Silver and Green with Envy: A Sebastian Sallow Story

Chapter Nineteen

"What happened?" Poppy hissed at me as I went to stand by her at our potting station. I just looked at her while chewing my lip for a moment, then back toward Sebastian, who was trying and failing to smirk in my direction. 

"I've got a shadow, apparently."

"...Did you make up already? You almost killed him Saturday! If Natty hadn't stopped you-"

"I'm aware, Poppy. I was there, after all."

I said nothing else until we were a few minutes into cutting up the fluxweed we were assigned to that day while Professor Garlick tended to something else for a moment. 

"Neither of us are backing down. I want Harlow gone and won't stop looking, but Sebastian can't stop working with him. I wasn't the only one he was attempting to keep safe from that monster. Speaking of which, I'm pretty certain you're on that list, so I'd ask you to stop looking up poacher movement for a while."

"Absolutely not."

"Poppy, listen-"

"No. I loathe poachers. You of all people aside from my gran know that best. I'm helping you. I'll just...try to find a way to do it...a little more subtly?"

"Oh? And how do you plan on that?"

"He can't follow you everywhere. There's always the loos on the third floor. The ones near Professor Ronen's classroom. All of us have Charms at different times, we could pass notes, somehow? I'll ask Natty, we'll figure it out."

"Well. There's one other problem. We share a common room."

"Invisibility potion?"

"An option, but the ingredients aren't too easy to find. I don't fancy going into the Forbidden Forest to troll hunt for bogeys."

"We'll figure it out."

We kept talking quietly, where time permitted, and I attempted to walk with her to our next class, but Sebastian swept right in next to me with his hand in mine again. I sighed a bit, rolling my eyes. Poppy snickered despite herself and I shot her a dirty look. 

"Trying to figure out ways to get past me during class? You two were talking an awful lot."

"Don't flatter yourself. We were talking about the Yule Ball next month."

"I don't believe you, but in that case, what color are you thinking of wearing?"

I looked up at his face and raised a brow. "I'm not sure yet, why do you ask?"

"Well I have to know what color to accent my robes with, of course."

Poppy laughed. "Was that your attempt at asking her to go with you? Because if it was that was abysmal."

He looked confused. "Do I need to ask? She's all mine, I figured it was implied by that point."

"All yours? I don't know how you could say that, she smacked you bloody two days ago!"

"She did. But did she happen to tell you about what happened in that same room last night?"

"What are you-oh. OH." 

Poppy once again saw how red my face had gotten and put it together in the same stalled sentence she had previously. She made that her cue to scurry off as Sebastian laughed. I thumped him in the back as we kept walking. "You don't have to brag about it!"

"I wasn't bragging, I was informing. She seemed to think you hated me."

"I do hate you."

"No you don't. That ship sailed a while ago. You told me you loved me last night, you can't take it back."