Disclaimer: Harry Potter and all related characters belong to J.K. Rowling. They are used without permission, and no money is being made from this story. All original characters are my creation.
Lessons Taught, Lessons Learned
Chapter Seven: The Disheartening Letter.
The next morning, Trista woke at her usual early hour and went about her daily routine as usual. She showered, wrapped her wings, dressed, and fixed her hair. The only thing that was different was that she was smiling the entire time. The memory of the previous day made her very spirit giddy.
Still smiling, Trista quietly crept out of the dorm room and headed down to eat breakfast. She had to exercise restraint so that she didn't start skipping, but she was smiling all the while. Not even Scorpius Malfoy could ruin her good mood.
She had fortunate timing that morning, because just as Trista entered the Great Hall, breakfast appeared on the tables. She sat down about halfway up the Hufflepuff table and helped herself to a bit of everything. It seemed giddiness made her hungry.
"What now, Nott?" Scorpius Malfoy said appearing behind her and looking down at the food scraps on her plate. The smile temporarily vacated Trista's face. "Are you that upset you're such a loser Hufflepuff? Are you going to start eating your feelings like Hollows does?"
"Shut up, Malfoy," Trista replied, "If you were half the person Gertrude is…"
"If?" Malfoy interrupted sarcastically. "Are you looking at the same girl I am? You should have seen her trying out for Quidditch; I thought the broom was going to break right underneath her! She could barely get off the ground, the fat cow."
In an instant Trista had jumped to her feet and pulled out her wand. She pointed it threateningly in Malfoy's face and his cruel laughter stopped.
"You don't have the guts," Malfoy said, but his voice suggested that he thought maybe she did have the guts. "You wouldn't dare try to hex me."
Trista muttered something under her breath and then sighed and lowered her wand. Malfoy smirked victoriously and strutted over to the Slytherin table where he sat down to eat. Trista smiled sarcastically at him and then left the Great Hall to go down to the Hufflepuff common room to work on her homework.
When she reached the Hufflepuff dormitories, Trista was greeted by an excited Isabella who was still in her pajamas. Isabella grabbed Trista's arm and pulled her to a secluded corner. It was completely pointless since no one else was up, but Trista was too confused by Isabella's actions to protest.
"What is it?" Trista asked curiously.
"I've figured out how to make out snargaluff grow bigger and faster!" Isabella exclaimed.
"Really, how?" Trista asked.
"I asked Professor Moss about it, and he told me about a potion called 'Miracula Exubero'," Isabella explained. "He said that if we add a drop of it every day to our snargaluff, we'd have to take it to the greenhouse within a week!"
"Wow, that's amazing!" Trista replied, "Where do we get some? Do you think Professor Longbottom has any?"
"Professor Moss showed me the recipe for it. It looks really simple, I could make it," Isabella replied.
"You should ask him to give you extra credit for it," Trista suggested.
"Yeah, that's a good idea," Isabella replied thoughtfully. "I'm going to go have breakfast and then go see if he'll let me make it today."
"I hope he does," Trista replied.
"Me too, see ya!" Isabella said and dashed back to the sixth year girls' dorm to get ready.
Trista grinned as she headed back to the dorm herself to get her book bag. If Isabella successfully made the potion and they had to take their snargaluff in early, it was possible they'd each get some extra credit and earn house points for putting so much thought and effort into their project.
She returned to the common room with her book bag in tow and sat at a table near the fireplace. Her potions and transfiguration homework was already finished, so she just had to do her charms assignment and some reading for DADA. She decided to do charms first and looked at the assignment.
Practice the Refilling Charm both verbally and nonverbally. Describe which method produced the best results and explain why you think the other method did not.
Trista stood up and walked over to the nearest water pitcher and poured herself a small bit. If she was going to perform a refilling charm, she'd have to have something to refill. She carried her glass of water back to her table and drank it.
She pulled out her wand and pointed it at the now empty glass, "Repleo," she said. The glass refilled with water, and it looked to be the same amount that she'd poured in there from the pitcher. Satisfied with the results, Trista drank that water and set the glass back down to do it nonverbally.
She pointed her wand at the glass once again and focused her concentration on refilling the glass. Repleo, she thought, and the glass began to fill with water. It reached the same point where she'd originally poured to and where the verbal attempt stopped, so Trista lowered her wand and reached for the glass. However, she realized that water was still filling up the glass at a much faster rate than she'd expected. Any second now it would overflow and ruin her notes.
In a panic, Trista pushed her books to the floor and desperately began to think of how to stop the water. It was now flowing out of the glass and onto the table.
"Oh no, oh no!" Trista said anxiously and then did the first thing that came to mind. She pointed her wand at the glass and cried, "Impedimenta!"
The water stopped flowing, but the mess was still there. Trista used her wand to siphon up the excess and sighed. Well, now she knew which method hadn't worked out the best, and she had to figure out why.
As she was trying to figure it out, Patrick came out of the sixth year boys' dorm and came over to her table. The memory of the previous day came over Trista and she smiled at him temporarily forgetting her unfortunate attempt at nonverbally refill a glass of water.
"Hi," she said.
"Good morning," Patrick replied. "Working on your charms homework?"
"Yes, I'm not very good at nonverbal spells," Trista confessed.
"Why not?" Patrick asked.
"I don't know," Trista replied, "I did the refilling charm nonverbally, and it started fine, but then it didn't stop when I lowered my wand and water got everywhere. I only just got my books and notes out of the way."
"I see," Patrick replied and sat in the seat next to Trista. He pointed his wand at the glass and an instant later, it filled with water to the point where Trista had originally filled it. When he lowered his wand, the water didn't continue.
"How'd you do that?" Trista asked.
Patrick shrugged, "I just stopped thinking about refilling the glass."
"How'd you just stop thinking about it? I stopped thinking about it and it kept going!" Trista exclaimed.
"I thought about something else as soon as I'd though the charm," Patrick replied.
Trista frowned slightly, "Let me try," she said and handed Patrick the glass.
"Cheers," Patrick said before drinking the water.
Trista performed the spell nonverbally again and as soon as she'd thought repleo, she turned her thoughts away from anything to do with refilling at all. She thought about unicorns and kneazles, concentrating on them until she felt it was safe to check her glass. She hadn't heard Patrick yell that it was overflowing, so maybe she'd been successful. She looked at the glass only to discover that it was gone. How on earth had she managed to banish the glass instead of refilling it?
She turned to Patrick somewhat worried that she would get in trouble for banishing a glass that belonged to the school. However, when she turned, she saw that Patrick had the glass and he was drinking from it. He caught her looking and lowered the glass grinning guiltily
"Sorry," he said, "Got thirsty."
"Did it work?" Trista asked hopefully.
"Oh yes," Patrick replied and held the glass out, "Do it again."
______________________________________________________________________________
Trista walked to the Great Hall with Patrick for lunch, and they sat together near the end of the table. They talked quietly as they started fixing their plates, but the conversation died down when they actually started eating. It wasn't until Isabella showed up with Amy, Gertrude, and Allie that there was any talking at all.
"I've made it," Trista said excitedly and pulled a small bottle out of her robes. In it was an ugly liquid that was somewhere between green and brown in color.
"Made what?" Patrick asked a look of revulsion on his face.
"We're not telling you," Isabella replied.
"Trista will, won't you?" Patrick replied and looked at Trista.
"No I won't," Trista replied. "It's a secret."
"It's a love potion isn't it?" Patrick joked, "Each of you girls wants me to be in love with you, so you're going to spike my pumpkin juice while I'm not looking."
"We'd be a little more discreet if it were," Allie replied.
Patrick fake sighed, "Fine, I'll turn away and pretend like I don't know what's going on."
"Ooh, the post is arriving," Gertrude said, pointing at the owls that were now flying into the Great Hall.
The arrival of the post ended the discussion of the substance in the bottle. Trista hadn't heard anything from her parents since she'd sent them a letter at the beginning of the term, so it came as a slight shock to her when a brown screech owl dropped a letter on her head. She took it and offered the owl a bit of bread as she looked at it.
"It's a letter from my Mum," she said and ripped the envelope opened.
Dear Trista,
It came as quite a shock to your father and me when we received your first letter and learned that you were placed in Hufflepuff. I'm sure Hufflepuff is a fine house for muggleborns and near-squibs, but you were raised to be a Slytherin. I hope that you have at least managed to make friends with the Slytherins.
We're not upset with you, dear; please don't think that we are. We knew that whichever house you were put in would be the one you were stuck with. However, we were certain that that house would be Slytherin. You'll just have to make do in Hufflepuff, I suppose.
I'm sorry that it took me song to write you, but I needed some time to collect my thoughts and feelings about all of this. We had dinner with the Malfoys a week after term started, and you couldn't imagine the superior, condescending looks Draco and Astoria gave us. They now think that they're better than us because you were put in Hufflepuff.
We know it's not your fault, you told us what the Sorting Hat did. However, we do feel that you should have tried harder to convince Headmaster Grinkleby to let you try the hat on again. It wouldn't have done you any good, but a Slytherin never gives up without traveling all possible avenues.
All my love,
Mom
P.S. Your father and I have decided to go visit your Aunt Deidre in her manor outside Yorkshire and stay for the rest of the year. You'll need to sign up to stay at Hogwarts during Christmas.
Trista stared at the letter she'd just read while her friends chatted around her. It made Trista feel sick to her stomach; there was such an accusatory tone to the letter. She folded the letter and put it away in an inside pocket of her robe.
Her parents were ashamed of her and didn't want her coming home for Christmas just because she didn't get into Slytherin, which wasn't her fault. She had tried to get it changed; didn't her parents believe that she did?
"Is everything all right, Trista?" Isabella asked from what seemed like very far away.
"What?" Trista asked. "Oh, yes, everything's fine. I just remembered I need to go finish my Potions assignment."
Trista pushed her plate away and jumped up from the table before anyone could respond. She didn't want any sort of sympathy from them over this. Not because they were Hufflepuffs and she was supposed to be Slytherin, but because she was a Hufflepuff too and she considered them friends. If they knew how badly she'd wanted to be in Slytherin, how mean she'd intended to be to them…Well, they'd probably never speak to her again. And what would Patrick think?
After saying a hurried goodbye, Trista left the Great Hall as quickly as possible without rousing suspicions in her friends. She had just made it to the stairs to the basement when she heard Patrick calling for her. She tried to pretend like she didn't hear him, but he caught up with her anyway.
"Hey," he said casually.
"Hey," Trista replied glumly.
"Are you okay? You seem kind of down suddenly," Patrick said.
"I'm fine, I just have to finish my Potions homework," Trista lied.
"You said earlier you were done with it," Patrick replied.
"Well, I'm not!" Trista exclaimed somewhat angrily. "I'm not done with it. I'm redoing it! I'm going to trash it and start all over! I'm…"
She stopped short at the look on Patrick's face. His usual grin was replaced by a look of shock. It was all too much. He had only been trying to make sure she was okay, and she blew up at him. This was a time when she needed a friend and she was trying to push him away.
"I'm sorry," she whispered, "It's this letter…"
"What's it say?" Patrick asked gently.
"My parents are ashamed of me because I didn't get into Slytherin," Trista replied, her voice shaking slightly. She willed herself not to start tearing up as she continued, "They don't even want me to come home for Christmas."
"Just because you didn't get into Slytherin?" Patrick asked, "Do they even know what Slytherin is like."
"They were both in Slytherin," Trista replied.
"Oh," Patrick replied. "Don't let it get you down, you can't change the house you're in, and I'm glad you're in Hufflepuff and not Slytherin. Besides, we all know that after we leave Hogwarts everyone'll think that Hufflepuff was the greatest house ever and then everyone'll want to be in it."
Trista laughed and felt better. "Please don't tell the girls about this," she said.
"Cross my heart," Patrick replied and drew an 'x' over his heart. "Now, tell me what you're wearing to the Costume Ball."
Trista smiled softy and shook her head.