Chapter Text
When winter released its cruel grasp on the castle and spring trickled back into being, Pansy decided that Harriet needed a makeover.
“Nuh uh, I don’t want to hear any complaining. Mrs. Malfoy supplies you with such beautiful accessories, and you don’t use any of them! It’s my job as your future stylist and publicist to make sure you are always presented in the best light,” Pansy declared as she pushed Harriet down onto the chair in front of the vanity in the girls’ dorm. Harriet allowed it, if only because the dorm was empty and Pansy did have a better eye for fashion than her. It was not one of the subjects prioritised by her father.
She stared holes into the mirror as Pansy went through her jewelry collection, holding up jade and emeralds to compare to her eyes and pinning her hair in place with gold brooches. Pansy went through several different looks before settling on a gold necklace with an emerald charm and two gold hairclips on either side of her face. They shone from amongst her blood-colored hair.
Then Pansy began applying spells to her cheeks and eyes to add color. Harriet bore through it, thinking it important to keep Pansy happy and feeling important.
“Perfect, now you’re all set to impress Zabini!” Pansy gushed as she began fiddling with her own hair in the mirror. Harriet turned her sharp eyes to glare at Pansy. Blaise had not been part of the agreement.
“Don’t give me that look, I’ve seen how you’ve been watching him all year!” Pansy defended.
“I want to recruit him, not court him,” Harriet spat. Her father thought romance was a distracting waste of time, befitting only short-sighted idiots. Pansy’s obsession with romance and boys had never made sense to her, especially when Pansy periodically decided she was in love with Draco; those were always bad weeks.
“Of course you do,” Pansy sighed in disappointment. She understood Harriet’s opinions very well, considering how many times she had been subjected to her lectures.
Harriet turned back to the mirror, critically cataloguing all her flaws. Perhaps Blaise would be persuaded to join her more easily if she were prettier?
****
Hannah Abbot succumbed to loneliness on the first day of spring. Harriet had been monitoring her, waiting for the quiet girl to get sick of the silence of an empty dorm. It happened subtly, but between one day and the next, Hannah had joined them, studying in the library and asking Harriet for advice in Dark Arts class.
Harriet could only smirk to herself while talking to the girl: her plan had gone perfectly.
She happily wrote to tell Narcissa that the Abbots had been won.
****
“Harriet, did you see that?” Draco called from his broom. Harriet was sitting in the stands, waiting for Draco to tire of flying in circles.
“Impressive,” she called back flatly. Draco did not need more praise to inflate his ego. Pansy did enough of that when she fancied herself in love with him. Which she currently did, if the way she cheered from beside Harriet was any indication.
Draco was positive he would make Seeker next year, and Harriet was ready to severely injure the other players to make that happen, but she did not see the value in watching each practice. Flying was dreadfully boring when you weren’t the one on the broom.
Her father’s plans left little space for Quidditch, though. She had to stay focused.
****
Near the end of the Spring term, when all the students were restlessly watching the windows, waiting for summer to save them, Harriet received a letter.
A letter from her father.
It should not have shaken her up so much; daughters received letters from their fathers every day, and none of them cried about it. But she couldn’t help it as she stared at the letter in her hidden alcove on the sixth floor.
The tears were beneath her, and she would have to severely injure anyone who saw them, but she could not stop them from coming. Her father had gotten reports from her teachers about her year and was not satisfied with her progress. He was sending her to study under the Carrows all summer. That meant not seeing Narcissa until the following Yule break!
And Professor Carrow was cruel: he enjoyed utilizing the cruciatus curse as an encouragement for his students to succeed, no matter how proficient they were at Charms.
Harriet was sure she would be able to handle his teaching, but she missed Narcissa and her room and flying with Draco. And as grueling as Bellatrix’s sparring was, she did not use the cruciatus with the same fever as Carrow.
“Oh.”
The interruption startled Harriet, but she was even more surprised by who she found looking down at her.
“Go away,” she spat, patting around for her wand so she could curse Blaise Zabini for finding her at her weakest moment.
“Are you… Alright?” he asked hesitantly. It was the first time she had seen him look anything but bored or smirking. She glared at him.
“I’m fine.”
“Right. Cause everyone who is fine is crying in a hiding spot,” Blaise retorted. Harriet threw a lackluster curse in his direction, but he dodged easily. She gave up and buried her head in her arms. Surely, Blaise would scorn her unbecoming behavior and spread news of her tears around the school. It’s what she would do.
Her father would feed her to Nagini if he saw her curled up pathetically in front of this boy, but she had no energy to do anything about it.
“Would you like to know a secret?” Blaise asked after several moments filled only with her silent tears. She jerked her head up to stare at him incredulously.
That was the last thing she expected to hear from Blaise.
“What do you want for it?” she asked suspiciously. Secrets were valuable, as Narcissa would say, and should not be undertaken lightly. Blaise studied her, his face unreadable, but not bored.
“I want a secret in return,” Blaise stated. Harriet considered this. His rules were lax; he did not specify what the secret must be.
“Alright, what is your secret?” Harriet asked as she stood up. Her tears had rolled to a slow stop, and her dignity required her to be on the same level as the boy (well, almost; he was quite tall).
“Follow me.” Blaise turned and took long strides down the hall. She hesitated only a moment before following, just enough time to wipe her face of any remaining signs of weakness.
****
Harriet was not expecting the kitchens.
Blaise had led her through the castle until they reached one of the lowest levels, where a giant painting of a pear waited for them. The surprised disbelief of Blaise tickling the pear was immediately overshadowed by the ginormous kitchen before her.
Harriet had not had much cause to be in kitchens most of her life, but this was surely the grandest one she had ever set foot in. The space was made cozy by the number of elves dotting the room, rushing to and fro to prepare food. She never interacted much with the Malfoy elves, though Draco was particularly fond of one of them, so she was uneasy when a right horde of elves stopped what they were doing to stare at Blaise and her.
“Hello, Mister Zabini and Mister Zabini’s friend, how may the house elves be helping you today?” an elderly house elf questioned. Harriet bristled at being referred to as Mister Zabini’s friend; didn’t they know who she was? But before she could say anything, Blaise had already answered.
“Hello Tippy, we were hoping you had an extra snack or two we could have.”
Harriet stared at Blaise, unable to fathom someone of their station speaking to a house elf in such a manner. Everyone knew strict, direct orders were the easiest for house elves to understand.
“Of course, of course, Tippy is happy to be providing snacks,” Tippy went on mumbling as she scurried around the kitchen, presumably grabbing snacks.
“Why do you speak to her like that?” Harriet demanded. Blaise raised an unimpressed eyebrow at her.
“Besides being polite, everybody is more willing to do things for someone who treats them with respect,” Blaise explained, before rudely turning his attention back to Tippy, who was handing him a plate of biscuits. He even thanked the elf.
Harriet pondered all this. It made sense, she supposed, for Blaise to use manipulation to get what he wanted, since he was not ranked high enough in the hierarchy to just demand people do as he said. The house elf did seem very eager to complete Blaise’s request, which she supposed could offer some advantage.
Still, it seemed an awful lot of humiliation for a few easy biscuits.
Blaise led her over to a small table by the door, where he set the plate of biscuits down and took a seat. Harriet took the opposite chair, keeping her back to the wall.
“Here, try one,” Blaise insisted as he pushed the plate towards her. He already had one in his hand.
She took a biscuit gingerly. Her father did not allow her to have sweets; he thought they were unnecessary distractions and degradations of the body. She had headed his wishes while at school, turning her nose up at any dessert her followers offered her. She proved herself stronger than them every day in this way.
But the biscuits were fresh, and the smell reminded her of warm blankets and a cozy room she couldn’t recall ever seeing. There was something about them that brought forth a nostalgia for something she couldn’t remember.
Well, it wasn’t like her father would know if she had just one biscuit, and she already knew she was stronger than Blaise, because he was on his third one.
It was the best thing she had ever eaten.
It was gooey and crisp on the edges, with chocolate chips that added a dark twist to the sugary treat. Harriet ate the entire thing in two bites and was reaching for the next one before she even finished swallowing.
“Have you never had a biscuit before?” Blaise was eyeing her strangely.
She quickly swallowed and patted her mouth with an available napkin. How undignified of her to forget her manners because of one little biscuit.
“My father believes sweets are a distraction,” she said primly. If her father said it, everyone knew it was true.
“Strange, my mother used to use sweets to get me to do chores. Every time I cleaned my room, I would get a dessert with dinner.”
Harriet was not sure what to make of that.
“Well, I’ve shared my secret; now it’s your turn,” Blaise said casually, eyes not leaving the fourth biscuit he was holding.
Harriet had to admit that the location of the kitchens was a useful secret. And Blaise was not acting bored by her presence, which had been her goal nearly all year. He still didn’t treat her quite the same way all her other followers did, but it was a step in the right direction.
He had earned a secret, she thought. But which one?
She could tell him that she was being sent to the Carrows for the summer, but then she was at risk of those pesky tears again. Or how she had almost sorted Ravenclaw, nobody knew that except the hat and her. Or she could tell him that her father had taught her the unforgivables using a rat. Or that Bellatrix had once fed her poison and made her fight for the antidote.
“Just tell me something about you that you’ve never told anyone,” Blaise suggested.
Harriet studied the boy. He was so laid back, so uncaring of what anyone thought of him. She wished she could afford to care so little.
“My favorite color is pink.” It was a secret no one else would care about; her followers would probably be confused at her even having a favorite color, but for some reason, she thought Blaise might care. She couldn’t make herself look at him, though, in case he was laughing at her.
“Really? The future Dark Lady’s favorite color is pink?”
Well, at least he wasn’t laughing, but he did sound a little amused. Harriet had half a mind to throw another curse at him.
“There’s nothing wrong with pink!” she defended, hand inching towards her wand.
“Then why is it a secret?”
“Because no one would take a Dark Lady in pink seriously, and my father requires me to be serious,” Harriet admitted. It felt treasonous to say aloud, like her father might overhear and start destroying every pink thing Harriet had ever laid eyes on. He was so particular about things like that.
Blaise was just watching her, something like understanding creeping up his face.
“You know, you are not what I thought you were, Miss Riddle.”
****
Harriet stood on the Hogwarts Express, watching as the castle faded into the distance. It had been an informative experience, being around her peers like that. She could not say she disliked it.
And she was especially satisfied when Blaise came and sat with her entourage in their compartment, even if he didn’t bow his head to anyone but her.