"Your office, Madame Hooch," the Headmaster said, indicating the heavy wooden door before them. "You're in one of the towers, obviously, and you'll rather like the view, I think." With a feather-light touch, Headmaster Dumbledore opened the door. Rolanda Hooch was instantly in love.
The room was airy and open, strangely so for a stone-walled room with a heavy door. The windows took up almost the whole rounded wall, and the small stretch of stone in which the door sat was covered with Quidditch schedules and a broomstick cupboard. The view, as Dumbledore had said, was beautiful. She could see the Quidditch pitch, tall and beautiful and her favorite place in the world; it took up a good solid third of her view, and she felt her face break into an unfamiliar grin. The rest of her view was mostly open grounds, just a hint of the lake on one edge, and a row of squat little buildings in the middle.
"What are those," she asked stiffly, "those buildings there?"
Professor Dumbledore replied, "Those are the greenhouses; they are rather nearer you than the pitch or the lake, but I daresay they're just as beautiful, at least, once you are inside." With a welcoming pat on the shoulder, Dumbledore left her alone in her new home.
Rolanda had few possessions, and the house elves had already arranged her various supplies - goggles, a few books, some old and battered Quidditch gear - with their usual efficiency. The important thing was her broom closet, and she held her breath as she carefully opened it. There, gleaming and winking at her, were her broomsticks, and at the base, a beautiful old chest in which, she knew, the Quidditch balls slept. "Hello, old friends," she said, that rare smile on her face again.
There wasn't time for a flight, not just now, because the welcome feast was about to begin and she had been instructed to appear. Quickly changing into the nicest robes she owned - which were from her military days, unfortunately - Rolanda hurried through the corridors, only getting turned around once on her way to the banquet hall. She slid into the last empty seat at the high table, just in time for the students to begin filing in.
To her left was a tall, skinny slip of a man, missing several fingers on his right hand and stinking of Porlock dung. "You must be Professor, er, Kettleburn, I presume?"
He peered down his nose at her and sniffed. "Aye."
Rolanda waited politely, but he made no move to return the question. She sighed and settled back in her chair, thinking, Nothing really changes. A nervous giggle from her left, strangely familiar.
"Looks like we will be seeing a bit of each other, then," Pomona Sprout said with a guarded smile. "Unless you'd rather chat with Silvanus over there, and he's," the short witch paused thoughtfully, "a bit unfriendly."
"Wonderful," Rolanda said, trying her best to fill the word with all her disdain and lack of interest in socializing. Unfortunately for her, Sprout paid no attention and continued to chatter and question and joke with Rolanda throughout the meal. When they were introduced as new staff members, Pomona received a wide round of applause from her House.
Rolanda earned only two enthusiastic responses in a sea of lukewarm clapping. One loud applauder was Pomona Sprout, of course, and the other was a slender, severe-looking woman on the other end of the table. Rolanda nodded her thanks in the stern witch's direction and took her seat again. Sprout was suddenly quieter, a fact Rolanda didn't analyze lest it suddenly reverse itself. Instead, she dug into the plate of food before her, idly daydreaming about taking her first flight over her old field.