Thank you for your kind reviews and patience... the next chapter will be posted soon as well... updates will continue =)
~Merci
Chapter Eight- Weary Witchcraft
"You expect me to believe that you were 'just collecting reeds'!" Rolanda all but shrieked, her face centimeters from Sam's nose. The small man nodded, holding tightly to a wet dripping hat of sorts and looking as though he had died and gone to the fiery abyss.
"Rolanda, do try to be polite." Filius whispered, smiling apologetically at Sam. "Now just ask him nicely and do stop being so cross."
"Cross?! I'm not cross yet. Samfool Gambee just sucked Minerva through her bathtub and you are telling me to be polite. I say we do him in." Her yellow eyes lit up with fiery passion and Sam swallowed hard, attempting to back up but finding the wall rather unrelenting.
"Stop it, you sound so petulant." Pomona sighed. "I don't think young Samwise here is to blame. I mean look at the poor child, shaking like a leaf."
"You would too if you'd just murdered someone!" Rolanda snapped back, nevertheless having to mentally admit that her colleague had a point.
"Where am I?" Sam asked, daring to pose a question now that the wild grey haired witch with yellow eyes had stopped poking him with her pencil.
The smaller man, who had smiled, suddenly looked flustered as he and the round woman with messy hair exchanged glances.
"Scotland. At Hogwarts School of Witchcraft." Pomona offered.
At "Witchcraft", poor Sam's eyes widened. All he knew of magic was that told in stories and fireworks. He knew better than to bother those who studied it and knew most normal folk lived by the same principle. Now he had fallen into a pit with them.
"Where are you from, lad?" Filius asked.
"The Shire." Sam replied, feeling a bit more confused but at the same timed trying to be respectful.
"Oh I've had enough!" Rolanda shouted, stomping out of the bathroom. Filius and Pomona hurried after her, gently dragging Sam along.
Only one thought was flitting through Samwise Gamgee's mind at that moment and that was survival.
***
"My goodness!" Bilbo gasped, nearly dropping the cup he held. Gandalf rose in a swoop of grey to catch Minerva, but the table stood in the way and her head made a rather nasty thump against the stone floor.
Kneeling beside her, Gandalf gently lifted her up into his arms as Bilbo motioned toward one of the many guest rooms, that had been fitted with a larger or more so longer bed for the strange big folk who lived outside the Shire.
"I'll get a cool cloth." Bilbo offered, hurrying out to find the materials.
Gandalf nodded, laying his newest friend out on the soft bed and gently covering her lithe body with the coverlet.
"Weary are you..." he murmured, catching himself only after he had brushed her hair from her face. "So very weary." he repeated, setting his large hand against her cheek, glad to feel its warmth.
She was beautiful in his eyes. Not the sultry beauty of many mortal women, or the doelike mystery of the elven maids, but a beauty of her own. She was aged, that he knew by her deep eyes and soulful manners. The delicate wrinkles around her eyes and the tighter lines about her thin mouth.
He knew very little of the "Scotland" she came from; but was certain that she was no doubt a descendent of their royal house, her bearing being too regal.
"You have bewitched me." Gandalf chuckled, finding it odd that his weary lips muttered such words.