself and looked up at her, beckoning. "Come on, then."

"Okay . . . "

"Oi, that's my foot!"

"Move your leg!"

"Here, just . . . yeah, there."

"Right." She'd settled back against him, belly-to-belly, shivering fully now, and Ron felt her release a long breath as he wrapped his cloak around them like he'd had it done up before. "Um?" She paused, her shaking worming its way into his belly. "Um, it might help if you, you know, put your arms around me."

"You are mental," he said, highly uncomfortable at her request.

"No," she snapped angrily. "I'm cold. Now fucking do it before I get hacked off!"

"All right, all right! Sheesh!" He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close. "You're always hacked off, anyway. Not much of a shift between 'hacked off' and 'not hacked off' for Parkinson. Nope, not at all!" he said, feeling strange and uncomfortable at the entire situation. He was a bit cold himself, so it wasn't like he wouldn't benefit from her close proximity as well, but it was hard having her right here on his lap, pressing against him like she was. It gave him a weird feeling, like he was doing something inherently secretive and forbidden, when in actuality he was doing what any decent human would, and that was saving a fellow classmate from death by hypothermia. Her cheek was resting against his wool jumper again, and just like before she reached around him and tucked her hands into the back of his trousers. "Shite," he said, sucking in his breath fiercely. "Oh yeah? See how you like it!" And Pansy squeaked as he slid his own hands under the waistband of her skirt to rest above the rise of her arse.

"Don't get any funny ideas," she said ominously. "It's for warmth."

"Yeah, yeah," he said, once again tipping his head back under the cloak to rest against the rock wall of the cave. "I think we've covered the bit about me not fancying you ever, even if you were the last person alive. So no worries there."

She snorted. "Right."

"Excuse me?"

"You heard me."

He gave a bark of derisive laughter. "Don't flatter yourself."

"Yeah? Then what's that digging into my--"

"It's the butterbeer," he said defensively, mortified. "Fucking slag!"

Pansy laughed outright. "Slag? What'd'you know about that?"

More than you think. "Pretty obvious!"

"Obvious?" She seemed almost amused. "How so? Hmm, could it be all the shagging Draco and I do during class? Oh yes, that must be it! Or perhaps you're referring to our nasty penchant for secretly invading GryffindorsoddingTower and fucking all over your common room?" She shifted and his hands inched lower. "Because obviously that's a regular occurrence, yeah?"

Ron wanted to die. "Vulgar much?"

She tipped her face up to look at him then, and he could see the faint outline of her face in the dark flickering light easing through the folds of his cloak. "Not much, no," she said slowly. "Presume much?"

He stifled the urge to push her off him. "Doubt I'm wrong," he said weakly, feeling as if this conversation was quickly spiralling out of control.

She gave another snort, a light one this time, and lifted her chin, and her lips brushed hot at his ear. "Yeah, I fuck my boyfriend, Weasel," she whispered bitterly, falling back onto the safety of her usual petty insult. "And I don't give two shites whether you approve or not. If that makes me a slag, then whatever." She laid her head back down on his chest, shivering lightly.

As they fell into another strained silence, Ron contemplating what she'd just said, despite himself, wanting nothing more than to retain his monochromatic view of How Things Were: Black. White. No shades of grey. It's different, he thought, than me. Malfoy and Parkinson are different. It's not like-- He took great pause at this. It's not like Hermione. And me. Not like Hermione and me are a -we-, but if we were a we, then we'd be different. His chest rose in time with his shallow peaks of breath, and he was angry, and the weight of Pansy's slight body against his was upsetting not only because it was her, but because if it weren't for her, he wouldn't be thinking about these fucking shitty things at all. He didn't like to consider what he couldn't have, and right now he couldn't have Hermione, and it was goddamned fucking hell to have to wait it out. It would be -different-, he thought savagely, purposefully angling a fingernail into the skin of Pansy's back until she jumped, and he hated her fiercely for keeping him from being able to knowingly wallow in his ignorance of her and Malfoy, for forcing him to ponder exactly what she and Malfoy meant to one another, and actually wondering if two Slytherins were capable of feeling something even remotely akin to what he felt for Hermione.