endgame // sebastian sallow

Phase One: The Reeling

Phase One:
The Reeling

"You used me as an alibi,
crossed my heart as you crossed the line."

Noelle's Perspective

Fingers drummed anxiously against the wooden desk underneath with a quill while my teeth fidgeted at the lip of my mouth. If I kept going, I guaranteed a piece of my skin would chew off from the lack of knowledge.

I side-eyed in the moment and cleared my throat, being careful not to seem like an idiot on the first day of the sixth year.

"Psst,"

I could hear murmuring beneath her lips, clearly showing that she was in fact, concentrated on the lesson given.

"Poppy!"

The brown eyes raised.

"Do you, uh," I pressed my lips, embarrassed as I flicked my wand, "...know the incantation for this?"

Poppy Sweeting furrowed at me from the questioning and wiggled her fingers down her closed spell book — she knew if she opened it, Professor Ronen would call us out.

"Elle, we spent the summer learning these. I even owl'd you a book with enchanted notes." Poppy whispered back. 

I blinked once. Oblivious.

"You read it, correct?" She asked again, but I could see a concerned expression building.

Force a nod. Just force a nod.

I forced a half smile, masking confidence, and nodded. "Yeah, right. Of course."

Yeah, right. Of course — I was going to have the proper head-starting time to study for classes after I followed a horrifying first (late) year at Hogwarts; battling anything in sight, countless threats, deaths, sleepless nights, and oh yeah, right, completing assignments.

I was definitely going to have the perfect time-space to study how to enchant a levitating spark within trauma. Definitely.

"Noelle Ellis can't conjure up a spell, I hear?" A whisper, as a matter of fact, it wasn't a whisper coming from the student. That specific student.

I sighed, keeping my posture straight to prevent chaos from my lack of knowledge, and pretended not to hear the red-haired man from behind.

"Say, did you not spend the majority of the fifth year fighting off enemies and saving the day?" Garreth poked my shoulder with his quill pen, "...yet, can't cast this? Huh,"

Garreth Weasley.

There might've been a slight tingly feel of butterflies when I clashed paths with him in the Gryffindor Common Room one year ago. Might've. After getting to know his disastrous, troublemaking potion-making kits — let's say my feelings were up for debate.

And they stayed that way.

He was class trouble. And the best eavesdropper to contract.

"Hilarious, Weasley," I spoke from the side shoulder, "I could say the same with your lack of potion-making."

A few 'ooo's' and chuckles whined from the student boys beside him at the joking interaction and Garreth chuckled.