#rubyredmagic

[lacedwithdark-blog]

The Bitch Is Back

After a week, Lacey had returned. Sure, she'd been in and out, dropping off assignments and all that. She didn't want to fall behind and be on the level of the normal idiots who went to those classes. Striding up to her dorm, Lacey reveled in the looks she got as she passed by. She was in a black miniskirt, knee high leather boots, fishnet leggings, and a blue top with a window in the back. Built to kill and everyone who saw her knew it. Lazily making her way up the stairs, she drank in every "Damn girl" and whistle and glare from jealous girlfriends, drowning every memory of why she up vanished from her mind.

Strolling into her empty room, Lacey was surprised to see that her side of it was untouched. She'd figure Ruby and Victor would have snuck some fun in on her bed, she was a bit disappointed that they apparently hadn't...or impressed by how well whoever had remade her bed had done. Clucking her tongue in disapproval at how very bookish her side looked, Lacey pulled out her wand and slowly drifted it in front of her side of her room, murmuring spells quietly. The overabundance of bookshelves shifted with the bed and the desk until everything flowed seamlessly together. The bed's frame was now a bookshelf, there was plenty of open space, flowing lines...it looked much less librarian of her. Perfect. Lacey jumped onto her bed and relaxed, sighing contentedly and pulling her hair free from its knot.

[lacedwithdark-blog]

Violet But No Violence

Lacey strolled into her room and headed right for her bed, sliding in under the extensive bookcases and closing her eyes. She was quite done with groups of people for the day and plenty ready to hex a load of the idiots just to shut them up. Of course that was excluding the fact that she already had, Lacey idly wondered if the morons still smelled like stinkweed and were quite voiceless.

Sighing, she turned over and levitated a book down to hover in front of her, probably the best little perk of being a witch was being able to levitate books when you wanted to lay down. Poor little mundange muggles. Settling in for a late night, she happily kept reading her battered, first edition of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea.

[vicsgotmagichands]

A Note Stuck in Ruby's Potions Book:

As you may have noticed, something fluffy and cute has gone missing from your room. Katsu has been owl-napped. I promise, no harm or strange things have befallen him. But if you want to see him again, meet me in the quad at midnight on Friday. Please be so kind as to wear a warm set of pjs and comfortable hiking shoes. It's a new moon, so bring your wand for light. Signed, Vic The Mysterious Owl-napper

[lacedwithdark-blog]

Gray Day

Lacey watched as her books finished arranging themselves on the shelves over her bed. They aligned themselves perfectly, alphabetically by subject, as she tapped her wand. Sighing, she wondered to herself what she was going to do with this room now that the entire wall was covered in a foot deep of shelving, and all of that filled with her books. She'd barely left enough room for her bed and enough space for her to sit up in it. Not to mention the bookshelf by the window.

Lacey sighed and snatched up the book she was reading off the bed, sweeping out of the room and closing and locking the door with a flick of her wand behind her. Heading down into the common room, she looked around for a good chair. Rolling her eyes at the lack of what she considered a good reading chair, she conjured her own against a lonely corner. Soft gray fabric, deep set seat, and a slight curve to the back. Perfection. Settling herself in it and smoothing down her skirt, she decided to watch the room before she actually started reading. Might as well see what everyone was scurrying about to before classes started.

[vicsgotmagichands]

The Ice and Fire Incident

Victor had spent the last two weeks in a state of pure, unadulterated happiness. An odd way to be, for him, at least. The first three days, he'd spent every spare second of his time in the infirmary, sat up in his chair at Ruby's bedside. Wright had occasionally stopped in to bring her books and homework by, making it a point to mention Quidditch practice and throw Victor a nasty look every time; like Victor was the one who was keeping her in bed. He'd shrugged it off and had a good laugh with Ruby over it a few times, eventually making a point to ask whether there was something going on between the two Hufflepuffs. He'd deny up, down, sideways and backwards, his relief at finding out Wright was just an uptight, rude arse, as it turned out. A few times, that relief had almost overtaken his good sense and Victor found himself watching Ruby as they studied or practiced charms. Her beauty was bewitching, and Victor felt that if he wasn't careful he was going to end up pulling his hair out in frustration as he tried to make himself focus.  His favorite example of how he'd been slowly losing his mind had been after dinner one night, when he'd left his wand laying on the table beside her hospital bed before he'd seated himself next to her. Without thinking, Victor had stood and braced his thighs against the side of the bed, leaning cautiously over her legs to reach for it. As an afterthought, he'd looked down to apologize and found their noses almost touching. It had been an exercise in self control to not lean in and press his lips to hers. He'd fallen back into his chair, without retrieving his wand and busied himself shuffling his homework papers about. The last night of Ruby's hospital stint, Victor had fallen asleep with his arms folded on the edge of her bed and when one of the healers had found him that way, she'd gently nudged him awake and shooed him off. In his sleep-fogged state, he'd seen a stray lock of hair across her cheek and tucked it behind her ear gently, accompanying it with a tender kiss to her forehead before he realized what he'd done. Victor left quickly and silently, so as not to wake the sleeping girl. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Now Victor was spending his days trailing beside his newest friend, gladly carrying her books from class to class and deflecting other students around her crutches; a smile on his face and warmth in his heart. Today was no different. Except today had Victor cursing as he dodged patches of ice on the sidewalks from a late winter frost, directing Ruby carefully around them. "Jeeze, Ruby, couldn't you have picked a better time to break your leg? I mean, really? You're going to break your other one if we're not careful!" He hitched his bag higher on his shoulder, directing a smile at his companion as she hobbled along. 

[vicsgotmagichands]

It's All In The Past || The First Instance

Victor traipsed down the potions hallway after his last class for that Friday, dodging the other students lounging against walls and participating in a multitude of activities that ranged from; calmly discussing weekend plans of visiting Halfwit Heap, to tossing random objects back and forth across the wide walk ways. He had to duck a few times to avoid being caught by a flying book or two. For a mere moment Victor felt an odd pull to be one of them, just enjoying their time in school. Their life. But he quickly shook it off as he walked outside into the windy day. Settling himself comfortably under a tree in the well manicured courtyard, he opened his potions book to the last page on healing draughts he'd been studying before class had let out. Content to exist separately in his own world, where it was safe and quiet. Every now and then, his head would jerk up as someone would wander out into the quad, saw him and immediately stopped laughing, before turning and practically sprinting back into the school. It wasn't an unusual occurrence around him and he shrugged it off, turning back to his book. Alone was best.

[vicsgotmagichands]

A Christmas to Remember (One Year Ago)

Victor clearly remembered telling John not to hang up mistletoe this year. In fact, he vividly remembered sending seven different messages reminding him not to put up the awful plants. Ever since one of his friends from Hogwarts had sent over a batch of the stuff from Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, Victor had a new found hatred for the stuff.

George Weasley had taken the typical muggle Christmas tradition of getting a kiss while you were standing under the mistletoe and made it (what he called), "ten times better." By ten times better, Victor had determined he'd meant, a thousand times more awkward for the person standing under it, but incredibly hilarious for everyone else. George had developed two different kinds of mistletoe to be strung up around the holidays. The difference between muggle mistletoe and wizard mistletoe was: when someone stepped under it, was spelled to trap their feet to the floor until someone kissed them. With white mistletoe, any kiss would do. When Uncle John had gotten stuck after trying to figure out what was so special about it, Victor had almost laughed himself to tears before apparating over to the neighbors house to get her to come kiss John loose with a peck on the cheek. Then Victor had decided it might be pertinent to read the warnings on the box before fooling with any more of the stuff. 

With white mistletoe, a multitude of kisses will work to break the enchantment that holds your feet to the floor. For example: A kiss on the cheek, forehead, hand, or anywhere else. The 'kiss rule' also extends to: butterfly kisses and eskimo kisses, but does not, however, cover kisses with a fist.

Victor had laughed before his attention was distracted by a separate sprig of mistletoe, this one with a cluster of ruby red berries and it's own warning.

Warning! Please Read Before Hanging This! Red mistletoe was designed in much a similar way to white mistletoe with one caveat. Only a proper kiss will let you loose from under this treasure. HAPPY CHRISTMAS!

Victor had known when he asked Snow, August and Ruby to accompany him to his Uncle's house for dinner before they all went their separate ways for Christmas Break, that John was going to hang up mistletoe. It was inevitable. So he'd made sure to explain to the three of them what each color meant. He'd thought, however, that John would have had the good sense not to hang up the single piece of red they'd received  Victor had spent the evening trying to dodge all the little bunches of white and green and had thought he'd worked out where John had stashed them all. But 'lo and behold, as Victor felt himself stop suddenly on the way to the dining room and looked up; there was the damn thing, in all its crimson and leafy glory. Victor swore he could feel the berries mocking him as he glared at it.

His first reaction had been to look around wildly for John so he could deck him, and when his Uncle had realized what was happening, Victor watched with a murderous look as the older man slunk around a corner back into the kitchen, chuckling to himself. Victor's next order of business was to look for Snow and beg her to break him loose. They'd been friends for a long time, right? She wouldn't mind. Right? Unfortunately, his eyes first landed on August in his search, the scruffy man staring at his frozen form incredulously.

"Uh. What're you doin' there, Vic? You coming to dinner?" 

"I'm stuck, Woodman. It's the damn mistletoe!" Victor gestured towards the offensive plant wildly, almost falling over while unable to adjust his weight on his feet. "Help me get unstuck..."

"I'm sorry, what? Nuh uh! Don't look at me! I'm not kissing you, mate." August had started to back away, waving his hands wildly in front of him as if to fend off Victor's non-existent advance towards him. Victor had thrown up his hands and huffed loudly enough to draw the attention of Snow and Ruby, who'd been waiting in the dining room. When Snow had stuck her head around the door, Victor had started trying to wave her over, looking for all the world like he was trying to land an airplane.

"SNOW! Oh please. Look, I'm stuck under this stupid mistletoe and I need someone to kiss me to get me out. Can you just come over here real quick and un-stick me. Please? I'm begging you, Snowflake." He even tried with the puppy eyes, holding his hands out to her pleadingly. He was not above begging at this point. Snow, for her part, had only walked in the room far enough to stand beside August, folding her arms over her chest with an amused expression.

"I just have to kiss you on the cheek, ri-..." Before she could even finish her sentence, August stepped in front of her, effectively cutting her off from Victor's view. She'd given him a slight shove and raised an eyebrow haughtily at him when he'd turned to see what her objection had been. Then he'd caught sight of Ruby still standing in the dining room doorway and side stepped Snow. 

"'Scuse me Ruby, I need to borrow you." Without waiting for a reply, he'd picked her up and carried her over to Victor's side, completely ignoring Victor's panicked expression. Setting her down on her feet gently, August made sure they were standing close enough that Ruby had also been caught in the mistletoe's enchantment. Victor looked for all the world like he was going to throttle August as soon as he got loose, eyeing the other man just over the top of Ruby's head. Then she'd bounced up on her tiptoes and pressed a kiss to his cheek, and Victor felt his knees buckle. 'What am I? A twelve year old getting his first kiss? Get a grip man.'

Victor had smiled gratefully at Ruby and went to step out from under the plant, only to find his feet still latched to the floor. Looking down at Ruby, he felt as if he blushed from his hair to his toes, but steeled himself to answer her confused expression.

"It's the red mistletoe, Ruby. Gotta... Uh... You know-... O-onthelips." He was finding to be having trouble breathing properly and had rushed to finish the sentence. As he stared down at her, he noticed a mischievous twinkle in her storm-cloud gaze.

"Oh right!" Sounding not a bit phased by the situation, she placed her hands on Victor's shoulders and pulled him down a little bit, pressing her lips to his. Victor had closed his eyes, began to reach up to put his hands on Ruby's hips and lean into the kiss; when the flash of a camera had startled him and his head whipped up to find the source. John was grinning evilly and clutching his camera.

"Granny is going to love this."