"You will tell no one of what you saw. No. One." She punctuated every word with a poke on his chest. It felt like being poked with an ice pick. He couldn't help but let the corner of his mouth pull up to a smirk.
"Do you understand?"
"Uh...No?"
She stared at him with a frown. "Are you trying to be funny?" She poked him harder this time.
He had to clench his teeth to remain unsuspecting. His smirk grew steeper.
"What's wrong with you?" Fleur demanded hotly. "Were you dropped as a kid? Do you not even speak your own language?"
"No, I do." He insisted, nodding vividly but holding on to that tense smirk.
His words seemed to do little to calm her and with a sudden step forward she jerked her hand at his throat, circling her fingers around his tie and pulled him toward her. His face was mere inches from her own. Her breath tickled his nose hair.
"Are you mocking me, English? Do you fancy a visit to the infirmary?" Her tongue lashed across the vowels like a whip, slashing across his face like an apex predator taunting their prey into making one more fatal mistake.
"No. One. Do you understand these words?"
"It's Harry." He offered dumbly.
"Quoi?" She jerked slightly. It wasn't the reply she expected. "What do I care for your silly name?"
"I'm merely being polite," he strained against her harsh grip on his tie. "I'm English. But I'm also...Harry."
She studied him and noticed a sense of defiance in his eyes, albeit small and more akin to an ember of spirit. She then loosened her grip on him to which he sighed a breath of relief.
"Harry, the English, then?" She summarised, her face a mirror of boredom. "So you have a name, you are English but seem incapable to follow...instructions?"
"Yes," he provided first before realising his mistake. "Or...No?"
She schooled her feature. At least that's what he thought she did. Her skin had just seemed to move.
"Your...face," he worded slowly. "It moved again. Just like before."
And again her fury made its presence known, letting the air around her dance.
"I don't know how your people have remained alive this long, but surely they can't be as foolish as you are proving to be?" Her grip on his tie tightened and pulled him up toward her again.
"What game are you playing?" She asked once more. "What is it you want?"
The question was warranted. Why did he play the fool with her? Why did he always play the fool? With her? He licked his lip and swallowed.
"sp...ti..w..ou," he murmured.
"Quoi? Say it again. Louder," she instructed, jerking at his tie again.
"To spend time with you!" he yelled at her.
His eyes were closed as he did spell itt out for her. What else could he do? It was certain death. He didn't want to die and let the last thing he remembers to be her.
So he waited. And waited. And waited. He waited for a curse. For the pain. For the end.
But it didn't come. It never came.
Instead he feltt his tie slacken. He felt the ground under his feet. He heard the sharp intake of a wet breath.
Slowly, he opened one eye, and then he opened the other.
His sight needed a few moments to clear up. It was all shapes and colours until a few flinks wiped the moisture from his vision.
She looked different. She didn't look like herself. Her eyes were wide. Her mouth was covered by her hand. And her cheeks, a deep scarlet.
Before he could say or do anything, she quickly pulled herself together and snapped at him.
"Forget what I said about telling no one. You are shameless. You silly boy. Shameless, arrogant...," her voice failed her as she huffed and puffed. "Time...with...me?"
She huffed again, only this time with a look of indignation.
A moment later, she whirled around and sped off into the distance and into the shadow of the evening leaving him to look at the last place he’d seen her silhouette.
What he couldn’t hear anymore or could see any longer was the many shakes of her head and the teeth that bit her lip.
What a silly, silly boy. Aiming higher than his station should permit. But that face. So earnest. So honest. How could I not?