Chapter Three: In Which There are Mad Prefects, No Coffee, Illegal Flying, and the Flu
Gwen hadn't really given any thought to the house system in the weeks between their regression and the first of September. She probably should have, but she'd just assumed that the Torchwood employees would be in the same house. After all, weren't they all drawn towards Torchwood for the same reasons?
It seemed like the answer was no, and now she'd be staying with a room full of eleven year olds for the next year. Stuck. With primary schoolers. She groaned, and smacked her head on the table, not noticing the looks her housemates were giving her.
Next to the Gryffindor table, Tosh was finding out that she fit in surprisingly well. Perhaps not surprisingly, given what she had read about the school before arriving. But after years of dealing with only Torchwood employees (and Mary, she thought with a wince), it was nice to chat with people who were both intelligent and enjoyed learning. Even if they were children. A small part of her was already wishing that they could stay children, stay here, for longer than just a year – but an equally sized part of her was already yearning for her laptop, and technology in general.
The Slytherin table was in a bit of an uproar, as Jack told yet another of his many stories (passing it off this time as something his 'older brother' had said). Jack had no problem with being a Slytherin and had expected it. There's only so long you can live without becoming a little mercenary, and since he didn't have a time machine he could skip in and out of situations with, he'd also had to become cunning. (He liked to think he was cunning to begin with, but then he'd remember that one time where he almost destroyed the human race, and... not so cunning.)
The final table in the Great Hall, however, was definitely the most interesting. To say that Ianto had been surprised to become a Hufflepuff would be an understatement. A vast understatement. An understatement so large it could contain the entire galaxy with room to spare.
Owen, for his part, didn't much care. He was too busy feeling vaguely insulted by what the Sorting Hat had told him, and the Hufflepuffs looked like a nice enough group. Not exciting, but he figured they'd be fine to live with – he could always find his own excitement during the day, after all. He was a bit concerned over the fact that Ianto was in the same house, given how mothering Ianto had been lately, and also over the way Ianto was looking. Shock didn't do the Welshman's complexion any favors, he thought.
"Come now, Hufflepuff's not that bad!" a pig-tailed girl a bit further down the table said, trying to cheer Ianto up. It did jerk Ianto out of his daze.
"Oh, no, I know, I just... rather expected another house, that's all," he tried to explain politely.
The girl nodded solemnly. "Come from a house family, don't you? Megan here," the girl patted the shoulder of a half-asleep girl next to her, "Her family's been Ravenclaw for generations, she acted a bit like you when she was first sorted. My own family's been mostly Hufflepuff, with a few Ravenclaws and Gryffindors scattered in, and when my brother got Slytherin, there was a complete uproar!"
"You don't say," Ianto said weakly.
The next morning, Owen made a horrible discovery. "No coffee?!" he cried, staring at the Gryffindor Prefect who'd seen him rooting around the table in search of something, and had come to help him out.
Percy Weasley winced at the shrill tone. "Well, no. It can stunt your growth, you know," he tried to tell the small Hufflepuff, but the boy was too busy wailing and lamenting the lack of decently caffeinated beverages. "You should try the pumpkin juice, it's really quite good."
The glare he got for that comment sent him scuttling back to the Gryffindor table. Whoever thought that Hufflepuffs could be so scary?
The second another member of Torchwood walked through the door – this day, it was Tosh, in the midst of a crowd of first years from her house, all of them discussing the lack of actual, solid information in Lockhart's books, and bemoaning the fact that they would be taught by such a person – Owen launched himself at them. "Tosh!" he wailed, "There's no coffee!"
Tosh awkwardly patted him on the head. While she did enjoy coffee, she wasn't as dependent on it as some of her coworkers were, and would be fine without it. Actually, without the need to stare intensely at a computer screen for hours on end, she'd probably do better without coffee. Gwen was the same way – fond of, but not reliant upon, coffee.
Owen, on the other hand, was a bit of an addict. Jack wasn't much better, but he did have more self control (of course, it could be argued that a rampaging hippopotamus has more self-control than Owen Harper). As for Ianto – she realized with a start that she didn't actually know how much he liked coffee (that one time he'd tried to enlist them in a coffee cult aside). Speak of the devil, here was Ianto now! "Ianto!" she called out gratefully, dragging the whiny Owen over to him, "Owen says there's no coffee!" With that, she quickly dumped Owen on him and made her escape.
Ianto sighed and dragged Owen over to the Hufflepuff table, where he did a quick transfiguration spell on a pitcher of pumpkin juice. "There, coffee."
Owen hugged him – actually hugged him. "Thank you!" he cried, before grabbing the pitcher and sipping from it. Ianto rolled his eyes and went over to the Slytherin table to do the same (with instructions to the few Slytherins who were up already to give Jack the pitcher if he started to whine over lack of coffee) before taking a seat with his fellow Hufflepuffs. Which was still a very disturbing phrase to think of. Fellow Hufflepuffs. He shuddered a little. What would his old housemates have to say about that?
"So what've we got first?" Owen asked, mouth full of banana (oh, the comments Ianto could make about that...).
"I wouldn't know, we haven't gotten schedules yet."
"Oh yeah." Owen considered this for a moment, then reached for some bacon. "I just hope it's not Defense. Potions would be nice."
This statement caused a choking noise from one of the older kids seated nearby. "Are you insane?" spluttered a second-year that Ianto had noted as being rather pompous at the opening feast. "Potions is taught by Snape!"
Owen blinked at the boy for a moment, then stuffed more bacon in his mouth. "Buh Poshuns ish fun!" he proclaimed.
The older boy – Macmillan, Ianto thought – gaped at him, and Ianto felt the need to explain his friend's behavior. And Merlin, when had Owen become a friend? "He's got delusions of becoming a Healer," he said in what his old study group (three Ravenclaws, and one rather psychotic Hufflepuff – of course, as the joke went, how could you tell a psychotic Hufflepuff apart from a normal one?) had dubbed his 'Slytherin' voice. Subtlety mocking, with a hint of honey. Just the way he liked to make cookies.
He really needed to get out more.
Owen, still stuffing his face, settled for kicking Ianto, hard, under the table for slighting his obviously superior medical abilities. It had taken two weeks for them to stop an eleven year old Owen from introducing himself to everyone as Doctor Owen Harper.
"Timetables, everyone!" a voice trilled happily, as a shaggy-haired boy with a Prefect badge pinned to his inside-out robes bounced to the end of the table with a huge stack of papers. "First years first, second years second, third years third," the Prefect sung merrily, banishing smaller stacks of paper in the general direction of the various years.
The first years, for their part, stared at him for a long moment before one of them finally said, "He must be insane."
Cedric Diggory, an older and highly charismatic student, grinned at the comment. "He's not insane, he's a Seraphim."
As Owen (and other Muggleborns) blinked in confusion, wondering how the crazed boy could be an angel, the purebloods nodded, and Ianto groaned. At their looks, he explained, "I- er, my– brother, he went to school with Ceirwan Seraphim." (The Muggleborns and Owen got looks of understanding on their faces as they realized that 'Seraphim' in this case was a name, not a classification of angel. They were still confused on how the Prefect – who was currently dancing around and singing something about magical lobsters as he flung the seventh years' schedules in the air and then proceeded to mambo underneath the fluttering pages – could be explained by just a family name.)
Cedric caught these looks of confusion, and took upon himself the title of Official Reciter of the Notorious Hufflepuff Lines. "Something you've got to understand first is that there are certain families that traditionally go to a certain house. The Malfoys and Blacks always go to Slytherin, Potters and Prewetts always go to Gryffindor, MacDougals and Belbys go to Ravenclaw, that sort of thing. Of course, there's many more than just those I've mentioned." He took a deep breath. "By the very definition of Hufflepuff, there aren't many hereditary Hufflepuff families. In fact, there's only two who have been entirely Hufflepuff for more than three generations." Cedric paused again, this time to sip some water. "The first of those families is the Smith line," he nodded at one of the first years, a blond who immediately preened at the mention, "And the second is the Seraphim family. Now, the Smiths are descended – however distantly and vaguely – to Helga Hufflepuff. Not to say that blood is stronger than personality, but throughout the generations Smiths have prided themselves on their heritage and instilled the house values in their children."
The older boy shook his head, as if to clear it. "Anyway, then there's the Seraphims. Commonly held belief since the seventeenth century is that Seraphims always end up in Hufflepuff because they're completely insane, so the Hat puts them in the one house that accepts all comers."
"Oh, come on," Owen scoffed. "They can't all be insane. I mean, this one certainly is, but generations upon generations? It's simply not possible."
Cedric smirked, an odd look for the nice boy. "You'd think that, but then you start looking through history books and the Daily Prophet, and you start to notice things. For instance, both Uric the Oddball and Wendelin the Weird? Seraphims. And in more modern times, we can't overlook Hannah Seraphim, the current matriarch." He smirked, again.
"Well?" Owen demanded after a long moment. "What can't we overlook about her?"
Cedric grinned, as did anyone who had heard the story. "It is well-documented that three years ago, dear Granny Hannah became rather incensed about some Ministry proposal or another, and to show her disagreement she marched into the Ministry headquarters completely naked and began to sing, 'I'm a Little Teapot', loudly and off-tune. It went on for about three hours, with her dodging every hex and silencing spell thrown her way, before she got bored and wandered back out."
All of the Muggleborns gaped, dividing their stares between Cedric and the still-dancing Prefect. "Also," Ianto couldn't help but add, "Ceirwan Seraphim was arrested the summer after his sixth year for Polyjuicing into the Minister of Magic and making out with a wizard rock star on stage – a very male wizard rock star." He grinned, and most of the table burst into laughter. It wasn't exactly hushed up, but Ceirwan's incident hadn't made quite the same waves as old Hannah Seraphim's had, so hardly anyone in the house had heard the tale.
"So you see," Cedric continued, nodding at Ianto, "Seraphims are crazy, and they are Hufflepuff's legacy." He considered the Prefect, now face down on the table and snoring lightly. "He's not generally so bad, his brain just doesn't wake up for about two more hours. But if you ever hear him doing a charm, run as far as you can. He's great at hexes and curses, but nine times out of ten, his charms will create giant holes in the floor or walls." Everyone stared at him. "No, seriously. Just ask Flitwick."
"As entertaining as this all may be," Owen said dryly, "I think it's about time for class." While he had been listening to the stories (which really were entertaining, he had to admit), he'd dug through the papers littering the table and found his.
"Which class do we have?" Ianto asked, choosing to read Owen's schedule upside-down than look for his own in the mess.
Owen's voice was grim. "Defense Against the Dark Arts."
While the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff first years were suffering through Defense With a Moron, and wondering if they'd learn anything in the class that wasn't about Lockhart himself (Tosh and Owen had given up on paying attention and were coming up with new, inventive ways to pass notes using magic), the rest of the first years had Potions.
To say that Severus Snape disliked teaching first years was, perhaps, the most understated statement ever made in the history of the universe. First years, as a rule, were easily distracted, messy, annoying, accident prone, and cried a lot. All of which added up to a disaster when combined with potion-brewing, no matter how simple the recipe.
Plus, they were complete pains in the ass, even (or, part of his mind whispered, especially) the Slytherins.
Needless to say, Snape was Not Pleased at having first years first thing in the morning on the first day of classes; however, he was quite prepared to take it out on the Gryffindors.
Then he met Jack Harkness, a tiny little boy who actually winked at him when the professor strode through the door, robes billowing menacingly and scowl firmly in place. Snape purposefully ignored the boy and dived straight into his standard 'Potions is awesome, and shall not be contaminated with silly things like wands, so there!' speech. Then, of course, the fun part: quizzing children who didn't know any better over various bits of Potions trivia! It almost cheered him up. Almost.
"Who can tell me what the most common ingredient used in potions is? Anyone?" he sneered, before picking on one of the confused children. "Mr. Creevey?"
"Er," the boy started, "Water?"
Snape lifted an eyebrow. "Care to repeat that, Mr. Creevey?"
"Water," the Gryffindor said, more firmly this time. "I mean, pretty much all potions start off by putting water in the cauldron, right? So water would be the most common ingredient." He nodded, pleased with his reasoning.
He couldn't help it, he was actually amused by the boy. Horror of horrors. "Technically correct Mr. Creevey, but not the answer I was looking for. Mr. Powell?" he said, calling on one of the Slytherins who had tentatively raised a hand. The boy gave the correct answer, and Snape continued pounding the students with question after question, leaving a few of the weaker students near tears.
Class finally ended, and Snape dismissed the children with a sneer and began preparing for his next lesson, which was thankfully N.E.W.T. level, meaning everyone had already earned an Outstanding on their O.W.L.s and weren't quite as likely to blow themselves up.
To the surprise of no one, Owen had earned himself a week of detention by the end of the first day. Because the incident had occurred in Transfiguration (which he could already tell he was going to detest), he was sentenced to serve it under the watchful eye of Professor McGonagall. Well, the somewhat watchful eye, since she left not long into his first detention after placing a spell on the door so it wouldn't let him out until he served his time.
"So," Owen said, turning to the others in detention, "What're you in for?"
The twin redheads grinned at him. "You see-" "-we were just having fun-" "-in class, right?-" "-And we may have-" "-accidentally-" "-turned a classmate-" "-into a goat." "But-" "-he was a Slytherin-" "-so who really cares?" Owen, going a little crossed-eyed at the rapid switches, shook his head and wondered what Ianto and his fellow Hufflepuffs were up to, and if they had to deal with crazy people who would talk for each other...
The Hufflepuff first years, at that exact moment, were in the middle of sneaking out to the Quidditch pitch. Not all of them, of course, since Owen had detention and two more had begged off with the excuse that they needed to read up on Potions – they'd all heard about how the Gryffindors and Slytherins had been grilled earlier in the day. But the majority were following Ianto as he marched determinedly down to the broom shed and helped himself to a rather ratty-looking broom. It had been way too long since he'd last flown.
There was a total of nine Hufflepuffs in their year, not counting Ianto or Owen. Of those, three were pureblooded (or mostly pureblooded), two were Muggleborn, and four were some variation of half-blooded. Despite this, however, only one of Ianto's fellow firsties had ever truly flown before; the others raised in the wizarding world, of course, knew of broom flight, and a few had toy brooms when they were younger. Zacharias Smith, though, had practically been born on a broom – his mother was a Chaser for the Holyhead Harpies, had been since he was a baby.
It had partially been Ianto's fault that they were now on an illegal trek to fly around (against all rules listed in the school charter), but Zacharias was just as much to blame. He had reportedly thrown an incredibly dramatic fit when he'd found out first years weren't allowed brooms, and it had only gotten worse when his father informed him that no, he would not be sneaking in a broom for Zacharias.
This would be the reason why a quarter of the Hufflepuff first years wound up in the hospital wing before the end of the first full day of school, and why three-quarters of them would now be joining Owen in detention.
"I'm thick," Owen sniffed, looking miserable.
"Yes you are," Ianto commented automatically, before actually noticing the sickly, snuffly boy. His face was flushed, eyes red and watery, and kept wiping his nose on the sleeve of his robes. He looked completely pathetic, and Ianto resisted the urge to just laugh at him.
"No, I'm thick!" the former doctor snarled stuffily, crossing his arms and glaring.
"So go to the hospital wing," Ianto said, unsympathetic and quite wrapped up in his Astronomy text.
"You thould help be," he whined.
"I have to study."
"You already graduated, you know that thuff!"
Ianto pouted. "Not Astronomy! I got straight Ts, all the way through." He glared down at his book and grumbled, "Such a stupid class."
"Tho take be to the thothpital wing!"
Ianto stared at him. "...what?"
Owen let out a noise of pure infuriation and grabbed a piece of parchment, which he scribbled on for a moment, then held up to Ianto. 'Take me to the hospital wing, teaboy!'
"Are you deaf? I need to study. Don't you know the way yourself?"
'No, I don't!'
"So ask somebody else, I'm busy!" Ianto snapped, and then Incendio'd the paper before Owen could write something incriminating (or insulting). Owen huffed, but finally left him alone in favor of peering up at some of the prefects pathetically. Unfortunately, the only prefect in the room was Seraphim, who thought Owen was asking him to participate in a funny-faces contest, so there was no help in that corner. After a bit of this (and Owen sneezing all over the place and coughing up his lungs), one of the other first years with a better sense of direction came over and led Owen out.