The room was not large, but certainly not small, and as they Apparated into it a wave of odd odor washed over Eve, Danny, and Howl. Howl wrinkled his nose in disgust, and stepped forward into the room, Danny and Eve trailing close behind them. It smelled like a zoo, as if all sorts of animals nested here, and looked much the same, the heavy scarlet curtains torn, most of the furniture broken or else in shambles. There were three beds, all three of which sported a horribly ripped and destroyed mattress and sheets. The curtains hanging off of the canopies were hanging in shreds, and the pieces littered the floor, along with straw and several bowls full of odd foods and water. The only untouched thing seemed to be a large, ornate fireplace in the back.
On the nearest, broken nightstand was massive and heavy fish tank, cloudy with algae and waste; Eve went over to it in curiosity, tapping the cloudy glass heavily, trying to draw out whatever was inside. "Oh, don't!" a voice cried from the back restroom, and a sharp beam of red light shot out of it and hit Eve on the wrist, making her jump back, rubbing her wrist in pain. "My plimpies are sleeping in there!"
"Who is this girl, some kind of psycho?" Danny whispered nervously to Howl as he tapped one of the bowls with his foot.
"Worse," Howl answered blankly. "A Care of Magical Creatures major." Danny looked at him peculiarly, and then to the girl who was coming out of the restroom, her wand still pointed straight at Eve. She was by far the most peculiar girl Danny or Eve had ever seen, an owl perched on one shoulder, an odd, puffy, brightly coloured bird on the other. Her blonde hair was cut short, but that could barely be seen beneath the giant lion's head she wore atop her head like a headdress. The owl hooted sleepily, and the girl tripped over several trunks and scattered pieces of furniture, stumbling to find it dusty cage, which sat dilapidated in the back corner, never once taking her eye or wand off Eve as the owl hopped into the cage.
On her shoulder, the other bird looked like it was trying to call out, but to no avail; no sound came out of its beak, try and strain as it might. The girl looked to it, surprised, and then back to Eve, who had scuttled to Howl's side. Seeing Howl, the girl dropped her wand. "Oh, Dean!" she cried. "I didn't see you there!" She tried to bow, and the lion head fell off her, crashing to the floor and scaring the song-less bird off her shoulder. "Oh no!" she cried out again, her voice squeaking. "That was my mother's!" She picked it up, scrutinizing it to make sure no damage was done, and replaced it on her head, letting the hair of the mane fall down her back.
"It's quite all right, Lorelei," Howl chuckled. "I've just come to introduce your new roommates, Daniel Mikhailovich and Evelyn Berry. They're new students." Lorelei shrieked in excitement as bounded over to them, apologizing exasperatedly to Eve while hugging Danny. She was nice enough, he mused, looking at her carefully. She had a slight bump on her petite, pointed nose, and her slate blue eyes shone with excitement. She was pretty enough, and as she kissed Eve on the cheek her bright red lipstick left a distinct mark.
"They'll be staying with you this term; be nice," Howl told Lorelei before Disapparating with a loud, distinct pop before either Danny or Eve could protest.
"No one's ever wanted to stay with me before!" Lorelei told Eve, sitting her down on her bed. "That one'll be yours," she told Danny, pointing to the bed nearest the back. "Mine is that one," she added, gesturing to the one across from Eve's.
"I wouldn't say that we wanted to stay with you," Danny said. "We're not really sure what we're doing her at all." Lorelei cocked her head to one side, leaping over to her own bed and bouncing on it before settling down.
"What do you mean?"
"We're new wizards," Eve explained, shooting a glare at Danny. "We've just found out." Lorelei's eyes opened wide, and her face broke out into a smile.
"That's so great! I went to Hogwarts, you know, Ravenclaw house, of course, just like my mum. And you know, she was right." Lorelei leaned in, as if inviting Danny and Eve to do the same, as if about to tell a secret. "There are just as many Crumple-Horned Snorkacks as she said there were." Eve looked over to Danny, confused.
"What a Crumple-Horned Snorkack?" he asked tentatively.
"A most extraordinary creature," Lorelei said, still whispering. "It lives in Sweden. Very rare. My mother found one, once. Never documented it, though."
"Right…so, do you know any of these spells?" Eve asked, distinctly to change the subject, giving their new roommate the list of spells Howl had given them. Lorelei walked over and got it; as she walked back, Eve mouthed to Danny behind her back furiously, telling him to notice the odd faces she tended to make and how she never seemed to blink. The frantic mouthing stopped as Lorelei slowly sat down on her bed.
"Oh, yes," she muttered. "I know all of these. These are basic spells. So you two really don't know anything about magic?" she asked, intrigued. Danny shrugged while Eve shook her head.
"We've just come from Diagon Alley," Danny told her. "What sort of wand have you got?" Lorelei held it out to him proudly.
"My grandfather made it for me out of the hair of a Wrackspurt. It goes a little fuzzy sometimes, but that's okay."
"What's a Wrackspurt?"
"Oh a most interesting thing!" Lorelei cried. "It's an invisible creature that floats into your ears and makes your brain go all fuzzy. Don't worry, though; I haven't got any in here."
"You do seem to have a lot in here," Eve said, looking around at the various creatures that were beginning to crawl out from the baseboards and the rafters. "Do all of these things live with you- uh, us?" Lorelei nodded vigorously. She pointed to the owl, now fast asleep, in its cage.
"That's Rudolphus," she said.
"I thought owls slept during the day?" Danny asked. Lorelei just stared, unblinking at him, unnervingly.
"And that's Mordecai, he's a fwooper," she said, pointing to the soundless, colorful bird. "I have to keep him Charmed because their cries can turn you mad," she told Eve, who shivered. She cracked an uncomfortable smile.
"That's…nice," she said to Lorelei, who spent the next hour or so introducing all of animals, more, her plimpies and moke, which she had trouble finding- "it shrinks a lot," she explained- her nifflers and her nogtail, which resembled a pig with long legs and beady, devious eyes. She introduced several rocks as pogrebins, and took a curtain off of aanother birdcage, which was full or four-armed, blue pixies. "Cornish pixies," Lorelei told them. "Very mischievous." After an hour or so of this, Lorelei at back down, looking at her menagerie, frowning. "I have more; maybe they just don't want to play."
"Erm- yes," Danny said to Eve, who was playing with what Lorelei called a occamy; it looked like a winged snake, with beautiful golden and silvery plumage that grew from its seven foot body. Eve jumped as it stood up and walked over on two hidden legs to Lorelei, who rubbed its head absentmindedly. Danny fell back onto his bed, which, despite being ripped up, was rather springy and comfortable.
"Uh, Lorelei?" he said suspiciously. She looked over to him.
"Yes, Daniel?" He quickly corrected her, and she blushed deeply. "I'm sorry. Yes, Danny?" He pointed up the rafter above his head, where a small bundle of green leaves was hanging. "Oh, yes!" she said enthusiastically. "Mistletoe!" Danny looked at her, clearly uncomfortable. She had picked a fruit, shaped similar to a misshapen green balloon, from a small plant, its ceramic pot broken, on her nightstand. "Dirigible plum," she explained sheepishly. "Anyway, that mistletoe is infested with nargles. I'd stay away from it, if I were you."
Danny looked to Eve, but she, too, had fallen onto her bed and was quietly snoring, dreaming of what it would be like to be a witch. Danny smiled fondly, and followed suit, allowing sleep to sweep him away into a world of flying broomsticks and magic wands. Their sleep, no matter how blissful and refreshing, was cut short by the prickle of the golden sunlight through the windows of their dormitory. Eve awoke before Danny, yawned, and turned over to find a niffler sniffing at her curiously. She screamed, which caused Danny to sit up in alarm, but after calming down a moment, both of them looked at each other and laughed as Danny crawled onto Eve's bed.
"Can you believe it?" Eve whispered fiercely. "We're wizards!" Danny nodded vigorously.
"I was scared it was a dream," he admitted nervously. He pulled at his robes, as they had both slept in them, and grinned, his hand brushing by his wand, a small surge of pleasant heat racing up his arm. "What time is it?" he asked, stifling a yawn. Before Eve could answer, however, there was a whooshing sound, and the fire suddenly burst to life, crackling green flames licking at the firewood. Out of it, coughing slightly, came Lorelei, carrying a large bundle of what looked like food.
"You missed breakfast," she said. "But I'm glad you're awake now. Did you sleep well? Usually Rudolphus wakes me up at dawn, but I guess he must have known that you two needed your sleep."
"What did you just do?" asked Eve in amazement; the green flames in the fireplace were gone, replaced by a comfortably crackling normal fire. Lorelei stumbled over to Eve's bed, tripping on her robes, which matched Eve's, and sat between them.
"Floo powder," she said. "Our fireplace is connected to the school's network. You can use it form 4 in the morning to ten at night. I wouldn't be caught outside after ten, though; you can't get back in until the next day. Especially not with the Umbugular Slashkilters that guard the Great Hall at night," she whispered fiercely. Danny looked over to Eve and shrugged; they hadn't seen anything that had been remotely terrifying when they had been in the Grand Hall the night before, other than Howl. "Anyway, it's Saturday, so we don't have classes today. I can show you around, if you like."
"I think we were going to try and learn these spells today," Eve said, showing her the list of spells again. Lorelei smiled and clapped excitedly.
"Oh, I know just the place!" she cried. "I can help you; follow me!" Just as Danny had grabbed what looked like a small pie, Lorelei took both by the wrists and dragged them up to the fireplace, sprinkling on the flames some powder from a small sack on her belt. She closed her eyes, instructing Eve and Danny to do the same, and said, strongly, "Great Hall."
She stepped forward into the emerald-green flames, and in an instant they felt a small tickling sensation, which licked at their legs. Eve opened her eyes slowly, just a crack, as they whooshed through the fireplace; she saw more fireplaces, just like theirs, pass, almost too quickly to be recognizable, surrounded all around by green. Before them, a large fireplace grew nearer and nearer; in an instant Eve, Danny, and Lorelei stumbled out into the Great Hall.
It looked completely different than it had the other night. Gone were the layers of dust that seemed to coat everything, the cobwebs and the spiders. The tables were straight, and in neat lines, repaired and beautiful, the golden wood shining elegantly. On each of the tables, every few feet, was a delicately carved ice sculpture, depicting various creatures, all of which spurted streams of water out of their mouths. The water fell on the tables, solidifying, but not into ice, making a sort of liquid tablecloth. All along the wall were several dozen fireplaces just like the one they had just come out of, and several students walked out of them in stride.
Eve nudged Danny, and pointed up to the great stained window above the Hall; it had changed, no longer depicting the two wizards and the roiling sky, but rather a middle-ages wizard with a white beard, standing triumphant over a somewhat younger wizard with blonde hair. There was light coming down onto the winner's wand, a long, white rod that was depicted to glow.
"Come on, then," Lorelei said, adjusting her ashen-covered lion's head hat and leading Danny and Eve on. Around the Great Hall, several groups of a dozen or so candles floated, moving slowly around the room, from barely touching the floor to the vaults of the great cathedral ceiling. In the daylight, the rest of the castle seemed less intimating, but it was still rotting and falling apart, many doors broken or missing altogether, revealing the equally broken rooms within. The halls wound and turned with sharp angles, and in the day, the cold grey stone walls were decorated with large banners depicting the school's crest, a white unicorn and a black, winged, skeletal horse- "a thestral," Lorelei said- crossing their necks and looking straight forward.
Lorelei led them outside of the castle, which looked more ancient than ever. From here Eve and Danny could see that it was hardly a castle at all, a single story, comprised of winding hallways and rooms. In the center they could see the Great Hall rising up, it's own building, and it looked as if half of the school had simply been shorn off. There were hills behind the castle, and around Danny and Eve there were still a few small ones, covered in ice and snow, which still fell from the sky in small flurries. Though their breaths misted, Eve and Danny found themselves to be quite warmth under their fur robes.
"The grounds are extensive; they go around the entire world," Lorelei said, watching Danny and Eve as they looked at the castle disappointedly.
"What do you mean, around the entire world?" Eve asked, intrigued.
"Well, you see, the castle is only sort of central location. The classrooms and offices and dorms and whatnot are spread over the entire world. Our dorm, for instance, is floating over Scandinavia. I think. It tends to move." Danny and Eve blinked at her, gaping. "Quite the levitation spell. All of the dorms are floating somewhere in air. I've heard that there are some over Brazil. Not that anyone really ever knows, of course; you can't see very well through the windows."
"Then, where are the classrooms?"
"Oh, well, first you have to go into the classroom in the castle. There's usually a portkey there that'll take you to wherever your class is that day. It changes a lot; my favorite is my Kelpie Care class, it's in Loch Ness," Lorelei said without batting an eye, as if this were all quite normal. "Of course, you can't Apparate off of school grounds. They've set up pockets of Apparition Zones so that you can go to the dorms and offices and castle, if you want. But I expect you two can't Apparate, huh." Eve shook her head; Danny was still in shock.
"The castle's not all that bad though," Lorelei continued. "I mean, it's got the Quidditch fields."
"What's Quidditch?" Danny asked. This, even Lorelei couldn't find the words to explain, simply calling it a sport played on broomsticks.
"The Quidditch World Cup just ended," she said. "Bulgaria versus France. Bulgaria won, of course; they've got Viktor Krum." Danny perked up; he remembered the man, and the name, from when they had been at the World Cup a few days before. "Of course, that's Professor Krum to us. He's the Quidditch coach here now, after Professor Rodin had that accident with the Bludger."
Danny and Eve didn't ask, but simply followed Lorelei as she brought them further and further from the castle, into the snowy hills around it. The pine trees here were heavily weighted with snow, and groves of them protected small, icy ponds. There were students milling about, but not many; they were all in crowds, and laughed and talked amongst themselves.
"Here we are," Lorelei announced suddenly, stopping at a iced-over pond, where the ice was especially thick. "If you can cast a spell on ice, you can certainly do it on solid ground. The trees here have bowtruckles, too." Eve nodded; this was the first creature that Lorelei had mentioned that she recognized, from Ollivander's.
Danny whipped out his wand, balancing it on his hand; he loved the sensation of feeling the warmth of the wood as it danced beneath his fingers. Eve, on the other hand, held her lifeless wand despairingly, frowning at it in distaste. "Do you know anything?" Lorelei asked. In return, and secretly wanting to show off, Danny levitated a nearby stone and pointed his wand carefully, stepping onto the thick, sleek ice, his footsteps crunching beneath him.
"Reducto!" he yelled, and the rock exploded in midair, sending a small shower of sand onto the ice. He, however, went flying back, skidding across the ice and landing hard in a nearby snowdrift. Eve laughed and pointed while Lorelei clapped vigorously.
"That was very good! Now you, Eve." Eve groaned, and stepped onto the ice. She, too, levitated a stone; it rose high above their heads, and she beamed in delight at the sudden success of her spell. She figured it was because of their full nights' sleep, and took a smug sort of satisfaction from Danny's stunned looked and Lorelei's exuberant clapping.
"Now try the Reductor Curse," Lorelei encouraged while Danny sulked. Eve smiled at him, knowing it would annoy him; he liked being the star of the show too much to let this one not get to him. Eve raised her wand a bit higher, and shouted- "Reducto!"- watching as the red flash exploded from the tip of her wand and hit the stone. Before she could see the impact, however, in kickback Eve was knocked over, sent stumbling across the ice until landing face-first in a small pile of snow. She ignored Danny's unsuppressed snorts of laughter and stood up, brushing her robes off and looking to the stone. It had clattered to the ice, completely unharmed.
"It's her wand," Danny explained to Lorelei as Eve screamed at the rock, casting the curse again and again, each time flying back into the snow, frustrated. "It's not hers, see; she had to order one special from Ollivander, and he's making it for her. She has to use this one until it's ready."
"Well, your Reductor Curse needs work, too," Eve said, sniffing and breathless, having given up out of frustration. Lorelei agreed, and stepped onto the ice, levitating a rock up to the lower boughs of a pine tree. She showed Danny how to stand, his knees bent and his feet about shoulder-width apart, as to provide more support.
"Reducto!" Danny cried, sliding back only a couple of inches on the slippery ice as the rock fell to dust on the ground. Eve clapped begrudgingly as Lorelei clapped encouragingly, and Danny beamed, trying the curse again and again until his feet didn't slide at all along the ice.
"Good! Now, Eve, you try!" Lorelei said, pushing Danny off the ice playfully and pulling a struggling, defiant, and frustrated Eve onto it. "Okay, I'm going to levitate this stone up again; I want you to do just what Danny did." Eve nodded, and braced her feet, letting Lorelei bring the stone up to the same height. In her minds' eye, Eve could see the smug look that Danny wore, could feel the pain of crashing into the snow drifts again and again, and that sparked a fury in her; she screamed the name of the curse, and felt the power ricochet from her mind to her wand to the stone. It exploded into a thousand small pieces, and left Eve panting in effort.
Danny blinked as Eve stuck her tongue out at him. "Oh yeah?" he said, looking at the list of spells quickly. "How about this: Stupefy!" A red bolt like lightning shot out of his wand, hitting a surprised Eve square in the chest. She stumbled back a few feet, and crumpled to the ground, completely unconscious. Danny rushed to her side; he hadn't expected his spell to work, he hadn't ever tried it before.
"Danny!" Lorelei reprimanded him. "That wasn't very nice!" She leant over Eve, rolled her over, and put her wand on her chest, muttering, "Ennervate." Eve stirred, and opened her eyes. Before Danny could react, she jabbed her wand into his ribs.
"Flipendo," she hissed, laughing as Danny was blown into the air, soaring a moment before falling into a drift of snow a yard or two away from the frozen pond. She took Lorelei's hand, and stood shakily, slipping on the ice as she tried to stand. "You're not the only one who studied the list last night, Danny!" she called out to him.
"How did you know I studied the list? You were asleep!" he called back, brushing the powder snow off of his robe. Eve laughed, and let Danny step back onto the slippery ice.
"This is good," Lorelei said decisively. "Since you both know the list pretty well, let's see what you two can do. Ok, Eve, let Danny back onto the ice." Danny situated himself, then threw his shoulders back, looking proudly at Eve, who glared at him with a sudden ferocity and lowered her wand. "One- two- three- go!" Lorelei cried, screaming in delight as they cast their spells off.
"Locomotor Mortis!" Danny cried, just as Eve yelled "Petrificus Totalus!" Both spells hit, and Eve instantly began to struggle with standing, her legs stuck together, soon falling to the ice with a loud crash. Her spell had only worked halfway; his legs were rigid, as if turned to stone, and after a moment of struggle with balance, Danny crashed to the ice as well. Both of them grunted, and Lorelei walked over to each daintily, tapping each of their noses with her wand. As it touched her, Eve felt her legs break apart, and Danny bent his knees, and both groaned as they at up, rubbing the backs of their heads and wincing. Lorelei helped them both to their feet.
"Okay, that probably wasn't a great idea," she admitted, sulking. "Okay, let's see this list." She began to read the spells aloud. "Wingardium Leviosa…Reducto…Locomotor Mortis…Petrificus Totalus…Expelliarmus…Flipendo…Lumos and Nox…Reparo…Stupefy…Alohamora…Accio…this is a good list. How long did Howl give you to learn them?"
"Until tomorrow," Eve answered, shooting a look at Danny.
"And how many do you know?"
"All of them," both Eve and Danny answered in unison. They both shot a dirty look to one another, but those broke into smiles, and then laughs. When Lorelei demanded that they show her what they could do again- this time, not on each other- Eve nodded to Danny.
"Expelliarmus!" Danny shouted. Instantly, a reddish purple bolt of light shot from his wand to Lorelei's hand; the scroll of spells flew into the air.
"Accio list!" Eve said, and the scroll flew towards her, losing heart halfway and falling to the snow. Eve frowned, and bent to pick the list up. "Stupid wand," she muttered, annoyed.
"Well, it's only for another couple of days," Danny said encouragingly, and for the next several hours Lorelei insisted that they practice their techniques and spells, muttering a spell- Eve thought she heard "Geminio"- and making magical copies, identical twins, of Danny and Eve, living, fighting targets for them to practice on. As the sun began to set, the duplicates, worn and bruised, disappeared, leaving only the real Danny and Eve, worn and bruised, on the ice, which was now scratched from so many times of feet or bodies sliding across it.
The silver snow clouds dulled to grey, and darkened more and more under the setting sun as the three walked back to the castle. The snow flurries had turned into a light snowstorm, and Eve wrapped her robes tight around her as they walked through the glistening hills up to the castle. They walked over a hill, stopping a moment as its crest to see the castle from a different angle than before. From here they could see that the entire thing was hanging over a cliff, and it looked like half of the castle had fallen down the steep slope, for at the base of it were scattered large rocks, now buried beneath the snow. Under this massive cliff was a large field, split into massive sections. Each of these sections had three fifty-foot-high hoops at either end, and Lorelei simply commented that these were the Quidditch fields. There must have been five of them.
They sat down in the Great Hall, watching as the other students filed in from all sides, some using the Floo powder fireplaces, others the door, others just appearing with a sharp pop. Soon, all of the long dinner tables were full of students, all dressed in same fur, all talking amongst themselves in a buzzing white noise. Eve and Danny sat across from Lorelei, who was trying to explain the politics of the student body to them. She seemed to forget a lot that Danny and Eve had no experience in the wizarding world, and had no idea what she as talking about.
"Not everyone here is a nice person," she whispered fiercely. "There are a lot of Slytherins here, as well as people from Durmstrang. We don't have a lot of graduates from Beauxbatons; most are from Hogwarts. You see, Slytherins are a good match for this school. They don't really teach ethics here, they only teach power. It's good, for most people, they turn out good enough, but a lot of very Dark wizards have passed through these halls.
"There's one of them now," she muttered, pointing to a thin, pretty girl surrounded by a tight group of other girls and boys at the end of a table not too far away. "Lucifera DuMarne. The only girl to ever be accepted into Durmstrang, ever. Her granddad was a Death Eater, back in the days of Voldemort. I guess it runs in the family; you don't want to come across her in the halls alone. She's a Beater on the school's Quidditch team." Eve looked her over as she laughed with her friends. She had dark, flowing hair that cascaded over shoulders, and she flipped it occasionally with a thin, dark hand. She looked of mixed ethnicity, her hair shiny and black, but her skin as dark as charcoal. She was beautiful, but there was something in her amber eyes, something that her wicked smile didn't touch as she laughed with her posse.
"Is she mean or something?" she asked, almost naively, to Lorelei.
"Worse; she's a Physical Magic major. That's sort of like a sub-branch of the Dark Arts; most of the people who come out those schools of magic end up going Dark. She's a master of curses, too, and not the kind that you two were doing today. The Reductor Curse would do barely anything to her," Lorelei explained, shivering. "I've heard she's part veela, too, but I think that's just a rumor. Though, it would explain a lot. Though they're enchanting, veela are notorious for their violent mood swings and powerful magic."
"What are the teachers here like?" Danny asked, changing the subject as easily as he could. Lorelei seemed to relax immediately, adjusting the lion's head hat on her head so that it was straight up.
"Well," she said, "there's the Dean, Professor Howl. He's very powerful, very mysterious, but most wizards are afraid of him. I've heard he's an Animagus, can turn himself into a giant eagle." Eve and Danny looked at each other; Howl hardly seemed the mysterious and terrifying type. "Then, there's Professor Markl; he's the Transfiguration professor. Also very powerful, but a bit doddy." It seemed ridiculous that Lorelei should call anyone else doddy, and Danny choked on his pudding. "The Care of Magical Creatures professor is Professor Mardaline; she's very nice, though a lot of people don't like her. I never really understood why. She really seems to think a lot about plimpies.
"Professor Calcifer is probably the professor you two want to avoid the most," Lorelei warned them. "They say he's part fire demon. Very powerful, teaches the Dark Arts. Of course, he doesn't call them that. Here, there isn't a such thing as Dark Arts. It's all magic, it's just a matter of how you use it." Danny shivered, and looked to Eve, who looked horrified. Lorelei broke the mood by continuing her list of teachers.
"I already told you about Professor Krum," she said, flushing a little. "He's really very handsome, all of the girls want him. Even Lucifera DuMarne. I don't think he'd ever go for a girl like me, though," Lorelei muttered, shifting uncomfortably. Eve instantly jumped in with comfort.
"You never know, he might. You're a very beautiful girl, Lorelei!" she said, rubbing Lorelei's hand from across the table. Lorelei looked up, and smiled, but blinked- possibly for the first time all day.
"You don't understand; I don't think he'd go for a girl at all." At this, Danny flushed, and again choked on his pudding. Eve, having no response to this, settled back in her chair uncomfortably. "But, then there's Professor LaHaye, she teaches Defensive Magic, and Professor Hayeel, he teaches Charms. He's from the Middle East, you know. Very powerful," she said solemnly. "Has his own magic carpet and everything. A bit clichéd, but I think he likes it that way." Dinner was over, and the masses of students had cleared from the tables by the time Lorelei was done listing all of the teachers and what she thought of them, from History of Magic to Divination to Arithmancy.
"We've got a long day tomorrow," Eve finally said, to break from the boredom of the long spiel. "We should go to bed, rest up."
"Oh, of course!" Lorelei said, pointing to a fireplace. "Just take some Floo powder off of one of the mantels, close your eyes, and say 'Dorm!' very firmly. Be careful; it's really easy to end up in the wrong room." Danny and Eve thanked her, and then rushed off, standing in front of a fireplace while Lorelei played with her leftover pudding.
"Dorm," Eve said, and they disappeared into the emerald green flames, only to walk out a moment later into their messy dorm. The animals scattered as they entered, and Danny cleared a niffler off of his bed, lying down and facing Eve, who sat on hers.
"What do you think of her?" he asked.
"Very odd, but I think she's fun," Eve replied, knowing that he was talking about Lorelei. "I like her hat." Danny chuckled, petting the occamy absentmindedly.
"Do you remember what she said about Howl, how was powerful, but mysterious, and that a lot of people are afraid of him?" Eve nodded. "Well, he doesn't seem that way to me."
"No, but Ollivander did say that that's the only veela hair wand he's ever sold. He said that they're untrustworthy; maybe that says something about Howl. The wand chooses the wizard, and all that." Danny nodded, turning over onto his back and looking at the nargle-infested mistletoe, which looked just like any other mistletoe.
"It's still unbelievable," Eve said after a moment.
"Yeah. Can you imagine our high school reunion?" They both laughed at that, at the shocked looks on the faces of their peers as they walked in, wearing their robes and waving their wands. There was another long silence; this time, when Eve looked over to Danny, she saw his eyes closed and his chest rising and falling softly. He was asleep. She smiled, and did the same, letting sleep close her eyes and rock her into her dreams, humming a lullaby as bliss descended over the dorm.