Cold Dungeons & Cold Punches PV Beckett Closed

"I'm not what?"

Dot thought about the question, before speaking, for a minute. "Well," She started. "For starters, not as warm-"
Dot was cut off as a tall girl from the upper years approached Anastasia and interrupted her. Dot had heard footsteps behind them, but Dot thought it should be any first year with History of Magic next. The girl that approached them was older, obviously, so she didn't need a reason to be here. Unless she wanted to talk to Anastasia, whom she had addressed.
Still, she had no right to interrupt her conversation, and definitely not so rudely.
Even though Dot wasn't good at this, she managed to give the girl a cold and mildly disrespecting stare. "I don't think I know you," The words were dumb, but the glacial and severely inhospitable tone beneath them was worth attention. "Mind introducing yourself, conversation intruder?"
It may sound stiff and bad - which she intended to - but the dark haired girl had called Dot a 'someone who utterly disregards everything in the wizarding world'. Dot didn't even knew the girl - how could she say that about someone she's not met, doesn't know? As far as Dot knew, she doesn't 'disregard' anything in the wizarding world. There was a huge difference between not liking a quill and disregarding everything in the wizarding world, if the girl had listened in on their conversation.
Judging by the proud look she had on her face, and the Slytherin badge on her robes, Dot assumed the girl was a pureblood fanatic. But she wasn't sure. And she shouldn't assume bad things by just clues, even if the girl insulted her.

Lydia sniffed and ignored Dot's words completely, as if she wasn't even worth her notice. She did that quite often when she didn't approve of whomever Anastasia was with at the moment. Anastasia resisted the urge to roll her eyes. She had to at least appear like she didn't hate her brown nose, controlling cousin, at least in public. That had been drilled into her as a child - you can have whatever opinions you want about your family, you don't voice them in public. It hadn't been much of a problem with Amelia, or her twin cousins, but Lydia was irritating at the best of times, and seemed to want to filter every bit of Anastasia's Hogwarts experience. "Dot, this is my lovely cousin, Lydia,"  Anastasia said. Lydia couldn't tattle to Anastasia's parents about that, although the way she said lovely made it clear that she considered her cousin anything but. 

"Anastasia, honestly. That half-blood brat on the train was one thing, but at least she grew up in the wizarding world and isn't willingly ignorant of how to behave. But this, this girl knows nothing. I mean really, how is someone like that supposed to keep from disrupting other people's educations?" Lydia lectured. Anastasia bit her lip. She had to say something to defend Dot, but she wasn't sure what she could say that wouldn't result in Lydia sending a letter to Anastasia's parents. Normally, that wouldn't bother Anastasia one way or another, but her parents were already angry at her and had threatened to disown her merely because she was in Gryffindor. "Lydia, haven't you something better to do than police your cousin's social life?" Anastasia said, her voice and smile tight. 

When the girl completely ignored Dot, something inside her stomach stirred, angering her, although slightly. She made it look like Dot was nothing but a beetle not worth her notice. Dot scrunched up her nose as Anastasia introduced the girl as her cousin. The horror that this girl was her almost-friend's cousin lasted a whole second before Dot hid it behind the mask of distaste for Lydia. "Lydia," Dot said, almost checking how the name felt in her mouth. If names could bring you taste, Lydia's would be bitter. Dot made no attempt to hide that.

"Anastasia, honestly. That half-blood brat on the train was one thing, but at least she grew up in the wizarding world and isn't willingly ignorant of how to behave. But this, this girl knows nothing. I mean really, how is someone like that supposed to keep from disrupting other people's educations?"

Instead of trying to insult her like she previously did and failed, Dot turned to Anastasia. "Anastasia, honestly," Dot began, imitating Lydia's voice. "That small unpoliteness from you was one thing, but at least it did not cross the line of very bad. But this, this girl is talking disastrous. I mean, really, how is someone like that supposed to keep themselves from destroying other people's lives?" Dot completed, a smirk on her face as she inwardly congratulated herself on her wit. True Ravenclaw, after all.
Dot hoped Anastasia wasn't offended, because Dot had merely used Lydia's talking layout and fitted her own words there, to maybe piss Lydia off into minding her own business. Instinctively, Dot raised her hand to check the time on her wristwatch. It was minutes before class time.

Anastasia coughed to hide her giggle. Dot's imitation was spot on, and she would have said something if she didn't know it would result in more of her parents wrath. Anastasia hadn't told Lydia about her parents letter since she really didn't trust her, but if her parents had meant what they had said (and Anastasia had every reason of believing that they did), they were already considering disowning her.  "As much fun as this entire interaction has been, and really, Lyd, it has been positively thrilling, we've simply got to get to History of Magic or we'll be tardy," Anastasia said, barely hiding her smirk. The entire thing had made her like Dot even better, and made her feel more guilty about her earlier behavior. 

"Well, I suppose it's a good thing that it's only History of Magic, so your charity case won't shame your house too badly with her incompetence," Lydia said, her smile tight and venomous. "And, Anastasia, consider what your father would think about this friendship. Because I know exactly what he's going to say when I tell him." Anastasia sighed and spun on her heel making her long hair fly dramatically as she began to leave. She was not in the mood to engage with her cousin's nonsense anymore nor to be late to class. 

It was visible clearly to Dot that Anastasia had not had the natural need to cough, but the cough was a way to mask the laugh she was going to experience if she didn't cover it. Dot wondered why Anastasia was covering her laugh. Lydia did look like an enemy, and Anastasia and Lydia were both glaring each other with poisoning looks. Maybe they didn't realize, but Dot, as a third person, realized it in first glance.
Anastasia, politely, made an excuse to leave for the class, which made Dot even more curious. Why wasn't she just telling Lydia to go away? Yes, she was her cousin, but she was also bothering them. Dot kept quiet about her questions, intending to ask Anastasia later.

"And, Anastasia, consider what your father would think about this friendship. Because I know exactly what he's going to say when I tell him."

Anastasia turned to leave rather like an actress from a Muggle movie, but Dot stayed where she was. She knew this was a sixth-year, and what she sensed they were going to have could land them both in detention, but Dot wanted to ensure Lydia knew that her words didn't go unnoticed.
Stepping right in front of her, so that she'd have no chance of ignoring Dot's presence, Dot said through gritted teeth, "Tell him what, jerk?"
Yes, Dot was irritated at Lydia for insulting her, but she was trying to help Anastasia as well. Lydia had no right to go threatening people with their fathers.

Lydia scowled at Dot's words. She wasn't so much offended as she was irritated. In her mind, this brat was interfering in family matters. She wanted to her to just leave and let her speak to her cousin. Maybe blackmail her just a little. Although, Anastasia could be quite cunning when she needed to be, so Lydia was mostly bluffing. "How very un-Gryffindor of you, cousin. Really, leaving your utterly incompetent pet to deal with your well meaning cousin," Lydia taunted. She could tell that her kid cousin rather liked this inferior girl, and the strange girl, Spot or something equally stupid was her name, was a bit more hot headed than her cousin. She figured she could provoke the friend into really insulting or attacking her or something, in turn getting her brat cousin to say something that would actually interest her aunt and uncle. 

Anastasia moaned inwardly when Dot didn't follow. She didn't know all of the information, and would end up causing problems for the both of them. Knowing her cousin, she was rather enjoying the whole mess. Dot seemed like she was trying to a friend, but Anastasia wished she could tell her not to. She made a mental note to tell Dot about her parents' letter. If not explain all the details, at least inform her of how precarious her relationship with her family was at the moment. 

Dot stared at Lydia for a full minute, her chin up to see directly in the tall girl's eyes. Dot was maybe a little frightened at her scowl - she did look scary - but she managed to keep the stare. When a whole moment passed, she said in a soft, low voice, "Why don't you just call me a mu-mudblood and be done with it? You don't have to attack her only because she was conversing with me. I can leave, you know - just leave her alone."
Adjusting the strap of her plain book bag, Dot made to follow after Anastasia, who seemed to be trying to get out of trouble. She inwardly hoped that Anastasia had heard her trying to defend her. Maybe it was a family problem or something but...Dot felt like...nosy? Maybe, but she didn't particularly liked all this pureblood fashion of the wizarding world. It seemed stupid, but Dot wanted to put an end to it. Which was impossible, since it has been going from centuries.
She had even read that, there were twenty-four pureblood families, called the Scared Twenty-Four, who only married purebloods to save the purebloodness in the society. Did they realize that if some of their children hadn't disobeyed, the wizarding society would have been extinct by now? Then they would have been dancing with their blood in their graves.
Were the Becketts one of them? Dot thought with dread. She really, really hoped it wasn't the case.

Anastasia did hear Dot defending her and it raised her already high opinion of Dot. Even if this could cause problems for Anastasia later on, Dot was standing up to a sixth year for someone she barely knew. Someone who had been rather rude to her in the past few minutes. She rather wanted to hug Dot but decided against it. She also decided she would tell Dot about her parents letter later. Two reasons - one would be so Dot would know all the information next time she had run into Lydia, and two would be since she was sticking her neck out for Anastasia and had told her about her rather difficult sounding past, she deserved a bit of trust from Anastasia. 

"Anastasia, we both know what happens to blood traitors in our family," Lydia said, her voice dripping with false sweetness. "And keep your nose out of things you don't understand, Spot." Anastasia stopped short. Nobody had mentioned Amelia in years, until recently in her parents' letter and now this. It made Anastasia furious because Amelia had been more of a big sister to her than she had been to Lydia. "Lydia, don't you have anything else to do? Like class or talking to your friends or literally anything else," Anastasia said as she turned around, her eyes cold and a bit scary. 

"And keep your nose out of things you don't understand, Spot."

Dot shook her head in mock disbelief. Turning around back to face the snotty girl, she said, "How about you keep your nose out of her business? Looks like she wasn't even paying you any attention when you marched up for some attention seeking." Dot was getting very annoyed on Lydia's continuous ignorance, and how she kept dictating and lecturing Anastasia about pureblood this and pureblood that. For that moment, Dot wished she knew the Legillimency. Then she'd go in Lydia's crapped up mind and figure out her unpure secrets and write a letter to her parents, then. Then Anastasia and Dot will have their time to mock her as much as they like.
Dot was brought out of her short lived fantasy when Anastasia spun around, looking deadly - at least to Dot. With ice cold eyes, she said:

"Lydia, don't you have anything else to do? Like class or talking to your friends or literally anything else,"

At that moment, Dot could've hugged Anastasia. She bobbed her head to show her agreement. "Yeah, or like opening the Chamber of Secrets or something? Your Dark Lord will be proud, I'm sure." Dot thought that she'd gone too far now, with her ignored mocking. Giving reference to Voldemort won't be appreciated by Lydia - or perhaps even Anastasia. Lydia was a Beckett, after all.
To her surprise, Dot felt her heartbeat quickening. Instinctively, and in a way that neither Lydia nor Anastasia would watch, she reached for her wand and gripped it tightly in her hand. She expected any time now for Lydia to attack her, by words or spells, she wasn't sure.

Lydia rolled her eyes and scoffed at the inferior brat. She was on the verge of hexing her, although she would prefer not to get herself and her annoying cousin in trouble. Becketts didn't get in trouble, although she was certain that her parents not to mention her uncle and aunt wouldn't be too angry when they heard the reason. "Anastasia, I'm trying to look out for you. We're family, that's what we do. Are you really so silly that you can't be trusted to even select your own company?" Lydia said, a bit taken aback at the look in her younger cousin's eyes. She had seen that look directed at other people occasionally and it had made her uncomfortable even then. The idea that she would look at her own cousin like that was just horrid. 

Anastasia's normal polite smile was nowhere to be seen as she walked back towards the other two girls. She was about to reply to Lydia's stupid remark when Dot said something that made both her and Lydia flush. There wasn't any way that Dot could know about their family connection to that since the Becketts had hidden every trace, but all of the Becketts knew it was true. The girls' grandfather had been killed by an Auror during the Battle of Hogwarts, and their grandmother had received a life sentence in Azkaban for her connection to the Death Eaters. Lydia looked murderous. 

"If you're so amazing that you speak that way to your superiors, then clearly, you must be quite powerful," Lydia said, her voice trembling with rage. "Why don't you show, Speck?"