Ravenclaw Rendezvous

Bertie had just finished an exhausting Friday, his busiest day. He had a tonne of transfiguration homework to get through, which wasn't his best subject. Then the poor boy had to write an essay on electricity and all it's uses. Not that this would be difficult having grew up in the muggle society but it was sure time consuming when he also had a star chart to draw, a care of magical creatures sketch and a potions essay to complete. Then on top of that he had all his exam revision for the upcoming weeks of grueling end of year tests.

After climbing the spiral staircase of Ravenclaw tower he reached a brown door. This door, however, was different from the other doors in the castle. It was the smartest door, even smarter than those pretending to be walls, wiser than the ones that could move from one location to the next, this door had could talk, understand and open on it's own command. In fact, it only opened on it's own command.

Bertie reached for the bronze knocker sculptured like an eagle. 'Describe the bloom of a flutterby.' The eagle asked. This was an easy one for Bertie, he'd recently spent time in the herbology greenhouses inhaling the aroma of a flutterby bush that was in bloom. 'The flutterby bush blooms once every century and it's scent smells different to each individual in order to attract the unwary.' The boy recited cheerfully. Within an instant the door swung open into the common room.

The Ravenclaw Common Room had to be the airiest of them all. The room was large and circular, with large windows carved into the white stone walls. Silver stars were embroidered into the midnight blue carpet which was mirrored in the starry domed ceiling. Sky blue drapes were hung near the windows and the room was laid neatly with brown leather sofas in the center. Around the edges bookshelves lined the walls with wooden study desks nearby - the perfect resource for the studious students of Ravenclaw. However it wasn't the carpet, the bookshelves, the marble fireplace or the amazing view of surrounding mountains and herbology greenhouses that was spectacular about the room. No. It was the white marble statue of Rowena Ravenclaw herself standing guard by the doorway to the dormitories above. Atop of her head was a diadem, whose inscription read: Wit beyond measure is man's greatest treasure.

Bertie beamed at the marble statue whenever he entered the room, it was beautifully crafted and hadn't worn at all in the thousand years that it'd stood high and proud. Walking over to a table by one of the windows he threw his bag onto the chair besides him and gazed dreamily out of the window for a moment to recover some of his strength after a busy week.

Liese was beyond perplexed, her eyes drawn to the book and her brow furrowed in an unreadable expression somewhere lost between irritation and a carefree grin. The pages were yellowed, worn in the middles of the pages where hundreds of hands had caressed, brushed, and even torn through the book that laid open on her lap. Where paper met binding there was a long, thin line no thicker than a hair but all too calling of her attention. Liese glanced right, left, then took a fingernail to the ancient binding and slit it in a single rough stroke. It would repair itself, which was a relief, seeing as she could hardly cast a summoning spell— which was by no means anywhere near the complexity required to send the threads that had held the book together over the years back to their homes.

Tracing the line with her finger, Liese bit the inside of her cheek and let her mind follow her body. The black streak was long and jagged yet somehow delicate in its composure, somehow reminiscent of a fluttering moth light enough to be blown away on the wind. Where nib had hit paper, the line had been thicker; from this, she could surmise that it had begun in the leftmost corner and spiraled out toward the right before darting back to nip the spin. In the middle of the book, it disappeared, then bounced out from behind the bindings for another inch before diving back under again.

There was an almost predatory gleam in Liese's eyes as she tore the book open. Her fingers brushed with a nimble sweep over the threads to pull them loose with the tips. Next, she flipped it on its side on one of the tables. There was something written on the scrawled-on book. A grin lit her features. This was an interesting, though not entirely unexpected, turn of events.

The door, however, had clicked, and it had done so much too loudly for Liese to attribute its unrest to the wind. She slammed the book shut just as a wavy-haired boy, somewhat drawn-out but not possibly any older than herself, found his way into the common room. She should have heard the noise. Now, she was fully aware of how strange she must have seemed, shoving her hand to mark some meaningless place in a bone-crushing, leather-bound book and just sitting there gawking at the newcomer. She'd had a free half-hour; having been excused for 'migraines' just two hours before, she hadn't been required to attend her afternoon classes. She'd been nearly alone in the commons for a good fifteen minutes, watched only by the unnervingly still Rowena Ravenclaw situated over the student study area.

Liese shouted a quick greeting to the newcomer, then went silent. She needed a distraction. She spouted off the first excuse for a lie that popped into her mind: "Hey. You don't happen to own something resembling a frog, do you?" She frowned at the boy. He reminded her of the boy in grade school known well for having once licked a toad. They'd all wondered if he'd get tongue warts. "Because I think some black cat just made itself dinner."

Bertie, completely perplexed was brought back to earth at the mention of toad. Swiveling around on the chair to see a brunette talking to him his eyes shot open. Snidget! Leaving his bag behind he hurried to her desk, his heart pumping wild. Bertie's toad had a nack for venturing off, exploring, Bertie'd always sworn if their pets got sorted then Snidget would be a Gryffindor. Hopefully, it wasn't his toad that had decide to explore the inside of a cats mouth.

'Yes I have a toad.' He said, reaching her desk with a nervous expression imprinted upon his face. Snidget didn't do much but he'd been with Bertie since his first journey to Hogwarts on the Hogwarts Express. He was more than just a dull pet, he was the one thing that reminded him of Hogwarts during the Summer. 'What did the toad look like?' He begged anxiously, his fingers trembling slightly as they tugged on the edge of his grey school jumper.

It couldn't be Snidget. It just couldn't be. Snidget was supposed to do on his best exploration. Perhaps after somersaulting from the tallest tower or in a fierce battle with the whomping willow not being eaten by a cat! Students shouldn't be allowed to bring cats, not if they feasted on other students pets!

Liese suddenly felt a pang of guilt, worrying the boy within an inch of his life. He didn't deserve it; his only crime had been walking in at a bad moment. But Liese had a secret to protect, and it was that taking first chair in her mind, at the moment. She could already feel the book beginning to repair itself under her touch. He could cry for a few minutes— self-preservation instinct was taking over. She raised her gaze to level with the trembling boy's, struggling for a moment to bring the words to her tongue. When was the last time she'd had trouble finding a lie? This was certainly quite the rare occurrence. She but her tongue for a moment, seemingly lost in the tide of memories.

"We'll," she began, "It was awfully bloody, so I didn't see much— and besides, half the thing had already been swallowed by the cat. Evidently, he put up a but of a fight. The can was pretty annoyed. What was left of it was small, brown, and spotted. Pretty smooth-skinned, for a toad." In reality, she didn't know much of anything about toads. She knew more about Tasmanian Devils and their mysterious jumping tumours than toads. Liese shifted, slightly uncomfortable. She wanted to move her hand, but picking it up risked her revealing the gaping wound in its side. She'd just have to suck it up and put on a smile. "If I recall correctly, it was one of the first-years'. Rumor has it her toad's legendarily stupid." Not that toads had much in the way of brains, anyway, but accuracy wasn't exactly her aim, at the moment.

Suddenly jumpier than usual, Liese folded her legs under herself and held back her utter discomfort. Her wand was on the table, and while she probably couldn't transfigure anything into an actual toad, she certainly could do half of one if it came down to it, given five minutes and a secluded view. Granted, if he asked to see the remains, she wouldn't be likely to get either of those. That given, she didn't actually understand transfiguration in the slightest. It had been a wonder, her passing the yearly exams. If she tried to transfigure even half a toad, it would probably come out looking disfigured.

Ah the common room, for something such as its name, Owen always felt as if it was far more than just common. In fact, nothing about Hogwarts even remotely seemed common to him. While his father was a wizard, he had also married a muggle, and she wanted to keep the household normal, or perhaps mostly normal is the better word. He could not wait to see the blue and bronzed room again, maybe relax in the corner and take in the conversation of the room. For being only a child, Owen certainly had perfected the ability to keep quiet and listen. He was good at picking up information from others, and information almost certainly meant that you were always one step ahead of everyone else. It was part of the reason he was in Ravenclaw anyway, Owen always presumed. Knowledge beyond his years had always been something he prided himself on.

He came up to the Bronzed Eagle Knocker. Clearing his mind, he went for it.

One of four
Bloodline pure
History and secrets
I buried them low and deep

Listened
Spoke
Disagreed
Left

If you heard me speak
You may not understand
But the last words your hear
Were my sole command

I left behind
My virtues; my beliefs
And one day
My work will be finished


Who am I?

Owen pondered on it for a little, just to make sure that he got it all. He asked the door to repeat itself several times before he was absolutely, positively sure.

"Salazzar Slytherin"

The door opened and Owen gleefully walked through. That one was harder than his last one, something about Every Flavored Beans. Quite simple really.

When he opened the door, he saw the blue and bronze room burst before him, and two older students conversing. He tried to sneak by, knowing they would still see him, but hopefully just ignore him as a younger student. He sat in a chair close enough for him to hear the conversation, but far enough to way that they wouldn't outright expect him to be eavesdropping.

Bertie's eyes began to round and sadden with every word the girl said. It was bloody. Poor Snidget. At least he'd put up a fight, it must have terribly frightening for Snidget, knowing that death was facing him about to reach out and take him from the body he was in. The toad probably had a flashback of all the memories he'd shared with Bertie and the adventures he'd embarked upon around the castle - that was if he had time to think being in a fight to the death. Until.... It wasn't Snidget!

'Um. My toad is green.' Bertie replied, his words sounding somewhat ordinary. What an idiot, scaring me like that when it wasn't even my toad. He thought, not wishing to communicate anymore with the girl. He did love to be in company once he knew someone but he hadn't conversed properly with her before and right now he needed time alone to rest and recover. 'Thanks anyway thought, I guess.' He sighed, before heading up the staircase to his dormitory to check on Snidget, noticing a small chubby first year enter the common room on his way.

He knew Snidget was safe, fastened tightly in his tank besides Bertie's bed but when someone's pet has been in danger it's only an instinct to want to be with your own. Bertie felt almost mother like.

(OOC: I will come back down in my next post I haven't completely left haha)

Valerie straightened her pose as she walked toward the Ravenclaw tower. Her feet were rather stiff and tired from hours of sitting down, reading potion books in the library. But she got many notes from her reading so her time were not wasted. She hoped tomorrow she could get all the ingredients to make a griding potion so she could do her experiment of sleeping draught in a day or two without getting tired.

She stopped her step when she reached in front of the big, wooden door among stony walls that surrounded it. Valerie grabbed the bronze-colored knocker. And as expected, the knocker spoke a riddle. This time it spoke in a sing-song voice, which in her opinion is rather unappealing.

“The sprout will whoop if you take it out, what is it?” Valerie raised her eyebrows after the eagle-shaped knocker cried those words. She waited for a few seconds, just in case that the knocker hadn’t finished with the question. When it didn’t spoke anything else, Valerie finally opened her mouth.

“Mandrake.” She said simply, wondered why the question was simpler today. The door opened, and she stepped into the common room. The sight was nothing unusual, the circular room which filled with books and the marble statue were in place. There were two other students though. One boy, seemed younger than her, sat on a rather far seat from the girl, meant that they weren’t in conversation. But she decided to greet both of them since she hadn’t converse to anyone in these hours.

“Greetings, all.” Valerie tried to spoke loud enough to make them notice.

Bertie scurried up the spiral staircase until he reached the third year boys dormitory. The room was round like the common room with four poster beds with sky blue drapes hung neatly around them. There were five other beds in the dormitory, giving six encircling a cylinder coal heater in the middle. Within the gap around each bed were arched windows embedded gracefully into the light walls. On the table besides Bertie's bed was a tank and within it Snidget!

Unfastening the lid and reaching in to grasp him Bertie lifted his green western toad out into the dormitory air. The wind whistled pleasantly around the tower soothed the sudden awakening of Snidget. 'How about I keep you out with me all weekend?' Bertie said in a cartoonish voice. 'Isn't that a great idea.'

When Bertie returned into the common room there was the addition of a brunette in the year above him. He'd never actually spoken to her although he'd seen her many of times in the common room and Great Hall at meal times. I wonder if she is friends with Henri. Henri Finch and Valerie were in the same year, shared a dormitory and it made sense that they would be friends, but then again Bertie wasn't good friends with the boys in his dorm, more acquaintances.

Valerie wanted to walk toward to the girls dormitory when she remembered that she hadn't sorted which ingredients she had and had not yet. She took her notes out from her robes and noticed that she lacked two ingredients to make confusing and befuddlement Draughts and two other ingredients for girding potion. Her face turned into frown before looking up to find another student had come to the common room. She recognized the student as Nogard in the third year. She didn't know his first name though. Spending her most of time reading and doing experiment on potion unless when she ate or had a class rather turned her into some anti-social person. She set her face back and nodded politely at him before she realized that the confusing concoction in her time was done in the third year, maybe she could ask him where she could get the ingredients inside hogwarts.

"Greetings. Nogard isn't it?" Valerie carefully spoke to the boy as she walked toward him. She didn't spoke to anyone outside her classmates that often unless it was necessary, so she still didn't know how to start a conversation like this.

Liese would have liked to tell herself her stomach twisted seeing the boy's face fall into something between shock and horror, but she'd reached her emotional limit by then— anything past that she wasn't equipped to deal with, so her subconscious stuck it on a boat and shipped it away. Before she could even register another thought, he was upstairs.

Glancing around the room, now, Liese caught sight of the younger boy— whose name she certainly wouldn't admit she didn't know— and a figure making her way through the door. The new arrival, a girl whose she could remember, for once, was a girl named Dubois. She'd never actually spoken to the girl, but Liese had seen her once or twice, and, for some odd reason, the name had stuck with her. It occurred to her, vaguely, that she really should have figured it out by now.

Cutting off Liese mid-thought, the Dubois girl spoke. "Greetings, all." The voice caught Liese's attention; loud, almost forceful, it commanded the air around it to do its bidding. How ironic it was that the very girl who'd produced the sound had slipped away before Liese could work up the nerve to reply. It was completely fine with her, though it was certainly odd. Liese had never actually heard her speak, so she wondered if she had misheard the greeting. Perhaps it had only been her imagining the strange tone to the girl's voice. In any case, she was gone now, off to the side talking with the newly-returned third-year she'd scared for seemingly no reason, now.

Liese slid her mangled book to the side and stood up. Hopefully, no one would pick it up in her momentary absence, but she'd be quick just in case. She was quick to disappear into the dormitories, and soon, she had sprawled herself on her stomach to seek out Pips. She clicked her tongue once or twice and waited, which usually worked to call her cat's attention, but if all else failed she at least hoped to catch sight of a tail or a shape beneath the beds.

(OOC: Yes, the thing about Valerie's voice was just Annaliese hearing it strangely. I'm not at all stating what your character's voice is actually like— don't worry ^^; Just in case you were concerned about that)