Chapter Seven: School Life
The sorting is finished, the feast about to begin, but first Garnet- or rather, Professor Abeni- must give a speech.
It is, as Steven expected, short and to-the-point. Garnet outlays rules for students both new and old. The Forbidden Forest is exactly that— forbidden. Curfew begins at nine at night, and ends at seven in the morning. There is a full list of contraband items to be found on the caretaker's door. However, in particular, Professor Magpantay would like to stress that anyone found using or possessing love potions will risk expulsion.
And finally: anyone who does not want to die should avoid the right hand third-floor corridor.
This last comment causes a stir of surprise and confusion among the older students. Steven's kinda confused too— he's never heard of any out-of-bounds corridors before. Garnet doesn't offer any explanation, but he figures he can ask her about it later.
"But enough of that," Garnet finishes, her tone turning lighter. "Now, let's have some fun!"
She raises her hand, and the tables fill with food. Everybody roars with delight as they settle into the masses of chicken, potatoes, gravy, sausages and roasted vegetables.
oOo
Sunlight falls on Steven's face, waking him with a start.
Not real sunlight, though. Fake, illusionary sunlight, streaming through magical windows, which are magical because the Hufflepuff dorms are underground, and he's in the Hufflepuff dorms because he's at Hogwarts and ohmygoshthisissocool!
Within moments he's rolled out of the bed and has rushed to his trunk, eager to get dressed. First he puts on his favourite jean shorts and star t-shirt, even though he knows no one will be able to see them, just for good luck. Over them he pulls his proper wizard robes, black and cool and mysterious. Then, it's the time for the tie. It was plain white when he bought it; only now has it transformed to bear the house colours of gold and black. He grins at it proudly, wondering how it'll look around his neck.
"Uh," he says, suddenly. "Anyone know how to put on a tie?"
He's met by a chorus of groans. Turns out that none of his fellow dorm mates were actually awake yet. Whoops.
As they mumble and roll into reluctant consciousness, Steven finds other things to do. He's been told that he doesn't have to make the bed, because house elves will do it for him, which is really, really nice. Still, he takes the time to arrange his plushies and stuffed animals into sitting positions, because his friends shouldn't have to wait to be comfy, and the elves won't know their favourite positions yet. Then he thinks he should probably write a note to the elves, introducing himself and thanking them.
He rustles around in his trunk for parchment, ink and quill. He holds them up victoriously, then scrawls a friendly greeting letter. He's not very good with quills yet, so the writing's kind of messy, but readable. At least, he hopes it's readable. He also hopes he'll get to meet some of the house elves.
By the time that he's finished, the other boys in the dorm are finally up and moving. Since it's a small year, there's only two others. There's Jay, a cheerful boy with black hair and brown skin, who's first move when they'd gotten in late last night had been to plaster his walls with posters of the Holyhead Harpies. The other is Peedee, a boy that Steven had chatted happily with at the feast, but who had hit his wall hard by the time they'd gone to bed. He's looking a little more awake now as he drags a brush through his thick blonde curls.
Steven bounces on the bed as he waits. It's so soft. And covered in a gorgeous patch-work quilt. The room around him is circular, with walls of warm brown and yellow brick, cheerful plants growing in pots along the wall. It's very different from the airy loft bedroom he has at home, but Steven adores it regardless.
"What class are you most excited for?" he asks, while his new friends are pulling on their socks.
"Breakfast," says Peedee. When the others protest that's not a class, he relents, "Probably charms."
"I wanna try transfiguration," says Jay. "Just go boom!-" he flicks his wand dramatically— "and turn a chair into a bear!"
Steven nods. That sounds awesome. But he knows what would be even more awesome! "Care of Magical Creatures!"
"You can't take that till third year," Peedee points out as he ties his shoes.
"Oh. Right." Steven droops, but only momentarily. "I bet we can still visit the animals though!"
Everyone gathers their bags for the day, filled with books, parchment and stationary. Steven hesitates for a moment, then grabs his ukulele too, because why not? You never know when you'll need some music.
They set out to find their way to washroom, then the common rooms. It's a little bit tricky; they're all linked by a complicate series of earthen tunnels, and they get a little lost. Thankfully, one of the older students gets them back on track, and promises they'll learn their way around soon enough. Eventually they make it to the main common room. It looks even nicer in the day time, filled with magically bright sunlight, huge arm-chairs and cosy beanbags, and wooden carvings of badgers on the walls. It's dominated by a huge portrait of their founder herself, Helga Hufflepuff. Her face is warm and friendly, and it reminds Steven a little of his Mum.
There's not a lot of people there yet. The older students aren't in any particular rush, but the girl first years are just as eager and anxious as the boys. There's four of them; Diane, Mona, Hayley, and Victoire. Also there waiting for them is Kiki, a prefect who'll be leading them back to the Great Hall to make sure they don't get lost.
"Especially since you boys have already managed it once this morning," Kiki says, with a playful laugh.
The Great Hall is a flurry of activity— there are students running this way and that, greeting old friends, the air is filled with ghosts, owls, and the delicious smell of hot food. Breakfast is delicious— bread, jelly, honey, bacon, sausages, four kinds of eggs, huge pitchers filled with milk and pumpkin juice. Despite being thoroughly stuffed by last night's feast, they somehow find room for more, and the biggest struggle is managing to eat and talk at the same time.
About fifteen minutes in, they're interrupted by a witch tapping them on the shoulders. "Schedules!"
The witch turns out to be Professor Pizza, Hufflepuff Head of House. She might be no taller than Steven himself, but she's ancient, with sharp, sparkling eyes. She already knows all her new students by name when she hands out their schedules. She orders them to eat up: they're growing and they need all the food they can get.
Steven pours over his schedule with interest. First class; potions.
oOo
Steven had known that potions class was in the held dungeons. What he didn't realise how big the dungeons actually are. Corridor after corridor twisting like a maze, flickering torch light casting strange shadows on the stones, past seemingly endless doors that all look identical.
By the time he and his fellow Hufflepuffs finally arrive, all the Slytherin students are all seated with their stuff out, and Pearl is waiting impatiently to start. She shoots them a withering glare as they slink in.
"Sorry, Pearl," says Steven. "We got lost."
Her expression softens. "Well, it happens," she sighs. "But do try to be on time next class. Now. Potions. This is not a class of wand waving and flashing lights. Potions in a subject of subtly and precision, of calculations and consideration. The proper potion can allow you to to call luck or dispel fear, to heal a bleeding wound or cause a sudden death…."
Steven tries to pay attention. He really does.
It's just. Pearl's in Lecture Mode. And Steven can't help but get distracted, because the classroom is so interesting. Stark walls of black brick, torches lit with strange blue fire, the smell of stone, water, and something else, strange and old. Along the back wall, behind the chalk board, there is a huge shelf filled with row after row of carefully labelled glass jars filled with brightly coloured potion ingredients. (That doesn't surprise Steven at all. Organising stuff is one of Pearl's favourite things in the whole world).
There are the other students. Steven looks over from the Hufflepuffs to the Slytherins, finally getting a good look at them. There's nine in total this year, five boys and four girls. Some are dark, some are pale; some tall, some short; some chatting under their breath, some doodling on their parchment, others studiously taking notes.
One of the notetakers is the Connie Maheswaran. The girl from Diagon Alley, with the bracelet. Steven tenses. He has it in his bag, right now. If he was only sitting closer!
But no, she's on the other side of the classroom. And besides, she's working hard, eyes furrowed as she listens to Pearl and wrestles with his quill. He can't distract her.
Wait! Pearl! He's meant to be paying attention.
"…so, let's begin," says Pearl. The room bustles into sudden activity. Books are flipped open, knives and scalpels pulled out, and herbs fly to each work station with a flick of Pearl's wand. Steven stares at everything with open confusion.
"Uh," he whispers to Peedee. "What are we supposed to do?"
Peedee sighs, but helps Steven set up his cauldron.
oOo
"Alright, kiddos," begins Amethyst, leaning on the blackboard at the front of the classroom. "Welcome to transfiguration. I'm Professor Jones, least around the other teachers. In here, you can call me Amethyst if you want. Or whatever."
She shrugs, the picture of indifference. An excited, surprised murmur goes up through the classroom. A professor who doesn't want to be called professor? Who has purple skin, and wears a matching violet cloak with tears in it so big that they can see the jeans underneath?
Steven's just glad he can use her name. He's already slipped up and called Pearl 'Pearl' twice in class, and she had to tell him off about it. ("In lessons, you're a student just like any other, and I can't go around giving you special treatment.")
"Okay," Amethyst says. "Can anyone tell me what, exactly, transfiguration is?"
A hand shoots up. It belongs to one of the boys wearing a Ravenclaw blue tie. Amethyst snaps a finger at him, and he answers, "It's the magic of rearranging matter into another form."
"A little wordy, but yeah," Amethyst agrees. "Basically, it's turning one thing into another. Like this."
She waves her wand, and suddenly, the ink pot sitting on her desk is a frog. Startled screams go up when it jumps at the first row; the second it lands, Amethyst waves her wand again, and the frog turns back into its original form. Only a slight splatter of black ink suggests anything had happened at all.
"Or this," Amethyst says again, and then Peedee's hair has turned into what looks like a giant pumpkin. Amethyst laughs at his shocked expression before transforming it back.
"Or this." This time, she doesn't wave her want at all; her skin just changes, instantly, from purple to dark black.
An awed murmur washes through the classroom. Steven's grinning ear from ear. He's seen it all before, but he's still enjoying the show. In an instant Amethyst's skin is back to purple, but her hair is now short and pink, her nose pointed, just like Pearl's. Then her nose is short and stubby, a pig's. Then Amethyst is shrinking, her curves softening, her features shifting; it takes him a moment, but then Steven recognises the shape. It's him. Almost a perfect mirror image, aside from the purple skin and oversized cloak.
The class is clapping in earnest now, and hasn't finished by the time Amethyst is back in her default shape, sitting smug in her chair. Victoire is waving her hand frantically in the air; Amethyst tells her to shoot. "Will we be able to do all that?"
"Ah. Well, not all of it," confesses Amethyst. "Changing my own appearance like that? Without a wand? That's natural skill. I'm a metamorphamagus, and you're either born as one, or you're not.
"But," she continues, suddenly sounding much more professorly. "There are ways to replicate those abilities, with wandwork and spell casting. After seven years, you should be able to turn an ink pot into a toad, or an elephant into a pin. Colour switching, shape changing, size alteration…. It should all be possible, long as you're ready to put in the work. You guys ready?"
There's a chorus of 'yes'es.
This is gonna be awesome!
oOo
Magic is awesome.
Magic school work is boring.
Alright. It's not always boring. Some of the stuff the teachers teach is really interesting, and it can be really fun when they actually get to do stuff. But before you can get to waving your wand, there's a lot of studying to do. History. Background information. Spell pronunciations. The right way to hold your wand.
Steven's never been really good in class. Teachers have always complained that while he's a good kid, he fidgets too much, bursts into song at the wrong moments, gets caught staring out the window or drawing pictures on the desk. He thought it would be easier once he got to Hogwarts, but it isn't!
(Pearl took him aside very early to tell him to stop bringing his ukulele to class. Steven didn't like it, but he agreed. It was kind of bulky, carrying it everywhere, with such long walks between classrooms and so many stairs to climb).
He doesn't want to sound grumpy. There's a lot about lessons he does like! He loves Professor Pizza's wry humour over meals, and wishes he was older so he could take Muggle Studies with her. He loves Professor Flitwick's squeaky voice, and the way he's so patient when demonstrating the charms. He loves how silly the Defence Against the Dark Arts Teacher, Professor Pettigrew is, and how he has some of the best stories to tell. He loves flying lessons, the first chance he's ever had to take a broom higher than a couple feet, even if Professor Smiley is kind of strict. His absolute favourite class is probably Herbology. They get to dig and play with plants, and Professor Longbottom is super nice.
He loves potions and transfiguration too, of course, even if they are really difficult and he has trouble focusing. Sure, he still hasn't managed to change the colour of the block of wood he's been given, and yeah, apparently he keeps almost blowing up his cauldron. But his wand is making cool sparks, and he likes adding ingredients to his potions and watching the colours change and shift. The best part is he gets to hang out with Pearl and Amethyst!
Even if they spend most of the classes lecturing. Even if they're not allowed to give him too much personal time because 'that would be favouritism'. Even if they don't get to spend a lot of time together out of class.
He thought he'd get to see more of them, living at Hogwarts full time. But during the day, he has classes, and they have classes, too. Garnet doesn't teach, not anymore, but she's always busy anyway, doing mysterious Head Mistress duties. He practically only ever sees her at meals.
Students aren't really allowed to go up to the teacher's table. There's no official rule or anything, it just… doesn't happen. Steven doesn't care; once he's finished eating, he likes to go up to the front and chat with Garnet, Amethyst and Pearl, anyway. (And the other teachers too). It's not really the same as when they'd visit home in Beach City, though. They're always getting interrupted and distracted by the other professors, and it's kind of awkward having to stand while everyone else sits.
Sometimes, they invite him to their private quarters after dinner. With all three of them hanging out in either Amethyst or Pearl's room, chatting, playing games, reading stories, it feels a lot like those long, warm nights on the beach.
Most of his free time, though, he spends in the common room with the other Hufflepuffs. That's nice too. All the firsties play Exploding Snap together, or Hangman using the animated toy from Weasley's Wizard Wheezes, or wizard's chess, which Steven isn't very good at. (Also, he really hates watching the pieces beat each other up). Diane has a beautiful set of magical pencils that sparkle and change colour, which she lets him share; he helps braid her hair in return. Jay has a great singing voice, and Steven likes to play the ukulele to accompany him, sometimes playing old songs or improvising old ones on the fly. Everyone will sit together and do homework, helping each other on the difficult bits and groaning at the long, long essays that Professor Binns, the history professor (and ghost), keeps setting them. Kids from all the years settle around the one old radio and get into good natured arguments about what to listen to. Some of the radio shows are fun, and there's some good music, but Steven finds himself really missing TV. He wonders what's happening on The Crying Breakfast Friends. He'll have a lot of catching up to do at Christmas break.
He makes a lot of visits up to the Owlery. He loves visiting the owls, and the owls like him, probably because he keeps bringing them scraps of bread and chips. They fly around him in a flurry, all tickling feathers and sharp talons. All the school birds are eager to help him carry letters.
He writes to Dad a lot. Tells him about Hogwarts; about his classmates, his lessons, that one portrait of dog he likes to play with. He draws him pictures of the school grounds to look at. Greg tells him how proud he is; how proud that he's a Hufflepuff, just like his Mom, and that as long as he tries his best in class, that's what's important. Dad says that everything's fine at the carwash, and that he misses him.
Steven misses Dad right back.
He writes to his old friends from primary school, too. Not directly, of course. There's no way they'd allow an owl to deliver directly to a muggle house. He sends the letters to Dad, who uses muggle mail from there. Those letters are a lot barer. Steven can't tell Angela or Shab or any of the others what subjects he's taking, or about the walking suits of armour, or the Fat Friar, the friendly Hufflepuff ghost. He can't explain why he's writing them by 'snail mail', instead of e-mail or texts. He can tell them even less than he could before. The gap between them widens.
Those letters get less and less frequent as time goes on.
oOo
There's one person Steven really, really, really wants to talk to.
Connie Maheswaran.
It's just. He hasn't found the right time yet. He has her bracelet, she deserves it back as soon as he can, but he just…
The Slytherins share both Potions class and History of Magic class with the Hufflepuffs. Neither of them seem quite right. During potions Steven's always so busy, he never gets the chance to talk to anyone who isn't sitting right at his table, and anyway, Pearl considers it bad safety protocol to leave your cauldron unattended. That's not an issue in History class, of course; all they ever do is listen to Binns talk on and on and on and on. But the ghost had everyone seat in alphabetical order on the very first day, so Connie is three rows ahead and two seats to the left of him. (She's always taking diligent notes, and never seems to get distracted. Steven bets she's really, really smart).
He could catch her after class, but somehow— he always get caught up talking with someone else, and when he remembers to look around, she's gone. And she eats so quickly that it's hard catching her in the Great Hall, too. It can be really hard to pick someone out of a crowd when everyone's wearing the same black robes.
Besides. He doesn't just want to walk up to her and give her the bracelet. He wants to… break the ice someone. Show her something cool.
But what?
His ukulele? What if she doesn't like acoustic? His wand? No, literally everyone has one of those. His cool red bike? No, that's back in Beach City! Uuuuugh.
He's thinking it over after supper one night, watching Connie vanish down the corridor towards the dungeons when he hears a sing-song voice in his ear. "Who you loooooooking at?"
Steven jumps and turns, only to find Amethyst grinning at him. Garnet and Pearl aren't far behind, looking bemused. "No one!"
"Oh? Doesn't sound like no one to me."
"She's— she's just a girl that I know. Except she doesn't know me."
Amethyst gasps. "You like her!"
"Uh… I like everyone," Steven mutters, shuffling his feet. He tries to ignore Amethyst's face splitting grin and Pearl's delighted smile. "It's just— she lost her bracelet in Diagon Alley, I want to return it—"
"Oh, do you mean that Connie girl?" says Pearl. "She's in my house you know, I could easily return it to her—"
"No!" Steven quickly holds his bag tighter. "I wanna do it!"
The three witches exchange a Significant Look. Garnet's the one who steps forward, crouches so that she's closer to Steven's height. She puts her hands on her shoulder, and says, "Just go and talk to her."
So that's what's Steven's gonna do.
He's built up his confidence. He's been preparing in his head. He's got the bracelet in his robe pocket, right next to his wand. It's cold against his hand from the Freezing Charm he got Pearl to place on it the day he left for Hogwarts. It's a warm Saturday afternoon in late September; there's a light breeze ruffling the surface of the lake, some dragonflies are lazily buzzing about, and in the Forbidden Forest leaves are just starting to turn orange. Connie's sitting in the castle's shade, reading a book, not ten feet away.
He's not gonna chicken out. He's gonna do it.
He does last minute rehearsal under his breath. "Hi, I'm Steven. Hey, I'm Steven. Hiya, I'm Steven. Hi, I'm—"
Then, he sees it.
Hogwarts is old. Ancient. A mighty structure build thousands of years ago from dark grey rock, held together by magic. And while carefully maintained, that age still shows. And at time, becomes dangerous.
High above, a huge chunk of a gargoyle gives, and the rock comes crashing down, right towards where Connie is sitting.
Steven doesn't think. Doesn't hesitate, doesn't stop, just rushes forward, jumping at the girl, and—-
oOo
Author's Note: Next chapter summary: Connie. Connie connie connie connie connie connie.
PS. Connie.