Disclaimer 1: Draco, his parents and teachers all belong to JKR. (As if you didn't all know that.)

Disclaimer 2: Severus Snape owning a raven belongs to J.L. Matthews. (Go read her story everybody. It's great.)

Disclaimer 3: The gang name Sharks is borrowed from the musical West Side Story of course. I don't remember where I found the name Rakers, but I know I read it somewhere.

Disclaimer 4: The idea for Snape having a family comes from Al's fic Time of Trial.

Disclaimer 5: The Glizzard family and Gringolf Glizzard belong to my friend PegaPony and so do all of Gringolf's songs. Thanks for letting me borrow them!

Disclaimer 6: My friend Edmund owns himself and his horse Apollo.

Disclaimer 7: Old Joe and Tess' Joe belong to Zebee.

Disclaimer 8: The looks of the five Slytherin girls are taken mostly from a drawing by Iremione.

Disclaimer 9: I first encountered the Ravenslyth-terminology on the Slytherin Rising e-group. I don't remember who invented it, but it's not mine.

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A/N: This is a longer one for once, but we're nearing the end of this fic. (14 chapters after it should have been over . . . I'm about as well suited to teach Divination as Trelawney, I suppose.)

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Chapter 17: Colleen's Troubles

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The Riddles club was held at Hogwarts, though in a part of the castle the Slytherin first years hadn't yet been to. It was a good thing Pank had thought to ask Professor Snape for directions.

To their surprise he and Rupert found their classmates all staring at sheets of parchment on their desks and the teacher that Gangolf liked so much sitting at the teacher's desk smiling cryptically.

"Good evening, Professor." Pank greeted him, but the teacher completely ignored him!

"We think we have to figure out these before he'll talk to us." a Ravenclaw girl explained to them holding up her parchment. "They seem empty at first glance, but if you tap your wand at one and state your name a riddle shows up, but you're the only one who can see it and you can only open one."

Pank accordingly pulled out his wand, pointed it at the next parchment and stated "Pank.". Nothing happened.

"I think she meant your whole name." Rupert remarked. "Rupert Lennox."

And indeed it seemed like he saw something on his parchment now.

"Pakratius Anterhill." Pank tried again thinking that he sounded silly, but indeed something showed up on the parchment.

It was a strange little puzzle with numbers that looked easy at first, but turned out to be rather frustrating once you had filled in most of the numbers and the last ones wouldn't fit.

"Ha, I've got it!" a girl somewhere in the back yelled in triumph. "It's changing! . . . H? Whatever does h mean?"

But meanwhile an even bigger problem had come up. The West Hogsmeade group contained three Squibs who didn't even have wands. How were they supposed to unlock their riddles?

A Hufflepuff third year offered to open them for them, but when she pointed her wand at the parchment and said the first Squib's name nothing happened.

"We've tried using somebody else's name before." a boy offered. "It doesn't work. You have to do it yourself."

"But Squibs can't use a wand." the Hufflepuff reminded him. "They won't be able to activate the spell."

"I'm Jesse Bennet." one of the Squibs declared pressing his hand onto one of the parchments. "There it is! It doesn't need a wand."

"But that's impossible." the Hufflepuff protested.

"No it isn't." a Ravenclaw informed her in a slightly superior tone. "The spell must already have been active. It was just waiting for the right words."

"But then why didn't it react when I said them?" the Hufflepuff challenged.

"Maybe because it wasn't true." Jesse Bennet suggested. "Maybe it has an inbuilt lie detecting charm."

"How would you know anything about charms?" sneered a second year whose name Pank didn't know.

"From Magical Theory, of course." Jesse stuck his tongue out at him. "I bet I know the names and functions of more charms than you can perform."

"Pah, a filthy little squib like you!" the second year snorted.

"Watch it." Jesse threatened. "I also bet I'm stronger than you and Ally is definitely bigger."

The second year and the Ravenclaw glared at Jesse. Three more West Hogsmeade students stepped closer to their friend and glared back.

Pank didn't like those odds. He cast a hopeful glance towards the Professor, but the wizard was still sitting in his chair ignoring them entirely. Maybe he wasn't even their teacher?

"Stop it." he told the arguing students. "You're not supposed to act like that in class. Get back to your work."

"And who're you to boss us around?" the tallest West Hogsmeade student, most likely Ally Pank assumed, demanded.

"Yeah, little first years shouldn't get cheeky with their elders." the second year added and suddenly everybody was glaring at Pank.

"He only meant to say that it doesn't really matter how the spell works, but that we should get back to solving our riddle." Rupert stepped in. "Who knows this might be a test to see whether we're really fit for this class. Those who don't solve their puzzle might get kicked out."

A moment of silence followed that announcement and then the class hastily returned to their parchments. Rupert smirked and went back to work as well.

"Do you really think that?" Pank had gone a little pale.

"Of course not." Rupert whispered. "But it worked, didn't it?"

"Worked?" Pank asked.

"It got them to leave you alone and continue working." Rupert pointed out.

"Ah, I think I've got it." he said moments later. "Five, three and one . . . and . . . m."

"M?" Pank asked.

"Yes, m." Rupert confirmed. "What's your result?"

"Haven't got one, yet." Pank admitted.

"Oh well, hurry up then." Rupert urged. "I want to know what it all means."

Several students had their results by now and were running around comparing letters. If Pank didn't want to be last he had to hurry.

"A" he heard a girl's voice say. "What do you have, Jesse?"

"N." Jesse reported. "Hey, is your letter bigger than mine?"

"I don't think so." the girl said. "Look, if you put them next to each other . . ."

A hissing sound interrupted her and Pank jumped.

"What happened?" somebody asked.

"Our parchments fused together." Jesse said wonderingly. "It says an now."

"An?" someone else said. "Whatever does an mean?"

"What did you do?" the Ravenclaw demanded.

"Just hold them together." the girl said grabbing Ally's parchment. "Like this, see?"

But this time nothing happened when she held the parchment up to the fused one.

"Maybe they go in a particular order." another Ravenclaw suggested. "Try mine."

It took several attempts, but then an i fused to the an. "Ian?"

"That can't be all." the Hufflepuff girl declared. "Everybody, hold your parchments together."

Soon there were several more hisses and Rupert beamed triumphantly when his m fused with the second Ravenclaw's a. After a while no more hisses would come, though and there were still several pieces of parchment, some longer than others.

"Who's still working on their riddles?" the first Ravenclaw demanded.

Pank and two others raised their hands.

"Well, hurry up!"

And finally, with a lot of help from Rupert, Pank managed to put all the numbers in correctly and the puzzle dissolved and formed into an r.

"Finally!" Rupert's Ravenclaw partner exclaimed. "Try it! Quickly!"

But the r didn't want to stick to the am, neither in front nor at the end. It didn't like the Hufflepuff's i either, nor what had meanwhile turned into lian.

It finally attached itself to a ha and then a ker turning the whole thing into harker.

Another student's u, stuck to a j and the last one, an f, picked a left over pro.

"Wait a minute!" Pank exclaimed. "Ju and lian? Julian!" Wasn't that what Professor Hooch had called the teacher at the desk?

And indeed the two fragments fused into Julian, but then nothing worked anymore. Even though they tried all the ends, they wouldn't stick together.

"Maybe it's just words." Jesse finally suggested. "And the i doesn't fuse with anything, because it is already a whole word."

"But what kind of word is Harker?" somebody asked.

Jesse smirked at them. "I" he said pointing at the Hufflepuff. "Am." Rupert and the Ravenclaw. "Prof Julian Harker."

For a moment Pank just gaped at him. Of course! Why that cheeky little Squib!

"Good evening, Professor Harker?" the Hufflepuff said experimentally.

"Good evening, Ms. Ronaldson." the teacher returned smiling widely.

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Gangolf was sitting in the great hall watching a heated game of exploding snap. Aterus had even invited him to join in, but Gangolf had wisely declined. That game was dangerous!

As if to prove his point another explosion went off almost singeing Jon's eyebrows.

"Boom!" Jorge laughed. "You lose."

"Big boom." Jon confirmed laughing as well. "Your turn, Danny."

Gangolf definitely couldn't understand how he could still laugh after such a close call.

"Gangolf?" Barbara stood behind him all of a sudden. "Could I perhaps . . . sit with you guys for a while? Just to watch?"

"Sure." Gangolf beamed. He really enjoyed talking to Barbara. She was the only one who never ignored him or scared him. "Come here."

He pulled out a chair for her and she sat down gladly.

"Are the Gryffindors giving you trouble again?" Mel asked in an almost motherly tone while the Slytherins at the table frowned at her.

"Oh no," Barbara said hurriedly. "They just . . ."

"They're still ignoring you, aren't they." Cam guessed. "Don't deny it. I can see how you're always sitting by yourself. They never reserve you a chair with your own year."

"I'm just not very close with them." Barbara claimed. "I don't really care much for Quidditch, you know and it seems that's all they ever talk about. Gangolf and I simply share more of our interests, so we have more to talk about."

"Sure." It was clear that Cam didn't believe her.

"Gangolf not share interest with Slytherins." Jorge observed. "But Slytherins always reserve chair. Gryffindors not nice to Barbara."

Jon nodded in confirmation. "We see how they treat you, Barbara, and we want to help, but you have to let us."

"We've tried talking to your classmates." Mel added. "But I don't think they got our point. I'm sure they don't mean to be so thoughtless, but they're so superficial. They just don't see how much they're hurting you."

"We can't change what housemates you have." Cam continued pushing aside her cards. "But we can be your friends, too, if you want us. Gangolf doesn't have to be your only friend."

"They don't like Slytherins much." Barbara sighed. "I don't understand why they're so prejudiced."

"Your parents weren't in Gryffindor, were they?" Cam asked.

"No . . . yes." Barbara stuttered. "Well . . . You see, the sorting hat said they were Gryffindors, but it must have meant my real parents."

"Your real parents?" Gangolf asked confused. "You mean you have false parents, too?"

"No, of course not." Barbara shook her head. "Of course they're all real parents. It's just that I have two sets and it gets a little confusing sometimes. I'm adopted, you see."

"So your birth parents were Gryffindors and your adoptive parents weren't?" Mel tried to help her out when Barbara just stared at the table looking miserable. "And they're the ones who raised you?"

Barbara nodded.

"Have your first parents been dead long?" Danny asked sounding almost kind for once.

Barbara shook her head and a small sob escaped her. Gangolf gently took one of her clenched hands into his.

"They're not dead." Barbara forced out. "They . . . well, maybe my father is."

"Maybe?" Gangolf asked. "You mean, they didn't even tell you?"

"My parents don't know either." Barbara explained. "All they were told is that my mother was only sixteen when I was born and too young to keep me. So her parents took me to the ministry's adoption agency and my parents were on top of the waiting list for new babies, so they owled them and my Mum apparated right over and took me home to Dad the same day I was born."

"Oh, that's a wonderful tale!" Mel exclaimed to Gangolf's surprise.

"Wonderful?" he asked. "What's so wonderful about not knowing who your parents are?"

"But Barbara does know who her parents are." Mel insisted. "Don't you see. Her real parents are of course the people who wanted her so much they were willing to drop everything on a moment's notice to get her as fast as possible. Did you know that it takes years to get to the top of that list? Wizarding babies aren't adopted out that often and usually there's already somebody else there who's related to the birth parents, or knows them, or simply buys their way to the top. Just imagine how happy your parents must have been when they could finally hold their daughter for the first time. I mean, biological parents wait nine months for their baby, adoptive parents sometimes have to wait nine years."

"Yes, and anyway, if they've raised you from the very first day, that's about as real as parents can get." added Cam.

"Draco was fifteen when our parents adopted him." Billy commented casually without looking up from the cards. "And Mum and Dad are still his real parents. What else would they be?"

"Your brother's adopted?" Danny gaped at him.

"Yes." Billy said as if it were the most normal thing in the world. "Why not? Lots of people are. Draco's official, though, just like Barbara. With adoption papers and everything. That's why he's even got our name. Most adopted people I know, just live with their parents and have the name of their first parents, or parent. Those are unofficial, then. They just moved into a new family someday and even then, that's still their real family."

"How can it be real, if they don't even have their name?" Barbara asked no longer sobbing.

"Well, it's where they live, isn't it? They go home to their family every day, their family feeds and clothes them, their parents tuck them in at night and hold them when they cry. Real parents are the people who love you and care for you, not names on a piece of paper."

"That's wise." Jon commented. "Who taught you that?"

Billy shrugged. "Oh, everybody says so. Haven't you ever heard it?"

"Must be another West Hogsmeade thing." Danny decided. "Billy grew up there." she explained to Barbara. "They're like a completely different culture sometimes. Like Tullia's Merpeople."

"Barbara play with us?" Jorge suggested.

"Careful." Gangolf warned his friend. "Don't get burned."

Barbara smiled at him. "Thank you, Jorge, but I think I'd rather just watch and chat with Gangolf."

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And then finally, one morning four weeks into the school year Colleen's owl swooped into the great hall with a letter tied to her leg.

"Shadowlady!" Colleen exclaimed happily. "Oh, good girl. Here, have some ham."

"Shadowlady?" Pank asked eyeing the owl critically. "She doesn't look much like a Shadowlady."

"Well, I was only nine when I got her." Colleen shrugged. "She seemed like a Shadowlady to me then and she likes the name."

She untied the ribbon carefully and then spread the parchment out before her to read in the dignified manner of a proper lady. Still the smile on her face soon faltered and she sat staring at the paper.

"Colleen?" Dinah asked when it became clear that she wasn't really reading anymore. "Colleen? Is something wrong?"

Colleen finally looked up, face pale and eyes wide. "My brother." she whispered. "Phelippe's really sick. His heart. . . . I . . . I knew he wasn't eating well when I left, but I never thought it'd be anything serious. I . . . I never even thought about it after I arrived."

"Well, of course you didn't." Dinah tried to console her. "Just because he didn't have much of an appetite. Little children get sick all the time and it's cold season. Who'd expect anything worse when the child's still happily playing and talking and not complaining of any pain?"

"Don't worry, Colleen." Anny said. "I'm sure with all those wonderful potions wizard doctors have Phelippe will be fine soon."

"We can tell my Dad." Billy suggested. "And ask him to send our raven home to my Mum. She's been brewing medical potions for years. I'm sure she knows just the right one."

"Don't you think they have medical potions at St. Mungo's?" Colleen yelled tears shining in her eyes. "If there were a potion to cure Phelippe, don't you think they'd have given him that long ago?"

She jumped up and ran from the hall and even though both the girls and Professor Snape ran after her right away, she had already disappeared. When Anny and Dinah didn't find her in the dorm either Pank decided to organise a search that even included Danny.

Surprisingly Gangolf didn't hesitate to offer his help, though all he managed to do was get lost and wind up in the kitchens where Mr. Filch found him. Luckily Filch had already heard about the search from Dinah and though he couldn't be convinced of Gangolf's bad sense of orientation, he allowed that it wasn't completely impossible that Colleen might have been hiding in the kitchens.

He then ordered the Slytherins to abandon their search as it was almost time for their first class of the day and even promised to inform the house elves that a distraught student was wandering the castle. He couldn't condone any house elves abandoning their assigned duties in order to search for Colleen, but would permit them to take the time to either lead her to a teacher, or alert him, should they happen to see her.

"The elves will be cleaning all over the castle, so sooner or later she will run into one of them." he assured Dinah. "And I promise I'll take her to the headmaster right away."

"The headmaster!" Pank gasped. "Oh, but we don't want her to get into trouble."

"Please Mr. Filch," Dinah begged. "If Colleen is skipping class, it's only because she's so worried about her sick brother. I'm sure in her state she simply isn't thinking about the time."

Filch sighed. "I'll take her to the headmaster, because he doesn't have a class to teach and can give her permission to skip a day of school, if she needs it. Professor Dumbledore really has a very soft heart and is much better at consoling children than I am. Now hurry off, before I have to take points off you for being in the corridors during class time.

Professor Binns was in a particularly distracted state that day, so he never noticed he was missing a student, though that probably had something to do with Tullia having the presence of mind to call 'here' when the ghost asked for "Naither, Calliope."

"Well, Calliope does have a double l just like Tullia." she defended herself when Danny shot her an angry glare. "He could have meant me."

Colleen finally reappeared during lunch when Professor Snape lead her into the great hall. Rumour had it that over at the Gryffindor table the fifth years were celebrating the unprecedented occasion of being let out of Potions class over an hour early and with minimal extra homework.

"He promised to owl my parents and arrange for me to visit Phelippe in St. Mungo's on a Sunday." Colleen reported in a soft, still very subdued voice. "That way I can see him and wish him well without missing any classes. Just in case he doesn't feel up to reading a long owl, you know."

"Of course." Dinah nodded at her. "At his age reading's still hard work and he'll probably be bored at the hospital. He'll be very happy to have a chance to talk to you."

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The next morning finally brought the long awaited official schedule for Gymnastics junior. It was once again to take place on Fridays one hour before dinner, but had been moved to a hastily adapted Hogwarts classroom.

"With a few more changes over the summer we might even be able to turn it into a fully functional gym." Dumbledore announced happily. "Which will help with the rather difficult scheduling of Sports classes."

Danny was a little disappointed once she saw the room, though. It contained only the most essential equipment and the stone floor had been covered with old rugs to protect the students from injuries should they fall.

"There are fixing charms on the rugs, so they won't slip away under your feet." Mara assured her class, but still the ground was uneven wherever two rugs overlapped and more than one student tripped while concentrating on a difficult exercise that didn't allow them the time to watch their step.

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On Saturday Barbara wordlessly slipped into Gangolf's empty chair at breakfast sporting a black eye and a torn sleeve.

"Gangolf said, I can sit with you, if I can't sit with my house." she explained when she noticed the hostile glares directed at her. "And Professor McGonagall said to avoid my housemates today."

"Gangolf isn't here today, though." Danny returned coldly.

"He often skips breakfast." Billy added a little more kindly.

"You shouldn't sit here." Pank decided. "This is for Slytherins."

"What happened to you?" Dinah asked her Hufflepuff upbringing showing through once again. "Your robe's ruined."

Barbara glanced at her sleeve. "Oh, that's not as bad as it looks. My mother taught me a great sewing charm, but it takes time and my other robe's in the laundry right now, so I can't change. I'll repair it in the evening."

"And what happened to your eye?" Aterus asked.

"Oh, is there a bruise?" Barbara's hand shot to her eye and she winced at the contact. "It's nothing really, I just got into a fight with an older housemate. You know, the kind of things that happen all the time."

The Slytherins exchanged surprised looks.

"You mean that Gryffindors beat up younger girls all the time?" Colleen asked incredulously. "Don't they have any manners?"

"Caligula's taken a few punches at Gangolf as well." Billy reminded her.

"Gangolf's a boy." Colleen pointed out. "Boys get into fights sometimes."

"Caligula's very hot tempered." Danny commented. "And Gangolf has a talent for saying the wrong things. Caligula's friends always stop him after the first punch, though. That," she nodded at Barbara. "Looks like more than one punch."

"It was just one of the second years." Barbara explained. "They approached me when I came down to the common room this morning and asked me to stop talking to Gangolf. I told them no, Gangolf's my friend and Steve got angry and started shaking me. He didn't even hit me in the face. The bruise is just because I hit the back of a chair when I fell and Steve tried to pull me back away from the chair by my sleeve, but the cloth wasn't strong enough and ripped."

"They hit you, just because you're friends with Gangolf?" Anny couldn't believe it.

Barbara winced again. "It's not like that. They're just worried about me." she defended her housemates. "And emotions have been building up for a while over it. You see, some of the older students keep saying that Slytherins are evil and practise the dark arts and a lot of the younger students look up to them and believe everything they say. So they keep telling me that Gangolf must be evil, because he's a Slytherin and I keep telling them that I know Gangolf and he wouldn't harm a fly. At first they said Gangolf was deceiving me. Someone even suggested that he has me under imperius, but the older students said eleven year olds aren't strong enough for that, so most of the higher years leave me alone now. After that I thought everything was okay, but then Laura started calling me a traitor and suddenly there were accusations that I was spying on them and telling their secrets to you." she shrugged. "Seems like some of them think they have secrets that would actually interest you."

"And you think it's wise of you to sit here of all places?" Danny sneered.

"Look." said Pank. "We don't like Gryffindors any more than they like us. We're not at all happy with Gangolf's friendship with you either and we most certainly don't want a Gryffindor at our table."

"We're not common brutes, like you Gryffindors, though." Colleen threw in. "So we won't harm either you or Gangolf."

"But," Pank continued. "We do not want you at our table and suggest that you leave."

"I'm sure the Hufflepuffs will be able to make room for you and it'll look better to the Gryffindors when they see you there." Dinah looked rather uncomfortable. "Huflepuff is neutral territory and they've offered you friendship before. It's not like you're intruding uninvited."

Barbara nodded mutely and trudged over to the Hufflepuff table where she was immediately placed between Cam and Mel and introduced to at least a half dozen older students.

"I can't believe that the Gryffindors ganged up on one of their own like that." Tullia said. "No other house would ever do that."

"It's been known to happen." Billy contradicted her. "Back when Dad was still a student it was quite common in Slytherin, especially when a student was muggle born or from a Gryffindor family. And a few years ago there was a teachers' meeting about a case in Ravenclaw. A girl had been caught doing something really bad, Dad wouldn't tell me what, and lost Ravenclaw a hundred points. The Ravenclaw prefects held some sort of trial against her for losing points and sentenced her to a punch for each point. She had to be taken to the hospital wing afterwards."

Dinah and Aterus stared at him in horror.

"Do you know what happened to the prefects?" Pank asked.

"Well, Dad wanted them to be expelled, but Professor Flitwick confirmed that a punch for each lost point was an old Ravenclaw tradition and the prefects simply had been irresponsible to execute such a large punishment all in one go. So in the end they only lost their badges and the trials and punishments were officially forbidden."

Anny shuddered. "And they call us evil?"

"That's the Gryffindors, not the Ravenclaws." Tullia pointed out.

"They probably didn't realise that so many punches would hurt the girl so badly." Rupert said. "A lot of children don't know what they're really doing to someone when they hit them."

"Those were prefects, not little children." Anny pointed out. "They had to be at least fifteen."

"But they're all out of school by now anyway." Colleen shrugged it off. "There's nothing like that happening at Hogwarts anymore."

"Are you sure of that?" Danny smirked at her. "Who knows what's going on in Ravenclaw behind the teachers' backs? Or what might be happening in Hufflepuff . . . or Gryffindor." She nodded towards the Hufflepuff table where a seventh year was examining Barbara's black eye. "She thinks it's normal to be ambushed by a bunch of older students. I wonder what else Gryffindors consider normal."

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When Billy came back after Chemistry class that same day he found Aterus had gone to the library with Colleen of all people.

"They were going to look something up for Aterus' History essay." Dinah told him with a wink.

"I thought he already knew what he was going to write." Billy stated a little surprised. "And why Colleen?"

"Because she knows Anny and I already finished it, you weren't here and Danny and Tullia wouldn't ask her." Dinah said as if that answered everything.

"Your father was hoping that she could visit her brother on the weekend, but her family still hasn't owled him back." Anny explained. "So we've been trying to keep her distracted. On Monday we got Cam to invite her to a French study session, yesterday she had French. Today she's studying with Aterus, tomorrow's her Choir club and on Friday I think there's a Quidditch practise she might like to watch with me."

Aterus and Colleen seemed to hit it off right away. They returned to the common room hours later chatting and laughing. Billy supposed that they had similar backgrounds despite the doubtful ideology of the Nocturnes. Both had rich families and lived in large manor houses without getting out much. Maybe Aterus could understand Colleen even better than Anny and Dinah.

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Time seemed to fly over the next weeks.

Pank was a little more cautious about what he said to his classmates after Rupert had had to rescue him in Riddles class and found that he got on much better with a lot of people. In fact, once you got used to him Jesse Bennet was actually an alright guy and one of the cleverest people Pank had ever met. The little squib and Rupert were among the top students in Riddles class and soon fell into the habit of working together on their assignments, which left Pank feeling a little left out at times. Try as he may he usually was one of the last students to finish his riddle which meant that the others didn't particularly like working with him.

Jesse accepted him along with Rupert whenever they were working in bigger groups, but when they had to work in pairs Pank usually ended up with the oldest Hufflepuff, a nice girl who was friends with Elton and willing to 'baby-sit' the first year. Unfortunately as a fourth year she usually had harder riddles to solve and Pank rarely could offer her much help.

He soon found that he liked the Soccer club much better. Though most of his fellow players were better with the ball Pit announced him reserve captain of the reserve team which meant that he could expect to become captain next year and had a good chance at making captain of the first team someday.

"You're a good leader." Pit explained when Pank pointed out his less than perfect record. "The others might be better individual players, but they don't pay enough attention to their team mates. Your ball work will improve with practise. Don't forget that most of the others had a head start."

That was right, of course, and to everybody's surprise Pank also discovered that he had another unexpected talent. He was the top student in their Herbology class, even better than Hermy whose mother had practically raised her in the glass house. Pank had no idea why, but he loved gardening and the plants flourished under his care. It seemed almost like he only had to touch a sickly plant to make it look healthier.

Charms on the other hand became his least favourite subject. For some reason he never got his swishs and flicks quite right and despite Professor Flitwick's almost infinite patience Pank's charms remained average at best.

"Don't worry about it." the teacher consoled him when Pank approached him with an apology for his weak performance after class one day. "You might not be a particular talent at Charms, but you can't expect to be perfect at everything. If my class is your worst subject, you should count yourself lucky. I have had much worse students. You're in no danger of failing and if you keep working as hard as you are, you never will be."

Still, his Charms talent was the one thing Pank envied Gangolf. Then again he wouldn't want to be Gangolf for anything in the world.

-

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Everyone could see that Gangolf was miserable. He was doing great in both Charms and Transfigurations, but had problems almost everywhere else. His worst subject was still Flying followed closely by Sports where the girls were teasing him mercilessly. Even the usually sweet Dinah declared him hopeless after he managed to fall over the ball during a handball game. Another class he got laughed at in was Latin, even though he wasn't the worst student there. It just seemed that he was always the one who came up with the most ridiculous mistakes.

Classes he really suffered in were Potions and Herbology. Both were full of disgusting things and in Herbology a lot of them were even still alive! On the other hand maybe Potions was worse. There he had to touch dead things and ran the risk of getting hurt in an explosion.

Not that he'd actually been hurt in Potions so far, but Professor Snape had prevented it just in the nick of time on two occasions and even without that he'd been forced to pay five more visits to the hospital wing by the time the Christmas holidays finally rolled around. Three of those he owed to accidents in Flying class, one to Caligula Lestrange slapping him so hard that he bit his tongue, one to a nasty Gryffindor tripping him in class and the last one to falling off a ladder in Sports class.

Even in Ballet some of the girls made fun of his pink tights and when he visited Professor Harker in his office for some consolation after a particularly bad lesson, the kind teacher took the chance to inform him that Professor Hooch was looking into transferring him into the Hufflepuff Flying class in exchange for Cam Weasley.

"Your classmates are all very good flyers." Professor Harker explained. "And so is Cam. I've been told that her family has quite a tradition of excellent Quidditch players. So, Professor Hooch and I thought that maybe we could speed up the Slytherin class a little for those students that are already getting bored with the simple exercises and collect all the weaker flyers in one class that will be moving more slowly."

"And that's the Hufflepuff class?" Gangolf asked.

"Actually it's going to be a mixed class with the weakest students from all the houses." the professor admitted. "We are switching out several students besides Cam. She's just the most talented and therefore the one we're putting in the top class."

When Gangolf returned to the common room with the bad news he found to his disappointment that most of his classmates were delighted to hear it.

"Cam's going to be part of our Flying class?" Colleen exclaimed. "That's wonderful. My favourite Hufflepuff friend!"

"Finally!" Danny joined in. "I was getting so bored with the beginners' exercises."

"Yes, we're the best!" Pank triumphed.

"Finally no more waiting for Gangolf." Anny sighed gratefully.

Only Tullia shared his worries, though what bothered her most was that she hadn't been asked to switch classes as well.

"You're not bad at Flying at all." Danny pointed out to her. "You'd be bored in a class on Gangolf's level."

"I wish they'd put me in an average class, though." Tullia sighed. "With Ravenclaw for example. I'm fine with the current speed of the class."

At least Barbara understood Gangolf and she was even considered for the same Flying class as well. In fact, Barbara was the one good thing he had at Hogwarts.

But even that didn't last. Again and again Barbara showed up with small injuries or confided in Gangolf that the other Gryffindors were teasing her, calling her names or playing pranks on her and she sat with Hufflepuff during most meals now.

Gangolf too had to suffer some pranks from his classmates as well as the Gryffindors. His dormmates limited themselves to occasionally hiding his beauty potions or items of clothing in unusual places, but according to his mother this was to be considered playful and he was expected to laugh along with them, so Gangolf tried hard not to feel insulted. They weren't truly malicious pranks at least and never caused him or his possessions actual damage.

It was harder when the older students played catch with his parchment case in the common room and he almost cried when the Gryffindors broke his flamingo feather quill, but all of that was nothing compared to the stories Barbara told him and he understood very well when she finally told him that she had decided to end their friendship.

"Please understand, Gangolf. I really like you and I'll miss talking and plying with you, but I just can't go on like this. I have to make amends with my house and that will never happen, if I continue to be friendly with Slytherins." she said with tears in her eyes.

Gangolf understood, yes, but he still ran to his secret bathroom hideout and cried for almost an hour. After that the out of the way bathroom became his retreat and he spent most of his spare time there. Once it was a little cleaned up it wasn't all that uncomfortable and the mirrors there were quite good for practising ballet.

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Dinah on the other hand was perfectly happy. Charms was her best subject as well and she learned some charms even faster than Gangolf. She also loved Potions and the only subject she had a hard time in was History of Magic, which simply bored her out of her mind. Luckily Binns hardly ever asked questions during class and Anny had no qualms about letting her copy answers during tests.

Herbology still bored her as well, but Professor Sprout was more focused on teamwork than theoretical knowledge and Dinah was happy to work with anyone in that class. Most of them she considered her close friends after all.

Her Slytherin side was kept happy by her good grades and her Hufflepuff side by the many friends she'd made. Besides all the first year Slytherins and most of the Hufflepuffs that included two Ravenclaws, a few older Slytherins and Hufflepuffs as well as Mr. Filch and the house elf assigned to cleaning her dorm.

She wasn't overly great at Gymnastics, but it provided a nice balance for all the studying they did in most of the regular classes, was fun and gave her a chance to get to know Danny better, who usually spent all her time with Tullia giving the others few chances to get closer.

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Rupert was quite happy as well, though Riddles was the only class he really excelled at. He was average everywhere else, which meant that he didn't earn any special praise, but wasn't having problems in any of his classes either.

For the first time in his life he wasn't getting teased and could actually consider himself popular, though. He was the main confident of Pank who was the most popular Slytherin first year and also admired by many Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws. He was friends with Jon, the most popular Hufflepuff boy, and proud Jesse, who rarely bothered with Hogwarts students otherwise. People from almost all years and houses greeted him in the corridors and it seemed like his secret would never get out, because nobody here knew.

What more could a young wizard ask for? Hogwarts was great.

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Colleen too was feeling popular. Not that there were nearly as many people seeking her out as Rupert, Pank or Dinah, but she thought she could call Anny, Dinah and Tullia her friends by now, maybe Aterus as well. They definitely got along well and often compared their homework.

She wasn't sure about Billy, Rupert and Pank, but they didn't seem to dislike her anymore and she couldn't care less about Gangolf's opinion. Danny was annoying, because she had to share her dorm with her, though.

She was also doing well with the Hufflepuffs, in her opinion. Cam even spoke of her as a friend and Lauri occasionally stopped to talk to her as well. And then there was impish little Lucinda Iterton from Ravenclaw who liked to talk about Quidditch with her.

Granted, the last two probably counted as casual acquaintances rather than friends, but to Colleen that was quite a lot of social life.

Yes, her relationships with her fellow students were quite satisfactory to her and so were her results in most classes. She was even top of her History of Magic class and Latin was downright boring. Her flying could probably be better considering that most of her classmates had never flown before arriving at Hogwarts, but it wasn't any worse than most of the class'.

She was a little below average in Sports, but Gangolf's bad performance assured that nobody paid much attention to it and she was working hard on improving her running and jumping. Her family probably wouldn't mind if she were bad at that subject, but she considered it a challenge.

The really troublesome subjects were Herbology and Potions. Colleen really wanted to do well and went into each lesson with the very best intentions, but she still couldn't bring herself to dig in the dirt without gloves or to touch sliced snails or beetle eyes.

Professor Sprout said that her performance was okay and Professor Snape even commended her neatness and occasionally awarded her points for properly cleaning her worktable at the end of the lesson, but she knew her performance was below average and it rankled her.

She still didn't have her French book and Sports clothes and hadn't been able to visit Phelippe either. None of that was the school's fault, though. When Professor Snape hadn't gotten an answer to his owl he'd even gone to the headmaster and Professor Dumbledore had owled her father repeating the offer, but her parents had declined saying that they didn't need Colleen underfoot right now.

Professor Snape had then informed his wife of the situation and Mrs Snape had actually gone to St Mungo's herself where she knew one of the nurses. As she wasn't a relative or family friend she hadn't been allowed to see Phelippe, but the nurse had found out that there was a spell that could cure him. Unfortunately Phelippe was still too young to have it performed, though, but if he survived until he was thirteen he would be cured completely then.

"The thing that worries the healers most at the moment is how he got to be this sick." Sarah had told her.

She hadn't been able to come to Hogwarts to visit her, of course, but every Tuesday Colleen had to have dinner at West Hogsmeade and apparently a teacher's mother was welcome to eat there as well, as long as she paid for her food like everybody else.

Colleen gave the motherly witch a grateful smile across their shabby table. It was strange how much more comfortable this place seemed all of a sudden. Was that due to the company, or was her relief about finally getting news on her brother's condition influencing her perception?

"You see." Mrs Snape continued. "He was indeed born with a slightly weak heart, a trait that apparently runs in your mother's family, but it shouldn't have caused him to get this sick. A lot of your ancestors must have had it without even knowing and others only had to take a simple heart strengthening potion for it. Phelippe's heart however shows additional damage that he wasn't born with."

"You mean, he had some very frightening experience, or overexerted himself?" Colleen asked. She'd read up on heart problems a bit and all the books said that hard physical labour or fear caused heart attacks.

Mrs Snape shook her head. "According to the healers the damage is of magical origin and it can't have been Phelippe's own innate magic. That's not that unusual, you know. People with certain deficiencies have been known to react badly to certain types of spells or potions. If you have low blood pressure for example, floo travel can cause you to faint and lactose intolerant witches mustn't take most nausea potions. What's so unusual about Phelippe's condition is that the magical traces found in his body don't fit any type of magic the healers recognise. That means they can't tell what magic should be kept away from Phelippe to keep him safe."

"So they think, if they let him go home, it might happen again." Colleen realised. "But how can they not recognise the magic? They're supposed to be experts!"

"They are." Mrs Snape confirmed. "But despite a lot of experience they haven't seen that particular problem before. I know that it's frightening not to know what nearly killed your brother, Colleen, but the very fact that nobody recognises it also indicates that it's probably a very rare type of magic, so it's not very likely to happen again."

"They're still not letting him go home." Colleen pointed out.

"Because it's suspected that that's where he encountered that particular magic." Mrs Snape explained. "As long as it's unknown what exactly it was, there's a risk that it's still there. Once the healers find out what exactly it is, your home can be checked and any danger removed."

"And if Phelippe isn't exposed to that kind of magic again before he can be cured, he's safe?" Colleen smiled. Then everything would be fine. Phelippe would stay at St. Mungo's until the bad magic had been removed and then return to the mansion. If he was home schooled until he was finally thirteen and could be cured he never had to leave the house which could be kept free of the bad magic. He'd have to start Hogwarts late, but he'd be safe.

"Unfortunately no." Mrs Snape admitted. "Now that his heart has been damaged exertion or excitement can cause him to have attacks without any magical cause. He will have to take heart potions every day and avoid any wild games. That's not easy for a child, I know, but other people are born with such conditions and still live long and successful lives. For Phelippe it will only be a few years."

Colleen still felt worried about her brother when she went to her French class, but at least she now knew exactly what to worry about. There probably was no danger as long as he was at the hospital anyway. Yes, the healers would be there right away, if Phelippe had another heart attack and would restart his heart with a spell. Maybe it was for the best that he wasn't allowed to go home, yet.

French as always took her mind off her problems. It was a difficult subject, but one she truly enjoyed studying for it, so it wasn't a problem. She was doing well in the class and sharing a book with Cam was fun. All in all French, to Colleen, was the exact opposite of the Choir.

What was supposed to be a fun class became boring at best and embarrassing at worst thanks to Professor Trellawney. By Christmas the number of students present during Choir class had reduced by half, though Colleen didn't know of any who had actually quit. They simply found excuses not to show up instead.

The Hufflepuffs were the reason Colleen hadn't tried to quit herself. Lauri and Jorge kept talking her into participating 'for the community's sake' as they put it. Colleen herself saw it as a commitment she'd made for the year when she'd signed up.

"I'll pick another club instead next year, though." she told Lauri. "I'd like to try Art, or maybe Acting. Anny takes Acting, so we could go together."

"We'll miss you." Lauri returned. "But I have to admit that I've been considering taking Music or French instead as well. Maybe I'll quit, too."

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Contrary to Colleen Danny found her clubs to be pure joy. Especially Volleyball allowed her to whirl around ad jump to her heart's content and the sadness over the separation from Tullia was long forgotten. Her Volleyball group was a wild bunch that enjoyed rough games and tended to get out of hand, if their teacher took her eyes off them for a moment. Tullia might have felt that was a bit too much for her, but Danny was always at the very center of the action.

Gymnastics was a little quieter, because it often required precision and concentration, but it was still a chance to move about after a long boring day of classes. Bruises from tripping over the rugs, colliding with Sports equipment or being hit by a particularly hard Volleyball shot were just a natural side effect of the fun and usually ignored. They did serve to provide a little entertainment in Sports class, though, where Gangolf got to stare at her bare arms and legs and occasionally express his fear of classes that left such marks.

She'd been unable to entirely suppress her love for fighting, but did her best to limit herself to Colleen, the Gryffindors and a few select Ravenclaws. Especially Shannon proved to be a worthwhile opponent and the Gryffindors always deserved it. The fights with Colleen annoyed her other classmates a little, but Danny just couldn't resist.

Concentrating her fighting on one classmate spared her trouble with the others at least and Gangolf just wasn't an option. What was the fun in fighting with somebody who ran away to cry at the first insult? At least Colleen always made an effort to fight, even though she was clearly outmatched whenever it got physical. She had some skill with insults, too, especially veiled ones.

Danny considered herself top of Flying class, though Professor Hooch occasionally complained about her lack of fine control.

"You're going too fast." she'd say. "And then you just jerk your broom over, tumble through the turns, lose your balance and drift off course. If you fly a little more slowly, but exactly, you're just as fast in the end."

But hey, there was enough room in the sky, so what could go wrong? If she didn't quite manage to get through between two objects she could always go over, under or around.

The only thing that worried her a little was that she'd failed the year's first History of Magic test. She hadn't expected the questions to be that difficult and . . . well, her mind had drifted off halfway through answering them, so she'd handed it in with only a little over half of the questions answered and, as it turned out, some of those incorrectly at that, but then who cared about the names of goblin leaders? She'd only gotten one goblin mixed up with a minister of magic, after all and apparently Grindelwald hadn't been a minister either. Maybe he'd been another goblin.

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Anny, too, had become a daring flyer once she'd gotten the feel for her broom. She excelled in Sports class, though that was probably due to the unfair advantage of having had Sports in primary school already.

Her only problem was Astronomy. For some reason she seemed to be unable to concentrate on the lessons and practically sleepwalked to class every week. Apparently she wasn't made to work at night.

The Acting club problem on the other hand was solved shortly before the Christmas holidays in a lesson that actually started out rather badly.

They were trying on their costumes for the play for the first time and Anny had just slipped into the pair of diving fins that had been spelled green to look like frog's feet when the Gryffindors started up again. Wendy, who was playing the role of 'second frog' pushed her and she tripped over her fins and fell onto Alberta's frog's head. The weak paper at the back tore and Alberta stole Anny's still intact head instead. Anny tried to snatch it back, but Alberta wouldn't let go and somehow the mask ended up torn in half.

Nina Wantage started spouting bible quotes, or at least that's what Anny thought they were, about evil demons and snakes at her again and Wendy threw Anny's school robes out of the window.

That was all it took. The usually friendly Professor got so angry that she ordered everybody to return their costumes and push the desks back into the room. Wendy had to go get Anny's robes back, even though she didn't know her way around West Hogsmeade at all and claimed she wasn't even sure how to get outside.

The rest of the class was told to sit down and write their text from the play three times. Only Ken, a West Hogsmeade third year who played the little unicorn, was spared, because he had the most text.

Next the professor took a deep breath and told Anny to fetch the torn masks. With a little parchment from Anny's backpack and some glue from Ken she was able to fix Alberta's head. The attempt to do the same with Anny's head failed however. The mask would probably have held together again, but the scar was clearly visible and quite ugly.

"It's no use." the Professor decided. "We'll need to replace it. Just lucky it wasn't borrowed from anyone."

Anny nodded sadly. It had been a lot of hard work to make the masks and she doubted she could do as good a job without any assistance.

"I can try to make one at home during the holidays." she promised anyway.

"No, no, dear." the teacher shook her head. "That'll never work. I'll do it with my boyfriend."

Wendy returned at that moment and threw the snow soaked robes into Anny's face causing the teacher to yell some more before ordering her to cast a drying charm on the robes.

Of course Wendy didn't know that charm any more than Anny did, but Nina helped her out by 'unintentionally' setting fire to the cloth. Anny launched herself at Nina in response and the teacher had finally had enough and transferred Anny into the Romeo and Julia class.

Instead of a frog she played a servant now and didn't even have a speaking part, but at least her classmates were nicer and she'd been promised a bigger part in the next play. Salazar said that it was an honour to play Shakespeare and she should take the chance to learn from the older students.

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Aterus had no such problems in the Chess Club. Every week he got to play against and get to know a different member, though he still liked Jessica best and always spent the time before the class began talking with her.

He was still bored in Latin and was also beginning to dislike Sports. Not that the class wasn't fun, but somehow he seemed to always be on the losing team and to take longer than everybody else to learn a new exercise.

One day after another lost Basketball game Isran even yelled at him. "It's all your fault! If you'd at least tried to get the ball once we might have had a chance."

But Aterus had tried and even succeeded twice, but each time the ball had fallen onto his toes and rolled away when he'd tried to dribble it over to the other team's basket.

Isran had apologised in the next Flying class and told Aterus that he knew very well that he had done his best, but Aterus could clearly hear the implied "but your best just isn't good enough." and Isran was right. All the other boys in class could dribble without hitting their toes.

"I not like play ball either." his friend Jorge consoled him. "Always lose ball."

Of course Jon ruined the effect a little when he told Aterus that Jorge was the fastest runner in the Hufflepuffs' Sports class and could do a perfect cartwheel.

Oh if only he were half as good as Billy in Sports!

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Billy did almost as well in Sports as he did in Potions and that was saying a lot. So far they hadn't done a potion Billy hadn't been able to brew by heart and sometimes he even helped older students with their essays for the class.

"It's nothing special." he'd say whenever anyone mentioned it to him. "I just grew up with all those Potions Masters around. That's how I know it all." But inside he'd be glowing with pride.

The Chemistry club was slightly more challenging, but only because the group was small enough that Draco could set different tasks for different work groups. That way everybody got to work at a their own difficulty level.

Transfigurations on the other hand was a constant struggle. No matter how patient Professor McGonagall tried to be Billy's incompetence always lasted longer than her patience. At first he'd hoped that things would improve once he had mastered the levitation charm, but it had turned out to be an illusion. He could perform wingardium leviosa in his sleep by now and still everything he tried to transfigure started to fly around the room the moment he pointed his wand at it. He wondered how his parents would react, if he failed Transfigurations.

Sometimes he still worried about not being at home as well. Had the Rakers already forgotten him or would Mely finally present him with his cap during the holidays? Should he ask her for it maybe? It was against the custom, but maybe she needed a reminder.

And then there were the constant accusations of being a teachers' pet. They'd died down a little now that most students were used to him and he rarely heard it from Slytherins anymore. The Hufflepuffs never had accused him in the first place and there was a rumour that the head girl, a Hufflepuff, had admonished the Ravenclaw prefects that it wasn't Billy's fault that his father happened to work at Hogwarts. After that the Ravenclaws occasionally complained about teachers favouring Billy, but rarely to Billy himself anymore.

The Gryffindors however had found out that it got to him and had consequently become even more vocal about it. Sometimes Billy wished he could throttle the entire house. No wonder the hat had decided not to put him into Hufflepuff!

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If Billy missed his home, Tullia was downright homesick at times, especially on days when there was beef on the menu or they had Flying. Despite being a good flyer, Tullia was still afraid of the class, though she had to admit that she was doing a lot worse in Latin. She liked Professor Stylus, though. The only teacher she disliked was Professor McGonagall which also caused her to hate Transfigrations.

Her best subject was definitely Potions. If it hadn't been for Billy, she'd have toped that class. Even with Billy outshining her Professor Snape had noticed her talent and encouraged her as much as he could. He was pleased about her plan to take Alchemy and recommended to stick with both Math and Chemistry while she did it.

Tullia was seriously considering it. It meant that she had to drop Volleyball once she reached third year, but she didn't care that much about the club anyway. It was a fun game, but she'd taken it because of Danny and now Danny wasn't even in the same group. Despite the presence of the Gryffindors in Volleyball she didn't suffer the way Anny had in Acting class. The Gryffindors were only two, after all, and Tullia had made friends with Ary who had the support of the other West Hogsmeade students. In fact it was the Gryffindors who were the most isolated in the class as the West Hogsmeade students had accepted Tullia much more easily.

Despite all that she was counting down the days until the Christmas holidays. She couldn't wait to see her family and friends again.

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ERMonkey, Burner of Cookies: Good guess, but the gold is indeed neutral gender and would have been aurum lepi. Aura has nothing to do with gold and is a female singular nominativ. (And really easy to guess, though the combination doesn't make much sense. I was going to use the Latin word for ear 'auris' at first, but then I wanted to put the female - male endings in to confuse Tullia. Preferably without taking out the similarity with aureus. So I checked and found that aura exists as well. Hence it's a magical text, probably about the testing of a new charm or potion on a hare.)

Joou Himeko Dah: Thanks, I try to give a glance at as many people as possible, just to show that there are a lot of people around. (With two schools full there have to be, after all.)

Pam Briggs: The students of both schools seem to actually be learning a little about their prejudices it turns out. I'm still trying to update every week, but with my current workload, I've probably got to be happy if I manage every second week, I'm afraid.

Kyzara: I've done Gangolf in answer to the claims that Lockhart must have been a Slytherin. He's a junior version of dear Gilderoy (brrrr!) and I think I've made him as realistic as I can get such a person. (Maybe he'll get more understandable when you see him interact with his Mum, though I'm not sure whether I know how to write that scene, yet. We'll see in one of the next chapters.) Anyhow, he wasn't written to be liked, though he did end up being my best friend's favourite character in this fic. Well, she liked Lockhart, too. . . .

Wirretine: Danny likes to fight and saw a chance to provoke both Colleen and Tullia. She's actually trying to keep that under control, but sometimes a situation is just too tempting. (It's just like some people enjoy to prove they're better than others in sports competitions. Danny likes to prove she's better in fights.) . . . She's actually modelled after one of my characters in my Saber Rider fic, who is developing a really weird and contradictory personality as I write him. (The original anime doesn't give him much background at all, so I just started with the intention to give him some colour and he turned out to be a really sweet mean guy. Don't know how he did that, but I'm trying to recreate the effect with Danny which should help me find out.

Blythe.Naurin: Well, you could just take Blythe1. (They did that to me automatically after over two years of being Silverfox.) . . . I can't either. I think I would have ended up doing the same as Aterus. Billy is used to not having warm water from time to time, though, so he can handle it. . . . It's the Slytherin dorms, not the Gryffindor ones. They don't have that security slide. (Because I've written so many scenes in those dorms before OOTP came out, I'm really not sure which of my fics have males enter the girls' dorms anymore and this is a sequel. Anyway I don't think it's quite fair that there's a safety measure on the girls' stairs and not the boys', so I'm assuming that it was added by a head of house after a particular incident of a boy sneaking into the Gryffindor girls' dorms. There never were any equally bad incidents the other way around or in the other houses, so only the Gryffindor girls' dorms have it.) . . . Git is a mild insult that's widely used in the fandom. I'm not sure of its exact meaning either, but it appears to be harmless enough to use in a G-rated fic. All the other ones I came up with for Laura to say might have caused objections with some parents and I don't want to up the rating. . . . Draco teaches Potions, Physics, Chemistry and Alchemy. In other words he's quite overworked. He Math professor hence is the West Hogsmeade Arithmancy teacher and remains nameless at this time. I kinda like him, though. The West Hogsmead students didn't all know him (some did), because Arithmancy is an elective, so those who didn't choose it, or are too young to choose it haven't met him. . . . How to start a class is up to the individual teacher. Charlie wanted to establish a personal relationship with her students, so she was very open with them. Her class is a club and mostly for fun, after all. She wants the students to feel that she's their friend who's showing them something fun, not a demanding teacher who will give them grades and detentions, if they don't work hard enough. She wasn't originally going to tell them that much about her family plans, but they showed an interest, so she decided to go with it. . . . As you saw, the mail brought bad news to poor Colleen. . . . Was this the mail you thought I hadn't answered? I usually keep reviews to answer with the next chapter, while I answer most direct mails as I read them.

None of the Above: I love your nick! It's brilliant. . . . Well, you've got another chance at the Latin as nobody guessed it. It's really easy, actually. Just don't think of gold! Either stick with the English language, or do what Tullia did and check your dictionary. (I can already see you rolling your eyes at me when you figure it out.)

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A/N: The aura lepi problem is still up for guessing. Come on people, it's really easy. I just threw in a false hint to confuse you. (Well, actually Tullia made a false connection with the word aureus.) Will Gangolf get over the loss of his only friend? And will Phelippe be alright?

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In the next chapter: The children leave for the Christmas holidays, Tullia finally sees her family again and maybe also Christmas at the Nocturnes.