Elvira leaned against one of the cabinets in Newt's shack, watching as he moved here and there, picking up bottles and plucking leaves from potted plants sitting around. He moved easily in this space and it was obvious that as unusual as the situation was he was comfortable here. More than that, he knew what he was doing. There was something enticing about watching him move so capably, mastering the situation as he smeared some of his concoction over the wound on Kowalski's neck, now clad in rolled-up shirtsleeves. He moved to a counter where a long quarter of pork was laid out, lifted a cleaver, and brought it down sharply. She watched as he skillfully broke down the meat, avoiding the bones with quick, sure cuts.

She glanced around at the walls, which were papered in maps and charts, detecting notes of everything from geography and anatomy to herbology and brewing. Some pages were crammed so tightly with notes she wondered at how he read them and others were accompanied by drawings. She leaned closer to one depicting a fwooper, a creature she was familiar with.

"Did you draw all of this?" Elvira asked, looking at the art, because from what she could tell it was all very accurate and well-done. Newt was a man of hidden talents, apparently including butchery and art.

"Hm?" Newt glanced up and saw what she was looking at. He blinked. "Oh, er, yes. I struggled to find accurate anatomical drawings of many of the creatures I worked with, and so I was often forced to make my own for reference."

"These things..." Kowalski did indeed seem to be recovering. The sweating was going down and he wasn't quite so red in the face as he had been a few minutes before. Instead, he was staring around at all of the different drawings in awe. "They all exist?"

"Crup, fwooper, Peruvian Vipertooth, grindylow…" Elvira recited for him, pointing to the drawings. That only made Jowalski stare at her with just as much disbelief as he'd been giving the pictures.

"You've seen these things?" he demanded incredulously, and Elvira threw her head back and laugh.

"Good Greylock no! I don't see anything here that's native to the US and magical law says we can't import or own magical creatures." She cast a glance over her shoulder to Newt knowingly. "You rebel."

Newt flushed and chuckled awkwardly, distracting himself by scooping the meat off of his chopping block and into a pail waiting beside his feet on the floor. He cleaned the blade with a quick spell and set it safely aside before picking up the bucket. He hesitated to pass it to Elvira, and instead pressed it into Jacob's hands.

"Take this." He said to Kowalski, but he was looking at Elvira, wanting desperately to show off his creatures to her. Here, finally, were people who might actually like them instead of asking why the hell he didn't just chuck his whole suitcase into a fire and destroy them all.

Meat prepared, Newt plucked up the small, folded form of the Swooping Evil in its little bundle of string. The thing was a bit flighty, and he intended to set up a habitat for him soon, but not until he calmed down some. The last thing Newt needed was a creature with a venom that messed with the mind loose in his suitcase. It was why he kept milking it, both for his own safety working with the creature and to study the properties of the venom and its potential application. Not that Newt was eager to see a mass market for Swooping Evil venom...

"Come on…" he urged gently, and he felt a body approach cautiously.

"What you got there?" Kowalski called, seemingly content to hang back and use his bucket of meat like a shield while Elvira crept closer.

"This the locals call Swooping Evil, not the friendliest of names," he admitted. "Its quite an agile fellow. I've been studying him. And I am pretty sure his venom could be quite useful if properly diluted. Just to remove bad memories, you know." A wicked little thought over came him and he turned, gently tossing the bundle under his arm. The Swooping Evil burst from its tiny form and flared its wings in Elvira's face while Newt kept a firm hold of its tail to keep it from actually reaching her. The wind buffeted the tendrils of hair around her face back and Kowalski recoiled a bit, but Elvira merely stared, fascinated. Newt tugged gently on the creature's tail and it obligingly coiled back up into its tiny form for him to replace in his pocket. "Probably shouldn't let him loose in here, though," he admitted with a shy grin.

Elvira beamed in reply. She knew that wasn't a slip, that Newt had done it on purpose, and it made her smile. He was loosening up a bit, and she liked what she saw. Newt with his shirt tails out what just as attractive as Newt all buttoned up, it seemed. And that Swooping Evil... such bright colors she'd never seen, with its leathery wings and shrill cry. The thing did look menacing but it was hard to be afraid when she watched Newt tuck it into his pocket like it was a bit of loose change, clearly trusting the creature.

"Come on," Newt urged them, and Elvira was quick on his heels, stepping outside and into a wide, open area. Kowalski, seemingly more so as he wasn't left behind than anything else, followed her out.

Elvira stared around in awe. Tarps held up on wooden frames formed habitats all around her, some with flashes of sand visible inside, others with snow. Some seemed to simply stretch on forever into the depths of the suitcase. There were creatures going here and there, mingling with one another, and in a strange way it all seemed like a very well-oiled machine despite the fact that the place was a bit messy, with odd tools set out and waiting by the creatures they were used for. She spotted diricrawls, mooncalves, fwoopers, grindylows floating in bubbles of water... any and every creature she'd ever read about and a few she'd never heard of were represented, with the fauna of the United States being the notable absence.

Newt stood before the closest habitat, one with red sand and high stacked rocks. Overhead a storm raged, lightning and thunder echoing around them, but Newt seemed utterly unconcerned, wand raised to keep the rain off of him as he looked up. Flaring gold wings, gleaming talons, clever yellow eyes, and a cry that could pierce for miles across the plains. The reason she and Newt had met.

"Come on. Down you come. Come on," Newt urged gently, and the storm faded as the thunderbird calmed, coming to roost on a claw-scared boulder just at the front of the habitat. the thunderbird lowered his head as Newt stowed his wand and reached out, stroking the massive, feathery head. "Oh, thank Paracelsus. If you'd have got out that could have been quite catastrophic. You see, he's the real reason I came to America. To bring Frank home."

"So this is him?" Elvira asked, and she itched to take a step forward but she also knew that a thunderbird could do real damage if it wasn't fond of you. Newt had obviously built a bond, but it wasn't as if Frank had been reading their letters back and forth and knew her from their words. The thunderbird had no idea who she was.

"Frank, this is Miss Elvira that I told you about," Newt murmured, and glanced over his shoulder at her. "She's the one who helped me patch you up."

"That's how we met," Elvira added to Jacob. "My father's name was given to Newt to advise him on caring for thunderbirds, but my father died. I replied and we just..." she shrugged, "kept writing."

Bolstered by her explanation, Kowalski took a step forwards and Frank gave a low, warning cry, his wings shuffling a little. Newt was quick to caution,

"No, sorry, stay there, he's a wee bit sensitive to strangers. Here you are, here you are," he added soothingly to the thunderbird as Jacob stepped back. "He was trafficked, you see. I found him in Egypt, he was all chained up. Couldn't leave him there, had to bring him back. I'm going to put you back where you belong, aren't I, Frank?" he asked, leaning his face against Frank's gently. "To the wilds of Arizona."

Newt reached into his pocket and pulled out a bit of meat. He flung it up into the air and, almost like a dog, Frank leaped after it, flaring his wings to get some height. He snapped his beak shut on his treat and rose higher, wings flaring. He would retreat to the top of one of his stone pillars to eat in peace and safety, Elvira mused, and probably take a bit of a rest. He was apparently very agitated before Newt arrived and calmed him, and no wonder.

"So you... you know about these things too?" Jacob asked her, and Elvira nodded.

"A bit. My father was the real magizoologist, but I do have an interest and I picked up a lot from him. I've never been this close to a thunderbird before though," she admitted, a smile stretching across her face irrepressibly. She crossed one arm over her chest to hide a bit of a shiver, something inside her feeling warm and proud. Thunderbirds were beautiful creatures and anyone who saw them would be struck, but for American wizards, who used them as the symbol for their country in place of the eagle the No-Majs favored, they had a special, patriotic significance. "The last time I saw one, Iliana and I raced it through a canyon on horseback. That..." she sighed at the memory, "was a very good day."

Newt turned and raised his hands to his mouth, letting out a loud cry. Kowalski jerked back and stared at the man incredulously, but Elvira leaned forward in interest. She could not even begin to imagine what else Newt had down here and she was eager to see what he'd call next. Newt darted down from the rock he stood on and took the bucket from Jacob, urging them to follow as he approached a boulder taller than he was, giving that same cry again. This was one of the habitats that seemed to stretch into infinity, a desert at night with clouds drifting low in the distance. Elvira stood near the rock, squinting out over the sands as a sound lot unlike Frank's thunder began to roll in. This was different though, this was hoofbeats.

"Here they come."

"Here who comes?" Jacob asked incredulously. He moved to stand close to Elvira, apparently counting on her to protect him as the creatures moving across the sands came into view and grew larger and larger... and larger still.

"The graphorns," Newt announced as the closest one galloped up. It was half again as tall as Newt and that was enough to make Jacob cry out in fear and turn to run. Newt caught his arm, soothing him as if he were one of Newt's creatures.

"You're all right. You're all right."

On this one, Elvira didn't blame him. The graphorns were likely the ugliest creatures she'd ever seen, large and hump-backed, with grayish-purple skin that looked incredibly tough. It had two golden horns and walked on large four-thumbed feet. Its mouth was made of tentacle-like appendages which it used to rub across Newt's face and shoulders in some kind of greeting.

"Hello, hello!" he added to the animal as it touched him, two younger graphorns and another adult arriving at the edge of the habitat. One of the younger ones began to circle Jacob curiously as Elvira stepped up to the larger one next to Newt and cautiously reached out, offering a palm. The graphorn switched its attention to her and she was surprised to find that the tentacles didn't feel nearly as slimy as they looked like they'd be. Instead, they were warm and smooth, reminding her of sun-warmed leather. It was pleasant, almost like a massage, as the tentacles roamed up her arms and shoulders. As one began to reach curiously for her mouth, though, she stretched her head away and took a small step back.

The graphorn that had been circling Jacob crossed behind her as she moved, and with its smaller size it hit her right at the knee. Elvira gave a small cry as she toppled, cane flying from her hand. She landed with a puff of sand flat on her back, wincing and glad that the sand at least provided something of a cushion, even if it did leave her feeling unpleasantly gritty now.

"Are you alright?" Newt asked worriedly, his face appearing before her. Elvira opened her mouth to respond but spluttered as she got a face full of curious tentacles from the younger of the graphorns.

"No, no, we must be gentle," Newt reproached the animal, gently peeling its tentacles away from her. Elvira was laughing as he did. It felt oddly ticklish and the situation was just so ridiculous - she was sprawled out in a suitcase with a foreign animal, a No-Maj, and a magizoologist. It sounded like the punchline to a joke.

Newt pressed her cane back into her hand and took her other arm, helping her to her feet. She stepped off the sand and onto the wooden floor that seemed to cover most of the suitcase, finding it a safer place for her to stand.

"I'm fine, English, I've had far worse spills than that," she assured him, waving off his concern. She wrinkled her nose and raised one hand, sketching a quick rune in the air with fingers glowing red. There was a faint pulse and all the sand sloughed off of her as if she'd suddenly stepped into a shower. "Why did you take these?" she asked curiously. Normally, an animal would only be removed from the wild if some defect would keep them from surviving. Unless, like Frank, they had been trafficked and Newt had spared them that, but honestly she wasn't entirely sure why one would want to traffic a graphorn. What would be the market for it? They weren't particularly pretty to look at, like a fwooper, or had magical properties that she knew of, like a re'em.

"They're the last breeding pair in existence," Newt explained as one of the two young graphorns ran its tentacles hopefully across his palm. He pulled a bit of meat from the bucket and handed it over absently. "If I hadn't managed to rescue them, that could have been the end of graphorns, forever."

Jacob gaped at him, and Elvira's jaw was just as loose. "What, you rescue these creatures?" he asked incredulously.

"Yes, that's right. Rescue, nurture, and protect them, and I'm gently trying to educate my fellow wizards about them," he added with a bit of a wince, and Elvira could understand why. One only had to look at MACUSA's laws to realize magical creatures definitely got the short end of the stick.

As Newt moved to continue his chores, Elvira followed him up a set of red-painted stairs that led into what looked like the opening of a rocky cave settled in the middle of the room. Elvira took a moment to note that it had to be a pocket dimension in a pocket dimension, which was a seriously impressive bit of spellwork, before she murmured,

"You know, English, if I saved a species from extinction, I don't think I'd be as calm about it as you are," she murmured as they mounted the stairs. Newt looked back at her, something like hope filling him. He was fully aware that the graphorns were perhaps the most visually unappealing of his creatures but Elvira hadn't seemed to mind them. More than that, she didn't ask why he didn't just let them die off. In fact, when he looked at her, all he read on her features was... approval. Encouragement. Delight. He'd seen her eyes darting all around to his many creatures as they passed other habitats, saw her faint smiles as she beheld some she was obviously fond of.

"It needed to be done," Newt said simply. "I couldn't just let them die off. How terrible would that be, to lose an entire species?"

"Not many think that way. Most would look at your creatures and see dumb animals. They wouldn't care."

"They're not dumb," Newt insisted a bit hotly, noting the faint plucking of the fabric on his shirt as Pickett made his way out from his waistcoat and began to move about his sleeve. "Anyone who spends a bit of time with them can see that. They have... personalities, temperaments. They're all unique, and some of them have had their moments when I first came across them, certainly, but that some who had been abused by people before were willing to trust me speaks to more capacity for forgiveness than some humans are capable of. It's brutal to stamp something so... good... out..." Newt trailed off, suddenly bitterly aware that he was rambling. He felt his cheeks go pink as Elvira stared at him, and he was glad of the distraction as Pickett slid down to wrap his spindly arms around Newt's wrist.

"Titus?" he called, stepping into the bamboo. "Finn? Poppy, Marlow, Tom?" He glanced back at Jacob, who was just stumbling after them and staring around in awe. It made him smile to see that the No-Maj appreciated his creatures. In some way, more than wizards. "He had a cold. He needed some body warmth."

"A clever idea," Elvira noted, staring at the small wand wood tree in a pot that Newt was approaching. She'd know a few people who kept bowtruckles as something like pets, but those poor souls were usually relegated to a tank with some leaves and twigs, like some bug plucked from the garden.

As Newt tried to coax the bowtruckle onto the tree, Elvira turned to Jacob and explained, "It's a bowtruckle, a tree sprite. They eat mostly wood lice, and most of the time they live in trees with wood that has the qualities needed for making wands. They're defensive of their homes, though, so it's not uncommon to see a wandmaker or a wand wood dealer with scars from bowtruckles on their hands. See their little fingers? They're entirely peaceable until someone starts messing with their tree."

"They're... kinda cute," Jacob noted, and she smiled in agreement.

"Yes, they are, but unfortunately, because they're small and easy to traffic, they tend to get put in abusive situations fairly often. Their fingers can be used to pick locks, or people will buy them and stuff them in a tree to guard their home. I found a whole lot of them, actually tied with string to a tulip poplar down in Georgia once. I nearly skinned that man for it, too." She scowled heartily, recalling that incident when she'd gone to consult with a man her father knew by reputation as a dealer of particularly hard-to-find enchanted objects. It wasn't surprising that his house was heavily wared given the value of what was inside, but the little bowtruckle guards had broken her heart and she'd smuggled the whole band out in her carpet bag when she left.

"Do you... do you all keep suitcases full of animals on you?" Jacob asked her blankly, and Elvira threw her head back and laughed as he continued uncertainly, "Is animals even the right word?"

"Beasts is the classification most often used," she explained. "Goes back to the medieval bestiaries. But magical creatures is more appropriate. If they're from the United States, then the term we use is fearsome critters. And no, we don't all cart a zoo around with us, Newt is just special."

"So you don't... I don't know, take these things in too?"

Elvira glanced at him slyly. "Now did I say that? But owning things like this, even for rehabilitation purposes, is illegal in the United States. If Newt were caught, he would likely be given a maximum sentence and his creatures would be destroyed." Her face fell and Jacob looked around at all the magical, wonderful things around him, and then pictured a dark-robed figure pointing one of those wands at them all and killing them. It made him shudder.

"What's the maximum sentence?" Jacob asked, not sure he wanted to know the answer. "I mean, do you people have jails?"

"We do," Elvira admitted slowly. "But for this many creatures? For some that can be dangerous? In this climate? It... wouldn't surprise me if Newt were killed."

Jacob looked at her incredulously. "Killed? You people have the death penalty for things like that?"

Elvira smiled at him humorlessly. "That and more."

"All right, I'm coming, I'm coming." Newt moved off in the direction of faint chirping and like they were on strings, Jacob and Elvira followed, peering over his shoulder into a spherical nest where many occamies rested amongst the remains of their shells, crying for attention. "Mum's here. Mum's here."

There was something intensely adorable about Newt calling himself mum to his creatures, and also almost comforting. Elvira had met many a person who illegally raised beasts in the United States and aside from a frail old woman who had an absolute passel of teakettlers out in Nebraska, they almost invariably tended to be gruff men who flaunted their scars and injuries as badges of honor, even when they were likely got by behaving stupidly around the animals in question. The men with the most grievous wounds, who were so proud of their missing fingers and scarred faces, were often the ones who had no business being around animals.

Newt was the complete antithesis of that. Well-dressed, meek, but skillful in the extreme. He was an expert in his field in the way true Masters were, with easy grace and unshakable confidence as he moved around animals that could quite easily kill him, and the trust that his animals had in him in turn spoke volumes. While they might withdraw from Elvira or Kowalski for lack of familiarity, Newt didn't hesitate to plunge his arms into a nest of freshly-hatched occamies and they didn't so much as hiss in his direction.

"I know these guys!" Kowalski said, pleased to finally recognized something. Newt lifted one out, the coils of its body slipping and sliding in his cupped palms, and offered it to Jacob with a smile.

"Your Occamy."

"What do you mean..." Jacob stared at him. "My Occamy?"

"Yes, do you want to…?" Newt asked, nudging his hands in Jacob's direction.

"Yeah, sure." Jacob couldn't contain his eagerness as he held out his hands. These were quite a bit prettier to look at that graphorns, and they weren't five times his size either. He cupped his hands like Newt had his and the occamy was gently shifted over to his palms. Newt thrust his hands back into the nest to check over the others and make sure they had no signs of any birth defects or were struggling in any way. Elvira moved closer to his side, peering in. There were roughly half a dozen all sitting in neat coils looking up at Newt. Elvira, without thinking, laid a hand on Newt's shoulder as she leaned over.

"Sweet Sayre, they're gorgeous, look at the coloring," she murmured. "English, you're an absolute gem, you really are."

Newt's cheeks went charmingly pink at that and she glanced at him, smirking faintly when she saw the color start to creep up to his ears. Adorable indeed. It was a pleasure to see that she could keep him on his toes as much as he did to her. After all, it wasn't every man she met who carted around occamies in his suitcase.

"It's nothing, really, I just-"

"Hey!"

They both jerked around and saw Jacob with a hand drawn back, the occamy slithering on his palm with a hint of agitation.

"No, sorry, don't pet them," Newt warned. "They learn to defend themselves early. See, their shells are made of silver so they're incredibly valuable. Okay. Their nests tend to get ransacked by hunters." Jacob slowly shifted the occamy back from his hands to Newt to place back with the rest of its siblings. "Thank you."

"Mr. Scamander?" Jacob asked, brushing his hands off and turning to look around at the general magical wonder of Newt's suitcase.

"Call me Newt."

"Not English?" Elvira asked softly, leaning into the nest, dropping her voice low, and again Newt's cheeks toasted.

"Well, I suppose..."

"Newt, I don't think I'm dreaming," Jacob continued, and Elvira looked up at him with a faint smile.

"What gave it away?" she asked archly.

"I ain't got the brains to make this up."

Elvira smothered a laugh at that and Newt pointed, giving Jacob a chance to explore a bit more.

"Actually, would you mind throwing some of those pellets in with the Mooncalves over there?"

"Yeah, sure."

"Just over there…"

Elvira glanced in the direction he was pointing. Mooncalves were a fairly tame species, they didn't tend to attack unless there was a real, life-threatening thing in front of them, and even then only if they were in a herd. Overall, they were friendly and not entirely afraid of people, especially if they approached with food. There was very little chance of something going wrong there, but what confused her slightly was that there was a distinctly Asian flare to the mooncalf habitat. It wasn't entirely incorrect, the creatures were found all over the world, but it did seem a bit of an odd choice... until she saw the bridge.

"You have a moon bridge to your mooncalves," Elvira said delightedly, and Newt straightened up from the occamies, looking around at her in surprise.

"You're the first one that's gotten that!"

"Oh, that's hilarious!" she cried, throwing her head back and laughing. "You're a clever one, English!"

"Thank you, Elvira. Would you... like to help me feed the nundu?"

Elvira's eyes widened. She reached out, grabbing his forearm tightly. "You have a nundu?" She stared at him incredulously. "Is that even a question? Yes, I want to help you feed the nundu!"

"You mentioned you'd never been to Africa," Newt recalled as he gripped the wheelbarrow full of meat that would be required to feed the massive beast, already cut up and waiting under preserving charms. Elvira walked at his side as they moved through the case. "I thought perhaps you might like to see an African animal."

Elvira smiled a bit sadly. "Yes, of course, since I'll never be getting there under my own power."

"You really can't break the terms of your sentence?" Newt asked, hesitating before adding, "Of course, I'm not advocating breaking the law, but... couldn't you just leave?"

Elvira gave him a look. "If I could, you think I would be here? I don't exactly love New York City. It's fine enough, but it's too crowded for me. No, if I could leave I would have done it already, but the binding charms are too much even for me."

"Binding charms?" Newt asked as he began the hike up the rock where the nundu was lounging, grunting as the wheelbarrow began to fight him against the terrain. "So you're... cursed?"

Elvira tucked her cane under her arm and unbuttoned her sleeves with quick flicks of her wrists. She pushed her sleeves up to her elbows and then smacked her forearms together sharply, the smooth insides of her arms displayed for him to see. For a moment, runes blazed red and inflamed against her skin and then slowly faded, leaving afterimages Newt had to blink away. He stared at her in horror as she rolled down her sleeves and began to button them back up.

"That's barbaric," he whispered.

The spells holding her in place were bound not to an item or anything like that. No, the runes had been spelled into her flesh meaning that, short of cutting off her own arms, there was nothing Elvira could do to get away from them and they wouldn't simply wear out. The runes would feed off of her own magical energy, keeping her in place until someone from MACUSA chose to remove them, and the way Elvira spoke, it sounded as if she had been given a life sentence.

"What did you do?" It was a question he'd been wanting to ask and he was aware that here in front of Jacob wasn't exactly the ideal time for it, but the question slipped out anyway. Elvira's lips pinched together into a tight line as Newt tossed chunks of meat to the nundu. It caught them casually, tossing it up into the air and swallowing it whole. He quickly added, "I'm sorry, it's none of my..."

"I was part of the Irregular Medics."

Newt's eyes widened. Anyone who'd been even tangentially involved in the war on the magical side of things had heard of the Irregular Medics. They were a group from all over the world that had come together. They made their way into the middle of battlefields, walking bravely through No Man's Land under Disillusionment Charms, and scooped up injured troops, applying potions and spells and helping to subtly return them to their people. They were in front of the front lines, and because they were from all over and fell under no one's purview, no one could tell them to stop. Being American, a country that had abstained from sending magical forces into the war, Elvira had, as part of the magical community, been strictly forbidden from joining the war effort, not considering that unlicensed application of memory charms were the only things that kept the Irregulars from breaking the Statute of Secrecy into rubble. Some countries saw the Irregulars as heroes, others as dangerous loose cannons, but none had been able to damn the group for their actions.

"Is that...?" Not quite intentionally, Newt's eye drifted to the leg she favored. Elvira, luckily, didn't take offense to it, merely laughed weakly.

"Don't stand near shells when they go off, English, it's bad for your health. No-Maj's found me and hauled me back, had no idea who the hell I was or how I got out there, but they were keen to patch me up and, sadly, No-Maj medicine doesn't do quite as well as Skele-Gro."

Newt's eyes widened as he realized. She had been taken away by Muggle medics, and lost her group of Irregulars. They likely assumed she'd either already left, or had been shot down. With no recourse left and likely in too much pain to manage a good enough memory charm on the multiple people that, by that point, had seen her, Elvira had been stuck with the Muggle way of healing. After a certain point, the only alternative would have been to rebreak her leg and set in the magical way, and even then it likely wouldn't fix everything.

"How did you get home?" Newt asked blankly.

"I got put on a boat with a couple of guys who were being discharged for injuries," Elvira replied, lowering her eyes. "Somehow, MACUSA actually managed to put the pieces together when my name came through on a list of passengers coming back from the front - they were checking manifests back then to try and keep witches and wizards from sneaking off to fight, but people just used fake names where they could. When I got off the boat on my crutches, the Aurors were waiting for me. I was taken in and charged with breaking the Statue of Secrecy, defying a presidential decree, illegal traveling, and whole host of other minor charges. Sometimes, I wonder what my sentence would have been if my name wasn't Blodgarmr?" she admitted wryly, and Newt stared.

It was, in a way, not so dissimilar to the pureblood rhetoric being espoused by Grindelwald. Elvira was suffering from the rest of the magical communities perception of her because of her surname. Because of something that her ancestor did hundreds of years ago, she had received a harsher sentence for something that, frankly, sounded heroic. It made Newt feel sick in the pit of his stomach, and it also made him feel painfully inadequate. This was a woman who risked life and limb to break the law and work as a medic in the most dangerous parts of the war, and he was a kook. What in Merlin's name was he doing daring to expect anything more from her than she'd already given, namely her letters and her time?

"It doesn't help if I tell you I'm sorry, does it?" Newt said quietly.

Elvira shook her head wryly. "Not like it's your fault my stupid self wasn't paying attention and got shelled. The fact of the matter is, I'd resigned myself to being stuck in New York for the rest of my life. Anything new and exciting I get to see has to come here. But this?" She gestured around the interior of his suitcase, and, to Newt's great surprise, to him as well as she smiled. "Damn, English. Never in my wildest dreams did I expect something like you to show up in my life."