IX

Cassiopeia held herself a bit tighter under the covers. It was the day of the second task, and the girl had woken up with a terrible fever. Madam Pomfrey was in such a hurry she had only given the Malfoy girl the potion she should take and its instructions. She told her to sleep and that she would be back before she realised before running off to attend the 2nd task.

"Cassiopeia," she heard by her side through her tired brain, trying to fall back to sleep. "Cassie!"

Cassie ?

She opened her eyes just a tiny bit, finding George just in front of her.

"What?" she groaned, completely ignoring the nickname.

He pulled a chair, sitting carelessly by her side.

"I was looking for you all around," he whispered. "I heard a girl saying she saw Draco bringing you to here. What happened?"

"Black cat flu," Cassiopeia whined.

She usually had a very strong metabolism and was very surprised she had fallen sick. With two large groups from different countries living in the school, however, it was easy to see where this had come from.

"That sucks," he rested his chin on the bed. "You're losing all the fun."

"You too," she reminded him, frowning. "Why are you here?"

George shrugged.

"Draco is out there, your friend… Uh… What's her name? Something Rosier?"

"Eleanor. Eleanor Rosier."

He nodded.

"She's out there too," he shrugged. "And I imagined you would be alone, so I came here to see you."

Cassiopeia gave him a tiny smile.

"Thank you," she said, surprised by his gesture. "But you should be out there. You don't want to stay around. I'm sick, you may catch it."

George chuckled.

"Well, maybe I want to catch it," he gave her a wicked smile.

Cassiopeia rose her perfectly made eyebrows at him, completely shocked.

"George!"

"What?" he sat up, chuckling a bit at her expression. "Look, I'll be out of classes for a week, I won't need to compete with Ron for the food and I'll have you right here, which is the best part. I mean, it's a week of not needing to sneak around or going to the library all the time to have five minutes without risking having people gossiping around."

She just shook her head.

Cassiopeia's friendship with George was probably the biggest secret she'd kept outside of her family. She didn't know about the Weasleys, but if anyone in the Malfoy family even heard the two were close in any way she would be in huge trouble. So, almost every day they sneaked around to see one another for a couple of minutes before going back to their usual lives.

Most of the time, they shared stories about their lives. George's told tales about him and Fred and their inventions and adventures. They were always a way he could make her laugh without any reservation, and Cassiopeia told stories about her family – or the little she could tell of them – which gave him an insight of the type of life she actually lived.

Outside the trips and presents and things that money could buy, and even with Draco as her brother, she sounded like someone quite lonely and who wanted something more out of life. Not that Cassiopeia didn't like the money: she spoke of the trips and things she had in a way he could see it was big in her life. But hearing about her parents made him feel rather grateful his were how they were. Money could be something the Weasleys didn't have much of, but Molly was always loving and brutally honest with them, and Arthur was very affectionate and present in his and his siblings lives. To him, Lucius sounded a lot more like having a teacher at home, watching your every step, than a proper father.

Internally, he took a note about how he'd never be like that to his kids if he eventually became a parent.

"You really think that?" Cassiopeia whispered.

Not even Draco had said anything like that to her. The moment she had insisted for him to leave her and go watch the task, he turned on his heels, put his "Potter Sucks" button right over his heart and ran out with Crabbe and Goyle.

Nice brother, the one she had.

"I would never lie to you," he rolled his eyes. "Do I look like a Sly..."

He stopped in the middle of the word, biting his tongue.

"Sorry. It's the habit."

"It's okay," Cassiopeia shrugged. "We are, indeed, good liars."

He blushed not looking directly into her eyes.

"I mean… You know," Cassiopeia shrugged. "Slytherins are ambitious, we can do anything to get where we want."

She rested her head back on her pillow – which Eleanor had given Draco to bring into the infirmary from the dorm.

"Most of us aren't above lying."

He hesitated.

"Are you?"

Cassiopeia turned to George, her grey-blue eyes staring bluntly into his own.

"Once, I put a pimple potion in a girl's pumpkin juice because she copied from my test and then made everyone believed it was Eleanor."

His eyes widened, completely surprised. He didn't know she could be that cold.

"Really?"

She stared at him for a long moment, but then started laughing.

"No," Cassiopeia shook her head, making her messy white-blonde hair go everywhere. She hadn't put much effort into brushing it before leaving the dorm, just enough to make it look decent. "I wish I had, though. I wasn't that good with potions. But you believed me!"

He let out a nervous laugh, relaxing.

"You really got me with that one."

She just continued laughing until it became a giggle and died.

"But, yes, George. I can lie if I need."

He hesitated, playing with the sheets under in his fingertips.

"But I'll never lie to you," she decided. "Don't worry."

George looked at her with his lips parted open, surprised, and then gave her a smile.

"Thank you for that."