“Pfft.”
A very faint laugh came from the seat beside Blaise, so short it sounded almost like an exhale.
Blaise whipped his head around, staring in disbelief at Theodore sitting next to him.
Theodore still held that expressionless face, dark hair covering half of one eye, slowly twirling the quill in his hand as if that laugh had been purely an illusion.
Blaise’s eyes went wide:
“Merlin’s holy lace socks!
I always thought you were a serious person, Theodore.”
“Oh, I’m not,” Theodore replied without a change in expression, then turned his gaze to Flins:
“Could you tell me how you did that, Kyryll?”
Flins looked at him for two seconds, the corners of his mouth curving: “Gladly at your service, Theodore.”
In passing, he tugged on Draco’s sleeve: “Young Master, care to listen?”
Draco kept a stiff face, though his ears had already tilted several degrees in their direction.
He did not turn around, merely shifting his chair two inches closer to Flins “by accident.”
Flins did not expose him.
Taking up his wand, his fingertips lightly twirled the wood, turning the perfect silver needle on his desk back into an ordinary match.
Then, slowing down his pace, he demonstrated while explaining in a low voice where the focus lay and how the intent should flow.
Theodore listened carefully, jotting down a few words on parchment with his quill, nodding now and then.
Blaise dropped his usual teasing grin, resting his chin on his crossed arms, listening quietly.
Draco kept his face set, yet the angle of his head tilted further and further.
In the end, he didn’t even bother pretending anymore, leaning half his body over toward Flins, his eyes glued to the process of the match changing shape.
A few Ravenclaw students at the next table had been working hard on their own.
A girl with glasses heard Flins’s voice, first sneaking a glance over, then shifting her stool slightly toward them.
A boy beside her hesitated a moment, then dragged his chair over as well.
Before long, a small circle of listeners taking advantage of the lesson had gathered quietly around Flins.
Every single one pretended to just be reading their books, while their eyes kept darting to the slowly changing match.
When the bell rang for the end of class, all four desks in Flins’s dormitory had a fully formed silver needle sitting on them.
Professor McGonagall walked down the aisle, her gaze pausing briefly on Flins’s silver needle, and in the end awarded five points to Slytherin.
The lessons that followed posed little difficulty for Flins.
As for the professors he had met so far, to be fair, they were all very learned individuals, though he did not have the habit of actually listening to lectures.
Hogwarts, after all, was not like Miss Aino’s workshop—there was no room for him to find an excuse and slip away early.
“Kyryll,” Draco sat beside him, looking at him rather unhappily, “you can’t just use the Duplication Charm to copy my notes every single time.”
Blaise nodded along, his voice full of exaggerated heartbreak:
“Merlin’s battered wardrobe!
Even though we know you’re remarkably talented, never taking notes in class and always getting called on by the teachers is truly a bad look.”
“Yes, indeed,” even Theodore’s dark eyes held a few traces of quiet complaint, “word has already spread among the professors.
Every class, they keep their eyes fixed on our corner.”
“Draco, you could sit with me, you know.”
A girl with short black hair suddenly leaned against the edge of Draco’s desk, her voice soft, though she shot a stealthy glare at Flins, the disdain in her eyes utterly undisguised.
“Oh, Pansy.”
Draco was clearly distracted by her advances, answering with only perfunctory politeness:
“You girls should sit together.
Daphne, pull her away.”
Sitting not far off, Daphne Greengrass was busy dabbing makeup onto her face.
Hearing this, she replied without even looking up:
“I can’t be bothered to care about your moods, Draco.
You know perfectly well what Pansy feels.”
A faint blush crept over Draco’s pale cheeks, clearly unable to handle Daphne’s bluntness:
“Well, well, ladies, we’re only in our first year?!”
He turned toward his three roommates, who were busy enjoying the show:
“Gentlemen, I assume you’d be willing to help your poor roommate?”
Blaise picked it up right away, his tone airy: “Since young Master Malfoy has asked, of course we can’t refuse.”
He tilted his head toward Pansy, his almond eyes curving:
“Pansy, you know all about the Malfoy family’s terrible habits…
Perhaps you could consider me instead?”
He even threw Pansy a playful wink, speaking in a slow drawl:
“Draco is still just a child, after all.
His understanding in that department probably hasn’t matured yet.”
“Hey, Zabini, I asked for help, not for you to put me down,” Draco protested from the side.
“That’s hardly putting you down, Draco,” Theodore, who had stayed silent the whole time, suddenly spoke up.
“In our dorm, you truly are the only child.”
Flins laid down the History of Magic essay he was about to finish, looking up at his roommates mocking one another, and noticed Crabbe and Goyle sitting nearby, quietly eating snacks sent by Draco’s mother.
He chimed in with an expressionless face: “Very well, mutual mockery is a form of friendship too.
How truly delightful.”
“Stop dropping such bizarre comments all the time!” Draco looked at him, nearly at his wit’s end.
“And you’re only a first year!
Isn’t the Duplication Charm supposed to be taught in upper years?”
“Young Master Draco, you have a very sharp eye,” Flins remarked.
Twirling the ebony wand lightly between his fingers, the tip swept gently across Draco’s open notebook.
The next second, a complete copy of notes with wet ink appeared out of thin air on the parchment.
He flicked his wrist again, and an identical set of notes dropped gently in front of Blaise.
“So,” Flins said, putting Draco’s notebook away with an even tone, “your roommate happens to need your assistance.”
Blaise stared down at the notes before him, froze for an instant, then burst out laughing, reaching over to pat Flins on the shoulder:
“Thanks, Kyryll.”
Flins didn’t stop there.
He looked up at Crabbe and Goyle across the way, tapping his knuckles twice on the desk—with another faint flash of blue light, another copy of Draco’s notes landed onto their table, which was buried under sweet wrappers.
Crabbe stared down at the notes that appeared from nowhere, stayed quiet for two seconds, then looked up and mumbled, “Thanks.”
Goyle put down his sweet as well, turning the corner of a page with a chocolate-smudged hand:
“You’re way easier to talk to than Malfoy.”
The air froze for a beat.
Draco whipped his head around, his gray eyes wide and round:
“You two are eating the sweets my mother sent!”
Crabbe chewed on the toffee in his mouth, mumbling back: “And so?”
He swallowed.
“Sweets are sweets.
You are you.”
“Brilliant,” Blaise raised his pumpkin juice from across the table, offering Crabbe a small toast.
Draco’s voice rose two octaves, “You two—”
He choked on his words for a while, finally burying his face into his open textbook, grumbling into the pages: “No more of my mother’s sweets for you from now on.”
Crabbe and Goyle exchanged a look, and then reached into the sweet box at the same time, each grabbing another piece.
Pansy Parkinson still hadn’t left.
She leaned against the edge of the desk next to Draco, her short dark hair falling beside her cheek, her gaze sweeping back and forth between Flins, Crabbe, and Goyle, her lips curled in a practiced sneer.
“Seems some people not only lack manners, but their tricks for buying people over are so cheap, too,” Pansy’s voice sounded clearly, her eyes falling on the copied notes beside Flins’s hand.
“Copying someone else’s notes to hand out makes you feel generous, does it?”
Flins did not look up, his tone flat: “Miss Parkinson, you are entirely correct.
I am indeed very generous.”
“You—”
“Pansy.”
Draco finally lifted his head from the textbook, his gray eyes showing the tired headache of someone worn out by noise.
“If you don’t have anything else to do, you can leave.”
Pansy’s expression shifted slightly, her lips pressing tight.
Beside them, Daphne snapped her mirror shut and finally looked up, her gaze wandering between Draco and Pansy before letting out a sigh.
Then she stood up, took Pansy by the arm, and pulled her toward the door, ignoring whatever unhappy face Pansy made.
Passing by Flins, Daphne glanced down at him.
“Let’s go, let’s go,” Daphne said lazily.
“Their little group is having fun on their own; don’t make a mess here.”
“Daphne!” Pansy’s voice came from the doorway, tinged with embarrassment and anger.
“Next time,” Daphne waved a hand without looking back.
The door clicked shut behind them with a crisp snap.
After half a second of silence, Blaise finally could not hold back his laughter:
“Merlin’s socks, that was quite a show for today.”