Standing in the middle of the pitch, Noémie has her arms crossed, with her broom nearby. Rather than having the usual conglomeration of things, the only thing outside with her is a pile of quaffles and her own broom. Nothing else sits on the pitch with her as she looks around, looking up at the sky, as if to defy the falling rain from continuing during her practice. Nothing much else is even on the pitch, which is rather quiet, considering that most people are inside to escape the rain.

The day is drawing to it’s end, but there is yet another Quidditch practice scheduled for the Ravenclaws this evening, due to the match that is soon to be played between them and the Hufflepuffs. A bit worried about the stack of homework he has left in the common room, but eager to do well at the practice and please his team captain, David runs to the pitch to make it on time; fortunately, he is not too late. “Hello, Noémie!” he says, and then, opening wide eyes as he notices the heap of quaffles, he adds: “What are all those Quaffle for? Those are for us Chasers, I bet?”

“Heyo!” Bailey calls, trotting onto the pitch. Is his hair mussed, or is it just a cause of the rain? “Not a great day for practice,” he comments and puts his broom over his shoulders. He grins perhaps a bit giddily at his teammates and stands next to David. “I hope it’s not like this for the match.” Glancing around as if looking for the rest of the team, Bailey begins to look perplexed. “Where’s everyone else?”

“It’s just chasers for this practice,” Noémie tells them, leaning down to pick up a Quaffle and toss it back and forth between her hands. “What I’m hoping to do is work on your catching exercises. This is a game that I hear muggle children sometimes play, but I’ve modified it a bit. So, up on your brooms in the air, and then I’ll turn around and throw this quaffle as hard as I can, and yell out a points value while I’m in the air.” Pulling out her wand and conjuring a scoreboard, the names ‘David’ and ‘Bailey’ appear on it with blank tally areas beneath. “And the person with the least amount of points does ten laps.” Noémie grins at them as she says this, tossing the quaffle in the air and catching it again. “No, up!”

“Hmm… I’ve never played that game.” says David, “But it sounds fun… let’s do it!” says David, who hops on his own broom and takes off, however near Noémie, and waiting for her to toss the first Quaffle in the air. Ten laps? That’s a lot, he doesn’t want to be in for it. Better be careful… David casts one last look at Bailey, just to see where he is: that may come in handy when trying to catch the Quaffle.

Flying upward, trying to keep a rather close list to David, Bailey grins. “I’m going to win over you for sure!” he tells the younger student with a smirk, flying in a figure eight, to get himself warmed up on his broom before the quaffles begin flying upwards towards them. “This ought to be good practice, either way.”

“ALRIGHT!” Noémie calls loudly. “Now, turn around so you can’t see me!” She yells this with an obvious grin on her face. “Now you HAVE to stay on your toes!” The girl gets on her own broom and hovers just a short way above the ground, a quaffle still in hand. “Okay, one hundred!” She yells, tossing the quaffle over her shoulders towards them, trusting that the chasers have done as she instructed and turned their backs to her.”

David darts a challenging look at Bailey, before turning his back as instructed. Staying aloft at the same position without moving is a bit difficult –the wind is stronger in altitude, and the rain is not helping either– the boy waits with impatience for the first Quaffle to be thrown. When Noémie announces the value of the first ball, he startles and moves his head frantically to locate the Quaffle, only to completely miss it. Had he stayed concentrated, he would have seen that it was thrown nearly directly at him… “Oh, no…”

Bailey misses catching it as well, though he does make a noble attempt, flying almost down to the ground completely. “Cripes,” he calls, flying up next to David again and shaking his head. “Next one, we’ll get it,” he tells his teammate with a nod, glancing over his shoulder slightly apprehensively. After all, Bailey would rather not have to do laps.

“Fifty!” Noémie calls, tossing another ball up into the air in a different direction. She turns around and flies down to the pile, collecting two more quaffles before she flies back to the area where she had thrown the first and second from. A moment later, “Two-fifty!” follows, and then after a pause, “One-fifty!” Noémie turns this time to see if any of her subsequent tosses have been caught, though the tally keeps score on its own, she wants to see how well they’re coping with this.

A bit reassured that Bailey hadn’t caught the first quaffle either, David relaxes a bit –not much– and readies himself for the next throws. He misses the second throw, lets out a curse the reader would better be off not seeing, but by pure luck, he managed to catch one quaffle of the pair that has been thrown later. “Hmm… your game isn’t that easy!” he yells at Noémie. “Let’s see if I can get the next one…” he adds, taking a look at Bailey to see if he managed to catch the two other quaffles.

Bailey manages to get his hands on the fifty-point quaffle, as well as the one that had been called at one-fifty, putting him at 200 points. “Aha!” He calls, grinning in David’s direction, for even though David caught the one worth the most points, Bailey managed to get two. “Come again, Noémie!” he calls, clapping his hands loudly. “This is kind of fun!” He comments with a loud laugh and another grin.

Calling the quafffles out on the pitch to her, and glances up at them, chuckling as Bailey yells this out to her. She pauses for a moment, rearing back with her arm and biting her lip as she tosses one very high. “Three hundred!” she calls, waiting a moment while the ball makes its way into the air towards the chasers. Following that, she makes another throw, yelling, “Twenty-five!” as she does. Noémie seems unconcerned whether the points are to be evenly distributed, rather, she’s more watching how the chasers clamor to catch her throws.

David Mildred drops the quaffle he caught earlier to the ground, not bothering to watch it bouncing loudly on the grass, and concentrates to get the next one. “I’ve got it! I’ve got it!” he yells happily, catching the second quaffle, only to realize that it is only worth twenty-five meager points, and bracing himself for Bailey’s comment on that. He really needs to do better…

Though he had really wanted to catch the quaffle that was worth so much, Bailey unfortunately lets it fall between his fingers, swearing very loudly as he watches it fall to the ground. “I’ll get the next one, I will,” he calls and groans loudly, especially as David’s lead increases with his catch of this other quaffle.

“Alright, bring it in!” Noémie calls, summoning the quaffles back to her and glancing up in the air at the chasers. The girl gets off of her broom and tosses the spare quaffles into the bag that she had dragged them out to the field in while she waits for the boys in the air to join her. Looking at the tally, Noémie shakes her head and crosses her arms across her chest.

Feeling much disbelief about his own luck, David nods at Noémie and lands, then walks up to her and the scoreboard, and waits for her assessment of the practice. He privately wonders if he will have as much luck for the real match… probably not. “Hmm…”

“Bollocks,” Bailey comments as he makes his way down to the ground and then gets off of his broom, coming to stand near Noémie. He can tell by the tally that he’s lost, and he very much doesn’t want to do laps for it. The boy doesn’t glance to David, either, as he stands there waiting for Noémie to say something — which inevitably will be an instruction for him to begin his laps.

“Well, that wasn’t as good as I had hoped,” Noémie comments, looking from one of them to the other. “So, I think you should both do five laps, just to keep you limber. We’ll have a regular practice with everyone tomorrow, and hopefully the laps will do you some good.” Noémie grins and turns, grabbing up her broom and the bag that the quaffles are in and skipping off towards the broom shed. Perhaps something has put the girl in a good mood all of the sudden.

“I knew it!” David says out loud, pretending to complain, but in fact grinning. It was a good idea, after all, and the running would indeed do them good… even if jogging under the rain will not be that fun. Putting his broom on the ground, he waits for Bailey to do the same, then starts his first lap. His little seat near the fireplace, in the common rooms, will be well merited after that…

“Both of us!” Bailey complains loudly, putting his broom down and scoffing a bit. All of this seems to be in jest however, as it is very clear that Bailey was not the one who won the competition. Pausing for a moment, as if he was trying to put it off ever so slightly. Bailey does pick up and run, though, beginning his five laps. Soon enough, the boy has finished his five laps honestly, and he very tiredly makes his way into the school after putting his broom away.

There’s flour in the air in the common room again, as Saphia, dressed in more easily cleaned and less black muggle clothing than her robes, is hovering over her Cleverly Organised Occultic Kitchen set, and in particular over the workspace area, kneeding butter into flour to make a stiff dough. As she works away, a small gaggle of first years have come to look at her again, in amused amazement, asking questions amongst each other into what she might be making.

Walking quickly into the commonroom, her hair a bit damp from the snow that began falling down on her while she was out having some quality time with a certain other fifth year Ravenclaw, Noémie drags that very Ravenclaw into the room by the hand, her scarf thrown hastily around her neck, and her face trying not to look very gleeful. “It smells good in here,” she comments. “Saphia must be cooking.” The fifth year smiles as her assumption is proved true. “Hello, Saphia,” She greets the younger girl, pulling her scarf off and tossing it onto a nearby table, the absence of which reveals a rather red circle high on her neck, whether Noémie seems to realize it or not.

For his part, Joseph is neither ashamed of looking too cheerful about his liaison with the prefect, nor interested in being discreet about the part he has played in the red mark on her neck. Indeed, as he obediently follows Noémie across the common room, he meets the eye of at least one of his mates, smiling broadly and giving a ‘thumbs-up’ sign, then tapping his own neck and gesturing to Noémie. This is about as subtle as he gets. At least he didn’t actually holler it across the room, even if his hand gestures are rather blatantly obvious to anyone watching him. After a moment, he folds his arms across his chest (what, was he silently indicating something? No, not him.) and smiles a much less self-satisfied smile at Saphia. “Hello, hello, Saphia.”

“Oh, hello Ms. Ribouet! And Mr. Wexler!” Saphia smiles broadly. Her hair has been tied back into a ponytail to keep it out of her way while she cooks, but she instinctively goes to brush it away despite it not being there, and only leaves a smudge of pastry dough on her face. “Mr. Wexler!” She repeats, after a second thought. “I… um… I have a favor to ask. An… a favor I shouldn’t ask around these first years.” She leans in closer and whispers, “An illicit favor. Something I need, but shouldn’t have.”

Looking to Joseph curiously, Noémie looks first closely at Joseph’s neck, then her eyes go wide and her mouth drops open as her hand flies to her own neck. “You didn’t! Oh, good grief, now I’m going to have to wear sweaters all week under my robes.” The girl shakes her head and grabs her scarf and wraps it tight around her neck again, a bit of a glare going to Joseph as she drops onto the couch and shakes her hair out in hopes of preventing frizziness. Her eyebrows raise as Saphia says this and she looks from one to the other and back again. “Is this something I shouldn’t be listening to?” she asks both of them.

“You can’t have any.” Joseph declares, his tone totally deadpan, though he affects a rather over-dramatic look of stern disapproval. “You’re too young for that sort of thing, Miss Bona.” He pauses for a brief moment, then adds, in much more conversational tones, “I told you, if you want to use some type of title, feel free to call me Lord and Master Joseph Wexler. Otherwise, just Jo-Joseph is acceptable.” His delivery is still quite serious, verging on mockery, though generally much more conversational. Then, he turns a look of utter horror (rather over-dramatised horror, but horror nonetheless) on Noémie, shaking his head. “Oh, Noémie, it’s hardly even visible.

“O… oh.” Saphia pauses, trying to think around Joseph’s comments, and then, in a flash of inspiration, changes tactic. “I’m sorry, Lord and Master Joseph Wexler. I know I shouldn’t, but really…” she keeps her voice low so the firsties can’t hear. “It’s just that when my grandfather makes this, he uses a small amount of whiskey in the recipe for the filling. I suppose I might be able to leave it out, but I don’t know what it would do to the taste.” She looks about, flushed pink. And then, in her most horribly helpful, earnest tone of voice, she adds, “And you might not have to wait all week, Ms. Ribouet, if you went to see Madam Wexler about it. I’m sure she’d have something that could make it go down.”

As Saphia says this, Noémie just stares at the girl with a rather blank expression. She has no idea what to say to that. “Thank you, Saphia, I’ll… I’ll consider going to see her.” And admit that she had been out necking rather than working on homework? Not a chance. “You’re not actually going to get– stop laughing at me, you did it.” The girl narrows her eyes at Joseph as she says this and crosses her arms and a leg.

For a moment, Joseph seems torn between answering Saphia and Noémie, just shaking his head and laughing for a moment before offering a response. “I’m sorry, Noémie. I just think you’re overreacting a little bit, and that’s very funny to me.” He just can’t bite back his next joke, either. “Did you want me to kiss it better, Noémie?” Trying to stop his laughter and the onset of more bad jokes, he turns to Saphia with a much more serious expression. “I don’t think I can do that, Saphia. I really don’t…”

Saphia Bona sighs, but nods her head. “No, I guess you can’t. Well, I’ll just try without it.” She offers her best smile, and begins mixing the baking powder into the dough, as well as stirring two large bowls. One is filled with a brown mix of some sort, kind of a soft fudge, perhaps, while the other is filled with a yellow mix of similar consistency.

“Oh, you are no help!” the girl tells him with a fierce headshake. As if it were possible, she crosses her arms further and scoots into the corner of the couch she’s staked herself out on, deliberately not looking at him. “I’m sure it will taste wonderful without the whiskey, Saphia,” Noémie reassures the girl with a bit of a smile. It is after she says this that she reaches up and begins to tighten the scarf around her neck, as if letting it loosen even a little would reveal the very thing that she is rather unsuccessfuly trying to ignore.

“Oh, Noémie…” Joseph sighs in exasperation, shaking his head at the prefect and flopping down beside her on the couch. “Look, it’s not even that obvious, you’re going to draw so much more attention to it by covering it up than if you just didn’t worry about it.” Glancing over at Saphia, he offers a shrug and a small smile, as if to say ‘Noémie, eh?’, then turns his attention back to the prefect. “Look, if you just don’t cover it up, and just leave your hair out for a couple of days, no one’s even going to be able to tell. And it’ll fade quickly. And, uh..” He leans back thoughtfully, trying to think of advice. “I think coconut is supposed to help it fade quicker.”

As if to change topic, Saphia declares, “You’re really going to have to watch out for the defence against Hufflepuff, Ms. Ribouet, by the way. I’ve been looking over their matches beforehand and… well… I think Riley and Tegan will have their work cut out for them. Their chasers have the lowest ‘tag’ rate across the board. Quick as lightning, you know?” She sounds a bit worried as she folds over the pastry, filling it with the chocolate filling and then the lemon filling, layering it so that the two flavors will stay separate until bitten into.

“Oh, coconut, honestly?” Noémie responds with a shake of her head and turns away from Joseph. “Coconut might be good in those… whatevers you’re making.” The girl pauses as Saphia talks to her about Quidditch and nods slowly. “I’ve been trying to work on it with them, as well as the chasers. We’ve got to be a more fluid team before the Hufflepuff match, else we’ll get our rears served to us on a platter.” A pause. “And no comment about that, mister!” Noémie turns back to Joseph, only to point her finger at him and then turns back. Ah, their first spat, and all over a neck mark.

Hesitating at this, Joseph seems unable to think of a way to calm Noémie and to win her over again, just reaching out with one hand vaguely to pat at her arm. “Seriously, coconut.” This is hardly witty repartee likely to win over a love interest, and so, after an extra moment of thought, he scoots a little closer to her and, lowering his voice, adds, “He jests at scars that never felt a wound. But soft, what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Noémie is the sun. Arise fair sun, and kill the envious moon, for she is already sick and pale with grief, that thou her maid art far more fair than she. Be not her maid, for she is envious: her vestal livery is sick and green, and none but fools do wear it. Cast it off! It is my lady, oh, it is my love, oh, that she knew she were…” Affecting an innocent, puppy-dog-eyed expression, he rests his head against the couch and pouts as he finishes this speech, willing her to look at him. “I have more, if you want, Noémie.”

Saphia Bona spins on her heels, delighted, and asks, “Oh, are you a fan of the Bard, Mr. Wexler? I’ve tried to read as much as I can, but sometimes his work confuses me. I don’t understand the language always.” She turns back to her work and place the pastry in the tiny oven cheerfully. The common room’s fire leaps as the heat is magically transfered to the oven.

The prefect is sullied for a moment by this and looks at Joseph, turning back a bit and looking at him. The moment is ruined just a bit as Saphia pipes up, and she glances at the girl, and then looks back at Joseph. “What’s it from?” she asks, her anger perhaps melting a bit, though she doesn’t touch the scarf to move it at all. “Is it more from that Shakespear guy you told me about?” Noémie‘s face seems to ease a bit as she thinks over the lyrical words that he has just spoken to her.

“Romeo and Juliet.” Joseph clarifies, turning and offering Saphia a small smile. “It’s a tragic romance, and I do hope that our relationship is better fated than theirs. However, it does contain some very romantic speeches.” To Saphia, he adds, “I’ll help you with some of it, sometime, if you want.” However, his attention turns quickly back to the prefect and he continues to recite, rather softly, “Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven, having some business do entreat her eyes to twinkle in their spheres ’til they return. What if her eyes were there, they in her head? The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars. As daylight doth a lamp, her eyes in heaven would through the airy region stream so bright that birds would sing and think it were not night. See, how she rests her cheek upon her hand,” with a small smile, he reaches out and guides her hand to her cheek. “Oh, that I were a glove upon that hand, so I might touch that cheek.”

Finally getting the hint, Saphia coughs gently and returns to watching her dessert as it cooks slowly in the oven. One of the firsties comes over to her, asking about it, and she takes the chance to leave the two beloved alone. Soon she’s energetically discussing the dessert with the first year and actually, surprisingly, getting along with her very easily.

Noémie blushes rather hard as he touches her cheek, clearly having been melted away from her anger, the girl smiles a bit and leans back on the couch. She sighs a bit. “That’s really beautiful… it really is…” she tells him quietlyand leans over to kiss him gently on the lips, lingering a bit longer than is probably absolutely necessary before she hears the snickers of some nearby housemates. Oh, oops! And she pulls back and blushes hard, looking directly at Saphia. “So, how’s the stuff coming.” Her face is completely red as she says this, trying not to look at Joseph at all now, though the damage is already done.

Lounging back on his side of the couch, looking a little more cocky than is perhaps entirely necessary – see, boys, this is why it does you good to memorise romantic prose – Joseph seems quite happy with this response, reaching out to take her hand in what is, on the face of it, a comforting manner. It is also, probably purely coincidentally, of course, just another way of bragging to everyone else in the common room about how smoothly he managed to win her over again. There is some genuine comfort being offered to the girl in the way he squeezes her hand, but he is, after all, a teenage boy and needs something to brag about. “Do I get some when you’re done? Huh, Saphia, huh?”

“Hm?” Saphia is pulled away with her conversation with the other first year. “Oh! No, this isn’t for anyone here.” There is a powerful and audible complaint from everyone who had gathered in the common room, drawn by the smell. “This is for Rawnie, to apologise for how we treated him before. It was going to be a Pignolata, but.. it… it kind of became a really massive cannoli, instead.” She smiles, watching it. “And it’s cooking nicely. It should work very well.”

“All the better for you. You could do with a few Quidditch workouts, Joseph,” Noémie tells him and rolls her eyes, trying to use his own tactics to quell her embarassment. “Why is everyone in here, anyway? It’s crowded. Go to the library or something. Isn’t that what Ravenclaws are supposed to do? Bother the librarian or something.” Noémie‘s embarassment only becomes more obvious as she tries to empty the commonroom a bit, though not doing a very good job of it. “Besides, if you want something tasty like that, make it yourself.” None of this is directed to anyone in general, and the prefect’s face does not become any less red.

Affecting a shocked sort of expression, first directed at Saphia, then at Noémie, and lowering one hand to his stomach, Joseph looks, to all intents and purposes, completely offended by Noémie’s words, though he does squeeze her hand again to show his jest. “Noémie Ribouet! For shame! Are you trying to imply that my weakness for sweets is making me too round about the middle? In that case, I shall never exercise again, just to spite you.” A pause, and he turns back to Saphia, pouting cutely. “Saphia, did you hear what she just said to me? I need more sweets now, sweet comfort food. Who are you to deny me?”

Stumbling for words, Saphia thinks, “I… I could maybe make biscuits? Or perhaps cupcakes? But the oven’s very small, it’s amazing it’s as big as it is now, and I can’t really bake much more!” She desperately tries to think of a desert she can pan fry, and finally thinks, “If you get me some strawberries I could melt some chocolate to dip them in.”

“Oh, that would taste wonderful, I imagine, Saphia,” Noémie tells her with a smile and glances to Joseph as she says this, then pauses, mulling over what Josesp has said. The girl grins a bit and then leans over and bravely kisses him again. “There, that ought to be sweet enough for you for a while,” she comments and flips her hair over her shoulder. She then turns her attention back to Saphia. “Perhaps you could charm it to be bigger after a fashion, that way you can cook bigger things in it while you’re at school.”

Pausing and apparently thinking very carefully about this for a moment, Joseph eventually shakes his head and reaches out for Noémie’s scarf, pulling her closer and kissing her again, apparently entirely uncaring for the opinions of others in the room. “Alright, alright. Now I’m done.” He whispers in response, winking at her, then turning his attention back to Saphia. “Yes. Yes, you should do so immediately, lest I die from lack of sugar. I’m dependent, Saphia, I need my fix.”

Saphia Bona shakes her head at him, smiling, and pulls out a small double boiler, filling the bottom half with water and putting it on the stove. “Go on, then. I’ll need strawberries.”

Noémie can’t help but giggle a bit as Joseph does this, then pauses, looking around. “Oh, oh, let’s go see if there are any to be had. I’m sure if there are any, Professor Walsh would have them, out near, y’know, the rose gardens.” The girl grins as she says this and looks back to Saphia. “It’s about time for the regular ones anyway.” She chuckes a bit and stands up, tugging her scarf out of Joseph’s reach and fixing it back around her neck, still hiding the evidence of their earlier business. “Do you want them today, Saphia, or just whenever?”

“I could handle an excursion to the rose garden now.” Joseph volunteers innocently, though he winks again at Noémie. “It should be nice and private out there right now. For the strawberry picking, I mean.” He really, really doesn’t need any sort of encouragement. At all. Getting to his feet, he smiles again at Saphia, offering a quiet, “No, really, if you need any help with understanding Shakespearean language, give me a buzz.” With a dry smile, he adds, “Chances are, I won’t be doing homework.” Then, he gestures with his head towards the exit, beckoning for Noémie to join him.

Saphia Bona grins and tells the prefect, “Well, anytime, but if you want to eat those strawberries tonight, I might sort of need them tonight. I agree magic does blur the lines a little, charms in particular, but cause and effect still remain in play, I think.” Her face adopts her deadpan expression and then, a second later, she breaks out into a giggle and starts melting chocolate in the double-boiler.

Noémie chuckles as Saphia says this and nods. “We’ll get right to it, then, Saphia. We’ll try to get back as soon as possible!” She says this enthusiastically, and indeed, they will be back as soon as they remember their actual goal. Which, well, could be a while. She doesn’t say this, though, and instead skips a bit towards the exit of the commonroom. Noémie skipping? For strawberries? It is a curious day indeed. And then the prefect is out of the commonroom, destination: Rose Gardens.

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. This is the sound of Kelly glumly making her way down from the dorms, dragging her feet on the stairs as she goes. Thump. Thump. Thump. This is the sound of her heavy bookbag bouncing off the stairs as she drags it along the ground, not even going so far as to properly carry it. With one final thud, she reaches the bottom of the stairs, surveying the common room with a pathetic expression of melancholy – it is early evening, and a number of people are now returning from dinner. Judging from where she came from, and her pitiful expression, she was not among those at dinner, prefering instead to wallow in self-pity in her dorm. One can only do this for so long, however, so she makes her way to a couch, flopping down on it and glaring at anyone who dares approach her.

Sitting near to the fire in front of a table, there are an assortment of sweets sitting on the table in front of Briony, and she appears to be trying to levitate them into her mouth one at a time. “Hi, Kelly!” The girl calls with an energetic wave and a grin. Nothing more is said as the girl appears to be quite intent on getting a sherbet ball into her mouth whole without touching it. She doesn’t succeed, though she does manage to catch it before it falls on the floor and pops it into her mouth, hovering about six inches off of the floor just moments later.

Running inside the common room from the portrait hole Rawnie is in a big a hurry as ever and as usual she even tramples over a couple of the other first year girls who she beleives to be a bit slow. “Oh quit yer whinin would yer? It’s not like Im that ‘eavy. Your toe ain’t broke ner nothin.” She says to a boy who is hopping around holding his foot and looking daggers at her. Rawnie‘s green eyes fall on Kelly and since it has been some time since the young girl had spoken to her it only natrual that she strike up a fast paced conversation right? Rawnie sits on the floor by the couch Kelly is sitting on and smiles up at her. “Ello Kelly…. whatcher doin?” Yes stunningly profound conversation here.

Isn’t it obvious what Kelly‘s doing? She’s wallowing in self-pity. Still, this is hardly a witty retort and she glances over, first at Briony, then at Rawnie, glaring at both of them in turn, then closing her eyes. “I… don’t feel well.” She lies, curling up her legs beneath her and withdrawing herself further from the first year girl, raising one hand to her head to help add weight to the lie. Certainly, it’s not even completely a lie, if one considers being in a bad mood as being not ‘well’ in some way. “So, please, don’t bother me.”

“Y’want schum schweets?” Briony asks with her mouth full of sherbet ball still. The girl giggles a bit and waves to Rawnie. It is apparent that the girls have come a long way from their sorting-day tussle. “My Auntie Eva sent me all these sweets because of the ball, isn’t it great?” Briony doesn’t seem to mind that nobody else is really paying attention to her, as she will end up making them pay attention if she has anything to do with it. “It’s soooo good. Better than that Honeydukes stuff, because my cousin Maura makes it.” Not that anyone had asked her.

Turning her head and peering at Briony at the mention of sweets Rawnie is the first to swarm over to the second year. “Can I ‘ave some?” She asks with the prettyest smile that has ever graced her face. A momment later she turns to Kelly. “Maybe ya should see tha nurse then?”

Opening her eyes and glaring at Briony, Kelly doesn’t seem to feel this deserves any sort of verbal response, just shaking her head and closing her eyes again, wriggling into a little nest of cushions in the corner of the lounge. Then, she opens just one eye and peers at Rawnie, shaking her head again. “I don’t need to see the nurse. I just – leave me alone, alright?” Her eye snaps closed again, and she presses her lips together in annoyance. Exactly what has gotten the girl in such a dismal mood is left unsaid.

“Sure you can have some,” Briony tells Rawnie, pointing to her pile on the table with a boisterous giggle as she continues to hover. “You should go see my mum. She can fix EVERYTHING!” Briony says this loudly, causing some rather sullen looks from some nearby fifth years who seem intent on studying rather than listening to the second year’s outburts. “And she’l make you feel all better, that way you can enjoy the sweets with Rawnie and me!”

Hopping up quickly to grab a sherbert ball herself Rawnie pops it into her mouth and smiles wide at the sweet taste. “Shanksh” she says to Briony. Rawnie sits in the floor again and looks at Kelly for a long momment. “Wotsh wrong Shkelly?” He speaks around the ball of candy in her mouth.

“But Briony,” Kelly replies patiently (or, more appropriately, in a tone that indicates that she thinks she’s being patient and, by extension, has more in common with condescension), opening her eyes and sitting up to glare at the younger girl, “I don’t want to share sweets. I don’t want to go and see your mum and get her to fix me.” Turning her gaze on Rawnie, she rolls her eyes and eventually explains. “I’ve… not had a brilliant couple of weeks, okay? Is that what you wanted to hear? Fine. I’ve had a terrible couple of weeks and I just want to be left alone.” For all that she insists on being left alone, there is an unmistakable tone in her voice: please, ask me more, so I can vent.

Briony frowns at Kelly, unsure of what to say or do. Briony‘s not used to dealing with rough moods. “I’m sorry you’re not feeling good, Kelly,” Briony tells her. “Do you like ‘em, Rawnie?” Briony asks with a big grin to the younger girl as she floats back to the ground and points her wand at a peppermint toad. “D’you reckon I can get the whole thing in my mouth? What do you think, Kelly?” The girl utters the levitating charm and the frog slowly rises into the air as the girl starts to direct it towards her already opened mouth.

Madly giggleing at Briony’s antics Rawnie cheers with a mouth full of sherbert ball as the older girl attempts to fit an entire peppermint toad in her mouth. Turning to Kelly once she has swalloed the candy Rawnie makes a bit of a face. “Yer wouldn’t ‘ave such a bad time-o-it if yer didn’t worry bout things so much…” Rawnie grabs a sherbert ball and tosses it in Kelly’s direction. She takes another and pops it into her mouth happily.

Reaching out, largely operating on automatic, to catch the sherbert ball (and missing, in fact, because she has made no pretense to being coordinated), Kelly seems rather put out by Briony’s lack of caring about her problems, be they real or imaginary. For this reason, perhaps, she turns her attention on Rawnie, narrowing her eyes in annoyance. “How am I supposed to stop worrying?” She asks, her tone edged with a scathing overtone. “It’s not like I can just pretend like it’s not going on. Did you know, I have a stepsister that I didn’t know about until my father wrote me a letter to wish me a happy birthday? And it’s March. My birthday was in October! And, and, Rafe isn’t talkign to me, and I can’t figure out why it is this time, and Icky Gravely in second year, he hugged me the other day, and that was just creepy, and, and, Suki Korosu-Dawson…” What crimes against her Suki has committed remain unsaid, and the third year falls into an uneasy silence, pulling further away from the other two girls and nestling deeper into her nest of cushion.

Briony pauses as Kelly points out all of her problems, the girl lets the toad fall back onto the table. “Isn’t Rafe always not talking to you?” the girl asks her friend — well, good acquaintance, at the very least — quirking her head and then reaching out and taking the peppermint toad, biting a bit off of it and chewing it as she tries to comprehend the confusions that love seems to behold for everyone she’s seen in love other than her parents. Or her aunts and uncles. Or Professor Fallon. Which really only leaves Kelly’s excursion into love.

“Well sittin there mopein bout it isn’t gunner make yer feel no better.” Rawnie says bluntly. She sits in the floor near Briony and smiles a little at the mention of Clavicle. “Next time ‘ee hugs yer kick ‘im and take his tatoo things. I wan’me some of em.”

Plucking a cushion from her nest, Kelly tosses it at the second year, nestling back into her nest with a particularly put-out expression, not even looking to see if her cushion hit the target. “It’s no business of yours whether he talks to me or not.” She replies sulkily, crossing her arms in annoyance. “And, in any case… well, okay, so we don’t really talk much, but it’d be nice if he had a better reason than ‘I don’t trust Charlie’ to ignore me.” This is all that she offers on the topic, turning a particularly venomous glare on Rawnie. “What else am I supposed to do? Tell my father that I actually turned fourteen last October? Kick Gravely until he leaves me alone?” Although that does sound like fun. “And what about Korosu-Dawson, and Rafe, and my stepsister? Kicking,” sadly, “doesn’t solve everything.”

“Well…” Briony starts and then oofs as she is hit with the pillow. “That was really mean, Kelly! What’d I ever do to you?” Briony‘s face gets more serious and she throws the pillow back at Kelly. “Anyway, I’m sorry about all that, but why don’t you just have some candies? Candy fixes everything that my mum can’t.” The girl shrugs and takes another bite of her peppermint frog. Pausing a moment, Briony turns her face to Rawnie. “What tattoo things are you talking about? I’ve never heard of them.”

Grinning toothily Rawnie “Yes! Just kick him till ‘ee gets tha point yer know? Over an over …. or till ‘ee gives you all them tatoos.” She says before turning to Briony. “Oh ‘ee sells neat pictures what ‘ee calls tatoos and they move around an stuff like paintings only on yer skin.” She reaches over and takes a peppermint toad herself and poke it in the belly to watch it squirm before savagley biting it’s head off.

Though she opens her mouth to make some sort of fiery comeback, Kelly is silent for a moment. What exactly did Briony do? ‘You made a very valid, truthful point about my relationship with Rafe which I find offensive only because of the inherent truth in it’ isn’t a very good comeback, all told. After a moment of glaring and opening and closing her mouth angrily, she stands up, grabs her bookbag, and storms back up the stairs without a word, though her loud stomping more than accounts for that. So, she absolutely does not have a comeback.

Staring as Kelly runs off, Briony doesn’t seem to know what to make of it. “Wanna go get a snack?” Briony asks to Rawnie, almost as if nothing had happened just a moment before. Briony‘s demeanor is slightly altered from the scene that has just played out, but for the most part she is still the same hyper girl that she was before the outburst, and one can imagine that she will will not linger long over having a pillow thrown at her. “I know how to get into the kitchens, and the houseelves are awful nice.”

Rawnie Weller gives a nod to Rawnie as she stands up to brush off her robes. “Arright! I never met any house-elves before might be intrestin I reckon.” Rawnie smiles and devours the rest of her toad and heads to the portrait hole at top speed. “Lead tha way Briony!”

“Alright!” Briony responds as Rawnie agrees to her proposed excursion. Quickly sweeping her sweets into the bag that she was gifted them in. It is just a moment before she has shoved the bag into her pocket and hops up, trotting behind Rawnie towards the entrance of the commonroom, making her way out of the area and back into the hallways, headed towards the kitchens for unknown goodies.

A bag slung over her shoulder, dragging her steps and massaging her temples as she enters the tower, it seems that Morgana DeWitt is not in the best of moods for class. In fact, she’s not in the best of moods for anything in particular, not that that is anything new. Dumping her bag on the floor by her feet, she leans against the wall, groaning quietly to herself as she continues to massage her temples. “Why am I even here?” She mutters. “I could be asleep. I could be doing just about anything. Why, oh, why, am I heeeeere…”

It’s midnight, but Saphia‘s not even half-way sleepy. Astronomy tonight! As always, she’s one of the first students to bound up to the tallest tower in Hogwarts, carrying only the required textbooks and her standard astronomy equipment, plus her quills, a purple dragonhide notebook, and a plate of chocolate muffins, balanced precariously on her school textbook. “Good evening, Professor Fallon!” she nods to the teacher as she enters shortly after Morgana. “I brought some chocolate muffins for everyone… I hope that’s alright. I think we could each get half a muffin and share evenly.” Saphia carefully puts the muffins down on the teacher’s desk, and then sorts her stuff out at her desk.

Already in the classroom, Avery Fallon is seated behind her desk, bent over an inch-high stack of papers. Circling a number in red on the top sheet, the professor exhales sharply as if in relief. She is only vaguely aware of the class filing in at first, and only looks up as Saphia greets her. “Hello,” she replies. “Wow… thank you,” Avery says, eyes wide at the muffin. Once she has organized the papers into order based on mark, the woman stands up, gathering the sheets in her arms as she surveys her class. “Good evening,” is her quick greeting as she steps forward a little, waiting for silence. “Your papers on outer moons have been graded!” Avery says in something of an astonished tone. “As… well… as usual, Saphia has taken first,” she comments as she hands a paper back to the girl, smiling. “However, I am overall quite pleased with the work from all of you,” she encourages as she continues handing back papers.

If Morgana even registers what the Professor is saying, she doesn’t entirely care, still rubbing at her temples and, as Saphia chirps away happily, glaring at her fellow second-year. At first, it is just a silent glare, but finally, she offers an explanation. “I feel like my brain has swollen up and is trying to force its way out of my head. This is not a chocolate muffin moment.” Surely there must be some method to relieve her headache. Like trepanning, even. A hole in her skull would certainly distract her from her pounding head.

Saphia Bona smiles somewhat dopily at the news that she took first in the class, and blushes embarrassedly. She whispers something to one of her Ravenclaw friends, who appears to be grumbling about his mark, and then turns her attention to Morgana, with a sympathetic frown. “Well, that’s no good, Morgana!” She looks down at her desk, suddenly deep in thought. But no, try as hard as she might, she can’t think of a way to make chocolate muffins cure a headache, at least not without using charms. Not that she knows how to use charms to cure a headache. Finally, she tilts her head back up to pay attention to the professor.

Giving Avery a big grin, Briony skips up to get her paper and then makes her way over to get her paper. “Thank you, Mrs Fallon!” Briony exclaims with some deliberation, for she is not used to calling the woman by ‘Fallon’ rather than Goden. Soon Briony is practically hopping back to her seat, with a grin at Saphia. “Congratulations for the score,” she tells the Ravenclaw and then glances to Morgana, who doesn’t look very pleased at all. “I’m sure Mrs Fallon wouldn’t appreciate you not coming, so you must be doing it to be nice.” She nods decisively as she says this. Briony is perhaps a bit giddy today.

Resisting the urge to pat Briony on the head as she chirps her thanks, Avery‘s face becomes a little emotionless at Morgana’s essay. DeWitt. Rafe’s sister. Fantastic. Now finished with handing out papers, Avery Fallon returns to the front of the room and sighs. “Now, aren’t we sad to be finished studying outer moons?” Avery asks, a hand to her chest as she nods with dramatic sympathy. “Luckily, our next topic is exciting, too,” Avery says, not completely without sarcasm. “I know you all read the introductory pages to astrology in your texts like I told you to last week,” the professor says hopefully. “As you know, astrology goes hand in hand with astronomy. Even though some of you will go on to take Divination next year and learn more details on the subject, it’s implied that you understand the basics here, first.” Scanning the class, Avery attempts to make eye contact with all her students as she continues. “All of you have a star sign based on the day of your birth, and a lot of you probably knew it even before last week’s reading homework.” Bracing herself for the noise, Avery says, “On the count of three, I want everyone to say their star sign out loud so that I know you did your homework.” Possibly the easiest homework-check Avery had ever heard of, that’s for sure.

Saphia Bona calls out in one long breathless word/sentence: “Leo-unless-you-use-the-chinese-methodology-in-which-case-it’s-Tiger!” She is, of course, overpowered by the many other students all yelling out their starsign at the same time.

Eying Briony with a raised eyebrow, Morgana has an excellent comeback just for this situation. “Urgh.” She mutters, clasping her hands to her forehead and resisting the urge to bash her head against a wall. That would not help. Then, after a moment, she looks up at the Professor, fixing a somewhat insolent glare on the Professor. “The cusp of Capricorn and Aquarius.” She offers, a certain defiance in her tone, before she slips back into her headachey self-pity.

Briony has to think about this for a moment. What was it again, what was it? Oh, that’s right! “Cancer!” She practically shouts, her hands both thrown up into the air, a motion which would make any true cancer cringe. The girl beams around at everyone, her face falling only a little bit as she looks at Morgana. Right, grumpy girl. She turns her face forward again happily to Avery as she waits for the next question. If only they were all so easy!

“Good,” Avery commends, nodding once. “We also learned in the reading that astrologers have worked to find some common traits of people born under each star sign. It is with this information that they cross reference, based on other signs and alternate happenings in the celestial expanse, and create horoscopes. Used to tell the future,” adds Avery, clasping her hands. “Many people are already far too concerned about the future as it is, if you ask me,” Avery notes, raising one eyebrow, “And that falls completely into Divination, anyway. Today we’ll just be looking at those primary characteristics that I mentioned before. Hands up, then, who can tell me some general characteristics of their star sign? Make sure you tell me which it is, first,” Avery says, looking to her class as a whole.

Saphia Bona raises her hand and answers, “I was born on the 22nd of August, which makes me a Leo. Leo’s are meant to be generous, kind and openhearted, but they’re also meant to be very domineering, emotional and loud,” she declares, in her tiny whisper, “And I don’t think that sounds like me very much at all. I was also born in 1914, which makes me Year of the Tiger in the Chinese zodiac, but that makes even less sense, frankly. Perhaps I’m just meant to like cats? I do like cats.”

Despite the pounding of her head, Morgana sort of half-raises her hand, a grudging acceptance that since she is here, she had better actually do something. “I was born on the 19th of January. Because I am on the cusp of Capricorn and Aquarius, it is hard to tell what I’m supposed to be like.” She begins. “If I am a Capricorn, I am ambitious and disciplined, reserved and practical.” She smiles a somewhat self-assured smile, though one hand still presses against her aching head. “And I am supposed to hate noise and immature behaviour.” This is a rather pointed remark, and she glares sidelong at Briony as she says it. “If I am an Aquarius, I am independent and intellectual, detatched, unemotional, and above all, loyal. And I would hate… sameness. Ridiculous sameness.” Turning her gaze back to Professor Fallon, she offers another insolent glare, before looking back down at her desk.

Raising her hand and waiting her own turn, Briony seems a bit less confident than her classmates. “Cancer people are supposed to be really emotional, and not like attention or people looking at them, and they would rather stay at home than go to Quidditch games or anything like that.” Briony shakes her head as she says that. “But it’s all lies, because I love going to Quidditch games.” Of course, if Briony does not fit the mold, it must be the mold’s problem, right?

Nodding, Avery smiles… even to Morgana, (though it disappears slightly as she looks to Briony), as the students take turns answering. “Good answers, all,” she says truthfully. “Five points to everyone who answered.” The professor does look genuinely impressed with her class’s astute responses, and there’s quite a pause before she looks back to Saphia, and then to Briony. “We have some deviants here, looks like,” she comments, bringing herself mentally back to the topic at hand. “What to think when you have few or no traits of your star sign? Tricky, and not really lies, Briony,” she says with a smile. “It’s a lesser known fact that while we all have star signs, we also have moon signs. Those of you sharing less traits with your moon sign are likely governed more by your moon sign. Thing is, you need to know your time of birth in order to find it out. This wasn’t covered in the introduction so I don’t expect that anyone will know theirs. For part of your homework I’d like you to try and find out what time you were born, even if it’s just a guess on behalf of your parents.”

Saphia Bona raises her hand with a question and, when called upon, asks, “Professor, why would some people be more guided by their moon sign, while others be guided by their star signs? Is there a theory as to why this would be?”

Briony‘s eyes light up as Avery tells them this. Aha, a reason why she doesn’t fit in the mold set by the astrologers! One can imagine that Briony will posthaste be trotting down to see her mother about what time she was born, because after all, Briony wants to know what her Moon sign is! That, and she can’t afford to do badly in the class, lest she be disallowed to do Quidditch next year. The girl might have ulterior motives, but at least they’re for the right end.

Glancing up with a quiet growl – her kingdom for a headache cure – Morgana eyes the Professor for a moment before resting her head in her hands again. “I fit mine.” She mumbles defiantly, probably scarcely loud enough to be heard. “But I am on a cusp. I am allowed not to fit properly.” This is the best comeback she can think up while clutching her head in utmost pain. Do forgive her.

Looking to Saphia, Avery appears quite entertained at the question and crosses her arms. “That’s something we’ll be starting to study in the classes to come, and a topic I’ll hope you’ll all touch on in your term papers. As a simple answer for now, Saphia, it’s hard to know for sure why people are guided so. Your moon sign is designed to regulate your personality and, your star sign, your individual side. The intricacies of people’s personalities emerge at different stages in life. Above all, people change as their environment does. Those guided by their moon signs now may not always be…” trailing off, Avery looks to Morgana with an inquiring look before asking, “D-do you need to see the nurse, Morgana?”

“No..” Morgana moans, looking up at Professor Fallon, scowling angrily. “I need to see an undertaker.” This point made, she claps her hands over her eyes, as if the effort of all these scowls and glares is making her eyes hurt as well as just her head, and she turns her attention back to her self-pity. “My eyes feel like they are about to pop out. My brain feels swollen, as though it’s going to crack out of my skull.” Because obviously, ‘yes, I have a headache’ just wasn’t a good enough response.

Looking around, as if weighing up the wisdom of this action, Saphia slowly rises to her feet and walks over to Morgana, laying one of her hands on Morgana’s back, gently and (she hopes) soothingly. It’s unlikely the two girls have ever said more than five words to each other before today, but Saphia‘s decided to try and help, it would seem.

“Oh, dear!” Briony responds rather loudly. “Someone ought to get her to — Madam Wexler quick, before she dies!” Briony looks genuinely concerned, and she faulters as she manages to say ‘madam wexler’, after all, it isn’t exactly normal for one to call their mother by another name than ‘mum’ after so many years of calling her such. “I’ll escort her if you want, Miss Avery — I mean — oops — I mean Professor Fallon.” Briony‘s face colors very red as she manages to get the name wrong, despite doing it conspicuously often.

“Bona, I understand that you are trying to be nice.” Morgana responds, sitting up a little straighter and trying to shrug Saphia’s hand off her back while not dislodging her hands from her head. “So I will merely give you a warning. Do. Not. Touch. Me.” Then, she moves her hands from her eyes just long enough to glare at Briony. “I am not at any risk of keeling over and dying, Wexler. I just want to be left alone.”

Saphia Bona withdraws her hand hurridly and whispers, “S… sorry, Morgana.” Returning to her seat, she instead just looks over sympathetically while one of her Ravenclaw friends dismissively waves his hand toward her and whispers, possibly informing Saphia that she’s not worth the trouble.

Though touched by Saphia’s kind act, Avery doesn’t show a lot of response in her expression as Briony starts speaking. Avery does smirk faintly at Briony’s ‘Madam Wexler’, and nods, looking back to Morgana, a bit put off at her reaction to little Saphia. “Class is almost over as it is… Briony could take you to the nurses’,” she says kind of forcefully, “or you could just head off to bed if you like, Morgana,” Avery says, her arms still crossed. To the rest of the class, Avery raises her voice a little to say, “Since all the zodiac constellations appear in the sky in different seasons, it’s impossible to see them all at once. Pity,” she shakes her head. “For the rest of the class I want you to use your telescopes and try to see how many zodiac constellations you can locate tonight.”

Peering up at Avery with eyes that don’t quite focus, yet still manage to hold a certain degree of defiant contempt, Morgana stands from her desk and, waving a dismissive hand at Briony, gathers her things together and leaves, massaging her head with one hand. “This class was the biggest waste of time I have ever sat through.” She mutters as she makes her exit, perhaps just loud enough for Avery, if no one else, to hear her.

Hopping up to escape Morgana’s possible glare, the girl digs into her bag and pulls out her small telescope, running to look at the constellations through it. For once, Briony seems to be standing still, even at this late hour of night, and she slowly brings her telescope into clear focus, trying to find the constellations that are visible in tonight’s sky.

Saphia Bona nods to the professor and takes up her position at one of the stations, happily using her telescope and book of constellations to map out the visible zodiac signs, and carefully noting down her co-ordinates shown on the telescope. She is careful and meticulous and cheerful, this being the only subject where her practical skills match her writing.

Avery is not quite sure what it was she heard from Morgana, but she certainly hopes she heard wrong. “Excuse me?” Avery questions in the departing girl’s direction. “Miss DeWitt, I understand you’re not feeling well. It’s really no excuse to be rude,” professor Fallon points out, assuming Morgana did say something rude. Attempting to not show any hurt emotion, Avery glances to the rest of the class, searching for stars. As the class has always gone in the past, they are more or less free to leave when they felt they’ve seen enough. No use forcing the subject, after all.

Spinning around and affecting a look of utter innocence – exacerbated by her pitiful clutching of her head, though there is a hint of something else in her eye, something much less sweet and naive – Morgana offers only a shrug and, “Being rude, Professor Fallon?” Her tone is completely innocent, except perhaps an extra edge in her voice in the last two words, a sort of deliberate, nasty emphasis on the name. “In what way have I been rude?”

Saphia Bona continues to search, and will continue to do so until she is forced out by the Professor (which is fairly typical) or she falls asleep at her telescope (which has so far only happened once). It’s not quite reading for her, but she loves astronomy dearly.

Lest Briony be caught in the middle of the fray of Morgana’s ‘wrath’, the girl closes up her small telescope quickly, putting it back into her bag, Stuffing the essay — on which she got mediocre marks — into her bag as well between two books, the second year hops up, tosses her bag over her shoulder, and quickly makes her way out of the room. Sleep would be a good thing to have, after all.

Glaring down to the girl, Avery decides it is in her best interest not to fight over this one. “Just get to bed,” she says after a moment, exasperation more evident in her voice than contempt. Turning from that scene, Avery takes up her post once more behind her paper-covered desk. Absently trying to organize the mess, Avery looks up from time to time, waving to students who acknowledge her as they pass. Eventually only Saphia remains, and Avery only shakes her head, a lopsided grin on her face.

Leaning on her broom, Noémie looks over a bit of parchment as she stands in the center of the pitch. The falling snow doesn’t seem to bother her, though she is wearing several more layers of clothing than usual, including not one, but two scarves. The prefect waits for her team as she peruses the information on the parchment, a very serious expression set on her features. No, Noémie does not look thrilled today.

It is a busy day for David. With the school year going slowly towards the end, the essays begin to be more and more demanding, and David is often spending his entire evenings in the Library. Having Quidditch practices on the top of all that work is not helping much, either, especially since the Ravenclaw team has now a clear chance to have the Cup, which means that practicing is now essential. Running to reach the pitch before the practice begins, David arrives there totally out of breath, and with a red face. “It has not begun already, as it?” he asks nervously, but apparently he is among the first to be on the pitch.

Following David from afar, Tegan walks at a slower pace. The fourth year is totally unwilling to run to get on the pitch; this is ridiculous, especially since they were both on time. Finally reaching the spot where David and Noémie are standing, she makes a quick nod as a greeting. “Hello, Noémie. So, what do you have in store for today for us?” she asks, trying to focus her mind on Quidditch, when she is really only thinking about one particular team member. “Bailey isn’t here yet.” she states, simply, thus revealing what is really going on in her mind.

Bailey Williams strides down to the quidditch pitch, wrapped up in several layers of clothing and looking for his teammates and especially for Tegan. He is determined to show his best in the upcoming practice. As he comes into range, Bailey waves and greets his teammates. “Hello Noémie, everything set up, yet? Hey, David, Tegan.” sounding very businesslike during the last name.

“Damn, it’s cold,” Riley mutters, pulling his cloak closer about his shoulders as he trudges his way out on to the pitch. His broom drags along behind him, and his eyes are heavy. His long, wine-red hair is unbound, and moves behind in like a flame streamer in the light breeze. He doesn’t looke very well, all told, pale and puffy-eyed. Never the less, his black beater dangles from his wrist idly.

Trotting out to the pitch several moments after the rest of the team has convened, Van looks quite happy, despite it being quite cold for March, and her having to bring herself out to practice. “Hello, everyone,” she calls chipperly as she finally makes it onto the pitch with a beaming smile. The seventh year slings her broom over her shoulder and comes to stand casually near the center of the group of them on the pitch, grinning to all of her teammates as she does so.

“You’re late, Van,” Noémie comments, her voice low and rather sharp as she says this. “Alright, good job beating Slytherin last weekend,” she tells all of them, though her face doesn’t have a single bit of congratulations in them. “I think that was the least organized we ever were,” she tells them all, her eyes narrowing as she looks to each of them individually. “Today, I want us to work on our teamwork, flying and playing as a fluid team.” She peers a bit and then turns around, gathering up some cut twine. “Alright, Bailey and David, you two together. Tegan and Riley, here for you two, Van, you go over there to the hoops. No, I’m not tying you down to the hoops. I don’t want to see your legs separating,” she directs to the two teams she has designated with a fierce look. “If we can’t work as a team, then we’re not going to beat Hufflepuff. They’re a good team, they work together, and they pay attention to each other. I don’t want anyone to get ignored this time, and I want us to take the cup. As of now, we go into double-duty. We’ll break for supper, and then come back down to the pitch for more drills afterward.” The girl looks at each of them. “Well, what are you waiting for? Get situated and get in the air. I’ll pass out the balls momentarily.”

David Mildred nods silently at the team captain and walks towards Bailey. “So it’s you and me, apparently.” he says, looking at the fourth year boy while attempting to smile. “Let’s take off, shall we?” he says, grabbing his own broom, and flying up in the air in a matter of seconds. When he reaches a few meters over the pitch, he slows down and turns around to wait for Bailey. The nagging impression that much of Noémie’s speech was directed solely at him is beginning to bug him, but he tries to shrug it off and concentrate on the drills.

Tegan Madison nods silently as well, looking at her bat as the speech goes on. When the pairs are made up, Tegan walks towards Riley, but steals a last glance at Bailey before talking to the other Beater. “Let’s go, then.” she says to him, trying not to mention anything about Riley’s tendency to send the Bludgers towards the public or even the Ravenclaw players, instead of the opponents. “We’ll do just fine. Or so I hope…”

Bailey Williams initially quirks an eyebrow as his captain reveals her plans for today, but then cottons on to the rather unconventional drill method. Glancing over to Tegan, the faint wish of having tried out as a beater emerges. “Alright.” he replies to David and briskly mounts his broom. Bailey zooms up and positions himself next to his fellow chaser, waving with the piece of twine. “Come a bit closer and I’ll tie us up. I hope we won’t totally crash.” Bailey chuckles.

Riley Markham passes Noémie a somewhat curious look as he accepts from her the length of twine, before turning to Tegan. His expression isn’t it’s usual brash, energetic cast — instead, he looks tired, and vaguely pained. Knotting one end of the twine about his wrist, he hands the other end to his partner, mounts his broom, and kicks off a few inches off the ground. Hovering there until his partner is prepaed and they can both soar high. His flight is as always smooth and fairly natural, one of his better attributes. But it lacks it’s usual umph.

Van sighs a bit and rolls her eyes at Noémie as she says this. “Oh, like you’re any better. I heard you skived off Wizo-music the other day.” This is no sooner out of Van‘s mouth than she is up in the air and flying towards the hoops. No, she doesn’t want the captain’s wrath on her, and she certainly doesn’t want to get an earful at how often she’s late because of her boyfriend. This thought quickly passes out of her mind, though, as she spots that very person sitting in the closest bleachers. An animated wave is given to him and she grins widely while doing small figure eights on her broom, waiting for everyone to get situated and take to the air. Though, how this was going to work, Van can only guess.

“Alright, let’s go,” Noémie calls, pulling out a Quaffle and tossing it to David, then getting out what appears to be a modified bludger and holding it up. “This is a different kind of bludger. It’ll only come back to you, no matter how hard you hit it.” She tosses it up in the air and it hovers. “It will go when I say for it to go. “Now, I expect you all to be able to run your own plays, for I’m going to practice with this practice snitch that I’ve nicked off of Eliza. Holler for me if you really need me, but remember, I can’t help during matches, I’ve got to focus on finding the snitch. Can’t be letting Leong get it!” With this, Noémie hops on her broom and releases the practice snitch that she has had in her hand, and waits for it to disappear upwards before following it without another word.

Bailey Williams bends down and fixes the rope at his ankle with a firm knot and reaches over for David’s foot now, tying it to his not too tight and not too loosely. After having swathed their entire shanks together Bailey readjusts his seat and smiles. “You heard it, let’s go!” Bailey calls, definately being up for some new experience today. “I think we should get used to it a bit.” he offers and slowly begins flying straight as a start.

David Mildred catches the Quaffle and begins to fly away, but the flight is not as smooth as usual. Somewhere behind, something is tugging him away and prevents him from flying towards the hoops. “Oh…” says David, realizing his mistake. “Sorry about that, Bailey.” he says. “Where should we go? I thought we could perhaps, uh, toss the Quaffle to Van, but if you feel like going somewhere else…” Flying in close pairs is definitely a hard thing…

“Okay… we could perhaps try to fly in a straight direction for a moment, just to get used to that rope? Then perhaps some turns?” says Tegan, eyeing the twine with some suspicion. “I hope this won’t cause us to crash.” she says, a bit worried. “You never now what could happen…”

Riley Markham exhales a deep yawn, covering it briefly with his beater bat. “Sounds good, eh?” Taking the lead off, he flies forward quietly, taking a moderate pace. Allowing him and Tegan enough time to get used to the bound flying, before motioning briefly with the bat toward the right indicating a turn and shifting toward the right on his broom. He seems to be adapting well enough, though it doesn’t seem like he’s really allowing himself to get worked up over it. Most of Riley‘s problem seems to be stress and nerves, but today he seems to be opperating out a part of his mind where stress can’t quite reach.

“Give it right here!” Van calls with animated motions, pointing directly to herself. The seventh year chuckles as she says this and waves at the two chasers who are tied together. “C’mon, give it here!” Truth be told, though, she can’t hear a word they’re saying, so she has no idea what the two of them are planning as they get used to being connected to one another as they begin to fly along, though not getting close to her at all.

“Just hit the bludger when you’re ready to actually practice,” Noémie calls to Tegan and Riley, closing her hand around the practice snitch, then letting it go as she looks down at them from far above. “Just make sure you get to it soon. No slacking today!” The girl nods curtly down to all of her teammates before flying off again to locate the practice snitch, which, thankfully, is a bit slower than the game model, but fast enough to challenge the seeker during the practice. Back and forth over the pitch, high and low, Noémie seems to be avoiding where the majority of her team is for the moment while she executes her own exercises.

“Woho! Slow slow!” Bailey shouts, getting dragged forward as David seems to underestimate the difficulty of performing a synchronous broomflight. A wonder, that Bailey did not fall off his broom, but as he didn’t he does not really care about it. “Alright, let’s head towards Van and try to provoke a good save. What do you say?” the boy asks his teammate, with a grin, not blaming him for his unawareness.

“Okay. Let’s do that. And, uh… sorry again about that.” says David, giving himself a mental slap behind the ears for what he just did. “Let’s do it slowly, this time…” he says, steering his broom gently towards the hoops. When flying at a lower speed, and looking at Bailey, it is easier to actually fly as a pair, but it is nowhere as comfortable as when flying alone. “Not that easy, eh?” he says, before adding: “Which hoop?”

There is a bit of resistance, but not much, as Tegan belatedly understands Riley’s intentions. A split second later, though, she leans on the right to negotiate the turn with Riley. Being slightly on the outer side of the turn, she feels that she must slightly accelerate to keep up with the boy, but the manoeuvre goes smoothly enough. “It’s not that hard, finally…” she says, with a grin. Of course, it’s easier to fly with Riley than, say, David. Another quick glance is given to Bailey as she hears him complaining about David’s brutal acceleration…

“Yeah…” Bailey answers briefly, concentrating on the unusual drawback. Bailey increases the speed slowly but constantly, always assuring, that he doesn’t fly at a too fast pace for David. “Still fine?” he asks another time. “We could try to get some swerves in before heading to the left hoop and we could keep passing the quaffle among our hands.” Bailey proposes.

“The speed is fine for me…” says David, checking on his trajectory before turning his head towards Bailey and adding: “Yes, let’s do some passes…” Without changing his flying direction, he holds the Quaffle for Bailey to take it. “There. Your right hand” he says, so that Bailey could take it without looking at him.

Van hovers in front of the hoops, looking from David and Bailey to her fingernails, and then back again, as if bored while she waits for them to come close enough to shoot. The girl doesn’t appear to be particularly concerned today, though, as if she will be able to block shots no matter what. This attitude gives her a rather nonchalant air and she even goes so far as to yawn while she waits for the chasers to make their way towards her, clearly underestimating the ability for her teammates to suddenly get their speed and surprise her with a quick shot.

“No, not really,” Riley agrees, suggesting another turn with the point of his bat. This time, so that he is on the outside edge of the turn. He catches somewhat in the accelleration, but it moves relatively smoothly as well. “Alright,” Riley murmurs, finally, in response to Noémie’s call. “Let’s get the bludger, then? You first, then me, then you? Sound alright?” Even his voice sounds a bit lackluster, and vaguely hurt. Never the less, he offers a faint smile to Tegan after brushing his long, wine hair from his face, even if the smile doesn’t quite reach his eyes.

Tegan Madison nods, feeling something strange about Riley today but unable to precisely pinpoint what it could be. “Okay, let’s fly towards the Quidditch box. The Bludger is hovering nearby, that’s where Noémie left it.” she says, and the pair begin yet another, smoither turn towards the ball. Once they’ve finally reached it, Tegan hits it with the bat, finding it very difficult to swing her bat without hitting Riley, who is just flying at her right. “Be careful”, she yells, just before hitting it.

“My right hand? Oh…” Bailey says and reaches for the quaffle. After letting it bounce from hand to hand a few times, while trying a few understated swerves, Bailey bounds it to David again. Now coming into the zone, they’ll have to prepare for a shot soon. “I could pass the quaffle to you behind my back, when we are in shooting range.” Bailey suggests with a chuckle and glances over to David shortly. “Maybe it confuses Van a bit.”

“Hehe, let’s do that.” says David, happy to try something that could show Van that she should pay attention to the game. “Just tell me when you’re ready” he says, readying his right hand and waiting for Bailey’s nod to catch the Quaffle and toss it through the hoop. The two boys are approaching the goals at a modest speed. “We need to make a powerful throw…” thinks David. “Ready.” he says simply.

The seeker seems to be on a bit of a rampage, throwing the snitch away from her after she has caught it, and hovering for a moment to observe what her team is doing. One would think that after winning to Slytherin so completely, Noémie would not be quite in this type of mood, but instead of being congratulatory, she is instead a bit short with them all. Instead of saying a word, she flies higher until she is but a spec of brown and gray to those who are closer to the pitch. It isn’t long, though, before she comes zooming downward after a snitch which seems to have found a bit of speed that she had not been expecting.

Riley Markham simply nods as Tegan warns toward caution, before pointing up with his bat suggestively and pulling up on the broom’s handle. Gaining altitude at a marginally quick pace, holding off long enough to allow Tegan to adjust before he is sufficiently near enough to club the bludger back down. Using an overhanded thrust, he has someone knock it down toward the ground. Obviously trying to stay in the spirit of the excersize by making them fly up in differant directions together. His eyes remain distant, somewhat clouded.

Tegan follows Riley without a word, and adjusts without too much difficulties to the new changes in the flying direction. Leaning a bit forward, she observes the Bludger as it flows towards the ground, eventually flying up again towards them. She wonders privately if Riley has really intended to hit it that way, but says nothing, realizing that Riley hadn’t spoken much since the beginning of the practice. “All right, Riley?” she asks, finally, wondering if there is something wrong.

“Fine,” the flame-haired boy responds, tilting back on his broom and pointing with his bat in a downward direction and toward the left. There’s a serious look on Riley‘s nearly fourteen-year-old features, that would suggest that the previously shut bludger went exactly where he believed it would. And as he reaches out with his bat, and sends it sailing out againt toward the edges of pitch, there is no indication that the bludger went anywhere other than exactly where he wished it to go. “This one is yours, Madison.” There’s an air of tired maturity to his pale features, one that gives him a much more grown up cast that he usually allows him.

Eyeing his keeper’s moves and performing a slight draft to the right, but still being in range to score at the left hoop, Bailey nods and adds a low “Go.” to call up the choreography.

Nodding slightly, David takes the Quaffle and from behind his back and throws it as fast as he can towards the nearest hoop, which also happens to be a free one. The whole movement lasts perhaps a second, and the ball flying towards the hoops is now sure to wake Van up. In the meantime, David stops his broom to enjoy the spectacle.

Van readies herself a bit more as the chasers approach, reaching out in a bit of a dive as the quaffle is thrown to the hoop. She has drifted perhaps just a bit too far to be able to manage to block it entirely, though the tips of her fingers do send it off track a bit, and rather than going straight through the hoop, it knicks one side of the hoop, bouncing to the other, then falls through with a loud CLANG. Scoffing a bit as this happens, Van flies down and catches the quaffle before it falls to the ground, and from her position, chucks it back to the chasers, a more determined look on her face as she flies back up to the hoops. “Just try that again now, won’t you,” she calls and puts her arms out at the ready.

Swooping about, Noémie‘s attention is caught by the clang. “Go again!” she calls to them, looking at Van specifically. “A few more shots and we’ll call it a practice for now.” Either Noémie is letting them off a little early to study a bit, or she’s trying not to wear them out before their evening practice after supper. One way or the other, it isn’t possible to tell by the look on her face as she closes her hand around the practice snitch quickly, flying down to the ground where she has all of the storage for the equipment out and just stands on the ground, snitch in hand as she watches her teammates perform their drills.

“Are you sure?” says Tegan once again. “You seem a bit tired, to tell the truth.” Her look is concerned, but she still tries to concentrate on the practice, and especially on that Bludger. Riley managed to throw it rather far away, but here it comes back again, as if attracted by an invisible force towards Tegan. She readies her bat, muttering “Careful!” once again a second before she swings her bat and sends the bludger away.

Bailey grins, as David scores, demanding a bit of effort from Van, who seemed to be rather absent-minded. “Good shot, David.” he cheers and cheers up Van. “Keep your eyes on the quaffle and you’ll save the next one.” Bailey says with a blink. Readying himself for the next attempt, he catches the quaffle and heads for the hoops again, always considering David on his side. Coming closer to Van with every second, Bailey fakes a pass to his partner and lets off the red ball towards the left hoop. Grimacing, as this shot is more than saveable, Bailey turns around to set up for the next and hopefully more satisfactory try.

“That last was a gift!” Van calls, just before the quaffle is shot at her again, this time in a more catchable place, as she is more ready for it to go this direction. Van dives for it, and this time manages to secure a catch of it in her hands. Coming to fly in the center, she tosses it back to them with a grin. “Come again!” she calls to them, staying in her readied position, so as to better catch the quaffle this time around.

Riley Markham passes a brief glance toward Tegan in regard for her concern, but he says nothing of it. Instead, pulling forward on his broom and pushing on. Waiting long enough for Tegan to adjust to the new direction before laying on the speed, to meet the bludger in mid-course. Shifting the bat in his hand, he gives the bludger an underhand struck from the bottom side of the bludger, sending it blazing almost in a directly upwards direction. The strike is powerful enough that the crack echoes through the stadium, and the reverbation shakes through his bat to his scarred hand, causing him to yelp almost in spite of himself. His bat slips from his fingers, but the leather strap about his wrist keeps it from falling to the ground. Wincing somewhat, he pulls his hand close to his, openning and closing it as if it ached. Something a shot even that hard shouldn’t have done.

Tegan Madison decides to drop the matter about Riley for now and instead concentrates on the match. Wielding the bat with someone at her side is hard, but shot after shot she improves, and the formation flying becomes rather natural after a few moments. Deciding to adopt Riley’s style of silent communication, she indicates the direction she wants to take with her bat, which is efficient enough in her mind. “Plus,” she thinks, “it could also work from afar, and help us to coordinate our strategy.” She decides to talk about that to Riley once they are on the ground.

Shot after shot, the awkward flying pair formed by David and Bailey turns into a more coordinated team. It is still not perfect, but they have gone a long way and are flying together more intuitively. Finally, starting to notice that the sun is getting low near the horizon, David looks at Noémie. “Hey, Noémie, isn’t it a bit late if we want to have our dinner?” he calls out, a bit worried now about that Herbology essay that he planned to finish this evening. The practice has been lasting for quite a long time now, and even if the drill has been extremely profitable to them, they need to eat as well.

For the remainder of the time that Riley and Tegan are practicing, Riley never seems to strike the bludger as hard. Even as he holds his bat, it seems as if it’s causing him some obscure pain that he’s attempting to hold back. Once they’re on the ground, he actually seems to be having some trouble standing. It’s subtle, but noticable under careful observation. Again, he hardly seems to lift his broom, and he waits officially for Noémie to call break so he can walk to the castle, though he doesn’t directly look at the team captain. “Aye, sounds good,” he mutters to Tegan, whom before now always seemed vaguely annoyed with his presence in her general vicinity.

Several shots follow as Bailey and David head towards Van again and again. The first of a series of attempt is thrown hard at the opposing hoop, with a good spin, curving nicely towards the ring. Following, there is a last-second hand off from David and Bailey tries to score, tossing the quaffle inbetween Van’s legs, a bit too obvious maybe. Getting it going they seem to harmonise better and better. Now they are trying to embed more complicated manouvers to increasingly challenge Van’s skills. One particular as they fly straight towards their keeper and lean apart to opposing sides, trying to let Van slip through the gap inbetween them and to score at the lonely hoop afterwards. They finally get untied and land to get into the warm castle to attend dinner.

Catching some shots and missing some, Van continues to go through the rest of the practice with a very set expression of concentration. No, she isn’t angry, but she doesn’t appear to be so cheery and nonchalant as when the practice first began. The girl pauses as the last shot comes to her and leans on her broom, looking around, not daring to look at Noémie, who she knows is watching them all from the ground now. “Good shot!” She calls to the last of them who made the throw, but she does not throw the quaffle back, hoping that Noémie will call the end of practice before she has to block any more shots.

“Alright, everyone come in!” the captain calls, her expression still rather tense as she watches them all. “No, David, it is not too late for supper. In fact, you’ve got plenty of time to do some homework before you all get to return to the pitch for our evening practice tonight after supper. We’ll be doing a lot of exercises, so make sure you get enough to eat this evening. Anyone who’s late will pay the consequences.” Without another word, Noémie watches for them to all come in, then goes and sets her broom in a large stand that she has drug out for the purpose of practices today. “No need to put the equipment away just now. We’ll be back after supper for it.” The girl nods to them all, then grins a bit. “I’m going to do homework and have supper, and I will see you all on the pitch this evening.” She doesn’t say another word, rather turns and strides off the pitch and into the castle quickly.

Scoffing as she lands and hears Noémie speaking, Van has barely removed herself from her broom and put the Quaffle in its box before Noémie has finished and turns to go into the school. “Snog her little boyfriend, more like,” Van comments, putting her own broom into the stand and grinning at her teammates. No, Van isn’t immune to the grapevine that has been busily spreading rumors of the prefect and her boyfriend. “I’m sure Joseph Wexler is great homework to be working on,” the seventh year adds with another chuckle then glances to everyone else. “I’ll see you at practice this evening then,” she tells them all with a sigh and makes her way off of the pitch slowly, waiting for a certain someone to make his way down from the bleachers before heading into the school.

Riley Markham nods vaguely, now that the official word has been given, before turning and starting toward he castle without a sound. His movements are natural, but slow. As if he were walking through quicksand, but trying to make everyone else believe the air was no more thick for him than anyone else. Again, he pulls his cloak tighter about himself, but he says nothing about it. Riley Markham does pauses, briefly, in his retreat, as Van’s voice reaches him. But his gaze remains downward cast, and after a moment, he continues on.

Once back on the ground, David walks away, more than a bit unhappy about the prospect of staying up late at night to catch up with his essay. “Plenty of time… yeah….” he says to no one in particular, but far enough from Noémie not to risk to be the target of her wrath once the practice resumes after the dinner.

Having gotten untied from David, Bailey stores his broom away with everyone else’s and sighs a bit. Double practices were not his favorite by any means, and he was certainly not looking foward to whatever exercises were in store for them after supper. Once he’s got his things situated, he runs back into the school, so as to make the most advantage of the time that has been awarded to them between the practices, and is gone from the pitch.

Back on the ground, Tegan unties her rope, pretending to need much time to do it but really only waiting for Bailey, who she looks from afar. Once the boy is free, too, she follows him, being careful not to run directly at his side: the last thing she needs is to spark another rumour in the school…

A large stack of books surrounds several rolls of parchment on a table in the center of the commonroom as Noémie leans over one, trying to coax it to dry more quickly. The girl is rather camped out on a small, plush couch, which she currently has to herself, given that the commonroom is rather quiet on this afternoon, despite there being snow falling outside. Setting the now-dry parchment aside, she leans back and sighs a bit, closing her eyes as she puts her hands over her face. Noémie has clearly been working at this homework for a while now.

It is a pitiful display that enters the commonroom, Joseph dragging his feet against the ground and his gaze fixed on the ground, a piece of half-eaten licorice hanging from his mouth. He flops down on the couch beside Noémie without any semblance of grace, and sits there, staring at her pitifully, for a long moment before speak. “Noeeeeeemie…” He finally whines, swallowing down the last of his licorice and fixing puppy-dog eyes on her. “How could it possibly be that I am so unlucky as to get a whole month of detentions, while you are free to spend the entire afternoon living a life of luxury in the common room, stretched out lazily on the couch with younger students feeding you grapes?” The grapes and the younger students are nowhere to be seen, of course, but it is surely only a matter of time.

For a long moment, Noémie only stares at him. “Grapes, my foot,” she comments and shakes her head, sitting up a little bit and tucking her legs underneath her on the couch. “I’ve been working on homework all afternoon, can’t you see?” She rolls her eyes and looks at him for a moment. “Well, it’s not my fault, surely, that of all your classes, you skipped Divination.” She fights the urge to laugh as she says this. “I mean, it’s just logic not to. You never know what the teacher might be able to find out just becuase of what she is.” She starts rubbing at the ink that she has gotten on her hand.

“Professor Kensington is the creepiest woman I have ever encountered in my entire life.” Joseph declares, fixing the same pitiful stare on Noémie. Look like a puppy. No one could hurt a puppy. “And, in any case, that was your fault. You enticed me away and I forgot I had Divination.” Because this is obviously somehow her fault. “And did you ever get in trouble from Professor Dwight? I should go and report you to him, so you have to suffer as I do.” Sniffle. Sniffle. “You skipped Wizo-Music and surely he’s managed to figure that one. I should write him an anonymous letter telling him exactly what you were doing. That is,” he adds mournfully, “if Professor Kensington hasn’t already told him. ‘I hope you haven’t gotten Miss Ribouet sick as well’… ugh.”

“Honestly, if you don’t want my attention anymore, I don’t have to give it, Joseph. If Professor Dwight knows, he hasn’t said anything, at least. I practiced extra hard today to make up for it.” She shrugs as she says this, giving him a pointed look. Either Joseph’s bad at the puppy face, or Noémie‘s just immune to it. “It’ll be good for your Divination marks if you’re able to work on anything for class during your sessions.” Noémie herself is not at all pleased with the idea of Professor Kensington knowing her business, but what can she do?

Clinging to Noémie’s arm, Joseph offers an extra heartfelt sniffle in response to this, shaking his head sadly. “No, Noémie, don’t say that. My life would just not be worth living without your… attention.” At least he has some semblance of tact left. Really. “Just, maybe it was a bad idea to experience it while I was supposed to be in Divination. Professor Kensington is so terrible. Did you know, she told me to ‘get back to the sappy, sloppy kisses’? She’s a Professor. She’s not supposed to say things like that. Ever.”

“Ewwww,” Noémie responds with a disgusted look. “Not during Divination next time.” She shrugs and leans into Joseph as he clings to her arm. “We’ll just have to do it after school… in that hour.” She grins a bit and looks up at him. Life not worth living, huh? “Anyway, it’s your fault to begin with. I mean, you came to see me after Runes and all, and then I would have called you a tease for doing it. Anyway, I don’t regret it.” She chuckles a bit as she admits this and looks up at him with a grin before leaning back towards her own ‘personal space’ on the couch. Not the two of them are at the moment used to or wishing for much ‘personal space’.

Indeed, as Noémie leans back into her own personal space area, Joseph edges closer to her, his expression still a pitiful mask. “Well, I wanted to surprise you with poetry. I didn’t run all the way from CoMC to stand outside your door and say ‘hey, Noémie, I could use some of your charms right now’, did I? Huh?” Indeed, that is true, he was much less up-front about it. “I’d been planning that for ages. Do you know how hard it was to get out of CoMC in time to do that? Professor Helit, I thought he was worse than Professor Kensington, but at least he doesn’t make comments about sloppy kisses.” He shudders a little bit at this repetition of her words.

Noémie rolls her eyes and scoffs. “They weren’t sloppy anyway.” She pauses and grins at him, turning sideways on the couch to drape her legs over his casually. Or perhaps not-so-causally. “She didn’t say anything about it today, did she?” Noémie visibly shudders at the thought and just shakes her head at Joseph about it. “Of all the classes to miss…” A sigh emits as she does think to the scene in the hallway. Noémie had not been mad. “I loved that. It was very sweet, Joseph.” Her cheeks pinken a bit at the mere thought of the scene.

“She asked how you were going to cope without me here.” Joseph shrugs, trying not to dwell too much on the thought. After a moment, he adds, “And you had better have appreciated it. If you hadn’t, I would have been very upset.” As her legs are draped over his, one hand rests just above her knee, while he reaches out with the other to fiddle with her hair. “Well, next time I feel the urge to do that, I’ll catch you after Wizo-Music so I’m not running the risk of skipping Divination afterwards.”

“That sounds like a good plan,” Noémie admits, leaning forward a bit, as if the mention of such a thing just put it into her mind. Shaking her head, though, she leans back again and her cheeks turn a bit redder. No, she could not initiate such a thing in the middle of the commonroom. “At least she gave you an hour after classes to work on homework before, right?” Noémie suggests, as if trying to shed a little positive onto the situation. Even Noémie can’t believe that he — or she — will be doing homework during that time.

“Right, homework.” Joseph repeats, shaking his head slowly. “I don’t think even Professor Kensington actually expects me to sit down and solidly work on homework for an hour every afternoon.” He pauses, then leans forward to brush some of her hair aside. It isn’t really a necessary gesture, her hair isn’t really running wild, but it’s an excuse to do something. “And that, really,” he adds, after a thoughtful pause, “is just a frightening thought. Imagine Professor Kensington just sitting in her office smirking, visualising my every move, then berating me in detention because I hadn’t spent the previous hour doing homework. Divination shouldn’t be allowed.”

“Well, I imagine she can’t see everything,” Noémie comments with a bit of a shrug, and then perhaps a smirk. “After all, didn’t she say she just knew you were with me doing things that weren’t school related? Or something like that?” Still, Noémie shudders again, more for Joseph’s sake than her own. “As long as you have what she wants when you go, she’ll have no reason to try to see what you’ve been, er, up to.” She glances around the commonroom again, to see whether anyone is specifically watching them. She seems to be quite satisfied that nobody is, and leans in to kiss Joseph on the cheek.

“It’s just an icky thought.” Joseph complains, shifting a little closer to Noémie and slipping one arm around her waist, the other hand still rested just above her knee, half-intending to pull her into his lap, rather than just her legs stretched over his. “I mean, you can just tell that if she wanted to, she could see more. And what if she decided that she just wanted to, to get one over on me, or just because she’s a disgusting old woman.” Another shudder. This is just really a terrible train of thought, really.

“So stop thinking about it,” Noémie whispers, letting him pull her toward him and in fact scooting a bit more and a bit more until she is seated on his lap after all. “I know it’s an unpleasant thing to think of, so it’s just best not to. Anyway, you’re done for today, so you don’t have to think of her again until you go tomorrow.” The girl grins and reaches up to run her finger down his nose affectionately. “So just don’t.” She glances around the commonroom again and leans in for another cheek kiss, pausing a moment afterward. “After all, if she’s all you can think about when you’re with me…”

Shuddering visibly, it seems the boy has a positive aversion to this line of conversation. “Don’t give me that mental image…” Joseph whines, shaking his head slowly, resting his head on Noémie’s shoulder for a moment. “Now you’re going to make me think of Professor Kensington all the time, and that would just be terrible, and.. ugh. I need to get this mental image out of my mind, right away. It’s just too disturbing to even put words around.” Then, he lifts his head again, eying Noémie. “Please. No more talk about Professor Kensington. Ever, ever, ever. Make me think about something else.”

“Don’t think about it, think about the hallway, the other day…” She says this very quietly, barely more than a whisper. “That’s worth thinking about, right?” Yes, Noémie‘s done with her homework now, and certainly has nothing more to worry about for the rest of the evening. “I’m sure that could use a repitition.” She grins at him and pushes his hair back, though it likely doesn’t need to be mussed with. She looks at him directly as she cups his cheek with her hand, just smiling at him while they sit so snugly together.

Pausing for a moment, considering this point, Joseph seems momentarily tempted to make some unsavoury remark, though he then just shakes his head slowly and leans forward, kissing her quickly on the nose. “Well, okay. I like the thought of that better than I like thinking about, uh, pretty much anything else.” After a moment, he leans forward again and brushes his lips against hers briefly, though this is all, edging back again quickly, peering around the common room. “Er. Is anyone actually watching us, do you think? Because that’s a bit creepy. Ew. First years.”

“Not that I saw,” Noémie tells him, not letting her gaze wander, for she would rather look at him right now than anyone else. She leans forward and kisses him gently. “And so what if they are? I’m a prefect, I’m sure I can find a reason to make them go away.” She grins a bit and kisses his lips gently again. “And, how sweet of you to say…” Her voice grows quieter, to barely audible whispers as she slowly inches her face closer to his, a smile still playing on her lips. “Just put them out of your mind.” It’s a wonder how a prefect is able to so easily shrug off the opinions and gaze of others, while a non-prefect remains so concerned at being watched by those who Noémie should be setting example for.

Shrugging vaguely, as if to indicate that it was all the encouragement that he required, Joseph pulls the prefect still closer, pressing his lips against hers again, a little more force behind it than the tentative, brief encounter of moments before. His other hand remains rested above her knee, rubbing at her thigh gently, while the fingers of his other hand run slowly up her back and entangle with her hair. If anyone does happen to be watching, well, he’s officially stopped caring.

Noémie doesn’t care either, and in fact leans in a bit more, sliding her arms around his neck. Her lips press against his almost fiercely as she rubs one hand along his neck and lets the other just hang loosely down his back. The prefect’s actions could be brought against her in a bad way, considering her job, but it appears that she has already thought of this and decided not to care. The girl’s tongue darts out and she squeezes him a bit, pulling herself closer to him. Reminiscent of their rendevouz behind the statue, which seems to have been rumor-fodder, despite Noémie not having told anyone? Very possible. Very, very likely.

At this point, it seems that they could not possibly get much closer without getting too inappropriate for common room liaisons, Joseph‘s hand sliding up the prefect’s thigh slowly, then snaking around to the small of her back, as the fingers of his other hand intertwine with her long hair and brush against the back of her neck. As her tongue flickers out, he invites it with eager reciprocation. After a long moment, though, he does break off the kiss, tilting his head back and seeking eye contact for a moment, his fingers unentwining from her hair and brushing gently against her jawline. “You… you’re beautiful, Noémie.”

Rather breathless, though not from exertion, Noémie‘s eyes flutter open and she smiles a bit, somewhat lopsided at Joseph as she does so. “Thank you,” she whispers, and kisses the corner of his mouth. “You’re so wonderful,” she tells him, her accent slipping to be slightly french, and she adds, “{I wouldn’t change you for anything in the world, my darling,}” in French. She winks as she says this, clearly having no intention of translating it for him. She rubs her own nose against his gently, a dreadfully cute action, though Noémie doesn’t seem to mind its saccharine outwardly appearance as she looks into his eyes with her own gray eyes.

Smiling slightly lopsidedly at Noémie, Joseph shrugs vaguely as she starts spouting French, looking both positively flattered and positively confused. “I… can’t say I know what you’re saying, but I’ll assume it was complimentary.” He wraps his arms around her tightly, just holding her close for a moment in silence, then brushing her hair aside and gently kissing her neck. “You’re also wonderful, Noémie. I just want to spend my time trying to make you happy.” This is offered as a quiet murmur, his mouth still positioned somewhere in the vicinity of her neck, voice barely audible. For a moment, he seems tempted to say more, but he remains silent.

Sighing a bit as her neck is kissed, the girl bites her lip and tilts her head a bit. “What was that?” she asks, rubbing his back gently, her fingernails dragging along his back, over the fabric of his robes gently. “What were you going to say?” She asks a little bit louder, letting the tips of her fingers trace over his neck ever so gently, and then slide up into his hair, though she doesn’t pull on it. After all, she’d rather have him continue his administrations to her neck. Another sigh slips out from Noémie‘s mouth as she curls one foot down and around his ankl.

Kissing her neck again, Joseph doesn’t say anything for a moment – when he does, it’s merely a murmured, “I forget already.” His mouth remains close enough to her neck so that his breath tickles her skin as he murmurs these few words. He squeezes her in his arms briefly, though he then lets his grasp on her relax, leaning back and looking at her again, almost as though he’s studying her, head tilted slightly to one side. And yet he remains completely, maybe even unnervingly, silent.

For a few moments, Noémie is contented to just look back at him. As the silence and the intense looking goes one, she quirks her head a bit, not breaking her eye contact with him, and just smiles a bit. “What are you thinking about?” she asks him, ignoring the bits of noise that start cropping up here and there in the commonroom. No, she will not let her housemates ruin this moment, and in fact, she finds it rather easy to just get lost in his rather intense gaze. It is soemthing that Noémie is not at all used to. “Anything special?” she adds, her voice barely audible.

“You.” Joseph replies quietly, smiling a little bit at her, finally averting his gaze as he clears his throat self-consciously. His hands run up and down her back a few times, then up and down her sides once or twice, almost edging over towards her breasts, but not quite, lowering his arms again to encircle her waist. “You’re, you’re..” He doesn’t seem to be able to find the words for what he wants to say, if indeed he does have anything else to add, and so lapses again into silence, leaning forward and kissing her gently again.

“Okay,” the girl manages to emit before their lips touch again and she sighs a bit nipping his bottom lip gently with her teeth, though not hard enough to cause pain. She brings one hand forward to trail down his cheek gently and then lets it stop to rest on his chest. She slowly removes her lips from him and then opens her eyes again. “I have an idea,” she tells him with a bit of a grin, her eyes still fixed on his. Noémie leans forward and gives him another peck on the lips before leaning back a bit to hear if he is curious about her idea.

Though he definitely jumps at this response, it does not seem that Joseph is at all put out by it, and he pouts in protest as Noémie ends the kiss. “Is it better than my idea?” He asks quietly as she waits for his response, tilting his head to one side and watching her carefully. “My idea is that we stay here and do more of what we’re doing right now. I don’t know that you can top that, weeping willow tree Noémie.”

“Oh, I can.” She looks around the room at the slowly filling commonroom and grins back at Joseph, giving him another quick kiss on the lips. “I propose that we go find a little hideyhole, perhaps, hmmm, out behind those slabs in the courtyard — it’s snowing after all,” she pauses, “And continue what we’re doing right now.” The girl smirks and stands up, taking his hands in hers as she wiggles a little to cause her skirt to fall straight. “Or we could find that statue again.” Her voice is still quiet, though Noémie doesn’t seem to care if any of her housemates hear her.

“On the one hand, that would require getting up and walking there,” Joseph murmurs, standing up and shrugging his shoulders vaguely. “But on the other hand…” He doesn’t seem to have much of a problem with the idea, all told, inching over to her and slipping his arm around her shoulders and fingering her long hair, intending to escort her out of the common room in this way. “I think I like your idea better.” He eventually concludes, smiling at the girl. The possibilities of what they could get up to without anyone watching surely don’t occur to him – he would never do something like that, would he?

If Noémie could read minds, she would likely be raising her eyebrows at what Joseph is surely not thinking right now. Instead, the girl turns her face to Joseph, grinning a bit. “As if my idea would be bad,” she teases him as they make their way out of the commonroom. “Unless you can think of something even better than what I’ve come up with.” She winks at him, grabbing at her scarf and hat on her way out, for though she’s without a coat, the girl doesn’t anticipate being particularly cold.

It took Saphia a lot of courage to come to the office of a Professor whom she’d barely said three words to before (As “Oh…um… sorry…” barely counted as three,) but she knew she had to start somewhere with her new program of investigation, and this was the first spot on her list — Divination. Pausing to utter a silent prayer, she adjusts her glasses, straightens the small Ravenclaw tie she wears over her robe, fixes her pointy hat, and knocks three times upon the door as confidently as she can. And then immediately adjusts her glasses again.

“Yes, come in,” Bonnie answers the door, not looking up from her work at hand. A stack of essays to her right and a separate stack to her left, it appears that Bonnie has been hard at work for quite a while, given the empty bottle of ink at the edge of her desk, and the fresh one sitting near to it. Her hand is ink-smudged, though not terriby so, with bright green ink as she sets the latest essay atop the right-hand pile. It is only after she finishes this and looks up to see who is entering.

Saphia Bona smiles as she enters, looking a little nervous (so, normal,) and whispers, “P… professor Kensington? My name is Sa– Saphia Bona.” She stumbles over her words a little, and then continues, “I’m a second year student and I’m trying to decide what electives I should do next year. I was wondering if I could talk to you about Divination.” She gulps and reaffirms her smile, making it as strong as she can. The tiny twelve-year old still has her hand on the door handle.

“Absolutely,” Bonnie answers cheerily, setting her quill aside and not drawing another essay in front of her just for the moment. “Here, take this seat,” she directs to the chair in front of her desk and pulls a tin out of her drawer. “Would you like a biscuit?” she offers, holding a tin out towards Saphia and sitting back in her desk. “What would you like to know about Divination, Miss Bona?”

Scurrying to the seat, Saphia sits down and smiles, nodding politely. “Yes please, Professor Kensington.” She takes a small biscuit and enjoys a polite nibble on it while she gathers her thoughts. “I suppose really, I want to know what it is, and what taking classes in Divination would mean. I’ve read a few books on the subject of foreseeing and prophecy, but I confess that I have no idea how this would become a class, and how it would be taught.” She hesitates, and says, “Madam Petunia Postremi is so … vague!”

“Oh, no, no, no, don’t take anything she says seriously.” Bonnie looks quite appalled at this. “No, Petunia Postremi is a presumptuous woman who knows nothing whatsoever about Divination in its true form.” The woman shakes her head and quickly reaches into her desk and pulls out a copy of The Complete and Unabridged Guide to Everything in Divination by Louisa Gartner and hands it to Saphia. “If anything, this is the best text there is, and I can verify this about it, for I studied under Madame Gartner for an internship just out of school. She’s an American Divinator, and she knows what she’s talking about.” Bonnie nods rather sharply at this, obviously having a severe disdain for the woman that Saphia has mentioned.

Saphia Bona looks absolutely delighted at the massive tome, and whispers, “Is this the text for Divination?” She runs her hands lovingly over the cover, opening it up and whispering, “It’s so long!” Her hands trace some of the words briefly, and then, coming to her senses and manners once more, she closes it and asks, “So what would we be doing in Divination classes?” Her eyes are open wide and she’s giving her full attention to the professor now.

“Yes, that’s a text that all years have required. The idea is that they’ll have as much as I can give them in class right at their fingertips,” Bonnie tells the girl with a nod and a smile. “Let’s see, classes. Well, essays are an imperative part of the class, and I expect my students to do some of their own research in the library as necessary.” Looking around over her desk, Bonnie seems to be thinking of how to demonstrate this. “Here, take a look at this, and tell me what you think of the essay.” She pulls an unmarked essay off the top of her pile and holds it out to Saphia. “See what you can make of this.”

Saphia Bona blinks as she takes it and begins reading. “Well, the writer mis-spelled acromantula, for starters,” she nitpicks, but then tucks more seriously into it. “I don’t really know a lot of the terminology here, but I don’t really understand his logic. He’s talking about the sign of the dog here, and then he’s arguing about the probability of death or severe change, but he doesn’t explain why the dog indicates death. Nor why it would explain the sort of change he’s talking about for the Ministry. I mean, if the dog does suggest major change, then couldn’t it be all sorts of major changes? Complete reversal isn’t the only major way something can change. Perhaps the bill will be amended?” She suggests, and then whispers tentatively, “But I could be very wrong. I… I don’t know an awful lot of the technicalities.”

“Ah, if you can manage that much out of an essay on a subject which you haven’t yet studied, then I think you would do very well. Of course, the ability to see is either there or it isn’t, but the discovery of it only comes with time. IF you think you would be interested, I can see you at least have a knack for seeing the discrepancies in some of the essays I get every day.” The woman chuckles as she says this and reaches out to retrieve the essay. “Divination is a difficult subject if you haven’t got dedication to it and a willingness to try, and open your mind.” Bonnie takes a biscuit from her own tin of things and smiles at Saphia.

Saphia Bona nods, and whispers, “Well, Professor, I can’t promise I have any, um, supernatural abilities beyond what I’ve already demonstrated. And I’ve never shown any ability to see things before they happen. But I can promise you the same hard work, dedication and research I pursue in every subject.” She smiles her best, and whispers, “I think I will be applying for Divination.”

“That’s good to hear, Miss Bona,” Bonnie responds with a grin. “Just keep that book and return it to me when you’ve done with it. Some of it might not make much sense without understanding the practical applications, but I’m sure you’ll do well in my class if you’ve at least an interest in learning it.” Bonnie nods at this and sets the essay atop the unfinished pile carefully. “Do you have any questions for me, or was that all?” She asks, closing up the tin of goodies, though she leaves it where it sits.

Saphia Bona pauses thoughtfully on that question, and is silent for a good long while. Finally, she asks tentatively, “Let’s say I do take Divination… how will I know if I have the, um, Sight? How long will it take for me to find out? And if I don’t have it, how will I be able to tell?”

“That is something that shows over time. There is no definitive way to know you have it or know you don’t. This is why I never discourage anyone from taking the course if that is where their interests lie, because there is always the chance that it will show up.” Bonnie pauses. “That said, you will know after a fashion, and I’ll be here to teach you how to harness it to the best of your ability. It takes practice and hard work, though, so you should expect to work very hard in this class.” Bonnie pauses here, looking at Saphia. After all, this same speech has chased of more than one student in the past.

But here, it has exactly the opposite effect. Saphia‘s smile grows wider, and she whispers, “Well, I can say I have the ability to do that. It will be tough, because I suspect I’ll be taking a lot of classes. But you’ll have my full efforts.” A pause. “Would it be reasonably fair to say that, if by the end of next year I’ve demonstrated no particular grasp of the Sight, it’s unlikely I’ll show it?”

“It’s hard to say, Saphia,” the teacher tells her, using her first name for a change. “Myself, I didn’t realize my gift until well into my fourth year, for tea leaves were not my strength at first, and I nearly gave it up. If, by the end of your fifth year, you haven’t demonstrated it, though, it is safe to say that you do not have the gift, or that it is choosing to elude you.” Bonnie smiles as she says this. “It isn’t something that can be measured or boxed, unfortunately, so there is no definite answer to that.”

Saphia Bona nods, and considers that. “I promise you at the very least to pursue the subject to the end of fourth year. If I’ve made no progress at that point, then I will consider focusing more strongly on other areas of study in preparation for the OWLs. But until then, I promise to study as hard as I possibly can, and do everything possible to excel in Divination.” She smiles broadly, surprised with this. She’s heard of Divination as a fluffy, ‘soft’ subject. Instead, she found a serious, level headed professor who she liked almost immediately.

“I’ll keep you to that,” Bonnie tells the girl witha bit of a wink before reaching for her quill again, twirling it in her fingers. “I look forward to having a hard-working Ravenclaw in my classes for once. It’ll do the house some good.” Whether Bonnie is teasing or not is not immediately obvious, but given the latest rumors flying around about Joseph Wexler, it is safe to assume that few others have dared to act out in terms of Professor Kensington’s class.

Saphia Bona smiles nervously at that, and whispers in perhaps an even fainter voice than normal, “Well, I shall do my best. Thank you, Professor Kensington.” Saphia rises to her feet, curtsies politely, and heads toward the door. Only a second before she gets there, however, she pauses and asks, “Who made those biscuits, professor?”

Glancing up from her desk as Saphia stands to leave, Bonnie‘s blinks for a moment at the girl. “Well, I did,” she answers simply, holding her quill above an essay that she has pulled in front of her. The teacher does not turn her face back to her desk yet, as a student is still in the room, and smiles a bit. Of all the questions to be asked, Bonnie had not expected this one.

Blushing slightly, Saphia whispers, “I… I’ll have to ask you for the recipe sometime. They’re very good, and I enjoy cooking. My grandfather, you see… well. Um. A story for another time.” And with that, Saphia opens the door, slides around it, and shuts it softly.

The door to the Wexler residence opens, and the cheerful voice of Sibyl Wexler echoes down the hallway. “Basil? Love, are you home?” Her step is a bit heavier these days, even when she is not weighed down by the wealth of packages that she carries now. Baskets in bright springy pastel shades of yellow, green, and purple; enormous chocolate eggs wrapped with fluffy ribbons, and other Easter treats fill Sibyl‘s arms, balanced between her hands and the convenient shelf of her ever-increasing stomach. “Basil?”

“In here!” Basil calls from the kitchen, where he looks a bit harried as he leans over the kitchen table, his wand pointed at an egg, presumably hard-boiled, There are three bowls of them on the table: one of brightly colored and decorated eggs, another with rather poorly colored eggs in it, many of them cracked or smashed, and the third, a bowl full of white eggs, yet to be decorated. The man’s hair is mussed and his face is one of pure concentration, as if his life is dependent on making these eggs look right.

“Oh, Basil!” Sibyl cannot help the affectionate laughter that bubbles up, despite her honest sympathy for her husband’s agitation. She leans forward, letting the precarious stack of parcels tip out of her arms onto the counter, then bustles over to stand behind Basil, edging close enough to lean her arm against his, and tip her cheek to rest on his shoulder as she looks down at the disarray of eggs. “I like the green one,” Sibyl offers, pointing at one of the neater ones, then tilting her head up to plant a kiss on his cheek. “How long have you been at this, love?”

“I dunno, what time is it?” He responds in a rather tense-sounding voice as he finishes a pink and white egg that seems to have frills spinning around it delicately. Who knew Basil was so creatively-minded? However, he does look up at the clock and runs his hand over his hair with a sigh. “Three hours,” he answers with a shake of his head. “I’m nearly done, though,” he answers, directing to the middle bowl, in which there are only five eggs left to do. “Wow,” he comments, looking at the parcels that Sibyl has brought in. “Wait, did you bring those all on your own? You didn’t have anyone help you?” His obvious concern — which reared its head in all of her previous pregnancies as well — makes an appearance here as he strides over to look at everything she brought home. “Really, you should have gotten help!”

“Three hours? Oh, Basil, dear, take a rest!” Sibyl cries, her own automatic concern taking over. But when she hears how close he is to being finished, Sibyl sighs and shakes her head, conceding, “Well, that’s good, at least.” She follows after him as he moves to the counter – not quite waddling yet, but definitely not as light on her feet as she usually is. “Don’t worry, love, it wasn’t bad at all. Really, it wasn’t!” Sibyl reaches out to loop her arm reassuringly through her husband’s. “I Apparated in from Diagon Alley – it didn’t take two minutes to walk home. And they weren’t heavy at all. And I got those caramel-filled eggs that you like,” she adds, giving Basil’s arm an affectionate squeeze.

“Well, you shouldn’t– oh?” Basil is, for once, mulled by the mention of sweets. “Did you get them from– er, the ones that Maura makes?” Basil apparently doesn’t feel like getting worked up about his sister today. “Those are the only ones I like, you know,” He does open up one of the bags to peer in, rather like a child in his sly pursuit for his caramel-filled eggs. He grins a bit at Sibyl, reaching up with his free hand to smooth his head rather than root through the sweets and goodies she has brought home for easter.

“Which is why I got them for you,” Sibyl declares, with a satisfied nod, and another fond squeeze of her husband’s arm. “Not there, love,” she adds, reaching forward to push open another of the bags. “They’re in this bag. And yes, I got them from Cordial Confections. Where else?” She lifts up on tiptoe for just barely long enough to give Basil another kiss on the cheek, and then thumps heavily back down to the ground. “How are the little ones?” Sibyl pokes her broad hand into one of the other bags of sweets, snitching a tiny dark-chocolate egg to pop into her own mouth.

“Brilliant,” he answers, more in response to the comment about the eggs than about their children. He reaches in and slyly pulls one out, shedding it of its wrapper quickly before tossing it to land in the bowl full of ‘dud’ eggs. “They’re outside playing with the neighbor kids. I think they’ve been bored all day. All Alden can talk about is Hogwarts.” Basil reaches his arm around to bring his wife closer. “D’you think he’ll be Gryffindor like Briony was?”

“I won’t bother them, then,” Sibyl decides, but her head turns towards the window, and there is a slightly wistful tinge to her smile. “They’ll be in soon enough.” Sibyl moves into the circle of her husband’s arm, leaning her head comfortably on his shoulder. “Oh, I’m glad he’s getting excited about it,” she continues, her smile warming as she speaks about her son. “I’d love to see another of our children in Gryffindor. He’s so quiet and sweet, but he might have the spark in him yet. Even if he doesn’t, I’m sure he’ll find a way to be happy no matter which House he ends up in.”

Basil does not dare to say it out loud, as, of course, this would be rather unfair to his son, but, still, the man can hope for another Gryffindor in the family. “I wouldn’t say no to a Ravenclaw, of course,” he does comment with a bit of a chuckle, reaching in and pulling out another caramel-filled egg and popping it into his mouth as he tosses the wrapper to the same fate as the previous one. “How’s life at Hogwarts? Is Briony staying out of trouble?” Basil pauses. “Do you need to sit down, dear? Aren’t you tired from your trip?”

“Well…” Sibyl hesitates for a moment, then admits with a sigh, “It would be nice to put my feet up for a bit.” She moves over to the kitchen table and eases herself down into a chair, letting out another audible sigh of relief as she kicks off her shoes and swings her feet up onto the chair opposite. “I know, I always say ‘no feet on the furniture,’ but I can break my own rules once in a while.” There is a mischievous twinkle in Sibyl‘s eyes as she grins over at her husband. Her hand steals behind her to rub at her lower back as she continues, “Things are going very well at school. The Quidditch season is nearly over, thank goodness – I’ve seen enough bruises and broken bones coming through the infirmary to last for several years!”

“None were Briony’s, were they?” Basil asks quickly, his eyes snapping onto Sibyl’s face, while a worried expression spreads over his own. She’s his daughter, after all, despite how much she resembles his own sister. “She’s not going to play next year, if so.” Basil finds himself a bit heated as he says this, and then clears his throat and shakes his head, as if to stop being so stodgy and paranoid. As if out of habit, he reaches out and begins to rub one of Sibyl’s feet gently, still waiting for the answer, despite his previous outburst.

“Oh, no!” Sibyl protests. She reaches swiftly out to touch her husband’s arm in reassurance – but she cannot bend forward quite enough to reach him, and drops back with a heavy sigh, settling for words only. “Briony wasn’t hurt at all, love, don’t worry! And she’s doing marvelously.” Almost despite herself, Sibyl lets out another sigh, deeper and more relaxed, as Basil starts rubbing her feet. “Mmmm…..oh, darling, that feels wonderful. Thank you.”

Basil smiles at Sibyl rather happily as she seems to enjoy this, even still. After all, some things never change! The man just continues his rubbing. “Well, that’s good at least. She hasn’t written to me in a while again. I imagine she’s too busy with that older fellow of hers.” The man does not look pleased at this statement, and even makes no attempts to wipe the look from his face. “What he wants with her concerns me. He’s sixteen, and she’s only twelve. He’s far too old for her. She’s too young to like boys, anyway.” After all, Basil had not even noticed Sibyl from any other girl until his Fifth year.

“It’s nothing serious, Basil.” Sibyl shakes her head fondly at her husband’s protective warnings. “She’s got a bit of a crush, and he – well, if he tries anything improper, I’ll be right there to put a stop to it.” The affectionate smile that Sibyl had given to her husband shifts, and for a moment, her eyes meet Basil’s with equal resolve, and equal parental protectiveness. “Nothing will happen,” Sibyl repeats, her voice and expression softening again, and after a moment, she lets her eyes drift close, and her head tip back, relaxing under the soothing motion of Basil’s hands.

“I’m just glad you’re there to keep an eye on him. I can’t imagine what would happen if that boy were left to his own designs.” Basil‘s voice is a bit gruff as he says this, but he continues rubbing the one foot, while scooting his chair closer to better help with the other. “Should I be getting you to bed already? They must be working you to exhaustion at Hogwarts.” He shakes his head and seems to tut a bit, almost like a mother might do. And perhaps it’s a habit he got from his own mother.

Sibyl nudges Basil’s hand reassuringly with her foot, murmuring again, “I’ll be right there.” She tilts her head up again, opening her eyes to say softly, “I won’t say not to worry, because if you didn’t, you wouldn’t be a father. But I will be there to take care of her, love.” She falls silent for a moment, letting her husband shift around, and then shakes her head in response to his next question, her smile returning. “Soon, but not now,” Sibyl replies. “I get so little time to spend with you and the little ones that I don’t want to fritter it away by sleeping.”

“Well, there’s always tomorrow, of course,” the man states as he runs one finger rather sneakily up the bottom of her foot. “I’m sure Alice and Alden will be in soon, though. I told them not to be long, since you’d be coming home.” Basil pauses again, looking over the table. “I suppose I should finish the eggs. There are five there… perhaps I should put our names on each of them.” Leaning over to pat Sibyl’s belly, he chuckles. “Too bad there aren’t six, or I’d do one for this one, too.”

“Well, I’ll happily eat two,” Sibyl replies with a comfortable laugh, poking her husband playfully with her toe in response to his tickling. “And we wouldn’t have a name to put on the sixth, anyway. Or we could put the whole list of names that we’ve been thinking of, if we had a very large egg,” she adds, laughing again as she folds her hand over Basil’s to pat her rounded belly. “Well, I trust you to get those last five done. Unless you want my help, of course? It was always fun to color eggs with you and the children…”

“You could help,” Basil answers almost too quickly. “I’ve never been very good at the pink and girly ones,” he answers, picking up the pink egg with frills on it for demonstration. “Not my specialty.” He chuckles a bit and picks up an egg, holding it out so Sibyl. “That is, if you feel up to it,” he adds, still holding the egg out and drawing his wand, setting it onto the table while he waits for her decision.

“Pink and girly it is, then,” Sibyl agrees, with a warm laugh. She swings her feet down from the chair on which they rest, and reaches down to push herself up, letting out a little “Mmph!” of effort as she lifts her belly up. “I’ve had plenty of practice with Color-Changing spells, lately,” she adds, as she pads over to her husband. “They’ve been working on them in some of the Transfiguration classes, and something always goes wrong.” Sibyl shakes her head, looking heavenward with an expression that is part amusement, part sympathy, and part exasperation. “Here, shall I do this one for Alice, then?” she offers, reaching out to pick up the egg.”

“Sure,” he answers, chuckling. “Do all that many of them acutally manage to change themselves colors, then?” He shakes his head, pointing his wand at the egg that he has picked up for his own doing. “I think some of them do it on purpose. I’m certain Eva did when she managed it that time in school. Mum was furious. I’m just glad I wasn’t there for it.” Basil chuckles and shrugs, grinning at Sibyl as he puts a blue swipe, before turning the rest of it green, and beginning to carefully write his own name onto it in the form of ‘Dad’.

Sibyl says, “Oh, there have been one or two every week,” %n replies with a soft laugh. She fishes her wand out from a pocket somewhere deep in the voluminous folds of her robe, chatting comfortably away as she turns the egg this way and that. “Some of them do do it on purpose, even though they’d never admit it. There was one girl who came in a particularly lovely shade of lavender. It matched her hair ribbons perfectly.” A quick flourish of %n’s wand, and then a light tap on the egg – and it too turns lavender. “About that shade, I think.” %n taps it again, and the egg pinkens a little. “Ah, there we go,” %n says. “Alice will love that color.”"

“Oh, there have been one or two every week,” Sibyl replies with a soft laugh. She fishes her wand out from a pocket somewhere deep in the voluminous folds of her robe, chatting comfortably away as she turns the egg this way and that. “Some of them do do it on purpose, even though they’d never admit it. There was one girl who came in a particularly lovely shade of lavender. It matched her hair ribbons perfectly.” A quick flourish of Sibyl‘s wand, and then a light tap on the egg – and it too turns lavender. “About that shade, I think.” Sibyl taps it again, and the egg pinkens a little. “Ah, there we go,” Sibyl says. “Alice will love that color.”

“I’m sure she will,” Basil agrees and laughs a bit. “There, I think they’ll know who this one belongs to, don’t you?” he comments, brandishing the ‘Dad’ egg to her and chuckling as he sets it aside. “Now, for Alden’s.” He pulls out another one, first turning the thing black, then changing his mind, and turning it yellow. A third color change, and it’s green. “Much better,” he comments aloud before putting some black stripes around the center of the egg. He turns it 90 degrees, and then carefully writes ‘Alden’ onto the egg, grinning as he sets the egg aside. “I’ve gotten a bit better at it,” he tells Sibyl with a laugh.

“Is that what you think?” Sibyl asks with a grin, in response to the choice of green for Alden’s egg, giving her husband a gentle nudge. “I thought you were putting him in Ravenclaw.” Sibyl taps her wand on the pinkish-lavender egg again, and a delicate white lacy pattern begins to spread over the smooth surface. “Oh, very nice,” Sibyl agrees, leaning over Basil’s arm to admire the writing. “He’ll like the stripes. Now, what do you think for Alice – purple writing, or dark pink?”

“How about yellow?” Basil suggests hesitantly, shrugging a bit in response to this question. He has set Alden’s egg down on the table, but he picks it up and shows the stripes. “Look, they’re black, not silver. Like I would do that to my own son.” Chortling a bit, he sets the egg back down, and picks up a third, clearly having a bit more practice at it than Sibyl has recently. Coloring this egg red to start, he looks it over, before putting small yellow stripes all around it. Soon, the thing looks rather Gryffindor-esque with its red background and thin, red stripes running around its circumference. Soon, a bit of silver is added to the egg, in a round circle on the front facing Basil, and it becomes clear that he is drawing a snitch — however misguided his drawing may be, as it is silver instead of gold. in the center of it goes the girl’s name, as neatly as he can manage it, and he brandishes the thing with a, “Ta da!” just as Briony herself was prone to as a small child.

“Lovely,” Sibyl declares, with a soft, affectionate laugh. There is real admiration in her voice, though, as she leans over to look at the intricate drawing on the red-and-gold egg. “Oh, that’s very nice! She’s going to love it, dear.” And Sibyl‘s smile softens, and she puts a hand gently on her husband’s arm for a moment – he has given his daughter an egg that she will love, even if he does have misgivings about her Quidditch playing. Then she withdraws her hand and shifts her grasp on her wand, holding it with careful control as she traces ‘Alice’ in curly white cursive letters across the egg in her hand. A tap of her wand turns the letters yellow – then silver – and then finally a deep purple, and Sibyl nods in satisfaction.

“All that’s left is yours, then, Sibyl,” Basil responds, putting the eggs that he has so speedily finished into the bowl of pretty eggs and holding out the last uncolored one to Sibyl. “Afterwards, I’ll go fetch the children. It’s getting dark anyway.” He says this so simply that it is clear that he has had quite a bit of practice now at being sole keeper of the house, though the children are more likely to have benefitted to his attentions than the house has. “I’m sure they’ll be glad to see you, I know Alice has missed you especially.”

“Oooh!” Sibyl sounds almost like one of the children herself, letting out a giggling squeal at the prospect of an egg of her own to color as she reaches out to take it. But the look she gives her husband has a quieter kind of happiness, and prouder, as she hears his comfort in dealing with domestic matters. “I can’t wait to see the little ones, either,” Sibyl replies. “Little ones,” she repeats, shaking her head at herself with a rueful laugh. “I must stop calling them that. Alden will be at school next year, and I know he hates being thought of as a child. And there will be a real little one soon enough. . .”

Basil does nod at this, clearly having heard his own earful from his son about this very issue. “I don’t think he’ll rest until we begin to call him by ‘sir’,” Basil chuckles as he says this and shakes his head. “I wish you could be around more. I miss you around the house,” he comments, reaching out to stroke her hand gently, some sadness invading his eyes as he looks down at the table and all of his hard work over the afternoon. “Alice will be so lonely with you away at school with Alden and Briony both, as well, this next year.”

“I miss you too, darling,” Sibyl says softly, curling her fingers gently around her husband’s. Her fond amusement at her son’s personality begins to shade into wistfulness, and the smile that she gives Basil is touched with sorrow. “And Alice, too. But I need to stay at Hogwarts. They need me.” Sibyl leans closer, rising up on tiptoes for a moment to give her husband a light kiss on the cheek as gentle consolation. “And I’ll come back as much as I can. Neither of us will have to miss any of our new baby’s growing up,” Sibyl promises, pulling her husband’s hand in to brush lightly across the curve of her belly. “You’ll see, love. We’ll figure it out.”

Nodding slowly, he leans down to kiss Sibyl on the cheek and then looks to the window with a shake of his head. “I had better go get the children,” he comments and rubs his hand over her belly quietly. Leaning down to kiss her cheak again, Basil stands fully and makes his way out the door towards the outside of the house and is gone, quite clearly to do as he has said and wrangle up his children to come indoors.

Bonnie wanders out of her office at that moment, leafing through a rather old-looking paper. “Ah, hello, Joseph. How nice of you to join me.” Bonnie‘s face does seem to have a bit of a smirk on it, and perhaps his missing the class and her subsequent note were not merely a premonition on her part, or doing her job as a faculty member. “So, if you would sit down please, and tell me. Where were you in class today? We certainly did miss you.” Her eyes do not move from him, though she does put her paper down on her desk and lean on the front of the desk rather casually.

Clearing his throat audibly, Joseph doesn’t quite meet the Professor’s eye as he mumbles his response. “Er. I wasn’t feeling well.” He replies. “So I decided it would be better not to go to class than to sit there, unfocused, and risk giving everyone else my sickness.” Another small cough, and he adds, “I feel better now, though.” He moves to sit down, looking slightly irked by the situation (though still not entirely focused on it – in his mind, he’s still locked away with Noémie).

“Well, I certainly hope Miss Ribouet didn’t get sick,” Bonnie comments, raising an eyebrow. She lets this marinate for a moment before continuing as she crosses her arms and actually smiles at him. “We missed you in class today, especially. It just wasn’t the same collecting papers without the careful attention to not smudging the ink on yours.” Her smile does fade a bit as she says this, and she raises her eyebrows.

The colour visibly drains from Joseph‘s face, hearing Bonnie’s words, only to be replaced shortly afterwards with a scarlet flush. “Miss Ribouet?” He repeats, wiping his sweaty hands on his robe. “Er… what does Noémie have to do with this?” His tone is hesitant, as if he is trying not to incriminate himself while clarifying what she says. “And, uh, I do have my paper… somewhere…”

“Alright, we can play that way, if you like,” Bonnie responds with a nod. “Let’s have that essay, then.” She holds her hand out and resists the urge to smirk very strongly. “And, let’s see. You missed an entire class during which we studied Planet Movement, and, you need to make that up. What can we do to make this up, hmmm?” She raises her eyebrows again at him, and it stands to wonder why she continues raising and lowering her eyebrows, and just how high they can go.

Hands flying to his back, Joseph rifles through the contents, apparently seeking the elusive Divination paper. Come on. Any minute now. Yes, any one of these… getting increasingly flustered, the boy looks up, quite red-faced, and offers, no louder than a whisper, “I must have left it in the, er, common room…” This might be strictly true. He doesn’t quite meet the Professor’s eye, offering only the quiet, “I could make it up… in my own time? In an essay, or something?” Because he does have such a good record at getting his essays done on time.

“No, no, I don’t think in ‘your own time’ is going to be a good idea,” Bonnie admits. “Though, I do think, hmmm, perhaps we could do some mandatory study sessions after classes are over, say, hmmm, for the next month.” The teacher stands and goes behind her desk. Opening a drawer, she pulls out a book. “This should help, I think.” She strides over and hands it to him. “And I’ll even let you have, oh, an hour or so after classes to do, ehm… homework. You’ll be needing it.” Her eyebrows do their trick again, raising high on her forehead as a rather mischeivous look crosses her face.

“A whole month?!” Joseph protests, just impulsively, no actual thought having gone into it. Eyes wide with the horror of having scored a whole month’s worth of what are effectively detentions, it takes a long time for him to get coherent enough to actually say anything. His mouth opens and closes wordlessly a few times, before he finally offers, “Do, do I have to? Is there some alternative?” He is hopeful, though not really expectant.

Crossing her arms again, Bonnie develops a more serious expression. “Cutting class for illness is one thing, Mister Wexler, however, your reasoning, and don’t think I’m stupid — I can see right through that goofy grin you were wearing when you walked in here — so, a month it is, unless you’d like to extend it to two.” She raises her eyebrows one more time, and holds her hands out open as if to ask him what his choice will be.

“That’s, that’s fine…” Joseph slinks down in his seat, flushed bright pink, and not quite meeting Bonnie’s eye. “I, I really wasn’t feeling well, though…” This is a particularly lame sort of excuse, offered at nothing higher than a vague whisper, though perhaps ‘mumble’ would be a better term. And, after all, it is true. He would have been rather unfocused if he had come to class, and outside of class he was having trouble breathing properly.

“Mmm, well, go make Miss Ribouet sick some more, and I’ll expect to see you tomorrow, as well as today’s essay, and the one that was assigned today on Stars and how they affect the outcome of the horoscopes. I believe you’ll find them in the Guide, as well as in this book.” She pats the book in question and then waves at him, as if to dismiss him. “I’m sure she’s waiting on pins and needles for your return.” She chuckles as she says this and turns to sit behind her desk and pull the paper up in front of her, a clear sign of dismissal. Yes, Bonnie‘s had her fun with this student for the day.

Opening and closing his mouth a few more times, Joseph seems desperate to say something else, though uncertain if he should. Then, finally, he gives up and offers, “P-professor Kensington?” It is a hesitant query, but he just has to ask. It’s the sort of thing that he does. “Um. How… how did you know about No – Miss Ribouet?” Perhaps, given the context, it would be better to refer to her more formally.

Putting down her paper, a conspiratal smile crosses Bonnie‘s face as she puts down her paper. “I haven’t devoted my career to Divination for nothing,” she tells him with a wink. “Perhaps all of this isn’t jus ‘Seeing Nonsense’ after all, hmmm?” She chuckles and gives another wink, pulling up the paper again to continue reading whatever article it is that she had been working on before he finally decided to call.

There is something innately creepy about the possibility of your forty-five year old Divination teacher having a vision of you cutting class to get intimate with your new girlfriend behind a statue; as such, Joseph‘s expression is a mixture of confusion and disgust at this idea. “What, really?” He finally offers, his tone slightly incredulous. “You could actually – actually see what I was doing?” He doesn’t have to say ‘ew’. His expression, his tone, it all says ‘ew’ for him.

“Let’s not get that gorey, now,” Bonnie responds, putting the paper down again. “I don’t see intimate details, no, but I did see your whereabouts and your company.” She nods at him and chuckles. “Go, go, young love, sappy, sloppy kisses, have fun, all of that nonsense.” One might get the idea that Bonnie was once young herself, and likely saw similar things of her own classmates. She says nothing more before waving him away. “Go, go, and be here sharp tomorrow, an hour after classes.” She nods again at him.

Flushed quite pink, Joseph doesn’t have anything else to say before he gathers his things together and makes a hasty, embarassed exit. Noémie had better be worth it. If nothing else, Joseph definitely needs her to kiss his wounded pride better, because having been given such a swift verbal kicking by his professor, he’s not going to be appropriately sarcastic for at least half an hour. Alas.

The clock ticking towards class finishing, closer and closer, Joseph Wexler has somehow made his way out of whichever class he has just come from early enough to, slightly breathlessly, make it to the Hall of the Dragons before the scheduled end of the lesson. Pausing in the hallway, breathing heavily but trying to catch his breath, he listens carefully at the doorway for some hint of sound, some hint that the class is in fact still going on but soon to wrap up. As he stands there, waiting, he leans against the wall – both to help support him, as he looks flustered from his quick travel to this hallway in the smallest amount of time possible, and to hopefully give him a more casual and debonair sort of look. With his cheeks flushed pink from exertion, this doesn’t really work. As he stands there, he murmurs to himself. “O, weeping willow tree? With all your tremulous…”

Finally Ancient Runes has finished, and Noémie packs up her things and makes her way out, holding her bag in her hand for a moment before slinging it over her shoulder as she exits, her gaze is nowhere in particular, so she doesn’t notice Joseph particularly as she exits the class. It is apparent, though, that she is rather relieved to be done with the class for the time being.

Spying Noémie, Joseph stands up all the straighter, waving a hand to her to attract her attention. And what does he say? Hi, Noémie? How was class? Forgive me, I’m about to do something ridiculously romantic in front of your classmates? No, in fact, he doesn’t say any of these, merely smiling and reciting, “O, weeping willow tree?” The first line is much a grab for her attention as it is the beginning of his recitation. “With all your tremulous leaves outspread betwixt me and the sun, while here I loiter on a mossy bed with half my work undone.” Pausing for a moment, for dramatic effect, he nevertheless plows on quickly, not allowing her time to interject anything – if she tries, he speaks over the top of her. “The weeping willow shook its head and stretched its shadow long; the west grew crimson, the sun smoldered red, the birds forbore a song.” He trails off here, offering a small, sheepish smile, as if to indicate that this is all he has to say to her.

“Oh, my,” Noémie responds, stopping in her tracks to grin and blush rather red at Joseph’s sudden burst of poetry. “Did you write that?” she asks, stepping closer with a bit of a grin on her face, determinedly trying to ignore the titters of her classmates behind her, all of whom have also stopped up in the hallway, as if to see what happens. What fifth year wouldn’t want a free show, after all?

Offering a small chuckle in response, Joseph shakes his head, offering his first actual conversational words for the moment. “‘In The Willow Shade’, by Christina Georgina Rossetti.” Then, a pause, and he can’t seem to think of anything much better to do than swoop in and kiss her, hoping to catch her entirely off-guard. Whether he actually succeeds is another matter altogether, of course, but he exists to give his peers a good show, after all.

Altogther shocked by this, Noémie‘s eyes fly wide, though she does not fight him and, indeed, rather submits to the kiss for her part. For her part, her arms are still just as they were before his lips had touched hers, and she doesn’t do much of anything to protest, though the snickers and hoots of the classmates in the hall get louder. She may be a prefect, but she is not immune to the good feelings this action gives.

Stepping back from her, breaking the contact between them, Joseph‘s cheeks are flushed quite pink when he meets her eye, though this does not stop him from winking at one or two of their yearmates as he waves them away. After a moment, he offers a quiet response, at a volume barely above a whisper, “Did you, uh, have a good lesson, weeping willow tree Noémie?” As far as he is concerned, this is her full name for now.

“Nice enough,” she tells him quietly, glancing furtively around the hall, her own cheeks turning a pink that could rival his own. She opens her mouth to say something else, but pauses in thought, just looking up at him. “Let’s go talk somewhere… else,” she comments, glancing around at the slowly thinning crowd. “We could go… talk… and things…” her tone seems to indicate something else, and she raises an eyebrow at him. Noémie might not come out and say it, but her tone most definitely says, ‘Hey, baby, I liked that, let’s go snog.’

Offering another wink to a passerby, Joseph slips his arm around Noémie’s shoulders and nods, smiling in a particularly satisfied sort of way. At this point, his cravings become far too much for him and he reaches into a pocket and holds out two pieces of licorice to the prefect. “Would you like a piece?” And thus proves that the lad can never quite get to that point of sweet and romantic: the poetry was a good move, the kiss in the hallway was passable, but licorice? This moment calls for chocolate, it really does.

“No thank you, Joseph,” Noémie replies, trying not to make a face about the black licorice. She leans into him a bit as the two of them seem to walk more and more speedily away from the crowds of people in the hallway, who soon disappear into this classroom or that. Pausing at the staircase, Noémie looks up and then down. “Let’s go up a level, I know of a nook,” she tells him, turning and trotting up the stairs quickly, and soon she has ducked behind a rather large statue near a corner on the seventh floor, waiting for Joseph to join her.

Unfortunately for Noémie, Joseph seems to conclude that her dislike of licorice just means all the more for him, and he bites down on both pieces at once as he walks, chewing them both and swallowing them within about three seconds, if that. The boy likes his sweets, okay? And now his breath smells sharply of black licorice. Hesitating at the top of the stairs, it takes him a moment to determine exactly where she has slipped off to, before he leans around the side of the statue, peering at the girl curiously. “You know, you’re a prefect and you’re always laying into me for not doing my homework. And now you’re skiving off class? Tut, tut.” A pause, and he adds, “Do I want to know how you know about this convenient little hidey-hole?”

“I’m a prefect, I know everything,” Noémie answers simply, if a little flippantly. She drops her bag onto the floor and shrugs. “Besides, Professor Dwight won’t miss me for the one day.” A shrug is given to the idea of his doing homework for the moment, because she definitely has other things on her mind at the moment. She grins up at him and waits just long enough to let him finish chewing the licorice and swallow it completely before reaching up to pull him towards her and plant her lips back on his. Nobody ever said that she was subtle and aloof all the time, after all.

Apparently torn between declaring that Professor Kensington wouldn’t be so forgiving, as though it actually mattered to him, and making some sarcastic remark about the all-knowing powers of prefects, Joseph doesn’t say anything in response to that until it is, in some way, rather too late to say much of anything at all. Not that he particularly minds, of course.

Noémie certainly isn’t complaining for her part in this scenario, despite her better sense telling her to run quickly to the Wizo-music classroom. How long the two are there is difficult to say, but it is safe to assume that they don’t emerge for quite a while, and while nothing untoward really goes on, the two do not go back to their commonroom for quite a long while.