Daria Ravenclaw: The Year of the Owl. Saturday
DISCLAIMER: Daria is the creation of Glen Eichler and is the property of MTV Viacom. Harry Potter is the creation of JK Rowling and is the property of JK Rowling, Wizarding World, and Warner Brothers. I own neither franchise and neither seek nor deserve any financial recompense for this work of fan-fiction (Although head-pats and "Atta boys!" are good compensation)
Daria Ravenclaw: The Year of the Owl* Daria Ravenclaw: The Year of the Owl* Daria Ravenclaw: The Year of the Owl
Daria had no classes on Saturday and on this particular Saturday she had no plans, save to go to the library or work on a couple of essays she'd been assigned as homework.
Her plans were disrupted almost as soon as the Sun rose. Dahlia and Majda were both early-risers and Daria realized that she'd lost the battle to stay asleep shortly afterwards. She yawned, stretched her arms, then drew back her poster-bed's curtains.
"Good morning, Daria," said Dahlia. How anyone could be awake at such ungodly hours, thought Daria.
"Good morning," Daria replied grumpily. She got out of bed, put on her bathrobe, then headed for the bathroom. This being Saturday, there wasn't the usual crush of girls waiting to bathe and adjust their toilette: some were still sleeping in, others kept ungodly morning hours. After showering and then washing her hair, she began to feel civilized. Sleepy and hungry, but still civilized.
She then returned to her room, dropping the damp bath towel and picking up a comb and a hand-mirror. She put her comb and mirror on her bed to see what the weather was like. She glanced out the window and saw the green lawn leading to the edge of the forest. In Texas the summer heat and the usual dry weather would have scorched the green grass to browns and yellows. It was still a jolt to remember that it was only early September. She pulled out the clothes she was going to wear, got dressed and set off for the Great Hall and breakfast.
She didn't go directly to the Great Hall. Instead, she made a detour through one of the Castle's side doors to see what the morning's temperature was like. She learned that it was cool, almost, but not quite chilly. In Highland she'd still be roasting: the summer heat persisted not only into September but well into October, too. Now having a notion about what the Great Outdoors were like, Daria headed for the Great Hall and Breakfast.
The Great Hall continued to awe Daria. It was like dining in the middle of a great cathedral, although the roof seemed to open to the sky and the stained-glass windows depicted wizards and witches and their feats and the states were of important wizards and witches from times long gone by.
Despite the fact that she was still young and relatively trim, Daria did make healthier food choices—at least when someone else did the cooking and food preparation. Since her arrival in Scotland, she'd turned away from the classic American breakfast of milk, cereal and orange juice towards yogurt, fruit, and toast.
The yogurt was different. The most obvious visible difference was that it didn't come in plastic containers. Instead, she had to ladle it out of a serving bowl with a large spoon. It was also whole-milk and lacked any flavoring. Daria saw some berries on a serving-plate and added them to her bowl.
"I see that at least one of you fledglings has chosen a healthier diet," said a Hufflepuff sharing their table that morning.
Daria replied by smiling at the Puff and saying "Whatever."
"So what are your plans for today, Daria?" said Violet.
"Study, I think," said Daria. "I'm not as long along in my class reading as I'd like. I also want to start work on a couple of those essays we'd been assigned."
"We're planning to follow the great lawn down to the Dark Lake," said Dahlia.
"Sounds nice," Daria said wistfully.
"What we're thinking of is doing some study en pleine aire and then perhaps have a picnic lunch afterwards," said Violet. "I'd like to enjoy the good weather before it turns cold."
Daria pursed her lips. That did sound nice. She hadn't really explored the school grounds but she'd already learned that they were much, much nicer than the parched grass and chain link-fenced fence she'd known back at James Ferguson Elementary School back in Highland. And if this doesn't work out I think I can get back under cover before I get soaked, she thought.
"I'm game," she said.
"We'll get together at the head of the stairs in the Common Room around 11:30, pick up our supplies in the Great Hall, and be on our way," said Violet with the authority of someone who'd done this before.
A picnic, thought Daria. Cool.
A screech interrupted her thought. Daria looked up, saw some owls flying in, and wondered who got mail. Most likely kids from magical families, she thought. Mundie parents, especially the parents of first- and second-year students, preferred to use mail drops.
An owl with a letter in its beak walked up to the table and looked at Daria. Her eyes widened when she saw the handwriting. It was her Dad's. "I gather you're a postal owl," she said. She wondered how the letter got sent; she was certain that her Dad didn't own an owl and even more certain that he wouldn't send it across the Atlantic. The Owl looked at her, chirped, then raised its left leg.
Daria was not in the habit of carrying spare change in her pocket and had to borrow some knuts from Violet to pay for postage.
After paying the owl, Daria watched the bird take off, opened her note, and began to read it
"Hi, Kiddo!"
"I want you to know that your Mom and I made it back to Highland alive and well. We both had a great time and we're both sorry that your Mom wasn't able to join us before you had to leave for school.
"It's still hot out here. I can't wait until the temperatures drop below the nineties.
"It's not the same around here without you. Both of your sisters miss you. Ronnie asks when you're coming back and I have to keep reminding her that you won't be back until June.
"I haven't run into too many of your school mates, but Mona Abrams, the girl from Temple, says hello."
"I hope you're doing well and making friends and learning lots of new things.
"Love,
Your Dad."
Daria's eyes teared as she finished reading her Dad's note.
There were two other pages. One was a short note from Quinn telling her that she was all right and hoping that she was enjoying school. It struck Daria as a little too pro-forma.
The other was from Ronnie. It was in Quinn's handwriting: Ronnie had yet to learn to write. Ronnie said that she missed her terribly and looked forward to her coming home.
"So who wrote you, Daria?" asked Anahita.
"My Dad and my sisters," said Daria. "I suspect that there's a letter from Mom somewhere in the pipeline."
"Are they Muggles?" asked Anahita. Anahita came from a magical family.
"My Dad and my sisters are," Daria replied. "My Mom's what they call a Wild Squib in the US. If she'd had a bit more, I suspect my grandfather and grandfather might have sent her to Ilvermorny."
"What's a Wild Squib?" asked Anahita. "I never heard that term before."
"A Wild Squib is a much like a Squib from wizarding families, except they both had Muggle parents."
"Did your family ever have any wizards or witches?" asked Anahita.
"Well," said Daria, glancing over at the Slytherin table and her distant Barksdale cousins, "it certainly looks that way, although I think they'd sooner die than admit it." Anahita and the Banks sisters grinned in response.
The girls returned to their dorm rooms after breakfast. Daria decided that she'd play catch up for her Charms reading and pulled out some notebook paper and a couple of her ballpoint pens. Young Hogwarts witches and wizards were expected to take notes using quills and parchment in class and in study hall, but this year's Prefects were more relaxed about writing materials—at least if it was used for note-taking within Ravenclaw Tower. She cracked open her textbook and began reading and taking notes. Her reading went more slowly than it would have back in Highland—there were a lot of unfamiliar terms and new concepts and Daria was still unsure as to how it all got put together.
There's got to be a better way to organize my information, she told herself. She remembered her Mom talking about her college days and file cards. She'd have to ask about that either over the Christmas holidays or when she returned home to Highland for summer vacation.
She plugged away for an hour and a half on charms theory. She then took a break, leaving her chair and stretching, careful not to jostle a Third Year who was deep into what looked like a Seventeenth Century work on Transfiguration. She thought there'd be a lot of Saturday morning slackers, but there weren't; the commons room was about a quarter full.
She returned to her reading and took more notes. Reaching the end of her assigned reading, she closed her textbook and straightened her notes. She pulled out her pocket watch to check the time. She'd had the surface so that the back of the watch showed its current ownership, but to Mundie eyes it still looked like it was still engraved with Robert MacDonald's name on it. There was a Robert MacDonald in her year, a Ravenclaw like her: he was engrossed in his own homework.
She descended the stairs to her dorm room, shelved her Charms book, opened her bureau, and placed her notes inside. She knew she'd be reviewing them for her end-of-term and end-of-year exams, then wondered if she'd need them again for her OWLS and NEWTs. She suspected that she would, even though both tests were literally years away.
She picked up her Transfiguration textbook and started reading. She got so engrossed in her reading that she jumped when Violet knocked on the corner of her four-poster bed.
"Daria, we need to get ready to go if we want to go on that picnic," she said.
"Oh," said Daria, blushing. She'd lost track of the time again. She put aside her Transfiguration text for later and picked up her copy of A History of Magic. "All right, then."
Anahita came in, dropped off her notes ((Neatly written on parchment), and picked up her picnic reading. Together, all three girls ascended the stairs to wait for Violet. Violet emerged a few minutes later with an old-fashioned picnic basket with a corner of a blanket sticking out of it.
A stop by the Great Hall, the house elves laying out supplies that Violet and Dahlia packed into their basket, and the girls were ready for their picnic. They left through a side door, following the steps down to a side path leading to the shores of the long lake. Daria saw that hey weren't the only students who'd decided to enjoy the lingering warmth. There were a couple of other groups of picnickers enjoying the vista and the afternoon sun, as well as lone wolves sitting and lying down and either sunning, reading, or in couple of cases sketching.
Violet found a spot about fifty feet from the water's edge and set down her basket. "This looks good," she announced. They didn't break out their meal immediately. The girls had come to a quiet consensus that this was a "working" picnic, and the first part was spent reading and quietly talking, usually about school work. It might almost have been a Mundie afternoon save for one major difference: Daria could see that several students had taken out their brooms and were either flying over the school grounds or out over the lake.
Daria dove into her copy of A History of Magic and began to catch up on her reading.
A boy walked along the edge of the lake with a gear bag, then set it down. She paid him no mind until Dahlia spoke up and said "What is that boy doing?" Daria looked over at the edge of the lake and realized that it was Cuthbert. He must have been sprung from St. Mungo's, she thought happily. She watched as Cuthbert reached into his bag and pulled out a mask and snorkel, then started peel out of his school clothes, revealing loud tropical-print swim trunks.
"I think we're about to see Cuthbert Fink-Nottle in his element," Daria.
"So what is he doing?" said Violet.
"I think he's about to start looking at fish," said Daria. "Cuthbert's a hard-core ichthyologist."
"A what?" said Anahita.
"Something like a bird-watcher, except that Cuthbert's into fish instead of birds," said Daria.
Cuthbert reached into his gear bag and pulled out a small sack. He put his hand into it and threw the contents out into the water.
Chumming the fish, thought Daria.
"Cuthbert Fink-Nottle," said Dahlia. "That's the boy you went to school with in Texas, isn't it?"
"The very same," Daria replied.
"So what is he doing now?" said Violet.
"I think he's chumming the fish," said Daria.
"Ah," said Violet.
Violet must know a little bit about fishing, thought Daria. She began to rise to her feet. "Excuse me," she said. She walked to the just off the water's edge but held off saying anything. She knew that sound traveled as well in the water as in the air and didn't want to scare away Cuthbert's fish. She watched in amusement as Cuthbert studied the fish he'd chummed.
Curious, she got up and walked over to get a better look. Cuthbert looked up and Daria could see the big grin he was wearing.
"Oh, hello, Daria," he said.
"Find anything?" she said.
"Brown trout, some smelt," said Cuthbert. "No eels or salmon. Not this time anyway." He looked a little disappointed.
Daria didn't know very much about marine life in fresh or salty Scottish waters. "Keep looking," she said.
An older boy walked down to where Daria and Cuthbert were talking.
"Fishing, are you?" he said.
"I'm not fishing, I'm observing," Cuthbert replied.
"Well, you might want to talk to Hagrid or Professor Kettleburn before you put a hook and line into the Dark Lake," said the older boy. "You don't want to catch a mermaid or the Giant Squid." He laughed at his own wit.
Both Daria and Cuthbert rewarded him with scowls.
"Is he serious about the mermaids?" Cuthbert asked Daria in a low voice.
"He might be," said Daria. "I have heard about the Giant Squid from other sources."
"Really?" said Cuthbert. He looked thoughtful. "So who is Professor Kettleburn?" he asked.
"He's the Professor who teaches the Care of Magical Creatures class," said Daria.
-(((O-O)))—
Cuthbert didn't let the older boy's warning deter him from giving up his observations. Instead her turned around to see what he could see. Ahahita and the Banks sisters shared Daria's amusement as Cuthbert snorkeled around the shoreline. Eventually, though, he gave up and then stepped out of the water to slipped away to find someplace discreet to take off his swim trunks and put his uniform back on. By that point, Daria and her friends had put aside their books and were eating lunch al fresco.
Later, after dinner in the Great Hall, they retired to their Tower. Dahlia pulled out a deck of cards and said "Is anyone up for cards? I'd love to play Exploding Snap."