Merlin made his way in the general direction of the front doors when he saw a flash of blond hair in front of him. He quickly sped up, hoping it was Luna. Luckily for him, it was. He weaved his way through the throng of students while mentally preparing what he would say.
When he had caught up to Luna, he tapped her on the shoulder. She turned.
"Oh hello Marvin." She smiled at him. "I suppose you would like to talk."
Merlin smiled back at her. "That would be great."
"Have you repaired the hidden room?" She tilted her head as she asked the question.
"I was not aware it was damaged." Merlin frowned, he had always been rather proud of the Room of Requirement. It had involved some pretty difficult magic. "I can fix it if you would like to meet there."
"Of course! Can we meet after class?" She said in her drifty voice.
"Yeah that'd be great! See you then" Merlin gave her one of his blinding walking away. To his suprise he realized that he had followed Luna all the way up to one of the towers. If he didn't run he was going to be late! He took off at break neck speed down the hallway before skidding to a stop and slapping himself in the face. "Idiot!" He mutterd to himself. He couldn't believe he had forgotten he could apparate on Hogwarts grounds. With a twist he was in an inconspicious corner just down the hall from the front doors. He grinned to himself as he made his way through the doors and down a small path to where he could see a class collecting. There were about five other children and an overly large man. They were standing next to the Great Lake. Merlin made it to the small group just in time. In the group he immediatly noticed Harry, Ron, Hermione, Neville, and a Slytherin he didn't recognize.
The large bearded man began to speak. "Welcome to Care of Magical Creatures." He beamed at all of them; it was obvious how enthusiastic he was about his job. "Today we will be learnin' about some of the smartest 'creatures' there are. Today we are learnin' about Merpeople!" The man looked like a small child on Christmas morning.
Harry had given a noticable start at the mention of Merpeople. "Mermaids?" He asked quietly.
"Why o'course Harry! Aren't they just the most interesting beings? The only reason they aren't classified as full beings is because they did not want to be in the same catagory as vampires and hags." He puffed his chest out at the information. He than deflated as a thought seemed to cross his mind. "Oh righ'. You don't have to stay for this if you don't want to."
Harry just smiled back and said, "It's okay Hagrid. Besides, I wouldn't miss your class for the world."
Hagrid now seemed so happy that Merlin thought if people were able to spontaneously combust, Hagrid would explode.
"Great! Now lets get on with the lesson. The merpeople have agreed to a simple translation spell and will be helping me teach this lesson. Everyone, may I introduce you to Loredana and Ante." As he said this two merpeople pulled themselves onto the shore, their tails still dipped into the water. The female, Loredana, had light green hair with a splash of blue while Ante had deep green. They both had greyish skin, but Ante's was a shade lighter. "First of all, merpeople can survive above water. They had the spell cast on them earlier by Headmistress McGonagall. Harry, Ron, Hermione, you can talk to Loredana. Neville, Emerson, Davis, you can talk to Ante. Now hop to it! And I'm sure you all know by now not to be rude during lessons." The rest of the students had interesting reactions to that. Ron, Neville, and Harry looked like they were trying not to laugh and Hermione had a small smile on her face. 'Davis' just gave a snort before walking over to the merman.
Merlin followed her. "Hi my name is Marvin." He introduced himself to the other two in his group and then again in mermish just in case. Ante seemed thrilled.
"You know my true tounge?" He asked in English. Merlin smiled.
"Yeah, I like learning." He then turned to the girl beside him. "What is your name?"
"My name is Tracey Davis." She said. She didn't seem very interested in Merlin.
Neville introduced himself to Ante and they began the lesson.
"Okay, so I guess now that that is over, we may speak about my culture. We live in settlements on the ocean floor..."
The class went by quickly for Merlin as he absorbed all of the information that Ante provided. When there was only about 15 minutes left of class, Merlin's old friend decided to pay a visit. Merlin heard the whinny before he saw him, and soon Charles was galloping towards him. He hadn't had time to say a proper goodbye. He had ridden Charles up to the castle by a back path and had parted quickly to make it to the sorting ceremony.
"What? Is that a thestral?" Hagrid seemed bewildered that one of the creatures had broken off of it's herd and ran out of the forest in broad daylight. He watched it running towards one of his new students with growing panic. The thestral couldn't attack one of his students! He ran to protect him.
"Charles!" Merlin yelled with glee. Charles had almost made it to his friend when the big forest man was between them. He whinnied and stood up on his hind hooves. Why wasn't he allowed to see his friend?
"Slow down! Go back to the forest and don't bother my students!" Hagrid felt a hand on his arm. He looked down to see the Emerson kid.
"Professor it's okay! Charles is my friend." Merlin looked up (and by the gods he had to look up) at Hagrid and gave his best puppy dog eyes.
Hagrid needed a few seconds to process this unforseen development. "He's your... friend?"
"Yes sir." Merlin walked around Hagrid and made his way towards Charles and way met in the middle with a nuzzle on the cheek. He laughed and hugged the thestral around the neck.
"Alrigh' then." Hagrid scratched his head and walked over to the Golden Trio. It took everyone a few seconds before they shook off their suprise and went back to talking to their respective merpeople. The final seven minutes were spent with questions about Charles from Neville and Tracey, and Ante, who had never seen a thestral before (because he had been underwater, not because of the death rule). When class ended Ante and Charles were on their way to being good friends themselves and Neville and Merlin had made plans with Ante to visit Valemere (the mer-village). He said goodbye to his friends and walked to Potions with a large smile on his face.
This is my Valentine to all of you :) Hope you like it!