"Hey that's some owl!" The voice said behind her. Elysia whipped around, already smiling. "Need some help getting him on board?"
"Sure, thanks." She said standing aside to allow the taller girl some arm room at the cage, "But, wait. - I still don't know your name." she said, glancing sideways at her mom and grandmother who were definitely listening.
"I'm Leora," and she offered her hand formally.
"Elysia," she chuckled, "nice to meet you." And they shook hands. Elysia introduced Leora to her mother and grandmother, and Leora pointed out her family through smoky crowd. Her parents seemed older than the parents of many first years, but then Leora was the youngest of four. Almost all of them, Elle noted, had blonde hair of varying degrees.
With Leora's help Rakesh was easily stowed in the corner of an empty compartment and the two girls settled in, chatting as the train prepared to leave the station. Leora sat next to her own owl's cage though it was extremely small compared to that inhabited by Rakesh. A small owl slumbered in the cage, it was barely as tall as a pint glass, but that, Leora explained, was because she was still very young.
"She's an Eastern Screech owl. Not really rare or anything, but she's so sweet. Never be especially big, though. I really liked that she didn't seem to scowl like a lot of the other owls and these little pebbly freckle spots, " she said indicating the birds lower stomach area, "and her too big ears. She's a goofy little thing, don't you think?" She said this last sentence lovingly as she watched the bird sleep. "Her name is Vered. I think it means "rose." What kind is yours? Huge isn't he?"
"He's a Eurasian Eagle Owl. The wizard at Eeylop's kept saying he was grumpy and mean, but he did this slow sort of dance for me, and it was supposed to mean he was happy I wanted to buy him. I named him Rakesh, it's from our book 'A History of Magic,' some ancient scroll mentioned a ruler by that name."
"Really? He danced? Amazing! Animals are so complex. More like people than they're given credit for, I think." Elysia nodded slowly, watching Rakesh watch them as the light outside changed with the scenery. An old witch trundled to the door with a trolley stacked with sweets and cakes. Elysia bought two chocolate frogs and a pumpkin pasty, but Leora bought a load of everything and insisted on having help to eat her way through it.
"So do you know what house you want to be in?" Leora asked between bites of a lemon macaron.
"I don't really mind any of them. It'll just be the sorting I'm excited for; I know the old hat will know just where to put each of us." Leora nodded vigorously in agreement while chewing.
"That's what I think. My grandfather on my dad's side, nearly had a fit when my sister was sorted into Ravenclaw, and he gave up all hope of continuing our "prestigious family history" when Serpian became a Hufflepuff. He threatened to go to the ministry and file an inquiry on the school and the hat and all kinds of strange things. I'll bet he's given up on me, but I always thought he was a bit mad. Could be the reason Dad became a healer." She laughed almost to herself, and Elysia suddenly wondered..
"Leora, what house did your oldest brother get sorted into." Her friend's smile faltered making her bright face look slightly wrong.
"He was in Slytherin House." Elysia was genuinely surprised when the girl didn't elaborate.
"He's graduated now?" she pressed, carefully reading the girl's face as she answered.
"Yes. Just last June." There was a minute tremor in Leora's bottom lip. She wasn't bubbling like champagne, now.
"What happened to him?"
"We don't- he just…left. I told you Greenland or North America or somewhere. We don't really know, but he said he wasn't coming back." She shook her head and spoke more quietly than Elysia had ever heard her. " It was aweful… the way he looked at Drayga and Serpian and all of us, like he was a different person. Maybe it was just a phase or quarter-life crisis or something, though, you know?" Elysia could see her friend trying to stopper the small pool of hurt she kept deeply hidden.
"Yea. You're right. That's probably what it is." She smiled warmly. "You think we should get into school robes? I think it'll be dark soon." Leora didn't say anything in response, but stood to lock the compartment door. Her face had softened again, already a little of her bubbly demeanor was returning. Before she got the lock to click however, the door was thrown open by a round-faced boy their own age, and he closed it quickly behind him.
"Hide me, please!"
The two girls just stared at him for a moment. Before she answered the boy, Leora's eyes brightened and she looked as merry as ever. "But why do we need to hide you? We're almost to Hogwarts. You don't really have anything worth hiding from, not here."
"Please there are two of them and they're huge. Please just hide me." He was begging and it was pitiful to watch. Elysia sighed heavily. She pushed him behind Rakesh's cage and covered him with her school robes and a few empty sweets wrappers for good measure. Then, Leora locked them inside. Not a moment later fists were banging on their compartment door. Leora opened the door in a huff, one arm hanging out from under the sweater she was wearing.
"Now what?" she grumbled convincingly, roughly stuffing her arm back into her sweater. Elysia almost laughed at their cleverness.
"Where's the lit'l weasel what come runnin' through 'ere," Said an older boy in the corridor. He had muddy brown hair and a smattering of freckles around his squashy round nose. A much taller and much skinnier boy stood behind him, he had a thin high-bridged nose and lank black hair. This tall boy eyed the compartment suspiciously, but said nothing.
"It's like I told the kid, no one here but us chickens and we were about to change into our school robes, so if you don't mind.." Leora said heavily, motioning for the boys to run along. Elysia thought they must be 2nd or third years and they were already in their robes.
"What you mean chickens? Where'd 'e run off to?" the first boy said. He was slightly shorter even than Leora and his friend was rolling his eyes at his companion's simplicity.
"It means they sent him on his merry little way, Derewood. Ladies, so sorry to have bothered you." And with a slight bow of his head, he ushered his thick friend away.
Leora locked the door once again and threw an unopened chocolate frog at the mound of clothing behind Rakesh's cage. "They're gone, buttercup, you can leave now." She said, chidingly.
"Thanks. I hate those types. It's like they can smell fear and they always pounce." He shook his head with shame.
"Ever think of not being afraid. It's all about attitude, you know. Just give off whatever sort of feeling you want; you just go for it. Think too much and it'll all just fall apart."
"She's right you know." Elysia agreed, "It's the most universal thing there is, telling people who you are without having to say anything at all."
"I'm not a good enough liar to kid myself, let alone anyone else, because I really am afraid." He said glumly.
"Oh, fine stay in here with us then. We'll go up to the castle together, but we need to get changed so you stare at that monstrous bird, and if you try to peek he'll make you wish you hadn't. Got it?" Leora said, looking at Elysia for confirmation. Elysia glanced at Rakesh, his head was bowed and he looked up almost mischievously. She nodded solemnly at the boy. He gulped and shook his dark brown hair out of his eyes, his slightly pudgy cheeks going pale as he turned to face Rakesh.
"You are an exceptionally good liar." Elysia told Leora as they changed.
"Awe, you're sweet to say so, Elle." She laughed. "It comes pretty naturally I guess, it's not like I try. Lying is no good in the long run. Unless you can make yourself believe, anyway." She saw the puzzled look on her friend's face and continued. "No really, think about it. The best liars have to believe without a doubt the false things they tell other people; actually make them the only reality they know. If not, it's too easy to forget something small, give too many details, and just make stupid mistakes, right?" and at this she waited for Elysia to think about it.
"Makes sense to me," the boy said from where he stood staring into the Eagle owl's cage.
"You can turn around now," Elysia offered. She neatly folded her regular clothes and stored them overhead.
"What's your name, anyways?" Leora said throwing herself back onto the seats. "Can you believe it happened again?" this was addressed to Elysia.
"Ollistare Cowen," he said quietly, opening the chocolate frog Leora had thrown at him.
"Nice to meet you, Ollistare. I'm Elysia and that's Leora."
"Ollie, can I see your wand?" Ollistare looked at Leora as if she'd asked him to peel off his own eye-lids.
"Why would you need my wand?"
"Because," she sighed as though it were the most obvious thing, "you can tell an awful lot about a person by their wand." He took out his wand and gazed at it lovingly clutching to his robes, unsure if he could trust her motives. "Oh stop quivering and hand it over for a second!" Leora snapped. Ollie handed her the wand. "I've been reading up on wand lore; dead fascinating stuff. Mine's fourteen and a half inches, Dogwood, Phoenix feather, and 'hard' according to old Olivander." She took out her own wand and held it up with Ollie's. "Yours must be about ten inches, springy… -what is this wood?" she paused and held the wand to her eyes feeling it carefully with her finger tips. "Is it willow?" Ollie nodded slowly. "A ha!" She handed it back to him, smiling. "What's the core?"
"Unicorn hair." He said, clearly impressed. Leora nodded sagely. "So what does it mean? Did Ollivander tell you all about yours? He didn't tell me anything." He practically squeaked with worry. Leora looked pointedly at Elysia who smiled and shrugged.
"You need to calm down. Don't take everything too seriously or personally or you'll never survive any little thing… let alone Hogwarts!" she gesticulated wildly as she said this, like she was moments away from grabbing Ollistare's shoulders and shaking him violently. Elysia was laughing, now. He just nodded obediently. Leora sighed. "Take a deep breath… Ollivander only told me what I told you, but I've been researching it. My sister had some advanced books magical plant life and so on, but there are more volumes I need to get on wand-lore in particular and I'd really love to get in touch with wand makers around the world. It's just so interesting! Not everything I found out about my wand seemed to make sense, but I was talking to Drayga and she claims it must be spot-on."
"Start with Ollie's wand," Elysia suggested. "It might calm him down, and I'd like to know what kind of rascal he really is." She smiled, and Ollistare smiled too. He seemed to be relaxing a little, finally.
"Yea, start with mine. I wonder if any of it makes sense."
"Oh, I'm sure it does." Leora said conspiratorially, before she laughed and became serious about her wand lore. "Ten inches isn't short by any means, but length doesn't necessarily correspond to height. Sometimes it has to do with force of personality, and other things like that. Apparently, if the wand is short in the extreme a person's character may be severely lacking in some way, but ten is a good length they say. Hmm…willow," she put two finger on each of her temples as if trying to compel information to present itself, "There's an old rhyme that I can't remember, it mentioned a couple of different trees, I think Willow was one of them. Oh, well. Basically, being chosen by a willow wand means you have a load of magical potential all built up, and that you tend to doubt yourself, needlessly." She stressed the last word and glared dramatically at Ollistare, which actually made him laugh. She rolled her eyes and continued.
"There's also something about non-verbal magic being much easier for a willow wand, which might come in handy if you don't learn to speak up for yourself. Oh!" she said remembering something else, "The unicorn hair! It's dreadfully loyal to its original owner, but you can't mistreat a unicorn wand 'cause you can actually kill the unicorn hair and then the wand is useless. So there you have it: love your wand and get ready to tap into your wild magical potential, kid." It was Ollistare's turn to roll his eyes. The train began to slow and they looked out the windows but smoke obscured their view of the platform.
As they stood up, Leora helpfully informed them that they left their things on the train and it would all just show up in their rooms by the time the sorting and feast were over. "Because then they'll know what house dormitory for each of us," she added.
"What about Elle's wand?" Ollie asked as they hopped off the train, bumping into and moving through the crowd of other students.
"Let me see it." Leora said pausing to let a large ginger boy move passed her. Elysia pulled her wand out from within her robes. "Wow." She gasped when she saw it. It was a rich glossy chocolate color."What kind of wood is that?"
"He said it was… Beech. With dragon heart string."
"Well, I'll have to check the books for beech, but I can tell you one thing, she's powerful. No, you hold her, but let me put my ear close.." Elysia held the wand and let Leora bow closely. "Yup she's thrumming. Perfect match, that." She held out her hand and Elysia handed her the wand. She weighted it, held it to her eyes and felt with her finger tips, narrowly avoiding being jostled by other first years as they heeded a call from the head of the Platform. "Well she's reasonably pliant, an elegant wand, to say the least. You won't want to let someone get that from you by force, dragon heart string is known for more easily changing allegiance than other cores, but then that still depends on the wood. Sorry, I can't remember more about the Beech." Elysia shrugged, more delighted by her friend's enthusiasm than anything.
"We'd better catch up, they said first years to the front," Ollie offered.
"This is it." Leora said, practically skipping towards the booming voice in the distance.