*tick...tick...tick...tick...*

Glancing at his pocketwatch, the young wizard paused. Shrouded there in the moonlit hall of the owlery balcony, he'd shifted the timepiece between his hands and had glanced at it no fewer than a dozen times in as many minutes.

It only occurred to him this time that he couldn't see it's face, even in the moonlight; it wasn't the kind of watch you looked into the face of to tell the time no matter, and what he did see told him everything he'd hoped it would.

It was close.

Scrutinous blue eyes turned skyward, watching for something, and they did not go much longer unrewarded.


An owl, on wings hastened by magic, crossed the face of the moon. There on the balcony of the owlery, Jor'havoc smiled for the first time all evening.

When the owl alighted, it bore upon it's left leg a scroll of paper; a scroll he was swift in retrieving, too eager upon it's message to immediately remember to give the owl something to nibble on for it's trouble.

It's squawking even as he began to unfurl the parchment reminded him, and with an utterly absent gesture of his wand, a loose nail in the railing turned into a mouse, squeeked once in shock and plummeted down the side of the tower with the owl in swift pursuit.

None of this concerned him. Rather, all his attention was bent upon the scroll, which he read intently.


"Jor-


I am led to understand that you are doing quite well in almost all of your studies. It pleases your father immensely that you are of the Ravenclaw house, though I must admit that it comes as no surprise to me; you take very strongly after your father's side of the family, after all.

Your marks in flying class also fail to surprise me; do not let such pitiful marks become a habit, my dear Jor- I will be most severely displeased if you disgrace your name by simply being too stubborn to apply yourself as we both know full well you can. And, since you can, so you must; no arguments either. Your father and I are both excellent flyers, and while I commend you avoiding that dreadful game of Quidditch, you /will/ learn how to fly and to fly well.

I shall be examining your progress on this as of this summer, and if the professor of this class cannot handle you, I shall ensure that you are well prepared to impress her upon your return in year two.

In other news, your father and I have been making excellent progress in our own pursuits. It shall have to suffice for you to simply know that for now, as you are not yet learned enough to understand the answer without entire books worth of explanations. Trust to that your father and I will tell you quite all about it in due time, but until that time, remove such matters from your mind and focus upon your studies; it will be those studies that bring you to that day, not idle dreaming or aimless curiosity.


In closing, I regret to inform you that your cousin Alouthe' was killed on the 21st of December. Your father is quite distressed by this, though I understand that you and she were not close.

The circumstances of her death are quite plain, at least- she ran away from home, as she had done twice prior, only this time she fled into a muggle community, where she revealed herself most foolishly as a witch, proved it by casting a number of spells and was shot to death by a muggle weapon.

The funeral was on the 24th. I'm sure you are not regretful of not having been in attendance.

Keep safe, my son, and since you are a Ravenclaw, do your House proud. It is in your blood to do nothing less, and to achieve nothing short of greatness.

-Your loving mother."


Jor grimaced slightly when he read his mother's admonition to embrace flying class, though news of a cousin's death really didn't phase him. His mother, after all, knew him quite well; he'd always thought Alouthe' to be a prattling idiot, and if she'd gone and gotten herself killed by muggles in such a pitiful fashion, she'd quite clearly done the family better by removing her idiocy from the bloodline before she could cause any real damage.


It annoyed him, of course, that his mother felt the need to again remind him of his meager mastery of wizardry, especially when it plagued him so to not know where she and his father were, what they were doing or anything except for the quite-possibly-fabricated generality of their being in Japan to study eastern dragons.

After reading the letter a second time, he folded it neatly and stuffed it away in a pocket; the same pocket in which a most peculiar amulet rested, it's cool metal and gemstone surface pressing lightly against his palm.

He'd not mentioned the amulet to his mother just yet, though clearly the monogram upon it was hers. There was simply no mistaking the Belletreux family crest along with his mother's personal initials.

For once, he had something to not tell her about, and he wasn't about to let that go without trying everything in his power to understand the riddle of his having found it, lying in a box in the middle of an otherwise empty room, as if it'd been waiting for him and him alone to find it.

Slowly, he turned his gaze towards the cloud-bare, star-studded sky, reflecting once more on the peculiar finding of that amulet. He was no closer now to discerning anything about it of meaningful substance than he was when first he found and inspected it, but there were years before him in which to contemplate it.

Years before and so very many spells, secrets and lessons to learn. The very thought made him as giddy as the simultaneous realization of having to learn those spells, secrets and lessons here in Hogwarts made him depressed.


He didn't like it here. He'd told his mother so, but she'd tacitly ignored that bit of his letter in it's entire, which was her clear way of informing him that it wasn't even a subject she'd entertain discussing, no matter it's direction or purpose. Moreover, that she'd written "...when you return in year two" as part of her admonishment for his poor marks in flying sealed it quite firmly; he was here to stay.

His giddiness lost it's verve in the face of that realization, as well as the attendant mental elaboration on that he'd have to put up with being randomly attacked (no matter how much the knuckledragging mouthbreathers called it 'pranking', it was to him a blatant, inexcusable attack), mocked by older students simply on the basis of not yet knowing spells they'd learned and other such ridiculous nonsense until he either graduated, died or wound up killing them all in their sleep and going to Azkaban.

He might, after all, have been sorted into Ravenclaw, but that diminished nothing of his desire for vengeance upon those who'd thus-far made it a point to humiliate him, and it was upon this that his mind dwelled, even as he made his way down the owlery tower stairs.

In his first few days here, he'd learned something about himself. It was not in him to forget a favor done or to forgive an insult, and to those who'd done decently by him, he would be as true an ally as he knew how to be.

Those who had wronged him, however, would be paid back in kind. It did not matter that they were invariably older, more powerful wizards just now; someday, somewhere, likely long after they ahd forgotten their flippant disregard, disdain and even violence towards him, they would be reminded most vexingly of why they should've thought better than to treat him so poorly.

He paused, on that thought, for hearing voices coming down the hall he'd otherwise been shuffling down; one male, two female. Side-stepping into a shadowy alcove, he watched a trio of nonchalant higher year students stroll past, laughing amongst themselves at some private jest or remark.


Jor sneered inwardly at this. So many of these older students thought themselves not merely clever, but the very icons of wit, intelligence and untouchability.

It did not seem to enter their minds, in some of their regards anyway, that they were pitiful and ignorant before their very professors, just as they would be before he himself one day.

"After all..." he whispered to himself as the trio passed with his gaze firmly, unblinkingly planted on their cloaked backs, "...I have something that your mothers didn't seem to see fit to teach you snobbish fools in sufficient quantity..."

The trio faded into the recesses of the distant hallway and, per their voices, had clearly rounded a corner.

Whatever the rest of his whispered utterance might've been was left unspoken within the confines of his mind, and again he returned to shuffling down the hall.

Time would speak the rest quite sufficiently, and precisely when it was it's time to do so.

Bubbling cauldrons simmered in the gloom of the potions classroom, but for the first time in a half hour, everyone was silent.

There was, of course, a very good reason for this silence, and it loomed over one of his fellow first years in the form of professor Snape. The student he was looming over bore a great deal of black and yellow soot on his face, which did nothing to mask the expression of fear he was giving the professor.

"Veldegren, when I told you at the beginning of class to use one-quarter dram of sallowmoss, two pints of purified water at sixty-six degrees and a half-thimble of powdered klara grass..." Snape droned in a low, cool purr, "What, exactly, did you hear, because clearly it was not my very simple instructions."


Ted Veldegren swallowed hard, glanced around as if hoping one of his nearby classmates would rescue him and, resigned to that they wouldn't by all of their looking at him as if he were a boy doomed to die, he swallowed again.

"I...I...think I got...the wrong moss, professor." he stammered even as Snape continued to stare at him.

"...wrong." Snape intoned immediately, then flicked his hands out of their sleeves and, fully ignoring young Ted's sinking down halfway under his desk, reached down and plucked a chocolate frog wrapper out from under the boy's potions book.

"Chocolate, Veldegren, was not called for in the recipe. Did it not occur to you that it would be all over everything you touched? No, don't speak, as the answer is...plainly seen."

The professor held the wrapper above young Ted's potions book for a few silent moments, as if to make sure that none who were watching failed to see it. He then snapped it into his palm and half strode, have drifted around to the front of the classroom.

Silence still reigned amongst the students, and when Snape whirled upon arriving at the class' front, no fewer than half of said students jumped slightly. Ted almost fell out of his chair for having slid too far under his desk.

"Kellestrien, you will be Veldegren's tutor in this class from now on and until I say otherwise."

At this, the only student paying no apparent attention to the ongoing proceedings, busy as he otherwise was with watching the sickly green contents of his size 2 cauldron swirl clockwise as they were meant to, looked up.

For a few moments, Jor met the professor's gaze. Numerous protests to being stuck sitting near, let alone assisting, that useless bum of a dunderhead Slytherin came to mind, but he gave voice to none of them.

Instead, he simply said, "As you wish, professor.", though his tone made it clear as to what he thought of the task.

Snape's gaze didn't linger on the young potions prodigy, though it did return to Veldgren, who had clearly hoped he'd vanished or melted into the floor or turned invisible by now.

"You, Veldegren, will be staying after class with Kellestrien, who seems to be the only one amongst you that has the ability to follow the simplest of instructions." Snape continued, and Veldegren whimpered, "But...professor...."

He was silenced by Snape's unblinking stare.

"...You will stay after class and you will finish this potion, Veldegren. Do not suppose for one fraction of an instant that I will hesitate to take points away from my own House; points I assure you that you have had no hand in earning; if you see fit to argue. Am I perfectly...understood?"

Veldegren couldn't manage more than a meek nod.

"Very good." was Snape's given reply, though in a tone that didn't sound at all as if he thought the young Slytherin was much good for anything.

"It's finished, professor."

Everyone looked over at Jor, who had seen fit to interject this news upon one of Snape's stare-downs.

Indeed, for the unblinking stare the potions master gave Jor, most of the class expected the young Ravenclaw to be next in receiving a derision.

One moment passed, then a second, and only during the third did Snape elect to speak.

"Very good, Kellestrien. Bottle it and place it upon my desk for grading."

That said, the potions master withdrew to the other side of his great cauldron, signifying that the class was to recommence their work without further delay.

"...'it's finished, professor'...showoff." Veldegren muttered, his pluck returning with Snape's withdrawl. "Stuck with that smarmy Ravenclaw smarty pants....I don't need a stinking tutor..."

"Oh get off it." A nearby Hufflepuff girl, whom Jor'd never bothered to learn the name of, shot at Ted. "You're just trying to puff up, and you -do- need a tutor. That's the third time you've gotten something in a potion that wasn't supposed to be in it."

Glaring moodily at the girl, Ted snorted. "Shut up, Sammy-Whammy Bludger-butt. I don't need your help either."

Clearly offended, the hufflepuff girl rolled her eyes and returned to her own potion mixing.

Turning his moody glare around the room, as if challenging anyone else to say anything, Ted eventually settled his gaze on Jor'havoc, who was otherwise busy with carefully bottling his finished product.

"You think you're so smart, huh, Kellestrien?" Ted spoke, though he got no answer; not so much as a glance; from the occupied Ravenclaw.

Ted, who wanted very much to take his humiliation out on someone, wasn't in any mood to be ignored. Plucking his wand out of his pants pocket, he took general aim under the table and muttered, "Expelliarmus".

Jor's flask flew out of his hand, spun thrice in the air and landed in a hissing, bubbling-green spray of broken glass and foul-smelling potion in the middle of the floor.

"Hah! Look at Jor; silly slippery-fingered Ravenclaw is supposed to tutor me when he can't even hold onto a bottle? I've found Ravenclaw's new Seeker, I have!" Ted hooted, though he swiftly fell silent when it became clear that none of the rest of the class found this quite as entertaining as he did.

He blinked a few times when the target of his ire simply looked right back at him. It was the most Snape-like unblinking stare he'd ever gotten out of anyone except Snape, and for a moment, he wasn't quite sure the matter was so funny anymore either.

"I trust that you will be cleaning that cauldron before your tutoring session after class, Veldegren?" Jor asked nonchalantly.

"...Uh..." Ted shifted his gaze from Jor to the singed cauldron before him. "...Yeah. I probably should."

"Yes. You should." Jor replied quietly. "It would be a terrible shame if it were to heat improperly and shatter due to surface impurities. Fragments might get lodged in your eyes, scar up your face..." Jor paused, then smiled thinly, "...it would be dreadful. Be sure it's very clean, of course, and we won't have to worry about it."

For a moment, Ted was left silent, staring at his dirty cauldron.

"They...can do that?" he asked in a small voice.

"Oh yes, Ted. That is, of course, if those same impurities don't turn the potion you're trying to make into something volatile and explosive in the first place. There's just no telling how much havoc they can wreak, if allowed." Came Jor's response, even as he'd set to pouring a second bottle full of his potion.

Ted glowered. "...I think you're just trying to scare me. That'd be like you, wouldn't it? Mister smarty pants scared-of-brooms? That's what you're trying to do, isn't it, huh?"

At this, Jor shrugged. "I don't personally care, Veldegren. If your cauldron or potion explodes and your face is permanently scarred, scalded or otherwise ruined, it will be for your parents to fret over and of no concern to me what-so-ever. It really is your problem; worry about it or...don't."

He then stoppered his potion-filled bottle and rose, either not realizing or not caring that most of the class' eyes were on him just then.

Ted's uncertain glare followed his unwanted tutor across the floor to Snape's desk, upon which Jor placed the stoppered bottle.

Without another word, the young Ravenclaw returned to his desk and busied himself with cleaning his cauldron.

Ted, after glancing around a few times, picked his up and carried it over to a water basin, where he shamefacedly set to scrubbing his own.

Though he was bent over a table and facing the other direction, Snape had heard every word of the exchange. No one could see it of course, but he was smirking.

"It's flippin' rainin'!" Gordy Geffle hooted as he and his fellow first years trudged out to the quidditch pitch. "I love flyin' in th'rain!"

"Oh, stuff a sock in it..." another Gryffindor boy muttered, clearly not sharing Gordy's enthusiasm for flying in drizzle, though he did get his hair ruffled by his fellow Gryffindor.

"Leave off the snarkin' today, wouldja Wheaton? It's no more'n a bit'a rain; c'mon, we'll have fun!"

This was merely the loudest of the bustling, yammering cadre of first year chatter as they scurried after Madam Hooch, though a few voices weren't enjoining themselves to it. Noteworthily not adding to the calamity of babble (as he disaffectionately termed it) was Jor, bringing up the rear as had been his habit all year.

In firmly predictable fashion, the most excited and enthusiastic flyers, quidditch-hopefuls and class show-offs were in the front of the procession, typically also being the ones who were the loudest.

Jor, for his part, simply sighed when he again saw all the brooms line up at Hooch's wand-waved behest. The class stumbled and clambered to fall in-line as she turned.

"We moving into the last half of your first year, and some of you have doubtlessly heard less-than-pleasant things from your parents." Hooch began, even as she set to striding up and down the line of children. "Those of you who've slacked off up to now, suck it up and get on with it. As for the rest of you...keep up the good work and don't you dare start slacking on me!"


"Yes, Ma'am!" came the chorus of responses from the flying enthusiasts, but then Hooch looked directly at Jor.

"I've heard good things about you from most of the other professors, Kellestrien, but maybe it'll do you some good for it to be said that you've the worst marks in this class out of everybody. Am I going to see some improvement out of you this semester?"

The whole class' eyes turned to Jor, many of them grinning, some of them maliciously. Ted Veldegren snickered, clearly being pleased with his unwanted potions tutor getting what he doubtlessly thought to be fair-dues.

"Actually..." Jor answered, looking at Hooch not quite unlike how he'd looked at Ted only a few days earlier in potions class, though if Hooch noticed, she'd probably seen worse glares and wasn't much for caring, "...I've been practicing over the holiday."

Arching a brow slightly, Hooch said "Good. I hope you have. I expect good things out of you, Kellestrien."

Whatever his response might've been, madam Hooch wasn't interested in sitting still long enough to hear it, as she launched from there directly into the day's class itinerary.

"We covered control and balance last semester, which some of you did well in and others, not so well at all. This semester, you're going to put all of that into use. Three laps around the quidditch pitch for practice warm-ups, and then you're going to be racing ten laps around the pitch."

An excited murmur went up from the enthusiasts, though Hooch motioned for silence and got it. "The winner of the ten-lap race will earn five points for their house, but only if it's a clean race; no cheating, no wands, no anything but skill. If I see any one of you cheating, I'll knock five points from your house and you'll be getting some unlikable homework to go with it. Clear?"

Amidst the myriad nods, a girl from Gryffindor asked, "What about last place? What's Jor going to get?"

This brought a snicker from a good few students, though Hooch silenced them again. "Last place gets nothing, miss Morfid, same as everyone else who comes in at any place that isn't first."

Another hand shot up, and Hooch nodded to the Ravenclaw girl to whom it belonged. "Madam Hooch, I don't think it's very nice for everyone to pick on Jor for not liking to fly."

The young Ravenclaw girl glanced sympathetically over at Jor, who was, himself, simply staring straight ahead, as if not hearing a word anyone was saying.

"Then he'd better get over it." was all Hooch said in response, and she put off any further questions with a barked "Brooms up! Three laps warm-up! Get moving!"

All of the students brought their brooms up, straddled them and took off in a generally ungainly cloud. It swiftly became apparent as to who the better flyers were for their taking the immediate lead and not seeming uncomfortable on their brooms.

Ted Veldegren was, of course, amongst them, being one of the best first-year flyers in the class, and also an aspiring Beater. Gordy Geffle of Gryffindor was also up there, and the competitive pair finished their three laps neck-and-neck while their closest pursuit was a quarter-lap behind.

Jor, despite clearly having practiced his balance and control over the holidays, still managed to come in with the last group, accompanied only by a group of fairly apathetic Hufflepuff girls who were busier gossiping than flying.

"You lot are shameful." Hooch declared when that last group arrived. "Gossam, Leshen, Marghere, fly another lap. Alone. Be quick about it."

The three girls groused at being split up and made to fly another lap, though only Sheila Gossam protested. "What about Jor? I mean, c'mon madam Hooch, he was barely ahead of Linda..."

"The fact that he was ahead of miss Merghere tells me that he, at least, was trying." Hooch interjected. "Now, move it."

The girls completed their individual laps in half the time it'd prior taken them. Jor, in that time, simply leaned on his broom and stared off into the distance.

The girl who'd spoken up for him prior tried, in that time, to tell him to ignore all the teasing, but all she'd gotten for her trouble as a vague glance.

Ted, who was only occasionally found amusing by even his fellow Slytherin, had gotten even Gordy laughing with mimicking Jor's awkward method of flying, though most didn't get in on the teasing.

"Now, we're going to have our ten lap race." Hooch announced when the last girl had landed. "Remember; five points to the winner's house and nothing for the rest of you. Keep it clean and give it everything you've got! We begin on three!"

Hooch straddled her broom and started the count while the students scrabbled to get astride their own before it was too late.

"One! Two! Three! Go!"


The promise of house points for winning the race seemed to motivate even the most reluctant in the first few laps, though after Veldegren and Geffle once again took an untouchable lead, it came down to Hooch's mid-air coaching to keep them from sloughing off.

Jor, however, wasn't faring much better, though it was obvious that he was trying. What he was lacking in physical strength made it difficult for him to keep from swerving around when buffeted by wind, and similarly, he simply lacked the solid sense of balance that better cornerers and accelerators relied so much upon.

Much to his surprise, however, he didn't come in dead last. Rather, the girl from his house did, and by a fair distance behind him, though he was second-to-last just the same.

"Lookit that limp noodle flying..." Ted hooted as Jor weebled in for a landing. "Too bad you can't brew yourself a potion for learning how to fly, huh Kellestrien? Maybe your broom will explode and lodge pieces in your bottom!"

He took Jor's enraged expression as a sure sign that his insult had struck home, and since he'd narrowly won, was content to go on with gloating elsewhere.

When the Ravenclaw girl landed a few moments later, Jor whirled on her.

"Why?" he demanded, glaring icily at her. Surprised, she opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out.

Jor's furious stare eventually forced her to avert her gaze, and she half-whispered, "...I...I thought that maybe..."

He interrupted. "I don't care. I shouldn't have even asked. Don't ever again lag behind just to make me look better. You could've been at least in the middle and we both know it."

"Aww, how adorable." Ted, who'd overheard the exchange, shot in. "Jor's girlfriend came in last for him. Jor and Serine sitting in a tree! Oh, wait, Jor couldn't fly that far. Maybe Jor's at the bottom of the tree and his girlfriend's throwing down a rope!"

This got a laugh out of most of the class despite that most of Ted's other jests routinely hadn't.

Normally, Jor ignoring him would've irked him, but he was too pleased with having won points for his house to care just then.

Serine Melledeux, however, burst into tears and ran off towards the castle.

"Now look what you did, Kellestrien." Ted snapped. "You made your girlfriend cry."


"THAT...." Hooch's bark silenced any response or ulterior twittering that'd been occuring..."is QUITE enough out of you, mister Veldegren."

Ted rolled his eyes. "S'true, Professor. He yelled at her and made her cry."

Hooch, never much for being argued with, narrowed her eyes. "I award five points to House Slytherin for your victory in the race, mister Veldegren. In the same breath, I dock house Slytherin five points for lying to a professor and arguing about it. Anything more to say?"

Stammering for a moment, Ted shook his head and opted to just shut up right about then, and for a moment, the class was silent.

"Good flying today, all of you. Get inside and shower. Kellestrien, before you go, I want to see you in the broom shed."

That said, madam Hooch strode off for that very place, all of the class brooms bobbing along behind her.

Jor followed along, arriving at the shed only a minute behind the professor.

After stepping inside, he watched Hooch replace the brooms on their hanging slots in silence, and only when she was finished glancing them over did she speak.

"I can tell you tried today, Kellestrien. I want you to know that it is trying that will get you passing marks in this class, even if you're never the greatest broom-rider, or even a remarkable one."

Jor remained silent, which brought the professor to pause and look over at him.

"I will not stop the other students from teasing you. If you're sore about that, -" she was interrupted by Jor gesturing sharply, at which she tilted her head.

"I don't care what anyone says about me, professor. I -really- don't. You saw how Serine deliberately held back to let me be ahead of her, didn't you?" he snapped without restraint, though if Hooch took offense, she didn't show it.

"Yes, I did. Why did she do that, do you suppose?" she asked, at which Jor's scowl deepened.

"So I wouldn't look even worse. I didn't ask her to do that, professor, and I never want her to do it again."

After contemplating this for a moment, Hooch leaned down and peered into Jor's eyes. This seemed to startle him out of his gloaming outrage, at least enough for him to blink a few times.

"You would rather lose fairly than win unfairly, Kellestrien?"

He had to think about this for a moment, though he nodded slightly when that moment's thought had passed.

"That's a valuable thing to know about yourself. Maybe this class isn't the 'reeking, awful dungpit' you so eloquently proclaimed it to be in the entry hall some months back, hmm?"

Her question and observation had come quite unexpectedly to the young wizard, who hid nothing of having clearly been, just then, made to see the whole matter from a perspective he'd never prior considered.

"...You're right, professor." He answered after a moment. He then blinked again. "...maybe...oh hells."

His curse went ignored by Hooch, who clearly understood that he was thinking out loud just then.

"...I've been as dumb as a bludger about this, haven't I." he said with an inward frown.

"That," she answered, "is for you to figure out. About this class, a few others and the entire school, if I've heard your many opinions about various things correctly."

She then ruffled his hair. "Get along with you then, Kellestrien. Go shower."

He nodded slightly and shuffled out the door, having been left with a great deal to think about from a source he'd never suspected would be the font of any great inspiration at all.

It was quiet in the Ravenclaw commons, which was just the way Jor liked it; quiet and empty.

It bothered him, he'd found, to be around large groups of people, even if they were fellow Ravenclaws. By and large, he'd also found that being around other people at all only occasionally agreed with him, but for now, it didn't matter.

What did matter was figuring out who had made a fresh breadstick appear on his copy of "Advanced Wand Spells".

It wasn't that he disliked the gesture, though he checked the breadstick quite thoroughly for any lingering hexes, charms or dungbombs; you never knew in this place, and unexpected gifts were often worse than expected nastiness in terms of getting unpleasant surprises.

Rather, it told him a great deal about whomever had sent it that there was nothing wrong with it. It wasn't even a transfigured frog or pebble. It was exactly what it seemed to be, and that was the most mysterious puzzle of all, in his figuring.

Someone had not only seen fit to impart upon him a friendly gesture, but had apparently paid enough attention to his sparse eating habits to notice that the great hall's breadsticks were his favorite food.

It was either that or someone had guessed blindly, which he didn't suppose for a minute to be the case. Anyone left to guesses would've probably supposed that he, like many of the other kids here, favored sweets and candy, though he quite disliked most such fare.

He'd grown up eating what his mother prepared for him, after all, which was a strictly vegetarian diet that he'd always rather fancied, especially since his mother was such a fantastic food charmer.

It'd rather surprised him to find that the breadsticks here at Hogwarts were just as his mother's were, and moreso to learn thereby that she'd likely copied the house elves' recipe for them from when she'd gone here.

Just the same, none of that reflecting and cogitating was going anywhere in explaining where this particular breadstick had come from, and since he didn't know of anyone considering him to be friend enough to care that much, he was resigned to simply eating the damn thing and worrying about it later.

A few hours passed as the young wizard reveled in his readings of wand magic. All of it was, of course, quite beyond him to acquire proficiency in just yet, though he understood the theories and underlying principles well enough. It was the province of those that truly fascinated him, and he repeatedly found it remarkable how even these powerful hexes and charms were all based on the same functional groundwork as the beginner spells.

It was also a perfect excuse to surround himself in books of magical theory, history, herbology, magical creatures, potion-making and arithmancy, all of which he often needed to reference to acquire a specific term or knowledge of some ingredient or another that he'd never heard of.

He was only ever truly happy when he was firmly lodged in a pile of books and made to read his way out of it, so for those few hours of quiet, he was perhaps the happiest lad in the school.

Nothing good ever lasts in perpetuity of course, and when Ravenclaws of all years began filing in, popping out of the fireplace or even flitting through the windows on brooms, he sighed inwardly and began packing his books up.

Plainly, he wasn't fast enough, as a much older Ravenclaw girl; a sixth year; flopped down on the couch beside him.

"What've you got there, kid?" she asked off-handedly, and it took a moment of Jor staring at her for him to realize that she was simply being friendly.

"Oh...um..." he looked at the book in his hands. "Advanced wand spells, miss."

She leaned over to peer at the page his hand was idling on, her amber hair spilling down over his shoulder, carrying with it a scent he found inexplicably gorgeous. "Ohh...hah! You're crazy, kiddo; I'm just getting into studying out of that book."

Her tone confused the young wizard almost as much as why her scent had got his attention so powerfully. Jor took some pride on being able to detect mockery, cynicism, sarcasm or charms...but she, as far as he could tell, was simply continuing to be nothing but friendly, nor had he noticed any spells being flicked in his direction to be inducing this weird state of mind.

All at once, he felt embarrassed, quite without knowing why.

"Do you understand anything out of that book?" the young woman inquired, to which Jor shrugged slightly.

"The theories and principles, mostly..." he quietly answered, "...the spells are beyond me, though I've been brushing up on the research methods. Someday..."

He then trailed off for having found himself staring into the young woman's eyes. It left him utterly without explanation as to why he lost his entire train of thought just then, but he felt as if he'd never seen more captivating, beautiful eyes in all his life.

"...Someday...?" she continued, as if not noticing his staring.

"...someday, I hope to..." he murmured dumbly on "...capture beauty in a bottle like that which your eyes show."

He then blinked, not sure that he'd said what he thought he'd just said.

She smiled, then grinned...then laughed merrily. Even though he didn't feel like laughing for how confusing this was, he just couldn't focus on it, and wound up laughing with her.

"My name is Hannalor Estrelle." She placed one of her hands thoroughly gracefully in his. Without thinking, despite trying very hard to and finding it impossible, he kissed the back of her hand, which seemed to please her. "And you, unless I've heard wrong, are Jor'havoc Kellestrien?"

He nodded, oblivious to the chuckles coming from some of the other Ravenclaws who'd spotted the exchange or even that a world existed outside of Hannalor's eyes.

Her smile didn't fade in the least, though her eyes twinkled cheerfully.

"What is your mother's name, Jor'havoc? May I just call you Jor?"

Again, he nodded obliviously, and only answered the question after it'd filtered through his inexplicably fogged-up mind. "Oh...m..my mother's name is...is Anastacia Belletreux-Kellestrien."

Hannalor's eyes lit up. "I thought so! I knew I recognized your family name when I heard it mentioned, and my mother told me over the holidays that an old friend of hers from Hogwarts had a son just starting here....which would be you!"

If he'd been in any frame of mind to formulate a question, he likely would've asked a dozen. As it was, he smiled for her eyes lighting up, glad that he'd whatever he'd done or said had made her happy and said nothing.

Her smile broke into a grin. "Oh, I suppose I should tell you...though it seems that you've already noticed. I'm half veela. Here..." she looked away, which brought a knot to Jor's stomach that tasted in his throat of grief pangs.

She only looked away for a moment, however; just long enough to rummage around in a pocket purse for what looked like a make-up case. After flipping it open, she dabbed a finger into the contents and tapped him on the forehead with it.

All at once, his world collapsed back to normalcy, which made his eyes bug out for a moment.

"...Half-veela." he murmured as his head cleared. "...I've...holy wow, you could've told me to walk out the window and plummet to my death and I would've done it just to make you happy..."

"...yeah." She sighed. "I have that affect on men. Believe me, I don't enjoy it as much as most would suspect." she then paused and shrugged. "But don't worry about it. I wouldn't ever make you do anything you wouldn't probably want to do anyway."

Jor frowned, not having missed the nuance of that, but shrugged as well. "Guess it just means that I need to work on seeing through it. I've never met a veela before, or a half-veela for that matter; only read about them."

Hannalor's smile returned, though Jor began to wonder if her pocket-concoction had entirely worked, as he still found her smile entirely intoxicating. "Your mother and mine were friends, if I've been told correctly. Anastacia Belletreux, as my mother told me, was a year older than her and the only other Slytherin that treated her like a real person, not a sub-human creature."

"Your mother was a Slytherin too?" Jor asked, to which Hannalor nodded. "Also one of the few veela to ever attend Hogwarts, if I'm not mistaken. Not that I think she probably much had to, and she's told me how controversial and unwelcomed it was by many...but, she did, and your mother was one of her only real friends here."

Jor contemplated that for a few moments. "Did you...send me a breadstick a few hours ago?" he asked, though Hannalor's quirked eyebrow immediately told him that it hadn't been her.

"No. Why, are you the recipient of mysterious breadstick gifts?"

He couldn't help but half-smile, half-smirk for how she said it, and he nodded. "Yeah. I was just settling in to read a few hours ago, and a breadstick appeared on my book. It wasn't charmed, hexed or stuffed with dungbombs, or a transfigured rat or anything. It was just a breadstick...so I ate it. I just..."

She laughed, and Jor felt his entire spine tingle when she did. "That's funny." She said as her laugh subsided into a grin. "So suspicious that you ate it for being nothing more than a breadstick, eh?"

He couldn't help but laugh at this as well. "Yeah. I was kinda hungry, and since no one was claiming it..."

"Well, I hope you find your mysterious breadstick benefactor, Jor." she hopped off the couch, still grinning. "I'm glad to have met you too, by the way. If you need any help with anything, let me know...though from what I've been told in asking about you, it might be me asking you for help before I graduate."

He couldn't help but grin at this. Being wholly unaccustomed to compliments delivered so genuinely, he couldn't help but feel a surge of pride for it.

"Yeah, right...you were sorted into Ravenclaw too, hmm?" he somewhat embarrassedly replied. "You've probably forgotten more in the past week than I'll learn all this year."

Again, she laughed, and again, he felt as if it were music any sane person should be dancing to, to hear.

With a wink, she shrugged. "You never know, eh? You were the one who snuck into the arithmancy class I was in, after all."

He blinked, then blushed slightly. "You...were there for that, huh?"

Nodding, she kept right on grinning. "I was rooting for you, by the way. Anyone with guts enough to sneak into a sixth year arithmancy class and take notes, no matter what year they're in, is either totally barmy or well worth watching, and since one's usually also the other, I'll count you as both, Jor'havoc. And now that I see what you read for fun, it makes perfect sense, at least to me."

He blushed again, through a barely-restrained grin.

"So...keep in touch, hmm? I'd love to get to know you better." she rocked back on her heels to say, and he nodded, rather more enthusiastically than he'd probably ever done so about anything in his life.

"See you around then, Jor. I've gotta run for now. I'm glad I finally caught up with you. See ya!" And off she dashed, waving a few hellos to other students she apparently knew and vanishing in a floo-flare in the fireplace.


For the next few minutes, he simply sat there, basking in the whirlwind oddity that'd just swept him up, part of him waiting for the other shoe to drop, but not with much enthusiasm.

After he'd reasonably collected himself, he finished gathering up his books and shuffled off towards his room, thoroughly baffled but equally pleased with the chance encounter of minutes prior.

It was thoroughly beyond his notice that, when Hannalor had leaned over to peer at his book, she'd also swept a few hairs of his from the shoulder of his robe.