"Hurry up there, you'll miss breakfast!" Professor McGonagall's crisp Scottish accent rang out in the corridors, speeding up a gaggle of dawdling first years. "Ah, Amelia. Sleep well?"
Amelia had indeed slept well, a hitherto unaccustomed feat in a new home; she had risen early and spent a good hour establishing routes to and from the classrooms marked on her timetable and her allotted rooms, along with several other key locations within the castle. She had just emerged from a portrait of an irritable looking witch who appeared to have lost her cat.
"Indeed. That's one hell of a secret passage – I was outside Herbology."
Minerva couldn't help but smile. She had taken a liking to the newest addition to the faculty, for all her unusual talents.
"Was Pomona there?" Amelia barely had time to register the flash of amusement on her friend's face before it was concealed behind a tight-lipped smile.
"Potions is that way, Bottomley – in the Dungeons, not the Astronomy Tower."
A terrified second-year scurried back in the direction from which he'd come.
"She was, as a matter of fact," replied Amelia, expression carefully blank. "She looked a little… delicate".
Minerva made a noise that could have been a snort of laughter but which would have been interpreted by any of the passing students as a perfunctory cough.
"She doesn't drink particularly often, but when she does…" she waved her hand in a dismissive manner. "Shall we join the masses for breakfast?"
As they made their way across the Great Hall Amelia spied her cousin bickering with her two best friends and gave her a quick wink.
"You're close to your cousin, aren't you?" asked Minerva over a bowl of muesli. "Pass the fruit? Oh, thank you Filius."
Amelia nodded, "We always were, both bookish and quiet," …and lonely, she added privately. She buttered some toast.
"And now?"
"She's all I have left," Amelia said, watching as the Weasley twins did their best to entertain her cousin.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to –"
It was Amelia's turn to wave away a comment. "It's fine, really."
Embarrassed, Minerva turned to Filius and Amelia was left to her toast. A few minutes passed in contemplative crunchiness before a new voice jolted her out of her thoughts.
"Pass the eggs?" It was her friend from the train.
"Sorry, I was miles off," she said, passing the plate across.
"I could see." There was that sparkle of joviality again, behind his weariness. They spent a few minutes in companionable silence before Remus was presented his timetable by Professor Vector.
"Hmm. Double fifth years, I suspect they'll be less than co-operative," he said, examining the parchment. Amelia chuckled.
"What?"
"You've got the Weasley twins," she indicated along the Gryffindor table to where Fred and George were once again impersonating Percy, making little Ginny turn crimson and attempt to disappear behind her timetable.
"Ah," he said, following her line of sight.
"I've got third years. I suppose the fourth floor is fairly easy to get to?" She'd found it once during her exploration that morning, but half of the stairs had vanished as she'd tried to get back down and she'd been forced to leap from one staircase to the next as it swung past at a leisurely pace.
"Relatively," replied Remus. He wondered vaguely whether the staircase in that part of the castle still tried to corral unsuspecting passengers. "My first class is up there too, I'll walk with you if you want."
"That'd be great – if you don't mind!"
"Not a problem," he smiled.
They finished their breakfast and set off together, passing an exceptionally delicate Madame Pomfrey as they left the Great Hall.
"I never took Muggle Studies, what are you teaching the third years?" he asked as the started up the stairs.
"Attitudes to science and magic, this term. Although I suspect I'll prefer first and fifth years."
"Why?"
"Cultural awareness – experiencing the world through cinema and music."
Remus paused on the third floor staircase to allow the Fat Friar's ghost to glide past.
"Won't you have some difficulty with electricity and magic? They tend not to interact happily…"
"I'd heard," she replied, smiling. Dumbledore had told her, during her interview, that he'd once tried to make a toaster run on magic, with some spectacular results.
"They tend to explode…" continued Remus, apparently concerned for his new friend's limbs; he was looking at her worriedly.
"I'm using clockwork," she said, only just managing to avoid rolling her eyes at him. "Don't worry, Dumbledore said that there wouldn't be a problem. I'm a big girl; I can take care of myself."
They came to a halt outside an empty classroom. He looked at her a little oddly.
"I've no doubt," he said. "Well, this is you…"
"Thanks again."
"Not at all."
Amelia went into the room and got out the course materials; by the time she'd turned back around the werewolf had gone.
0o0o0o0
She spent an enjoyable morning discussing various philosophies of science and magic with Hermione and her classmates, before setting them two rolls of parchment on the evolution of the modern Wicca religion. Once the moans about the amount of homework had died away down the corridor, she took the opportunity to catch up with her cousin.
"Good first lesson Mel!" she said, causing Amelia to beam.
"I hoped so, but it's nice to know. It's a bit weird being this side of the desk… I'm glad it was with you."
Hermione beamed back. "Everyone seemed to really get into it, particularly Ernie Macmillan – he's usually quite quiet."
Amelia nodded, "I'll keep my eye on him. What've you got next?"
"Divination – do you know about my… arrangements?" she asked, quietly.
"Dumbledore informed the staff last night."
"Oh, thank God… I don't think I'd have been able not to tell you," she grinned. "Best be off then." So saying, she removed a golden chain from about her neck, span the delicate pendant and grinning, disappeared from sight.
Amelia shook her head; she'd never get used to this place.
0o0o0o0
After getting the first years off to an appreciable start on the finer points of fantasy writing, Amelia went to secure some lunch in the Great Hall. She was delighted to discover that school dinners were much better in the wizarding world than they had been at her secondary school and was helping herself to a hearty chicken salad when she felt a familiar but unpleasant sensation twitch its way into her subconscious. She glanced up at the Gryffindor table just in time to see Hermione storming away from a puzzled looking Ron and Harry.
"I shouldn't worry too much," said Minerva, who was once again seated beside her. "Sybill told them that Harry was going to die this morning."
Amelia's head snapped around in shock.
"Oh, she predicts the same thing every year, possibly in the hope that she'll be right at least once. Your cousin appears to have decided that it is complete bunkum," Minerva looked faintly proud of her student. She continued more darkly, "Although I think Mr Weasley is less convinced."
0o0o0o0
She spent much of the first half of the next lesson attempting to prevent Fred and George from 'accidentally' setting anything on fire, but once she'd got the rather creaky clockwork wireless in the corner to work they had calmed down considerably. By the time she had covered their long-term project – researching Muggle life through popular music – they were sat with their classmates at their desks, attentively scribbling down assignment parameters, trying to get ahead on their homework.
Consulting her timetable, however, she was more than relieved to discover that she had the rest of the afternoon off. She looked out at the sky: sunshine had broken through the clouds now, and was bathing the grounds in a welcoming light. Amelia decided that she'd earned a damn' good explore, exchanging her good shoes for more robust specimens and leaving her smart robes behind.
There was a light breeze accompanying the sunshine and as she wandered the shore of the Lake, watching the tentacles of the Giant Squid ripple under the surface, she thought that this place could indeed become a very beautiful home. She rather lost track of time as she bimbled, and so it wasn't until dinner that she heard of the rather dramatic events playing out elsewhere in the grounds that afternoon.
0o0o0o0
In the dash between lectures that afternoon, Remus waited by a window that faced out onto the Lake while a rowdy bunch of sixth years ambled passed. He glimpsed a lonely looking figure striding off around the shore and, as the wind brushed her hair back from her pink cheeks, he caught his breath.
Curiouser and curiouser… he thought, as she rounded a curve and headed into the trees of the Forbidden Forest. Vaguely, he wondered whether anyone had given her the usual dire warnings about the woods… and then whether, if they had, she'd pay any attention. Probably not, he decided as he continued to his classroom. He was intercepted at the door by a grave and out of breath Filius Flitwick, who told him that there had been some kind of accident in Hagrid's class and that there would be a staff meeting after dinner.
"Who was hurt?" he asked, concerned. "Are they –"
"Draco Malfoy," the smaller man replied. "He'll live, though he's milking it for all he's worth."
Remus nodded before continuing into his already full class: "So, what do we know about vampires?"
0o0o0o0
The meeting was a sombre one, Remus having filled Amelia in during the meal.
Dumbledore assured everyone that Malfoy would be fine, and Severus that 'the beast' was secure.
Hagrid was in an awful state; he kept muttering to himself: "I tole him not ter insult him, I tole him…"
The school governors were informed of the incident during the meeting, apparently by the portraits of previous headmasters that lined the walls.
Snape left first, with something of a sneer, closely followed by Madame Pomfrey, who needed to tend to Malfoy and was kindly leading Hagrid to her office for a restorative.
As she made her way back to her quarters Amelia reflected on the uncanny ability of teenagers to get themselves in trouble by knowing better than everybody else. Lost in her reverie, she continued along the corridor until the abrupt appearance of the Bloody Baron eventually startled her out of her thoughts. She realised that not only had she been walking for some time, but also that she had no idea where she was; this part of the castle was entirely unfamiliar to her.
She doubled back on herself until she came to a junction where several passageways joined together. Thinking back to earlier in the evening she was somewhat alarmed to discover that she had no recollection of her journey; she was quite lost. Reluctantly, she turned back to discover where her feet had been taking her.
At the end of the corridor was a door leading to an ascending staircase; deciding that an upper window might provide a better clue to her location than her current position, she started up it.
The stairs came out into an extraordinary room: above her, Amelia could see an exquisite and curved model of the solar system, the bronze planets gracefully orbiting their tiny, gold sun. The model continued into an upper room, one or other of the planets disappearing into the upper room with a soft whoosh before arcing gently down again on the other side of the room. The shelves on the lower level were piled high with books and curious metal objects; her eyes rested briefly upon a brass telescope.
Ah, she thought, the Astronomy Tower.
She went, then, into a second room, more full of equipment than the first, and took the spiral staircase to the upper level, the metal cool under her hand.
Amelia was instantly glad that her feet had taken it upon themselves to show her this place. The pale light of the waning moon cast an ethereal glow across the brass and gold apparatus in the room. Amelia crossed to the rail set into the wall and looked out across the lake, her eyes following the shape of the woodland up to the mountains; they didn't seem too far off from up here, perhaps when it was warmer she and Hermione could investigate them.
So enchanting was the view, and so peaceful the night, that Amelia was still stood there a good twenty minutes later, when a bemused Remus Lupin came upon her, having sought peace following the meeting and remembered the excellence of the view from the Tower in his youth.
Doing his best not to startle his new friend, but not quite succeeding, he cleared his throat. Amelia nearly jumped out of her skin. The subsequent few minutes were therefore filled with repeated apologies and laughter before the two of them settled against the rail once more to drink in the view, and they lapsed into a comfortable silence.
The moonlight glittered off the lake below and Amelia thought sadly that if her mother were alive she'd have loved this view. Remus too was recalling those he'd once called family, romping about the castle by night, enjoying midnight feasts courtesy of the house elves, frolicking about the grounds, never quite staying out of trouble. He sighed as he thought of that last autumn and the threat that had hung over them all. Amelia had been watching a flock of bats circling the trees below and flowing past their lofty perch, so she missed his premise.
"Hmm? Sorry…" she apologised, looking sheepish.
"I said it's hard to believe a place this beautiful could be so dangerous."
"You mean Malfoy? Yes, I suppose that even if he hadn't provoked that Hippogriff it wasn't a great way to start the year… he's a nasty piece of work though, from what I've seen."
Remus nodded: "Even if he had paid attention, the Wizarding World is a place fraught with painful accidents."
"Now you tell me!" Amelia laughed, and he smiled back at her.
"Take Quidditch, for example – I've never known so many injuries be attributed to one sport."
"Ha! There speaks a man who has never played rugby," she chuckled. "Though you may have a point. Hermione's been here for only two years. Last year she spent the majority of her time petrified – as in turned to stone, not afraid. First year her friend Ron was nearly killed by an enormous moving chess piece… seems like every other week the Prophet reports a splicing, whatever that is."
Remus grimaced. "You make our world sound so violent."
Amelia checked herself, realising that she might have offended him and continued carefully. "Though having said that, the Muggle world isn't much better. It tends to oscillate between terror scares and pandemics, so it's more or less the same." She gave a hollow laugh, "and you should hear the stories I could tell about the city I took my degree in… Still, magic does seem to be rather more explosive than I was imagining."
Lupin had to agree.
"There was a girl here when I was a student, name of Ione, very nice girl – a Ravenclaw – bit quiet. Things blew up around her with alarming frequency."
"I hear that Seamus Finnegan hasn't spent a week here entirely in the possession of his own eyebrows."
They grinned at one another, earlier discomfort dismissed.
"I'm serious though," he continued, "it's even in the grounds. Everything seems so peaceful and yet…
"You see that tree down there, just across from Hagrid's? That's the Whomping Willow; it was planted in my first year, tends to wallop anything that gets too near it. Then there's the main doors, of course: beautifully carved, the peak of fashion when they were made I'd imagine… but then you look a bit closer and see the bolts from top to bottom. Those doors aren't there for aesthetics any more than the metre-thick walls."
"You really take your subject seriously, don't you," Amelia observed, looking the man beside her up and down.
"With good reason," he said, wearily. "I remember a time when those doors were put to good use." He looked at her eyes, narrowing at him in the moonlight. "But that's quite enough doom and gloom for one evening, I think."
Amelia was inclined to agree; looking out at the grounds once more she noticed that the soft glow of the moon was retreating behind the clouds. Suddenly the pleasantly cool breeze she had hitherto been enjoying made her shiver and pull her robes close around her.
Remus must have noticed as he turned the conversation to lighter things, describing the nearby village of Hogsmeade and giving some of the history of Hogwarts, embellished, she suspected, by memories of his school days.
It was very late indeed when they finally decided to turn in, Lupin helping Amelia find her was back into familiar territory ("Bloody staircases! Got a mind of their own most of the time!").
There was a note under her door from Dumbledore when she returned, detailing in full the Ministry regulations for safety in the classroom, probably in response to the earlier incident. Amelia stood for a while and tried to imagine anything that might make Dumbledore use the castle's defences, before deciding that it was probably better not to dwell on such things.