The Enemy's Ball

33. Butterflies

The spider clicked its pincers in their direction and Draco jerked back, pulling Harry with him. Weasley pushed his way through the crowd and froze when he found them. "Harry, is that-?"

Harry put his free hand on Ron's shoulder, "I think it is."

Ron smiled faintly, and turned very pale. He mumbled to no one in particular, "Ah, right, well. Hello Aragog jr." and promptly fainted. Harry let go of Draco's hand to catch his best friend. He dragged Ron from the circle and propped him on a log. Draco followed.

"Trauma," Harry explained to him. They both stared at Ron, who was slowly coming back to consciousness. "In second year we had to go speak to the king of those things, and let me tell you, the one over there? A tiny baby. Aragog was huge. It was terrifying. And Ron is scared of spiders anyways, so it wasn't good."

"Second year?" Draco asked, mortified. "Wasn't that the year with the basilisk?"

"Mm. Yeah, at first we thought Aragog was the monster, so we went to investigate, but it turned out he wasn't. Although his children were downright nasty when they tried to eat us," Harry said.

"You were twelve." Draco said. He stared at Harry, who was still looking at Ron. Harry's expression was unconcerned. He shrugged and took out his wand to point it at Ron's forehead.

"Hold on!" Draco turned around to see an out-of-breath Hermione running towards them. "Harry James Potter, you know your reviving spells are horrid, don't you dare use one on Ronald!" Hermione said, and she pulled out her own wand. "Ennervate," she casted.

Ron sat up straight, still very pale. "Spiders, Mione, there's a spider," he whispered. Hermione frowned and sat on the log next to him. She wrapped an arm around his shoulders and patted his hair.

"It's alright Ron, it's in a cage now," she assured him.

"But spiders," Ron said again.

"I know, I know," Hermione said.

Draco stared at them. This scene seemed very familiar. Just the other night... Draco looked at Harry again. The Gryffindor was blushing.

Harry had held him like this just the other night, and whispered words of assurance. And Ron and Hermione were dating. It was possible that Harry had just acted without thinking, but Draco didn't want that to be the truth. Not really. He wanted Harry to have done it knowing exactly what it would imply. He wanted Harry to have been thinking about Ron and Hermione and doing what they would do.

Draco blinked. He was doomed. He met Harry's eyes again and Harry bit his lip and looked away. Utterly and completely doomed.

"Ev'ryone step away from the acromantula circle!" Hagrid boomed. Harry and Draco turned back to the ring of students. Everyone formed a large circle, so they could all see the smaller circle of acromantulas. At least there was only one real spider. Draco was pretty sure he'd join Ron if there was another.

Hagrid bustled over to the spider and picked up its egg. "This is a life cycle ring. There's a baby acromantula, I would've brought an adult, but they get quite big." Hagrid pointed to the Fang-sized spider at the front of the ring. Draco shuddered, at least it was only a baby. "Although, some would argue that the babies are more dangerous. Since they can't control their appetites, the little buggers are just always hungry."

Draco stiffened and the rest of the class gasped. Everyone took a hasty step back.

"Ah come on you guys, it's alright. He's all secured in there," Hagrid said. Without waiting for any acknowledgements, he continued, "It lays an egg, or a hundred, after mating, and then it hatches and the cycle starts over again. Of course, when the mother dies, the babies eat her body, and that's kind of sad, but now you know about life-cycles!"