Slytherin Army [HP]

25. Bronze for the Fairest

It was the night of the Yule Ball, and the Slytherins ascended the dungeon steps to gather in the Entrance Hall, where they waited for the doors of the Great Hall to open. Blaise and Wilby were both attempting to adjust the large bow at the back of Cyndee's ruffled navy blue dress.

"It should go like this," Wilby argued, fluffing the bow up and making it symmetrical.

"That defies physics," Blaise complained, but he let it be.

Cyndee was huffing, "If my bow has become spaghetti —"

"It's fine," Drew assured her. She felt a curl of hair slip over her ear and pushed it back. She'd done her hair up earlier, and now it spilled down the middle of her back in twisting coils.

Cyndee smiled at her, azure eyes sparkling under her gold-threaded blond hair. She nodded at Wilby, "Thank you, Wilby. Zabini, you did nothing."

Blaise held his head up, "If I'd known I'd be publicly slandered, I'd have never accepted your invitation."

She teasingly pulled at the sleeve of his expensive dress robes, "It's not slander if it's true —"

"Check your facts or you're as bad as that Skeeter woman."

"Take that back!"

"See, you don't want the truth —"

Amid their squabble, Wilby came to Drew's side and asked, "Do you think I look okay?"

Now it was unavoidable and he knew it, so Drew stared at his black suit. His tie had been black before, but he'd coloured it to a royal purple to go with her dress. She looked up past his mischievous grin and took in his wavy hair that actually waved in an organized way for the first time.

"You look pretty nice," she admitted, and he beamed.

She thought maybe he was done embarrassing her, but then he studied her up and down and said, "You're gorgeous."

"Today," she corrected, warming at the compliment, "but thanks."

"No," he insisted, "yes, you're especially gorgeous today, but I think you're gorgeous every day."

"Oh stop," she wailed.

He just smiled cheekily. The Entrance Hall was getting more than a little crowded, and Drew watched the other students. Her sister was coming down the stairs in her cobalt blue dress with her friends, and Drew waved to her.

Torch had for some reason agreed to go with Isabell, though he seemed more preoccupied with his glitter-dusted silver hair to pay much attention to her.

Drew couldn't help wanting to know what Eliza looked like, but before she could find her Wilby nudged her.

He had noticed with surprise that Xavier was standing near the front, and they made their way towards him, squeezing past a high-collared Malfoy and a frilly-pink Pansy.

"Xavier!" she exclaimed, taking in his white suit and styled hair. "The number of times I've seen you lying about in the same green T-shirt had me believe you owned two outfits. How wrong I was."

"It's not the same shirt" was his only defence.

"You do understand that dressing up doesn't mean you're allowed to just lie down on the dance floor and have a crisis, right?"

Xavier tugged at his cuff links, "Yes."

Wilby eyed him curiously, "Why did you come?"

"Prefects need to be here to stop inappropriate behaviour," the Head Boy grumbled. "I wasn't going to come anyway, but Quentin convinced me. He said I needed to 'have fun,' whatever that means."