N A/N: And so it grows.
September 1986
Pepper had been half-joking when she had said that Erik was the scary one since really all the tall boy had done on the train was glower and make Stark's sunglasses jab him in the eye, but now she was seriously reconsidering her opinion on him.
Erik didn't seem to care or really even notice the way other Slytherins muttered, "Mudblood," in his wake, or the way they glared at and shunned him, or even when they called him, "Xavier's pet," but when a sneering 6th year had tried to cast a knee-reversal hex on him, he had pushed another Slytherin boy in front of him, pointed his wand at the chandelier, and caused the whole thing to come shuddering down as a huge metal spider that pinned the whimpering 6th year boy to the ground.
A few other older Slytherin boys draw their wands at that point, and the spider turns and clicks menacingly at them. Ten minutes later, Professor Snape is glaring (much scarier than the other Slytherins) at a defiant looking Erik who is standing next to his metal spider, with the five older boys sprawled out on the ground around him in varying states of pain (Erik had been very quick in ducking, rolling, shoving his opponents into the line of fire, and directing his spider to bite and snap, and she wonders where he learned all of that).
"What is the meaning of this?" Professor Snape asked coldly.
The older boys groaned and looked away (it had to be embarrassing to be beaten by a first year), the other Slytherins were shuffling around nervously (since when could a first year do that?), and Professor Snape looked furious enough to go ahead and give everyone detention until the end of the school year. She was beginning to consider explaining when Armando suddenly spoke up.
"Sir, Capulet tried to hex Erik, so Erik was trying to defend himself, then Capulet's friends got involved when it looked Capulet got trapped by the spider, and then Erik fought them off," Armando said, stepping forward.
Professor Snape's mouth curved into a sneer, "Is this true?" he addressed a miserable looking Capulet with a puffed up face (she thought he had been in the line of fire for a Stinging Hex), "Were you beaten by a first year?"
"Stupid Mudblood set some spider on me," Capulet muttered angrily.
Professor Snape's mouth tightened, "And with all of your prodigious skills, you couldn't even beat a spider?" he drawled, "You couldn't have perhaps vanished it? Transfigured it into something else? Levitated it elsewhere?"
"Well, yeah I guess—"
"But instead you cowered like a little girl confronted with a cockroach," Professor Snape finished contemptuously.
Capulet flushed red and turned his head away.
"Detention for all of you every night with Mr. Filch for the next two months, and after that hopefully you will be able to show the basic competence of perhaps a fourth year," Professor Snape declared, eyes sweeping disdainfully around the five older boys, "Any further trouble, and I will be forced to personally oversee your detentions, and I assure you I have better things to do with my time, and I will therefore be very displeased. Take yourselves to Madam Pomfrey for the time being. And as for you Mr. Lehnsherr, clean up this mess and report to my office."
Professor Snape sweeps out of the room, the older boys sulkily limp out, and Capulet turns to glare at Erik only to be faced with the flashing pincers of the spider and runs away. Erik calmly points at the spider with his wand, and the spider skitters back up to the ceiling, settles in, and lights up.
"Aren't you going to turn it back?" Pepper finally opens her mouth to ask as Erik turns to leave.
"I don't know how," Erik replies shortly and then turns to Armando, "Why did you talk?'
The other boy grins, "Not exactly fair is it, five sixth years against one first year?"
"If you cared about fairness, you should have gone to Hufflepuff," Erik retorted.
Armando shrugs, "The Hat did consider putting me there, but in the end I thought I would do better here. I'm good at adapting to situations; my friends call me Darwin."
"The Muggle scientist that studied evolution," Erik said, studying Armando carefully, "You are a half-blood."
"Mother believes in a balanced education; she's a Muggle science teacher," Armando said easily, "That's not going to be a problem around here, is it?" he asks, pointedly looking around the room.
The other Slytherins refuse to meet Armando's eye (blood purity is the basis of Slytherin house, but so is power), but Pepper has had enough of this (honestly, if he could do spells non-verbally as a first year, did it matter anymore where he came from?), and she snaps, "Obviously not; it's magic that counts, not blood."
Erik flashes a shark-like grin at everyone around the room as he waved at the chandelier spider that was clicking above them, "Then we'll be fine."
The next day, Professor Snape assigns Erik and her to be Potions partners.
While she is crushing the snake fangs, she asks, "How did your meeting with Professor Snape go?"
Erik gives her a long-suffering look, "Don't start," he mutters, measuring out the Flobberworm mucus.
"Because you already had a discussion with Charles Xavier about it?" she asks shrewdly, mixing the dried nettles into the potion.
Erik looks vaguely startled, "How—?"
She smirks, mixing in the snake fangs, "I don't think anyone missed the sight of a Ravenclaw making a Slytherin sit down with him at breakfast and having a frantic conversation that involved a lot of gesturing toward Professor Snape and a few injured Slytherins."
Erik nods grudgingly, lifting the cauldron up and adding the porcupine quills, "We talked."
"He wasn't happy?" she guessed, pouring in the stewed horned slugs.
"He's Charles," he replied dismissively, turning up the heat, "He doesn't like fighting. Why do you want to know?" he asked suspiciously.
"I just wanted to make sure my potions partner isn't distracted when in trouble with a professor or fighting with his best friend," she replies lightly, leaning over to take the cauldron off the heat as the Boil-Cure Potion turned red.
He snorted, keeping the heat steady, "I'm not in trouble; I was just advised to talk to Flitwick about extra lessons. And Charles and I are not fighting; worry about yourself. If we continue to heat this until it turns pink, it'll be more effective."
She sits back and smiles at him, "I look forward to working with you, Erik Lehnsherr."
It's fun being at Hogwarts. True, Erik isn't in the same house (and he had seemed to have some problems in Slytherin, but now everyone had learned to either tolerate him or was just plain terrified, and Charles should probably disapprove, but he prefers people to be scared of Erik instead of attempting to curse him), Raven's not here (but like they promised they visit every weekend for at least an hour, and even if she seems lonely, she does seem unharmed), he has a tendency to fall asleep in Astronomy (it's at midnight, he can't help it), the Defense Against Dark Arts professor is odd ("Drippy," Erik deems her, "Children, today we will be learning about the music of the night and how it affects us all!"), History of Magic was rather dull even for him (everyone needs his rather subpar notes), and flying lessons are a total disaster (he manages to figure out how to change directions slowly, but he had ended up in the hospital wing when Madam Hooch had insisted them on going faster. Professor Snape had evidently had to intervene before Erik had set his chandelier spider on the flying instructor), but everything else is lovely. Transfiguration and Charms are his favorite subjects, he's learning so many new things in Herbology (they didn't have half these plants in the mansion), and he really loves Potions (even if Professor Snape has a tendency to take points off for rather minor mistakes and seems to dislike experimentation).
"Can I see your star-chart Erik?"
"Hey Pepper, did you learn the Confundus charm today?"
"Stark. We don't learn that until fourth or fifth year, I believe."
"Well you must have learned it, and you must be using it on me, or are you just naturally mind-blowing?"
"…I think that was the most terrible one yet."
"No, no, I thought the 'Being without you is like being afflicted by the Cruciatus Curse' was rather worse."
In addition, he is meeting many new people, which considering how before the only people he had ever met around his age were pureblood heirs and Erik and Raven (and Cain he supposes, who he has heard is fitting right in to Smeltings), is nearly as exciting as the classes (and the library! He had not quite yet managed to charm or persuade Madam Pince to let him into the Restricted Section, but perhaps if he mastered Switching Spells soon, Professor McGonagall could be convinced to give him a permission slip).
Pepper Potts is an efficient girl, neatly making lists of assignments and homework and using different colored ink to carefully underline key sections of her notes. She is unflappably calm for the most part, casually blocking any spells thrown her way (it seemed that sneak attacks were still common in Slytherin) with a surprisingly vicious Tarantallegra, and is never fazed by Erik's bad moods or sarcastic comments. (He's a little amazed that she hasn't run away screaming from their group, but Pepper simply raises an eyebrow and tells him that in terms of competition and insanity, Hogwarts had nothing on her old all-girls primary wizarding school) Plus, he's never met someone who could completely ignore Tony before (unfortunately for Pepper, this only inflames Tony's passion towards her, and Charles occasionally felt like stunning Tony so that he wouldn't give them any more brain damage from terrible pick-up lines).
Armando Munoz, also known as Darwin (such an excellent nickname), is good-natured and seems skilled in every subject. He is absolutely elated when he finds out that Darwin's mother is a Muggle science teacher; he's never really been able to ask anyone about Muggle inventions and science before (Erik only has vague memories, Tony starts talking about semi-conductors and super-computers and eventually Charles can only understand every other word in Tony's enraptured speech, and Pepper's dad had been a Muggleborn wizard thoroughly entrenched in the wizarding world). Darwin can't answer all of his questions, but he does promise to owl his mom for books, and he absolutely cannot wait until they arrive. (It's also good that Erik has another friend in Slytherin; he did worry with all the rumors he heard. He feels reassured that someone else has Erik's back besides Pepper, especially since Darwin can cast three Leek Jinxes in a row with his back turned).
Besides their odd study group, Charles had also met an interesting Hufflepuff named Logan Howlett. Although by met, it was more like he and Tony had been the only ones willing to partner with the wild-looking boy in joint Ravenclaw-Hufflepuff Herbology classes (Ravenclaws always had joint classes with Hufflepuffs, never Slytherin. Erik had suggested once that that was because the teachers were scared that with Ravenclaw intelligence and Slytherin cunning, the students would do a coup-d'état and take over the class). Everyone at this point had heard about the first year in Hufflepuff who had punched, kicked, and bit his way out of a group of bullying Gryffindors, shrugging off spells as though they were mosquito bites. The World's Most Vicious little Hufflepuff still hasn't spoken more than maybe thirty words to either of them, but Charles chalks that up to Tony being annoying ("If I built a flamethrower that used Incendio, do you think it'd do twice the damage? Do you think Pepper would be impressed?"). Logan seems to be a bit surly and taciturn ("A bit? Charles, I don't think anyone has heard the Wolverine say anything besides, 'Thanks,' 'Hey,' 'Back off,' and 'Fuck you.'"), and the one time both he and Erik had met in flying lessons had somehow resulted in Erik with a broken nose and Logan stuck in a tree ("Were you trying to send him into the Whomping Willow?" "Maybe."), but he does his part of Herbology projects in a timely if terse fashion, so Charles is willing to cut him some slack.
All in all, he's having a wonderful time.
December 1986
Erik is slightly annoyed, and he's not entirely sure why, which only serves to make him feel more annoyed.
The first term had gone well; there is still the occasional insult and curse, but after he had transformed nearly all of the Slytherin common room's chandeliers into metal spiders (he still doesn't know how to turn them back, and Snape doesn't seem to care), and Pepper and Darwin had hit a few people with their favored spells, the attacks have mostly laid off. Classes are fine; Transfiguration is a bit difficult with anything besides metal to metal (which is unfortunate when their main task is to change matchsticks into needles), Charms is interesting (and Professor Flitwick had been astounded over the spider chandeliers that Snape had shown him, so he got more advanced work to do, which had made Charles ever so pleased at him), Potions isn't that bad since Snape will never take points off of his own house (which he acknowledges is a bit unfair given the amount of sheer effort Charles puts in that results occasionally in explosions and negative points but mostly results in innovations, such as a Boil-Cure Potion that also cures acne that Snape only grudgingly accepts), flying lessons are fun if not especially helpful, Herbology is dull but tolerable, History of Magic is his biweekly nap (supplemented by Charles' hazy notes), although the less said about Defense Against the Dark Arts ("You have to believe in the power of love!") and Astronomy (mostly spent prodding Charles awake) the better. Most of his free-time is spent exploring the castle with Charles, followed occasionally by Pepper (and therefore Tony) and Darwin ("Do you think we could install moving staircases in the Xavier Mansion?" "You and Raven would enjoy it far too much.") He had spent most of the Halloween Feast talking Charles out of interrupting the band of dancing skeletons for research questions ("Charles, no one is going to appreciate you interrupting the skeletons." "But Erik, think of the possibilities!" "I am, and they all end with you getting hexed by an annoyed fan."), and when he had gone to watch some of the Slytherin Quidditch games, he is sure that he can make Beater next year given that their current ones only ever seem to manage to hit a Bludger at someone by accident. They're on Christmas Break now, reunited with a joyful Raven, and they have no homework, and yet Erik feels slightly irritated every time Charles opens his mouth to talk.
"And so Tony and I tried to talk to Grey Lady, but she floats away any time we try to ask her questions," Charles complains, regaling Raven with stories from Hogwarts, "Tony was thinking about building a machine that could trap ghosts, but I said that that was quite—Erik, my friend, is something wrong?"
Erik starts, focusing back on a confused looking Charles, "I'm fine, why?"
"It's just you had the oddest expression on your face; are you sure you're feeling alright?" Charles asks worriedly, reaching out to touch his forehead.
Erik lets Charles take his temperature and rolls his eyes, "I feel fine," he replies shortly, batting Charles' hand away, "Stop fussing."
"Alright then," Charles says giving him one more worried look before turning back to Raven and continuing, "Anyway, and then we went to go meet Logan, who everyone ridiculously calls Wolverine honestly, in the library to finish up the project for Herbology…"
(And there it is again, that stab of irritation, that thought of resentment, that feeling of Look at me look at me, which he thinks is childish. He spends nearly all of his time with Charles; it's been that way for a long time. Why he feels annoyed cannot be because of jealousy because that is just stupid and childish and—)
"Are you done sulking yet?" Raven asks, leaning over his chair to peer at him.
"I'm not sulking; I'm thinking," Erik shot back, well-aware that his argument was weakened by his pinched expression and moody crouch in the armchair.
Raven shrugged, "Well, whenever you're done 'thinking,' come help me hide Charles' present. I need to find a new hiding place."
(It had been Charles' idea the first Christmas, hiding the gifts around the mansion and then searching for them Christmas morning, mostly because the sight of six presents beneath the huge tree was just slightly pathetic. It always ends with Erik finding his presents first since Charles and Raven are easy to predict, Charles giving up and digging through Erik's mind to find the locations, and Raven turning the house upside down until either she finds it or they are forced outside by either Sharon or Kurt, in which they tell Raven where the presents are and then promptly start a snowball fight.)
He sighs and stands up, "What did you get him?"
"A model of the universe since I keep hearing how terrible he is at Astronomy," Raven said, lifting up the wrapped gift to show him, "How about you?"
He had gotten Charles a lavishly illustrated edition of Idylls of the King, and he had been sure that Charles would love it, but that had been before Darwin had given Charles a huge stack of biology textbooks right before they had left and Erik had thought Charles was about to have an epileptic fit of joy. (Should he even bother? It feels as though he is being replaced—)
"Ookay, you're really out of it, so I'll go hide your presents myself, and you can sit there and go brood at Charles' gift," Raven remarks, patting Erik on the shoulder before running off.
He considers the modestly wrapped package for a few more moments before sighing and walking up the stairs to discreetly tuck it into a bookshelf in the library. It was too late to try to go buy another gift; he's not even sure what he could find to top a stack of biology textbooks. (And he's still not entirely sure why this is so important, and he just feels out of sorts and annoyed.)
The next day, he's in the solarium, shredding the wrapping paper of Charles' earnestly but badly wrapped package to reveal Beater's gloves, when he feels the familiar sensation of Charles giving up and walking through his mind to figure out where he hid the present.
You didn't even last two hours this year, he remarks affectionately, trying on the gloves.
The mansion is too big, and you hide things too well, Charles protests, flipping through Erik's memories of the past day, Oh you hid it in the library, honestly Erik how was I supposed to find it there—hold on, what's this?
Too late, Erik realizes that he had forgotten to cover up his odd feelings (that are not jealousy because jealousy is stupid and childish) with the reflective metal that he used to close off the parts of his mind he didn't especially want Charles stumbling into (Charles doesn't need his nightmares), and projects frantically, Charles, wait—
You're jealous! Charles exclaims, a feeling of delight (fizzy bubbles like a carbonated drink) bubbling through.
I am not! he protests, running down the hallway and up the stairs to the library, Jealousy is childish and dumb and I've just been feeling out of sorts—
Erik, we're eleven, we're allowed to be childish, Charles states with amusement, And you are! Jealous I mean. Just because Darwin gave me biology textbooks and Tony and Logan have more classes with me doesn't mean that you are not my best friend.
I know that! Erik snaps as he steps into the library, It's not that, it's just—
"Erik, this is beautiful!" Charles exclaimed, running up to him and clutching his present, "You will read it to me, won't you?"
"Aren't you too old for that now?" Erik asks, feeling slightly off-balance and wondering when he's ever going to be able to finish a sentence.
"I will never be too old for that," Charles replies, hugging him, "You are the only one who reads Arthurian legends properly. You are also the only one who can keep me awake for Astronomy, the only one who listens to me talk about Muggle sciences and doesn't fall asleep, and the only one who isn't scared of my Legilimency. No one could ever replace you," he tells Erik seriously.
Erik swallows (and he knows Charles can feel the warm feeling those words bring, which just makes it even more embarrassing) and mutters, "Happy Christmas Charles."
Charles beams up at him, "Happy Christmas, my friend. Now, let's go find Raven's presents to us and then try making an abominable snowman!"
(Raven laughs until Erik wonders how she is not suffocating when Charles forces him to apologize and explain to her exactly why he had been so moody and irritable lately.
"That's just rich!" she giggles, wiping away tears, "I should have gotten you a Best Friends Forever necklace instead of that deck of Exploding Snap!"
And while both he and Charles are unsuccessful in getting their snowman to do anything besides tip its hat, they do figure out how to enchant snowballs to zoom over and hit Raven and each other. Raven gets back at them by climbing up trees and shaking snow down onto their heads, and when they stumble back into the house, they're all completely soaked, breathless, and agreeing that this was one of their best Christmases ever.)
February 1987
Tony was trying to add another foot to his Defense Against the Dark Arts essay by writing about how the Wand-Lighting spell symbolized light shining in the darkness as a beacon of hope that would inspire people to stand up to the dark (Professor Merryweather ate this stuff up) when Erik marched into the Ravenclaw common room, expression thunderous and holding a broomstick.
"Erik, my man! What are you doing here? Do you think if I call Lumos 'the star that is the pinnacle of our hopes and dreams' that Merryweather will realize that I'm completely making this shit up?"
"Merryweather will love it," Erik snapped, eyes scanning the circular room, "Where is Charles?"
"He's probably down at the library," Tony replied, scribbling away, "Why? Don't you guys have some psychic mind connection that lets you know where the other one is?"
"That is utterly ridiculous Tony," Charles commented, stepping through the door with a stack of books, "Legilimency is very different from the Muggle idea of a psychic, and there is no such thing as a mind connection—"
"I can't take this," Erik interrupted, brandishing the broomstick in front of him.
Charles frowned, setting the books on the table, "Why not? Is there something wrong with it? Raven assured me that this was a pretty good broom, but if it's actually not—"
"You can't just buy me a Cleansweep 7!" Erik said angrily.
"I don't see why not," Charles calmly stated, sitting down at the table, "It is your birthday, and next year you will be playing Beater, and frankly the brooms in the Xavier Mansion are only meant for practice and not for an actual match—"
"I was going to buy my own broom!" Erik cut in furiously, stalking forward to the table, "Just because you have more money than me does not mean that I'm your poor friend that you have to pay for with your family's money—"
"First of all," Charles interrupted, blue eyes blazing in a way that kind of made Tony want to quietly leave and go bother Pepper, but Starks don't run, "I didn't use the family money. It turns out that Madam Primpernelle's at Diagon Alley is extremely happy to buy my Boil-Acne Cure Potions, and she paid well for them. Second of all, Raven and I bought you a broom not out of pity or anything like that, but because you need a good broom if you want to play on the Slytherin Quidditch team next year, and I want to see you play as well as you can. And third of all, it's your birthday, and I am perfectly allowed to give you a broom for your birthdays."
"Yeah dude," Tony butted in, seeing that Erik seemed to be at a loss for words, "Just accept the gift already! It's rude to do anything else."
"You have your own money from selling potions?" Erik asked confusedly, ignoring Tony, "Why didn't I know about this?"
Charles quirked his eyebrow, drawing out some parchment, "We wanted to surprise you. There's not enough money lying around the mansion to buy a broom, and we couldn't access Gringotts without mother's wand, and then I got an owl from Madam Primpernelle telling me she would pay for the potions, so I sold her a few batches over the course of this term. We were worried that we wouldn't make enough for the broom before your birthday, but we managed. Raven was the one who picked out the broom, if you have a complaint there."
Erik opened and closed his mouth a few times, before saying tightly, "It's a good broom. Thank you Charles."
"Make sure to thank Raven as well," Charles replied, smiling at him, "Although I'm sure she'll be expecting an appropriate gift as well next year for all her efforts."
"You Xaviers are so spoiled," Erik said heavily before gesturing out the window, "Want to come with me to the Quidditch pitch and see how well this flies?"
"Please go," Tony quickly said before Charles could open his mouth, "This essay is due in an hour, and I need another foot, and you guys can go kiss and make up somewhere else."
Charles rolls his eyes as he walks out with Erik, "See if I ever tell Pepper to not hex you anymore."
Tony snorts as he attempts to finish the stupid essay. One day Pepper will bend to his charms, and then he'll smugly rub it in Charles' disbelieving face. Or Raven will agree to go out with him, and then he'll probably have to use one of his robots to block Erik's rage, unless Erik and Charles confess their undying love to each other around the same time, and then he can finally collect the running bet that he so sneakily, with the help of Raven and an amused Pepper, set up in the various houses. Either ways, he wins.
June 1987
Erik kept telling him that he didn't have anything to worry about, but Charles was adamantly disagreeing with his friend's opinion. He hadn't memorized all of the goblin rebellions yet, the Charms, Transfiguration, and Potions exams could be on anything, his Knock-back Jinx was still weak (this could be because Professor Merryweather never actually let them practice spells on anything, but that was besides the point), there were too many plants that looked alike in Herbology (especially when you were studying at 1 in the morning), and he was going to utterly fail Astronomy because his star charts were always inaccurate.
"You're not going to fail Charles, keep breathing," Erik replied, frowning at his own Transfiguration notes.
"That's easy for you to say," Charles snapped, turning the page of his Herbology book, "You don't even have to worry about Charms with all the extra credit you have, and Transfiguration will most likely involve something metal, and Professor Snape is hardly going to fail a Slytherin in Potions, and Professor Merryweather is too scared of you to fail you, and you're actually awake in Astronomy and—"
"And if you don't take a breath soon I'm going to have to take you to the Hospital Wing," Erik said, patting Charles on the back, "Like I said, I think you're going to be fine. The only person with more notes than you is Pepper, and that's only because she's busy copying things out of textbooks."
"My god, I should be doing that as well!" Charles said frantically, grabbing the nearest textbook, "Erik, hand me that—"
Erik put a hand on top of Charles' book and carefully tugged it out of his grasp, "Tomorrow is your first exam, and it's late. Go to bed."
"But Erik!" Charles complained, standing on his tip-toes to try and reach the book that Erik was holding over his head, "Herbology is tomorrow, and if I don't go over the plants again—"
"You'll still know all of them by sight tomorrow morning, and you'll still be reading your notes at breakfast while I force you to eat," Erik responded, levitating up all of Charles' study materials and packing them in his bag, "Bed, now."
Charles grudgingly takes the bag from Erik and then asks pointedly, "Aren't you taking your own advice?"
"Some of us never actually heard Professor Binns lecture," Erik replied drily, waving his sheaf of copied History of Magic notes, "I better stay here and memorize the rest of this."
Charles considers protesting but he is tired (he's been studying non-stop for the past two weeks, and he can't actually remember when he last saw his bed) and he probably should get some rest before all the final exams start, so he yawns and asks, "But you will sleep soon?"
"Eventually," Erik says, waving him away, "Go."
When all the exams are finally over, and he is sitting with Erik by the lake with a book after the end-of-year feast (Gryffindor had won this year, since Slytherin had Erik who almost always talked back to the professors, Hufflepuff had Logan who was a little terror, and Ravenclaw had him blowing up things in Potions and making Professor Snape extremely displeased), he is willing to perhaps admit that he had been overreacting just a tiny bit. Transfiguration and Charms had been simple affairs (he was very proud of his ornate mouse-turned-snuffbox, and he had made the pineapple do a can-can), Herbology had been easy, he had written pages for History of Magic, Professor Merryweather had seemed to be grading on some sort of scale involving how sparkly the spells were, and his star-charts for Astronomy had been if not entirely accurate, at least close.
"Read me the story of Gareth and Lynette?" he asked Erik, pushing Idylls of the King into his lap and settling into Erik's side.
Erik gave him a long-suffering look (Such a brat, his mind whispers warmly), but still proceeded to open the book and begin, "The last tall son of Lot and Bellicent, and tallest, Gareth, in a showerful spring…"
A/N: First year is done! The book Erik got Charles was Idylls of the King by Tennyson.