This was an objectively bad thing to do and she knew it, but that wasn't enough to convince her not to. Zelda had always been more reckless when she was sad, and it was impossible for her to talk herself out of this now. Maybe if she pretended she was supposed to be doing this, if she pretended that this was fine and no one would ever find out and she was doing what she was supposed to be doing — well. Maybe she could just do this one bad thing, and maybe she wouldn't get caught, and maybe it would fix them.

She didn't actually believe that, but she followed Alfred out of the ballroom anyways. She could deal with the consequences of this later — she would have to — but for now the thought of staying in the ballroom was suffocating. This was the same logic that had her turning towards Alfred as soon as his arm was around her shoulders. People could see, probably, and as a pair they were definitely not unrecognizable — but she didn't want it to matter, and she placed a hand on his chest.

Zelda hummed her agreement. Somewhere felt appealing, at the moment — really anywhere but Hogsmeade felt appealing, because so much of her family was here and she didn't want to see them.

"I want to go back to Ottery," she said, tucking her head against his chest. "Is that stupid?"

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