A big thank you to Maggie for betaing this!

Nine-year-old Evelyn placed a candle on her table carefully, away from the curtains and books. She sat down beside the window and gazed at the sky. Soon enough, it would be midnight and the fireworks signifying the end of the town fair would start. She yawned widely. She'd taken a secret nap during the day so she could stay up and watch the fireworks. She wished Mum and Dad would let her stay up with them but they always told her she was too young.

It was a nice, quiet night. The sky was clear and the moon was small. That was good; the fireworks would look a lot better without bright moonlight. She rested her arms on the windowsill. It was quite late, wasn't it? She yawned again. The stars twinkled so nicely in the dark sky. That must mean it was almost midnight. Her head fell onto her arms and her eyes slowly closed…

CRACK!

Evelyn gave a muffled squeal and jumped back from the window. Someone – no something – had just appeared at her window! It was a small creature of some sort, a little shorter than herself. It moved closer and stepped into the candlelight. It had bright green eyes and a long pencil-like nose and bat-like ears. Evelyn grabbed the thick book on her desk.

"St – stay back," she said, trying to hide the fact that her knees were trembling. "I'm not afraid of you."

The creature backed away from her immediately. "Dobby is sorry, Miss. Dobby did not mean to frighten you."

"Dobby," she said, lowering the book slightly. "Is that what you are?"

"No Miss. My name is Dobby. I is a house-elf."

Evelyn dropped the book and stared. "An elf? You mean…you mean you can do magic?"

"Of course Miss. I is not as good as a wizard and I have no wand but I can do some magic."

"Can you show me?"

Dobby clicked his fingers and the book that she had dropped floated up gently and placed itself on the table.

Evelyn gaped at the book. She turned back to Dobby slowly, her eyes shining with awe. "You can do magic! And you talked about wizards! Does that mean all the stories are real? There are really fairies and trolls and goblins and evil witches and potions that make you fall asleep and you can turn straw into gold and everything?" She gasped. "Do you think I might have a fairy godmother?"

Dobby took another nervous step back. "Dobby is very sorry, Miss. I has no idea what you mean. Dobby will go now." He climbed onto the windowsill.

"No wait!" Evelyn rushed forward and grabbed the elf's arm. "Please, stay for a while. I just want to talk to you."

Dobby looked at her. "Miss said 'please'."

She looked confused. "Of course I said 'please'. It's good manners isn't it? After all, I'm the one who wants you to do something so I should at least be polite about it. Mum would scold me terribly if I were rude to someone." She pointed to her bed. "Er, why don't you sit down?"

Dobby climbed onto the bed, looking at Evelyn as though she was as wonderful as she thought him. "Dobby – Dobby has not met many kind witches before. And never one who said 'please'."

Evelyn frowned. "I'm not a witch. I can't do magic. Why wouldn't anyone say 'please' to you?"

"I is a house-elf, Miss. I is only supposed to follow orders. No one is polite to Dobby."

She tilted her head. "You're a house-elf? Does that mean you're different from Santa's elves?"

Dobby looked confused. "Who is Santa? I is a house-elf," he repeated. "I cook and clean people's homes and take care of them."

"So why are you in my house then?"

"Dobby made a mistake. I is supposed to Apparate to the next street."

"No, I meant why aren't you in the house where you work?"

Dobby lowered his eyes. "I is released from that house last week. I was given a sock which is the only way to free an elf."

Evelyn's eyes widened in comprehension. "Oh! I get it now. You're like the elves that helped the shoemaker."

Dobby looked at the girl, bewildered. She obviously knew about magic and if she could see him, she had to be a witch but she didn't thinks she was. She must be a Muggle-born then. But why did she say such strange things? Who were this shoemaker and this Santa that she talked about? And what was a fairy godmother? But more importantly, why was she being polite to him?

She was talking again, he realised. "But you look sad. Shouldn't you be happy to get clothes? They're meant as a reward for all your hard work, right? That's how it was in the story."

Dobby shook his head, his ears flapping vigorously. "'Tis a mark of shame for an elf to receive clothes, Miss. My old masters were very bad and Dobby is happy to be free from them but other people is reluctant to take in a dismissed elf." His face suddenly contorted and he started banging his head against the bedpost. "Bad Dobby, very bad!"

Evelyn dragged him away in alarm. "What on earth are you doing?" she demanded.

He looked at her, slightly dazed. "Thank you. We is not supposed to speak ill of our masters but it is hard to forget that I is not under their employment anymore."

She frowned. "Do you have to punish yourself for saying something bad about your masters? I mean, Mum always says I shouldn't say anything bad about anyone but I grumble about her some times when I do my chores and Jeanie – that's the neighbours' maid – complains about them a fair bit but she doesn't have to hurt herself for that." She looked a little thoughtful. "Isn't it very rude to have someone do things you should be doing yourself? The neighbours' boy, Seymour, is in my class. He doesn't have to do any chores because they're rich enough to have a maid. I have to make my own bed and help Mum set the table for dinner and tidy my own room but he doesn't have to do any of it."

"It is what a house-elf does, Miss. I don't mind. I likes work. I used to make my master's son's bed too," Dobby said.

"I bet he was a real brat," Evelyn said, scowling. "Seymour is. He doesn't care about anything but himself. He always laughs at us when we have to go home because we have to do chores. He gets all the pocket-money he wants from his parents but most of us have to earn it by doing chores for our parents."

Dobby stared at her, catching only one word from her speech. "Money? You mean you is getting paid for doing work?"

"Well only a little, but yeah. Don't you? Jeanie does and she does everything you'd do, I guess."

"No, Dobby has never got money. Dobby is not supposed to. I… I is a house-elf."

"Yes, I know that already," Evelyn said impatiently. "But why shouldn't you get paid if you're a house-elf, especially if the family you were with made you punish yourself just for grumbling about them? It's just a way of saying 'thank you' to someone who's doing something to help you, isn't it? I mean, if I didn't make my bed, then Mum would have to and that means she has to do more work. So paying me is her way of saying thanks. She even gives me a smile and extra dessert sometimes if I do something without being asked to."

"No one has ever thanked Dobby for doing work before," Dobby said, his eyes wide. "House-elves are only supposed to do as they is told and not expect smiles."

"Well you've had rubbish masters so far then. I mean, look at the shoemaker. He hadn't even actually hired the elves to make his shoes but he still made them clothes to show them he was very glad for what they'd done for him. Everyone deserves to be given a pat on the back at least. You make sure you don't do another job unless you get some form of payment," Evelyn said briskly. It was almost impossible for her to believe that people expected someone to do things for them without being appreciated. It was just rude, in her opinion. "I've been talking too much, haven't I? Mum says I don't know when to keep my mouth shut and let someone else talk. Tell me about magic. Are there really fairies and goblins?"

Dobby nodded and talked to Evelyn for a while about all the magical creatures she asked about. She had very strange ideas about them! She had thought fairies granted wishes and had no idea how dangerous they really were. Suddenly, a loud bang came from outside.

"The fireworks!" Evelyn gasped. She ran to the window and gazed at the bursts of colour lighting up the sky. She sighed. "They're beautiful, aren't they? Have you ever seen them before?"

Dobby joined her on the floor. "They is lovely, Miss. I is seeing them only once before on New Year's. I has to work in the night."

"Did you have to work on New Year's too? My, your masters must have been terrible! Didn't they give you holidays? And call me Evelyn. It's a little weird to be called 'Miss'," Evelyn said.

Dobby's eyes widened. "Very well, Evelyn…Miss."

She laughed. "That's a bit better, I suppose."

Dobby grinned at her too. "Dobby will leave now. I has troubled you long enough."

She reached out and hugged him. "Must you? You were no trouble at all. Thank you for all the stories about magic. I'm sorry I talked so much and didn't let you say enough."

Dobby was stunned. "I…Thank you Evelyn Miss. You is making Dobby feel nice."

She nodded, smiling at him. He snapped his fingers and disappeared.

Dobby materialized in front of the wizarding house he'd meant to go to in the next street. He couldn't stop thinking about Evelyn. Only Harry Potter had shown such friendship to him before and that was probably only because of how great a wizard he was. He had never realised that other people in the world could also be so kind. More than anything, the idea that people who worked for others were paid and treated as equals and given holidays stuck with him. Others who did the same kind of work as he did were appreciated and didn't have to punish themselves. They were smiled at and were shown kindness and politeness.

Dobby would like to be appreciated too.

Please review :)

It's my head canon that Dobby did not have ideas of equality and freedom when he was working for the Malfoys. He always seemed so timid and scared and surprised at Harry's kindness that I never really thought he could have been suppressing what were pretty much revolutionary ideas for a house elf to have. So he must have been exposed to that sort of thinking somewhere in his life and this is my take on how he might have started thinking that way. I'd love to hear your thoughts on it!

This was for Finals Round 1 of the Quidditch League Competition. The prompts used were : "Must you?", candlelight, fireworks