Normally, any insinuation of a black and hairy tongue might paint a picture of sickness and rot, suggesting a much-needed visit to the orthodontist...or in a worst case scenario, the morgue.

In this case however, The Black Hairy Tongues were a quite infamous wizarding band that had settled in for an after-hours show in the representable Zermatt Peak Lodge.

Their lead singer, Moldy Medusa, was the penultimate reasoning behind the name - an atypically domesticated hag who flashed tarry teeth and waist length hair riddled with twigs and random forest debris.

Two pure white orbs swirled terrifyingly in her eye sockets, framed by green wrinkled skin stretched tight to the skull. Frayed robes at her ankles dangerously wept near electronic equipment, dripping as if she had just crawled straight out of a steaming, slimy bog.

In fact the Black Hairy Tongues were a sensation worldwide due to Moldy's domicile ability to hold gigs without reacting like a cannibalistic zombie against the audience.

While all of the raggedy lyrics were shouted in cryptic haggish, witches and wizards pooled for ardent headbanging and rabid cheering nonetheless.

Back in the party at now half past one in the morning, Draco had elected to antisocially hover around the entrance to the sunken seating node with a silent snarl directed at the grotesque rioting.

And although his facial expression might suggest otherwise, deep down he was in fact in quite a dapper mood that evening.

In the span of four short months he'd swooned his dream girl into romantic reciprocation, convinced her ferocious father of his honorable intentions, finally taken her to the Yule ball, and proposed successfully.

Not to mention bedded their precious courtly diamond more times than he could count.

As the old saying goes; ain't no rest for the wicked. And when it came to the matter of Audette...Draco was prepared to be downright diabolical.

Now to his satisfaction her finger actively glittered with an ancient Malfoy heirloom, effectively signifying his courtly possession of her hand in coming marriage - a magical bind of which only death could terminate.

He was waiting patiently as it was, so that Audette might shuffle around her group of friends affording sad hugs whilst expressing that she was bereaved to be missing out on the first month of the coming winter semester.

He overheard her shouting into Cosmos' poor ear as she hugged him passionately goodbye, "I miss you dreadfully already, I'm sure my heart is shattering!"

Guy drawled back to her, "Oh don't you smooch at me. Perhaps I'll pester poppa Z to spare some sickles for a dome visit - that musty old crank ball."

Guy's grandfather - Ziggy Cosmos - had earned himself a trademark collectable wizarding card for the presumptuous service of uncovering the ability to alter spell casting colours.

This seemingly useless discovery had paid off as a manipulative tactic during the second world war, and had brought upon Ziggy sporadic wealth and mild limelight for a short stint lasting from 1940 until 1943, when fate wickedly struck in the form of self-destruction.

As the above ground exploded left and right with military activity, buried within his ramshackle laboratory below London Ziggy had accidentally cast a charm into a mirror which then boomeranged back into his beardy face.

This misfortunate incident had rendered Ziggy's memory with the condensed lifespan of fifty or so short minutes, much like that of a rat - not to mention his wispy beard constantly changed colours every few seconds like a pulsing rainbow.

And much like a rat he now lived full time in a high security, long-term care ward within St. Mungo's, gurgling his way through old age whilst perching upon a mountain of accumulated gold.

The only issue laid in convincing him to sign off for Guy's allowance requests before poppa Z's memory reset and he grew incredibly suspicious...and sometimes unforgivably violent upon realizing that his nuisance grandson was employing metamorphmagus abilities to impersonate Ziggy's long dead mother.

In fact Ziggy was ill-mannered ninety-nine of the time, memory loss aside. When Guy was only nine years old in 1989, the staff had all but dismissed Ziggy Cosmos as being a braindead menace, when he miraculously managed to stage an epic flee that totaled over a thousand galleons worth of infrastructural damage.

That dry Monday morning he had stood in the middle of group therapy and snapped off a chair leg, then convinced the shoddy wood to act as an imprecise wand, going on to produce hospital-wide explosions like some run of the muck demented spray can.

The sole reason he had not managed to reach physical freedom was in large part due to the brand new plate glass that had been installed within the ground floor emergency bay that morning.

Before the motion sensor could even be activated - and in possibly the worst timing imaginable - Ziggy Cosmos in all his instigated pandemonium had gone on to smash his face on what felt like an invisible barrier holding him back from the final steps of escape.

Two unsightly photographs had made their way into the papers from stone goblins built into the walls for observatory purposes; one image from the front depicting his flattened face on the glass, the other from the back depicting his scrawny hairy bum poking out from an untethered hospital gown.
If Guy had inherited anyone's quirky genetics, it was certainly his grandfather's.

Audette flattened her hands on both sides of his face, her fairy voice straining to outduel the sonorous band, "You know Montgomery stopped charging you admission ages ago when you kept impersonating him to get through the doors. Just promise me you'll come? Promise Cozzington?"

"Yeah, yeah, you sprig of absolute nightshade. Toss a hot toddy on the docket and you've got yourself a deal..." Guy sighed heavily before his bleary, lavender eyes shot to the side in curiosity.

His voice suddenly dropped in awe, "Sweet Merlin, what's aflame under Parkinson's skirt?"

The sound of Pansy's agitated high heels approaching rapidly brought about the stiff gaze of all in confusion.

The usually spotless girl was covered in multi-colored glitter from the celebratory canons, actively stomping into the luxurious carpeting as if she were the type of wicked witch found in a Roald Dahl universe hoping to catch a scampering rat below her stabbing high heels.

She blundered down the shallow treads leading into the social node and rapidly made to assault an innocently apathetic Draco as if he'd just labelled her nan a minging trollope.

Black nails latched onto his goblet aggressively, and in a matter of seconds he was whisked out of pensive enchantment and into a whirlwind of shouting and insults, "You idiot! I've been all about searching for your incompetent arse! Where have you been?"

His expression contorted in confused outrage as to why his whereabouts were suddenly Pansy Parkinson's concern, booz dribbling all over his pricey loafers as they began battling for the cup, "What's the meaning of this terrorist attack? Greedy cutpurse, get your own!"

Even the hag's blaring gargle in the background failed to mute Pansy's panicked cries as she fought with the rather tipsy blond for the drink in his veiny clasp, "Put it down, put it the fuck down."

A portion of the vile liquid splashed into one of his dreamy blue eyes and yet she continued to brave yelling at the tempestuous boy, "Stop drinking this waste Malfoy! Haven't you figured out what they've put into that cauldron yet?"

"You'll be going into that cauldron next if you keep it up. Let go, you sparkly psychopath," Draco growled, yanking her completely off balance with the advantage of having hold of the handle.

The hysterical struggle went on between them rather as a matter of stubborn principle given that there must have been but a decimal puddle left in that goblet, until Draco's patience ran just as dry and he viciously tossed the degraded cup off to the side.

Amused onlookers began to giggle in low tones at the madness.

Guy burped nonchalantly amongst the observing souls, "I warned you all there's boogers in there. Dip my left fuzzy nut in wax if I'm wrong."

Pansy's potent gaze appeared positively berserk under the disco ball lighting, tracing back and forth on Draco's reddened eyes, "You have to leave, right now, Malfoy! Take Bellarose out of here!"

As if on cue the current excuse for a rock song ended, and Moldy Medusa paused to hideously suck back raw blood out of an upside down human skull - straight through the bifurcating eye sockets of whatever unfortunate soul had ended up as a skeletal goblet.

Draco's drunken voice suddenly boomed in the temporary quietude, wiping potion from his cheeks in prideful frustration, "You've gone as crackers as that termagant on the stage if you think I'll be pissing off at your unruly command without a fraction of explanation."

Brown eyes wider than Audette had ever seen them, Pansy feverishly grabbed ahold his crispy white dress shirt with both hands, shaking his skull on his spine like a flimsy clover in the wind. White bangs flopped in fluffy delight over his forehead as she begged for his attention, "This is a trap. Don't you see-"

"Well, well, well, you were right Pucey - she did lead us straight to them," Cassius Warrington's sly voice whorled across the lounge, followed by a symphony of slow golf clapping.

There, at the top of the stout stairs leading to the recessed amenity, stood a thick cluster of antagonistic Slytherin boys. Each poorly bothered to mask their primed weaponry save for Goyle and Crabbe, who were drifting around behind like a pair of flightless albatrosses staring at the ceiling.

The mob had materialized like a scene straight out of the Great Gatsby; in which a slew of elaborate gangsters darned in dapper designer suits, bow ties, and pristine spats suddenly arrived with wiry telephone voices, meaning to collect some overdue payment in a derelict underground.

Draco shoved Pansy harshly away from him, scanning the looming brigade in heightened suspicion, "What the fuck is this now?"

Cassius tilted his head at the forefront of the sniveling cavalry, "Oh relax, Malfoy, you're so incredibly tense these days. Ran out on us with no farewell - not very polite to do to your mates. Do honor our association by returning to the smoking parlor, and why don't you bring the girls this time?"

Audette looked to Draco's side profile with concentrated worry in her verdant expression, and through his keen peripherals he could see her bare chest jutting nervously.

For her, it must have felt damn near impossible not to drown in trepidation under that sea of menacing jeers barricading them from reaching the departing fireplace portal.

"Come here, Audette," he protectively shot out a firm hand behind his back for her to take, of which she quickly interlaced her clammy fingers between his.

Draco spoke in a pitch-black tone, tugging her further against him so that her nose was buried in his shoulder, "Absolutely not. My fiancée has a very busy agenda on the morrow, and escorting her home happens to be a unique responsibility of mine."

When his shoe met the first tread upwards in an effort to evade the obvious quagmire, Cassius took the opportunity to lower his wand dangerously between Draco's eyes, "Ah ah, not so fast - we understand quite well that your smitten kitten requires round the clock chaperoning."

"Then you won't waste another second of my limited time to adequately chaperone Lord Bellarose's daughter. Might I remind you of who we are dealing with," Draco barked back tersely.

The older boy smirked in drooping sarcasm, "Just a quick night cap, to clear up a few...unsightly discrepancies...tied to your name, Malfoy. Bellarose can wait thirty minutes longer, surely."

Graham Montague tisked mockingly at the other snickering boys, "Thirty minutes longer and the Bellarose's won't want anything to do with the bloke, especially not this precocious little beasty."

Draco reacted with caustic insecurity towards whatever was being suggested, "Watch your wagging tongue, Montague, before I rip it out and strangle you with it."

His biting blue eyes returned to Warrington, heart now ramming like a coal engine on a train, "You animals couldn't have cleared up this mysterious stumper hours ago?"

While he might've been feigning a calm annoyance, Draco's jugular had begun to pulse wickedly in his neck like a garden hose on full blast. Surely a mutiny had begun to unravel. Yet the extent of the coming damage or what had spurned the action remained a total mystery.

Cassius popped his eyebrows in mocking innocence, refusing to lower his obstructing wand, "As previously stated, you disappeared before we had the chance."

That hardly seemed likely, as they all had been in that parlor for quite a stint with Draco, provided with ample opportunity to bring up any "unsightly discrepancies."

Instead, it seemed like the supposed guild meeting earlier on had been centered around mild and subservient concerns. The topics had been so boorish and unintelligent to the point that he had understandably left minutes before midnight to seek out his sentimental fiancée on New Year's Eve, who probably would have thrown a total strop if he hadn't.

The freaky smile on their host's face suggested that by means of careful design, the group of confronting men had in fact purposefully waited to corner their Guild Master until that very hour; when he was feverishly inebriated by whatever had gone into that cauldron.

Draco cleared his throat, now sensing a spiky rock forming in the pit of his stomach, "I'll play into whatever caitiff consort you miscreants have in mind...the girls however, would only serve as a redundant set of inanimate decorations."

He stood there crossing his metaphorically spindly fingers that he might be able to face this scheduled nightmare without Audette present.

He'd only just perfected his relationship with the mercurial girl who tended to react with explosive jealousy and rage at even the smallest of infractions on his part; the last thing he needed was a vehement betrothed weeks before their highly publicized engagement party.

"Noooo, nooo, nooo," a quite embittered Adrian Pucey hummed, shoving haphazardly between Cassius and Montague.

He looked positively mental in that moment, brandishing a marinating bruise on his forehead from the angered barista skeleton that Draco had set carelessly upon him.

Spittle flew from his mouth as he repeatedly jabbed his wand mid-air like a child assaulting an elevator button panel, landing hatefully on each occupant of the seating area, "All of these fucking wenches are coming. Every...last...one of them; even that ruptured rainbow, Cosmos."

"I dare say..." Guy hissed injuriously, straightening his splendidly sequined jacket in a huff, "Best cross your dirty dicks I don't release my scorpion farm on you lot in the dead of night. I just might feel frenzied to do so in the new year."

Having arrived at the conclusion that fifteen monsters with wands massively outweighed him even on his best dueling day, Draco carefully reached back to place a hand at the base of Audette's spine, guiding her in front of him up the narrow treads, "Very well - let's get this mummer's farce over with."

As they were paraded through the lounge Draco's mind evolved into a despairing black hole, theory after theory arriving and disappearing with regard to exactly which unsightly discrepancies he was about to be put on the chopping block for.

Regrettably, there were simply far too many unsightly discrepancies in his track record to even count, and without any further hints he was at a total loss to prepare himself.

The previously forbidden smoking parlor was packed to the brim with manly sorts of stumpy furniture; ritzy leather arm chairs and rouge recliners, low oak tables, bottle carts on rickety wheels, and a scintillating freckling of crystal decanters filled with questionably expensive substances.

The acrid scent of dusty hardwood, oxhide and musty cigars assaulted one's olfactory senses immediately, signaling if only to the blind that they had stumbled upon a setting dominated by overzealous menfolk who thought of themselves as important.

Naturally, a singular source of scarcely habitable brightness emanated from the crinkling stone-framed fireplace, paired weakly by an abundance of impractical trifurcating candelabras dotting the darkly papered walls.

Upon re-entering the pungent space it was quite a shocker to discover that a number of familiar girls were suddenly preoccupying the outer rims of the amphitheatrical furniture, causing Draco to just about halt in his tracks as he took inventory, eyes widening uncomfortably.

Oh no...

He'd been superficially involved with each of the thirty or so witches from various designations scattered in a confrontational semi-circle, all exchanging keen whispers and glances in his direction.

Among the participating vixens was the Beauxbatons girl who still bore a tattoo of Draco's signature upon her chest, and Daphne Greengrass' destructive little sister Astoria with a positively satanic grin plastered on her face.

Sat next to her was the troublesome female that had been effectively cauterized in the hallway less than an hour prior by Audette; one Poppy Selwyn.

Before Draco could drop his eyes in practiced avoidance he noticed that the girl's arm was now bandaged top to bottom, and her rancorous orbs were trailing resentfully after her attacker, leaning over to hush something inimical to Astoria who laughed obnoxiously.

He'd been foolishly flirting with both females behind Audette's back, mainly due to deeply rooted insecurity and a need to spite her for kissing Nott, yet no such explanation would abscond him of the crimes committed.

As they were directed ahead by jabbing wands, all of the girl's reverent gazes appeared to stick to Audette like hot glue, conveying some sort of coded message only females were partial to.

She nervously began to twist her serpentine engagement ring in a loop around her finger, and soon her injured orbs dug into his side profile, "Draco, this looks...this looks unbelievably condemning. What am I to make of this congregation?"

His heart cracked at the look of hopeful trust in her dewy eyes. They had come so far over the holiday only for it all to come crashing down, again.

And predictably it was his fault, again.

Even though he might retch from the stress Draco did absolutely everything in his power to remain speechless and avoidant. He felt inexplicably tempted to come clean to her on the spot instead of inventing more lies...but that was not necessarily in his favor either.

Unsightly discrepancies...Unsightly discrepancies...

The whole entire room was filled with unsightly discrepancies in high heels; it wouldn't take a genius to put two and two together.

It was the moment he spotted Theodore Nott grinning victoriously at him from the heart of the room that the dragnet grew crystal clear, and Draco's parasympathetic nervous system washed head to toe with a freezing cold dread.

In fact, the vibrant onset of alarm was comparable to those horrendous nights when his attendance was unforeseeably requested in the Malfoy estate dining hall - knowing full-well that the dark lord loomed in wait, growling and bloodthirsty.

"Well, well, well, look what the fucking Niffler dragged in," Theodore mockingly mirrored Draco's greeting in Monaco that very first fateful night of his enrollment into Excetra, waving a black glove at the couch directly across from him, "Have a seat - afterall, you are the shiny guest of honor tonight, Malfoy."

The woeful boy's revenge had apparently only just begun with that deadly Christmas morning attack, when he had sent his priceless painted owl to seriously maim.

Ain't no rest for the wicked indeed.

Clearly he had been busy gathering evidence for a New Year's Eve annihilation, scheming to destroy Draco commencing by dethroning his position in the guild and exposing his scandalous affairs to Audette.

How exactly the entire guild had been convinced to turn against their appointed master remained bouncing around in Draco's foggy brain as he and Audette sat stiffly in a rather superannuated loveseat with a creaky cherry skeleton.

But one thing was for certain; that was, like every project Theodore Nott took on, he had been meticulous and thorough throughout.

Even the Russian champion whom Draco had publicly cheated with had been invited back and was conveniently jeering from one of the stately Chesterfield couches, twirling around her wand in a tight red dress. Her features were as cold as ice yet alive with blithe vindictiveness, "Watch out Draco Malfoy, I might just sexually assault you wit' my eyes alone."

This garnished a flood of guffawing from the boys who had already been judging Draco for months for the outlandish claim.

Draco remained cocky as all hell, sneering defensively at the harem of collected women as if he hadn't just caught his bony ankle in a razor sharp bear trap, "Wrong room ladies, the Convention For Daft Cows and Dimwits is hosting next door."

Boys in surrounding chairs laughed again, one of them calling out, "Oh come about Malfoy, this is clearly the Convention for Daft Cows and Dimwits."

Clearly.

Draco cracked his neck impatiently and glared at the idiots he was forced to share oxygen with, honing in on the grand architect behind the ambush.

His newly formed arch nemesis' unblinkingly conniving smile was really beginning to crawl under his skin, "And look who's bared his ugly mug at the incorrect hour for a New Year's party - if it isn't everyone's favorite discount Galileo. That busted pile of junk hanging from your neck isn't doing you any good afterall."

Theo popped one eyebrow in reserved silence, seeing that only four people in the room knew about the time turner under his dress shirt; himself, Draco, Audette, and strangely enough Guy Cosmos who was probably about to soil his glittery pants from the distressed frown presenting on his birdy features.

Whatever default puritan aristocrat Theodore Nott had been before had apparently deceased the night of the Yule Ball, that angelic hue which had followed him around for years entirely vanished.

By nature his gaze had always presented somewhat sullen and macabre - simply as an organic consequence of the thickness of his eyebrows and a forever sharp intelligent flicker that most found to be unsettling.

But now a new ingredient had been added; his sailor blue eyes had taken on a venomous midnight tinge, ringed with dark shadows from months of sleepless nights and emotional fatigue.

In fact, he might've passed for a world class hitman, darned in all black instead of his classically preferred navy tones. Dark dragonhide gloves now governed his hands, supplanting a mysterious impression that he meant to leave no fingerprints behind whatever crime was actively brewing in that parlor.

Seeing him there, so exotically poisoned, was akin to spotting Santa Clause sunbathing in Hawaii, and Audette's particular preoccupation with her ex-boyfriend's commanding presence did not go unheeded by her new platinum-haired loverboy.

If she failed to blink soon her eyes were bound to dry out like prunes in her skull - it was either that, or Draco would jealously yank them out himself.

He found himself scowling in virulent contempt of his sweetheart's shifting focus, wrapping his arm around her shoulder as a tactile reminder of his presence. She glanced at him only briefly, before Draco shot his pointy nose back across the way, "Didn't peg you for much of a socialite, Nott."

Theodore shrugged nonchalantly, "You'll find that some opportunities are best not misplaced, Malfoy."

He pressed his lips together as his scrutinizing attention inevitably landed upon Audette's racy gown and glinting engagement ring, "Lady Bellarose, I see from that anfractuous ring that you have been dabbling in irreversible decisions. I imagine pitying you, however you have dug your own grave and fashioned yourself a coffin to top it all off. Perhaps you'll get lucky at the end of this...should they choose to tie a string around your finger."

A strangled gasp escaped as she wiped at rapidly brimming tears, "My decisions, whether permanent or fleeting, are no longer your concern."

His Italian lilt now translated potently sour, "Hmm, thank goodness for that or I might find myself undeniably inconvenienced. Regardless, I can't bare to linger idly by and allow this...divorce from reality to persist any longer. Enough damage has already transpired."

"Oh Teddy, don't do this, not like this," Audette burst into full-blown waterworks, directing her flaming face to her lap where tears began to speckle her beautiful dress in perfectly round dripping dots.

She had clearly forgotten that underneath all of that aptitude, propriety and formal attire laid a slimy commonplace Slytherin; prideful, and capable of unfathomable barbarism.

Draco tugged her closer but she quickly closed up her fist and slammed it off of his knee multiple times to wordlessly indicate that she would rather jump off a cliff than receive his support in that moment.

Fair enough. 

He leaned back in misery as the irritating sound of Guy's whimpering next to the fireplace contaminated the otherwise uncomfortable silence - anchored there by the heavy hand of Adrian Pucey.

Many of the cruel boys crumpled into chuckles as Audette scrunched creamy silk into an unnatural ziggurat of fabric in her lap, her stunning face half hidden behind a wall of cascading waves. And while she had yet to ultimately push off Draco's affectionate arm, he could already sense her throbbing heart pulling far, far away.

He tangled his sweaty fingers in fleecy aureate locks that were spiraling down her bare back in delightful twists that smelled just like a flowering garden. 

Perhaps, if he kept his wits about him, perhaps he'd be able to lie his way out of the situation without losing her priceless devotion altogether.

It was circumstantial evidence at best; the words of a bunch of floozies over his, right?

Nott's epic plan to paint him as a hound would fail, and then Draco truly would put an end to the unwise sneaking about, once and for all...even though he'd likely used up all of his chances to do so in the first place.

In fact he was now mentally praying in his thick skull for another undeserved opportunity to be a grade A fiancé cracking on. Please Merlin...if I escape unscathed from this run in, I promise never to glance at another female again in my entire life - even the paintings in Hogwarts if she so demands it...

Swallowing heavily, he prepared to fight for everything he had worked so hard to accumulate in the prior months, "I aught to commend our newest trainee supervillain. In one short of week of pure lunacy you've elevated from poisoning a scratching bird, to poisoning an entire New Year's party. Tech-grade mixology skills - the taste really left something to be desired."

Theodore leered sideways at Cassius whom he seemed to have formed a bizarre and unpredictable comradery with, "Equally as effective regardless."

Draco snorted in discontentment of the jarring alliance, "Genius, and yet we are all still breathing. What will your next Machiavellian trick be boys, killer gourds? Flaming bog rolls?"

"I'm so glad you asked that, Malfoy," Theo stood, steepling his tight black gloves in playful rigmarole, "The monopoly is over, you see, because for far too long you've been playing into a hot handed fallacy at all of our expenses. And we've decided that our next trick...will be to ensure total transparency."

He waved an arm around the assembled stakeholders tenanting the exuberant space, each nodding in slow agreement, "As our designated guild master, buttressing our faith in your reputation should pose as no matter of contention. Unless you have something to hide, that is."

"Oh really, and how do you lot plan to press me dry for all of my confidential tidings?" Draco quipped back in consternation, grumbling at the many traitorous faces.

Only Greggory Goyle and Vincent Crabbe had their heads bent to the carpeting in faithful solemnity. Blaise Zabini represented the third potential individual who seemed to be disassociating, hiding out by a stack of books in the dimmest corner.

"I have a striking impression that that potent course of veritaserum pumping through all of your veins will warrant sufficient answers," Theo winked triumphantly, "And as you can see from our lovely female representation tonight, we've concluded that you've been living a rather polarized secret life, Malfoy."

Click.

That frothing cast iron cauldron in the lounge zoomed into his mental focus.

The classified ingredient within those elongated white vapors curling down the side had been veritasium - tasteless, odorless, nevertheless often leaving a tract of distinct silver shimmer if one knew any better.

If this was true, then Draco was in big, big, trouble, because every female prisoner including himself had consumed a fair volume of the nasty sludge, and lying nor loyalty was no longer a strategy to be depended upon.

Audette leaned forward in total dejection, burying her pretty face in both hands, "Merlin on a broom, both of you are such monsters. I can't bare to hear a drop of it."

"I mean seriously, it's bloody New Year's Eve," Guy also chirped up in a hoarse strangle, stomping his shoe childishly, "You Slytherin menfolk age like fecking tap water. Antagonistic bunch of bigots grow worse every year."

Theodore snarled, twisting on the spot to glare at Guy whom he had always detested on a cellular level, "Put a sock in it Cosmos - you might consider the role you've played in devastating Audette's life."

"She's happy! She's bloody happy with Malfoy, is that so hard for you to accept?" Guy screamed back in a pitch, his teary eyes wide and defensive.

He clapped his hands slowly to emphasize his point, spraying light all over the room from his many shiny rings, "They. Are. Engaged, meaning airing out everyone's dirty laundry in this setting isn't going to bust them up this time."

Theodore responded with a cool hum, "So you would rather promote oblivious happiness than tell your best friend hard truths? She deserves to know the true character that lies behind the man she's marrying."

Back and forth they went, fully derailing from Draco who started to consider escaping during Cosmos' fussy distraction.

Guy's backlash was now feral without sensibility, pointing a finger in Theo's face bravely, "Oh don't you pretend to be a saint, mysteriously running off to Monaco all summer while she was strung up with a shattered heart. You want to talk character - I know what you are, Nott, I know what you all are."

Theo issued a deadly warning that apparently delivered, "Oh is that so? One might think that would be cause for keeping your sticky trap shut, considering the unforgiving nature of this room's occupants." 

As Guy finally fell quiet with a heavy frown, Draco realized it was now or never.

However when he reached for his wand it was only to find that Graham Montague had crept up behind the couch to jam his own into Draco's skull, breathing nasty breath down his collar, "Easy there, pretty boy. Until we're good and satisfied that your stories are sorted, you're staying put."

"Off with his head already," Adrian Pucey eagerly jumped down from where he'd been swinging his legs off the fireplace mantle, sending both his clamped victims - Guy and Pansy - tripping in either direction, "You uh, you miss bagging other birds, Malfoy, after settling down with this antiquated ball and chain?"

Audette loudly caught her breath and shot her runny attention to Draco, who was now sweating and swallowing like a labrador who'd inhaled a bar of toxic chocolate with absolute insolence.

"It's impossible to say that I do," he chose his words manipulatively in the split second his affected brain allowed minute control. 

Marcus Flint broke down into hysterics in his chair, "Impossible to say? I don't believe my ears; Sally Sage over here who's afraid to show her bloody ankles is coming out on top? The math ain't adding up, mate, not after what you've been on about."

To his mortification Draco's eyes began to glisten and flutter, fighting to select divertive yet authentic answers. He was cornered and the room was uncomfortably silent, all eyes burning into him. 

Now that he was aware of it, the veritaserum suddenly felt like an alien parasite clinging to his brain, threatening to ruin his perfectly constructed world, "My past experiences pale in comparison to my experiences with Bellarose, that is the bottom line. And this obsession with my private affairs is beginning to present as entirely bizarre."

He was beating around the bush pathetically, putting off the inevitable. Regret bloomed in his heart like a spreading cancer, and the heartbreak he'd undergone time and time again was already creeping back at the thought of how Audette would take it all.

She might be bound to him forever, but that did not mean the arranged marriage was guaranteed to be meaningful between them if forgiveness was out of the picture. 

The group of boys booed, seeming to realize that even though they had ensured Draco was sufficiently drunk and exposed to the truth serum, he was somehow finding ways to delicately outwit them with paraphrasing alone.

"What's entirely bizarre is your nancy arse roaming around for years spewing piping hot porkies right to our faces," Warrington fumed impatiently, his knuckles growing white hot as he gripped a crystal chalice with the promise to smash it off of someone's misfortunate skull.

"-Easy, easy, one move at a time, gentlemen, checkmate is a delicate process," Theodore calmed the riled crowd with a sharp whistle, "Let us not forget, that more than one individual has something to say about these supposed past experiences, and recall that direct questioning works best in this supervention."

"For primary example," he spun on the spot and tilted his lethal gaze straight at Pansy, who reacted like she'd rather hurl herself into the blazing fire at her heels than take on the limelight, "Parkinson, have you ever had sex with Draco Lucius Malfoy?"

Pansy was his first, everyone knew of that tale.

"No, I've never done anything sexual with Malfoy, we're only friends," her chin trembled as she hid behind her arcuate bob, whispering, "I'm sorry Malfoy, I can't...I can't fight it..."

"Real slick Parkinson," Draco cursed in unreasonable horror. 

A few rounds of shocked inhales could be heard throughout the field of spectators, followed shortly by a flood of giggling and mumbling gossip. 

Without hesitation, Theo smirked crookedly and pointed a finger at Daphne Greengrass next, "Going in order - Greengrass, same question. Have you ever been involved with Malfoy between the sheets? Surely, one of these preposterous claims bares merit."

She shook her head, glancing at Draco guiltily, "No, not once."

"Poppycock and pigswill," Guy's brushed eyebrows collided like two bullet trains, squinting around in disbelief.

Nott shoved his hands in his pockets and kicked at the carpet, the pep in his voice hinting that he was superbly enjoying the unfolding devastation, "Then do pray tell Greengrass, precisely why you have been parading around for years misleading your peers?"

He glanced up at her auspiciously, and the normally cool girl commenced melting on the spot like an ice cream cone.

"Malfoy paid us to lie about hooking up with him, and then swear to keep our words. And I...I haven't the foggiest which stories are true or false, or why it was even necessary," Daphne practically choked out the words against her will, before leaping from her chair and bolting out the room.

It wasn't long before Pansy attempted the same escape in a chicken-hearted stroke that miraculously paid off. Slytherin goons stepped aside like a parting sea, evidently having discerned that the girls purposes had expired with the unsavory confessions.

Anastasia burst out laughing in her dark and alluring Durmstrang tone, producing a mocking tisk with her tongue, "'ow disappointing."

By the time Theodore had commandingly unveiled that at least ten more Hogwarts girls had been bribed to fib in similar regard, Draco was convinced his body had gradually transformed into solid granite like a vampire caught slumbering upright in the rising sun.

His ears wrung with the consistent, barraging sounds of teasing and laughing emanating in his direction, like a radio landing on screeching channels that pierced the listener's brain over and over.

Each confession set off another round of boyish fireworks in the room, and there was nothing he could do but block it out by crisscrossing his silvery eyes on the disgustingly expensive Persian rug below his shoes, which for it's price seriously left something to be desired.

As the veritaserum would suggest without fault, it was all pitifully true.

The septic string of hypocrisy had begun in his fifth year as a parched cry for Audette's attention following the unsuccessful events of his fifteenth birthday, assuming prematurely that she might view experience as intriguing, or at a minimum it might magically serve to make the girl he pined after in such destitution terribly jealous.

It was an insane line of thinking really, trading his father's limitless galleons for the gift of PG rated gab.

Unsurprisingly, the rumors of his freshly painted cheeky run-ins only served to balloon the preppy princess' recoil from him, and by the time Draco recognized that impeccability was her top priority, well...repair was all but a forgotten concept.

Another failed effort, another judgmental emerald sneer from across the classroom....

However the opposite effect had settled amongst their male peers - most notably the older ones who were verifiably difficult to impress.

And so - as any fifteen year old boy might do in such a circumstance - instead of correcting the pernicious web of deceit when it was but a few strands in circumference, Draco had foolishly decided to bask in the glory. 

After feeding his disinformation demons for years until it was holy out of hand, he'd ended up panting nervously in his bed the night he and Audette had miraculously commenced dating. 

Holding the virtuous girl in his arms, all wrapped up in his sweater with a smile on her features, he'd solemnly wondered how on Earth he was meant to make sense of the fervent scuttlebutt that had effectively buried him alive by then.

It was Blaise Zabini whom Draco chose to trust all along with his biggest secret, the sole friend in the group who seemed to be less inclined to speak let alone partake in fruitless gossip.

His eyes darted to the statuesque spirit in the shadows, who's stony expression was anything but readable. Evidently, he had informed the others of the outstanding social scandal, which would wholly explain the mutiny at hand.

Theo noticed Draco's gaze and very smugly crossed his arms, "That's right, Malfoy."

Draco blew up at Blaise in a jolting fit of anger, barely ignoring a rocketing pain in his skull from a secondary wand administered to hold him awkwardly in place, "So you've betrayed me too, you treasonous bastard!" 

Blaise pushed off of the wall coolly, "Yeah, I told him. Because you took it too far with the cabinet, Malfoy. You took everything from Nott - you didn't have to fuck with his family on top of it. This evens the field."

Then he was gone, weaving out of the room with his signature willowy grace.

Audette's sugary little voice surprised all of them when she broke her extended silence, bottom lip trembling as she glanced between their faces, "And what precisely is this? Enough of the balderdash, you vile, vile boys." 

The apocalyptic moment had come.

Theodore sighed heavily and pointed his elaborate wand straight at Draco's wincing expression, "Zabini informed me that your perverted fiancé's recorded associations are nothing but a flimsy house of cards. It turns out there isn't a genuine building material aside from stock paper."

When Audette still appeared to be quixotically puzzled by the analogy, Graham Montague laughed, drawing her breathtaking doe eyes over Draco's head, "Obvious isn't it, love? He's as smaragdine as those orbs of thine. He's Jack who never found the magic bean."

"A cherry prick!" Adrian cried forthright with a hand cupped partially over his mouth to emulate a megaphone.

Then the classic English chanting began in predictable form, fists smashing off of wooden surfaces rhythmically, "Cher-ry prick! Cher-ry prick! Cher-ry prick!"

Finally a light bulb seemed to flare in her brain under the bombarding weight of the boisterous chaos.

"Is that true?" Audette asked Draco in a breathy voice, locking confrontational gazes with him on the tiny settee.

This...this happened to be the most humiliating moment of all for him, overwhelmed by the radiating atheism in her concentrated attention. He nodded in defeat, tears dripping down his cheeks as he blinked through the horror, "Yes."

A slow round of haunting clapping from the observing men erupted like a tone deaf orchestra. 

"That'll be fifty galleons, Montague! Pay up, you slimy git," Adrian demanded, lighting a cigar in celebration by the dwindling fire.

The shell shock on Audette's features was wholly unsettling, sat beside him shaking her head in disbelief. 

Then to Draco's shivering terror her mood evolved from gobsmacked to furious at the speed of lightning, shouting at him over the raucous room, "Why do you feel the need to manipulate every single aspect of your life? You've had all of these girls spreading rumors on your account, about-about putrid acts..."

"Listen to me, I can explain," Draco reached for her in a panic but the flawless beauty leaned strategically away with her wrists upright in defense, her features contorting in growing resentment.

She turned away from him with her hands over her face, shaking and groaning in frustration, "Ohhh I could just kill you with a dull spoon right this instant. All of this endless scheming, it's positively pathological. I can't trust you as far as I can toss a warty toad."

"I did try to tell you...multiple times..." Draco grasped weakly at his collar, feeling as though he must surely be suffocating from an active gas leak as his sentencing kept petering away. Perhaps an invisible person had come along to choke him without any motivation other than to ensure explaining himself became ten times harder.

In fact, to make things one-hundred times harder was the fact that she would be spending an entire month in silence for her critical animagus transformation, commencing in a matter of hours, far away from the school he would be expected to attend nearly every single day of January. 

With this isolation in mind, Nott couldn't have timed their vindictive unraveling better.

She seemed to reach her limit then, blasting to a stance to plant both tiny hands on Theodore, shoving him backwards at the center of the crowding buffoons, "Are you good and satisfied? Have you proven what you came here to prove? Because as far as I can tell, all you've proven is that you are foul for arranging this entire affair!"

Theo didn't so much as blink, staring down at her dryly, "The best is still to come, little rose. I proved his innocence for the men in this room who have been deceived, and now, I'll prove he's guilty for your sake."

He boldly tapped the bottom of her chin right in front of Draco who was still trapped on the loveseat by an acupuncture of invasive wands, a soft smile oddly overtaking his expression, "Deep breaths now, darling crab, deep breaths. Don't say I didn't warn you."

He marched across the room and halted next to Astoria and Poppy, nodding his head encouragingly for both of them to follow suite.

Fuck fuck fuck...

Draco was definitely set to pass out for round two, where more terrible things that he had committed absentmindedly would be dredged up - except these were the type of things that were very recent, and that Audette would certainly not be able to forgive.

Theodore stopped the two feisty teenage girls right in front of Draco's shiny shoes suggestively, "Remember Astoria and Poppy, Draco?"

"Obviously," he spat in trembling fury. 

He could see the outline of Audette's pearly dress swirling on the carpeting in his peripherals, stood there watching keenly with her arms crossed a mere meter from him. He could even hear her growling in a low, guttural sort of way; much like a cat that had spotted another strange feline having wandered into it's private territory. 

She was so close, and yet he couldn't bare to look up at the incredible female he had dared to wrong so horridly, feeling ill and boiling under her scrutiny. 

Astoria clapped her hands together giddily, turning to grin up at Theo behind her, "Ouu, let me ask him myself."

She stepped forward, judiciously biting her lower lip. It was much in the same manner she had done so the evening Audette had returned from the hospital wing, when Draco had made the angry mistake of falling for her tempting advances during a regrettable game of truth or dare, "Draco, Draco, oh Draco, do you also remember that time I gave you that zesty lap dance a few weeks ago?"

"I know you liked it," she winked at him and smiled around the room, showing off just how insidious the little brat was.

"Si ricordo," he replied in a tight tone, intelligently switching to Italian as a last ditch effort to save his relationship. Speaking in another language wasn't a recognized form of lying, and it would at least keep Audette from registering his answers in full.

Poppy didn't hesitate for her chance to return the favor of burning Audette, piping up like an irritating bird at five in the morning on a Saturday snooze in, "And what about that skinny dip bubble bath in the prefect's lavatory, with all of the Slytherin girls and the quidditch team? A few days before the Yule Ball? Did you mention that to your fiancée, Malfoy?" 

She leaned around Theodore to smile maliciously in Audette's direction, chewing at her fingernails disgustingly.

"Ovviamente non mi sono preso la briga di parlargliene," Draco bent forward and ran both hands deep into his long hair, willing himself not to pull it all out at once as he was forced to answer in some format of honesty. His heart was on fire and his blood had turned to pure acid in his veins which burned fierce agony, all because he was quite certain he'd landed himself the award for worst fiancé in history.

"He's cheating, he's not playing fair, make him answer in English, Theodore," the girls pouted dramatically.

Meanwhile Theodore Nott had started to laugh under his breath, "Oh don't worry about that ladies, tonight has demonstrated that he is in fact terrible at cheating. I tutored Bellarose in Italian, you see."

Oh Satan...how could he not have accounted for that very real possibility?

Draco's ears pulled back further yet with the sense that one of the ill-meaning boys was speaking directly to Audette, spewing false words of comfort on the sidelines, "Oh don't look so charred lovely, he did spend a good deal of time comparing your tits to theirs, and yours were the finest by a yard every time. Wouldn't even bother bringing up what the old dog had to say about your sensational fanny."

OH SATAN...

It had been a drunken bubble bath to celebrate their final game of the year ending in a victory, and there must have been over a dozen people in one gigantic tub. Yet the boys were choosing to frame Draco as if he'd been an absolute outlying rake about it.

Just when he was convinced the interrogation could not possibly get any worse, he was startled by an onslaught of scathing cold liquid being dumped directly over his head. He guiltily raised his stinging eyes, blinking as his bangs sopped and dripped with what stunk like pure vodka.

Audette said nothing, absolutely nothing, and it was perhaps the most dangerous she had ever looked in that flickering candlelight. She simply loomed there for the longest moment of his life with violent blackness in her eyes before flinging the emptied glass into the hearth and marching clean out of the room, holding her extravagant gown up with both hands, showing off her courtly upbringing at even the most unbecoming moments.

The last thing Draco recalled about that New Years Eve was Theodore Nott's satiated smirk hovering before him, and his final, sinister remark, "Now that's checkmate."