Margaid Requests Permission
Harry was packing when Margaid slithered barely across the threshold into his room and sideways to be against the wall instead of in the most walked-on section of the floor, then lay still.
Harry finished making sure his shirts were folded and stacked neatly enough that it would be easy to pack around them and keep them in place by pressure alone. (He hadn't bought the fanciest trunk available, way back before his first year, and he still hadn't gotten around to sorting through the attic for anything better.)
"§-What is it Pearl?-§" he said.
She took several seconds to ponder that, before morphing human, still in an off-centre kneel that seemed to say 'snake' more than 'submissive'.
"§-The first half of term I was Shy One's key and Niece-§ Padma's Alchemy tutor. Shy One has rejected my help as her key, but Padma has added to my duties researching Robbin's mind-healing and whether annulling the ritual that took his magic is possible or desirable. And there's been an idea floating around that I'm to tutor you in enough scrying that you'll be permitted to join the Dark Arts overview next year."
Harry stared at her, 'Divination' and 'Overview of Ritual Magic'. "Yeah, that was an option. Where are you going with this."
She shrugged, "The other path reserved to me, should it seem optimal, is tutoring the young ones on those afternoons which I can appear human."
"Sure," said Harry, "That tracks also. What do you have in mind?"
"Padma and I have looked at everything we can find about Robbie's case in your library, I would prefer to go through the Hogwarts Library for the cost of sneaking around with your access badge, rather than sneaking around Knockturn Alley book vendors and purchasing less useful books at black market prices."
Harry stared at her, "Your logic tracks, but the badness of the second option gives me pause about allowing the first option either."
She sighed, "§-The school should drop witchcraft from its title in protest of how restrictive the Light Party's policies have gotten.-§"
Harry blinked, "You're saying that the books in the restricted section used to be in general circulation?"
"Not all of them. But within my lifetime, a good two-thirds of them used to be in general circulation, yes. The ones I wish to access used to be in the care of magical creatures section, or the ritual and astronomy section."
"Does Astronomy still count as a required class because it fed into a Ritual curriculum that doesn't exist anymore?"
"Yes, same with potions. And maybe you'd prefer to say 'barely exists anymore' as slightly more accurate."
"Yeah, alright. Yes, you have my permission to study that."
"Thank you. If I'm not riding in Freya's trunk, would you prefer I ride in Padma's trunk or yours?"
"Oh, good grief!" said Harry.
"I've been using a pair of your brass portal plates to commute to tutoring appointments here, but I must be on the train for the wards to accept me as belonging on school grounds."
Harry shivered, it was good that the wards could have caught her otherwise, it was ridiculous that he was helping his erstwhile enemy sneak into the school, not for general havoc but to visit the restricted section.
Or ironic/suspicious that she was willingly his and Padma's research assistant rather than sewing havoc.
Or as the foundational rule of economics went, "An average population of rational agents in possession of the same resources and information will on average make the same choices." It didn't hold the smaller your sample populations were. But it continually raised the question would Harry in precisely her circumstances make precisely the same decisions that Margaid had made? Not likely, he was not her intellectual equal, but would he have adopted similar politics? Even if not the arrogance that let her lead a strikeforce against the ministry, stacking the courts not by buying votes or flooding them with 'Order of Merlin' courtesy votes, but by culling voters.
It was a horrendous waste of life. But … he'd never interviewed her about her politics, at least, not the foundations of them. Sure they'd discussed the morality and ethics of the big bill here and there. But did he know her well enough to predict her every move? Not by a long shot.
"When you were a student, did you ever do similar research for your fellow students?"
"Yes," she said and narrowed her eyes, "I think medical privacy ethics restricts me from saying much more."
Harry glared at her.
"As many in slytherin as the other houses combined, if you must know how closed off my horizons were then."
"Granted," said Harry.
"Robbie would be in Hufflepuff if sorted the day I was last in his mind if that's your next question. Slytherin or Gryffindor if sorted before your cousin instigated the rescue."
"It wasn't my next question," said Harry, "My next question is, prognosis both for Robbie and of ever finding the information you're looking for?"
"His mind healing is proceeding apace. Barring any setbacks depending on what memories are uncovered," she sighed, "I know enough now I could break the memory lock, but I'd rather he was more firmly integrated first, we don't know what's inside. Though it's easy to guess that it's incriminating for someone. But we won't know how bad Robbie will take whatever that is."
"Yeah, that's fair."
"Paradoxically it might be worse for him to find out that it wasn't bad, if he was discarded over some trifle it could be a blow to his ego. Though I suppose, already knowing that he was discarded over something, he has not built as large an ego as he should have."
"Humph," said Harry.
She sighed, "No matter what they tell you, self-worth is not a negative virtue, humans rule the planet because of two intimately related superpowers: intellect and the collaboration that language makes possible. If you do not possess the self-worth to ask for help, no one can collaborate on your desires, if you do not value your ability to contribute no one will invite you to collaborate."
"But when people talk about ego, the connotation is self-worth above good reason."
"True," she said, "Never mind."
"Thank you for the information about his mental health, My other question was more like, is it even worth sneaking into the restricted section for months to find out to the last percentage point that his magic is not curable?"
"I'm about 60% hopeful that it is curable, I do not yet know what the cost would be. It is ritual magic we're working against."
"Do you already have working theories that you can articulate? Or would asking you to summarise in English confuse your research?"
She nodded, "Leaving aside Robbie's case in particular. Similar effects have been reported where power or stability has been donated to or harvested by another. In a professional and legal ritual of that nature, it would only be permitted if the need was temporary and the donation was intended to last only until the patient had recovered. The process of reverting the donation would be simple and should be according to Robbie's volition. Because the donor should have been an adult, (both in order to consent, and to have that much more extra to donate). And it would not be clear whether the recipient was conscious and competent to be in charge of such."
"Yeah, ok."
"If such a ritual was used, the key to reverting the donation might be hidden in the locked memories. (And my research is pointless, I probably already know enough to conduct the reversion ritual.)"
"Sure."
"And there's a chance his magic would have grown at the proportionate rate of whoever he donated to, not of a child from 4 to 10 or whatever he is, and may come back to him with interest. He might have immediate accidental magic problems."
"Ah!"
"Given the fact that he was discarded afterwards, a non-consensual harvest is plausible, or even a suppression binding, but I think we'd be able to tell already if it was only a standard suppression binding."
"Hmm."
"We still don't know if he was discarded because a parent found he was without magic. Or if he was already to be discarded, (perhaps a bastard or even legitimate heir but suddenly inconvenient,) and the harvest was conducted to not waste resources, or the suppression was conducted to camouflage him as a squib to be swept up and ignored among all the other discarded squibs."
"Given those options, do you have hope of reversing it?"
"Most suppression bindings are only partial, to reduce the severity of accidental magic, and are triggered to end when the child pairs with their first wand. This binding, if that's what it is, is much more complete. It would be good to know why. And how that will respond to being reversed, and we don't know if there are triggers already in place. There was a rumour about a medical condition, I don't recognise what medical condition feeds on the victim's magic to cripple them. It sounds to me like various battle curses, perhaps practised in an uncontrolled environment and a sibling or cousin was hit by it. and the caster did not have the power or finesse to break it."
"Hell," said Harry.
"And they improvised by removing his magic to block the curse from progressing. He seems whole now. For whatever that's worth. I cannot find a curse on him, but I can't be sure it's not hidden somewhere I cannot see. And I was never good at scrying. In a decade Parvati may be able to look into the past and pull forward all the information we need. It will be much too late for him to attend Hogwarts as he hopes, or become fluent with a wand, but there are other programs out there, perhaps we should already be directing him towards the low stakes witchcrafts: herbology and potions …" she paused, "or portraiture."
Harry blinked and stared, "What? Portraiture?"
"Your jolly old Mr Filch holds a double mastery in magical portraiture and art restoration. But no one takes those classes anymore because magical cameras are quick enough for what little muggle-borns want, and little purebloods may never interact with the craft until they've been married for a while and find out that talking portraits are a standard gift to receive from their in-laws on tenth anniversaries."
Harry scrubbed his forehead and wondered if his old dorm mates knew those classes existed. Or would willingly sit them with a 'Professor Filch'. (Talk about Professor Snape's gruffness but another order of magnitude stronger!) Or did they already know? He didn't remember ever asking what electives they were taking. If they'd mentioned art in passing he might have forgotten. He didn't think he'd have forgotten if they'd mentioned they were taking it from 'Professor Filch'.
"Never mind, Is there anything that I can do to help with Robbie?"
"Like I said, you can continue letting me borrow your restricted section access badge."
Harry sighed.
"And you can learn legilimency and ritual magic, I know you're already thinking of taking ritual magic for camaraderie with Parvati. I mean study it for real. Because it can come in handy later, especially for healing arts."
"Alright," said Harry, "and legilimency?"
"I'd like to have a spotter when I finally go in to remove the locks in Robbie's mind. I don't fully expect them to be trapped, but there is a chance."
"Hmm."
"Your ability to maintain your sanity while being a bridge between your familiar's minds tells me you have the stability and strength of will that learning legilimency will not hurt you."
"I'm not exactly a rapid study at occlumency."
"Unlike all your other classes?" Margaid said with an amused air. "you maintain your mind open to your familiars, I would be surprised if you could temperamentally keep anyone out, but you do keep it monitored for unauthorised changes, specifically so that you can notice when they visit. I think you do very well under the circumstances."
"Oh."
"You might have a talent for the subject and for legilimency, or your entire ability in the area might have become inflexible due to only ever using it for communication with your familiars and never folding it into new shapes and frequencies to probe other minds, or toss them out."
Harry sighed, "Alright, fine. If we can find time, you can tutor me in that also."
She nodded.
"Ask me again in an hour whether there's room for you in my trunk."
"Ah," she said and stood. "And I'll go see if there's a good legilimency manual in your library."
"Sure," said Harry.
And she wandered away.
Harry made a mental note to watch carefully because this might just be a ruse for her to sneak into his mind.
.
...-...
Romilda's Hols
"Who's your last package from?" said Emma.
"No idea," said Romilda, "Is it my turn to open another?"
"Yes," said Mum.
Romilda tore into it, "What is it?" She held it up. It was … in the cut of a spring romper, but quilted apparently, fairly well insulated from the feel of it.
"Is that a muggle style?" said Dad, "I've never seen it before, or … not since the seventies?"
Mum nodded and chuckled, "This far ahead of the spring season, no one knows what the fashion will be. Someone knows you well enough to get you something dark and vest shaped, even if they don't seem to know about the desirability of proper knitting…"
"Yes," said Romilda, "I'm rather impressed, and it seems quilted rather well enough to make up for the fact that it's not knit. May I go try it on?"
"Of course dear," said Mum.
"Who's it from?" said Dad.
"I don't know," shrugged Romilda, "I've got two guesses."
Dad looked suspicious.
"Let me see the label," said Mum.
Romilda handed over the torn wrapping, she'd already checked and knew it to be blank except for her name.
"No," said Mum, and grabbed the garment and drew it gently out of Romilda's grasp.
"Oh."
"Leona Tonks, custom enchanted clothing. 'Appearances: Don't just keep up, go together!'"
"Oh," said Romilda.
"What?" said Emma.
"It's not from Millicent or Ron," said Romilda, "It was designed by both of them."
"I don't know a—wait … aren't both of them in my year?" said Emma.
"Yeah, so?" said Romilda.
"Are you saying that there's an inappropriate age gap?" said Dad.
Emma nodded.
Romilda sighed, "It's not like that."
"Then what's it like?" said Emma.
Romilda rolled her eyes, "It's just potions and arithmancy tutoring, When one of them gets in the mood for … something inappropriate, they warn me that it's time for me to leave."
Emma smirked.
Mum frowned.
Romilda didn't dare look at Dad.
Dad called her name anyway.
She looked at him.
"You're a smart girl, Romilda. I'd rather you didn't hang out with loose women, or with boys who chase loose women, but I think you're getting old enough to start to see through their ploys."
You have no idea how Emma acts at school … But Romilda wouldn't say that, because 'chasing boys', and 'letting boys catch you' were two different things.
And anyway, Millicent has never dressed 'loose' while I was around, nor behaved all that loosely, though, she and Ron talked about the effects of some of the potions as if they'd experimented with them. And trying to believe that they'd done that without doing, and meaning to do, a lot of … things that … I have no idea if I'd like, but would rather like to experiment with (or at least once or twice…).
Though she'd been around her parents and their friends enough to know, that they didn't have a problem with 'experimenting' with that stuff. They had a problem with doing those experiments with anyone other than who she was married to.
As if I even know who to date before I figure out whether I prefer girls or boys, or huge or my sized, or … and anyway … it still seems like I can have both of them for a while if I'm careful, and maybe at about the time they get bored of me, will be the time that I'm ready to actually 'chase boys' the way Emma does… Or maybe the other way around. When I'm ready to go find a girl for myself — or a boy I mean, it will be when I'll start naturally feeling more bored of watching them with each other.
"But my point is," said Dad, "if you ever need help, or just someone to listen, you can call me or your mother, Just talking things out with someone who isn't going to act hurt that you've managed to see through their lies, who can help you get your mind straight about things that are hard to see through otherwise."
Dad likes to talk also … that means Dad and Mum … so what I feel and want is natural!
Oh, good.
"Do you understand?" said Dad.
Mum snorted like he'd just stuck his foot in it. Though Romilda didn't quite see how.
What I understood isn't what you were even trying to talk about so … No, probably I didn't get all of it but …
"You're saying …" said Romilda, "That just because I'm old enough to be good at all the easy things that I don't need help with them anymore, doesn't mean that I'm not moving on to trying lots of newer, harder things, and I'll still need to ask for help sometimes?"
His eyes crossed for a moment, "Yes," he said, "Yes, exactly. There's nothing wrong with asking for help when you need it."
Mum patted her arm and went to the other room.
.
When there was nothing else to do Romilda challenged Dad to a game of chess.
He fought differently than she was used to, and eventually, he conceded at an awkward time.
What did that even mean? Had she made a better move than she'd understood?
But he went into the other room and complimented her skill to Mum and Emma. And came back with two cups of mulled cider and demanded a rematch. So they played again. Emma wandered through twice and 'called winner.'
And he'd just declared mate in four, when she got her second rook out, and six turns later, she'd won!
Then it was Emma's turn.
Emma played slowly. Very slowly. As slow as Romilda had played before she started playing with Derick and they'd agreed that the rule was five minutes of revising before one or two minutes to take a chess move.
In protest of the slowness … or rather, to avoid saying her protests out loud, she went to her room and got the homework scheduler that Emma had given her, and took it back. She didn't have all that much homework due at the moment, but she could fill in what she did have. And her name and course load …
But filling in her name seemed boring, and the general rule of not leaving too much evidence of magic where muggles could find it meant that even filling in class titles was a commitment to keeping this little muggle book out of sight of muggles, it wasn't that big of a commitment in context with all the other books she had to keep track of, but a decision that large didn't feel fun to make on holidays, so mostly she just doodled faces in around the nameplate and on the facing page.
Then topped it off with the Vane Coat of arms, complete with the cow and three gauntlets. Blue was a good colour, Romilda wondered if that had influenced which dorm Emma had wound up in.
When she ran out of other things to doodle she wrote her first name on the line for it, and in place of her last name, she put the entire house motto: Ne vile fano. Bring nothing vile into the sanctuary.
That was a tautology of what a sanctuary was. It's where you keep vile things out of. Or a tautology on what constituted vile, what you wouldn't bring home.
Romilda wondered if there were other families with mottoes that were equally vague, equally odd, or equally tautological.
Or if they only seemed tautological to the family that had selected it. And to everyone else, they seemed odd.
.
"Ronald Weasley?"
"Huh?"
"What are your intentions toward my sister?"
Ron frowned, "who are you?"
"Emma Vane," said Emma Vane.
"You are Romilda's sister?"
Nod.
"Oh," said Ron, "Mostly I'm just keeping an eye on her and trying to make sure she doesn't get homesick enough to dose anyone else with a love potion."
"That she doesn't … what?"
Ron nodded, "It was one of the mild ones, her intended target escaped unscathed, and her actual target recognised it and surrendered only as far as they were willing to anyway, so, no one got hurt."
"What happened?"
Ron shook his head, "ask her."
"I did and she didn't mention a love potion."
Ron rolled his eyes, "then we've each told you as much as you need to know. No one got hurt, except the part where she was already suffering from homesickness." He shrugged, "now she has an additional set of chess friends."
"Chess friends?"
.
"Millicent!" said Romilda, "What the hell was up with sending me that nightgown as a Christmas present to open in front of my parents."
Millicent's eyes popped open and she ran to her trunk, then sighed in relief and came back with a package. She handed it over with a whispered, "Merry Christmas, girlfriend."
"Huh?" said Romilda.
"Whatever you got, is what Ron got you, this is the one from me."
Romilda tore it open.
It was … a piece of burgundy lace. A large piece. She held it up farther it was … it was the ghostly outline of Ron's quidditch armour and all its badges, brands, and decorations. It was sized to fit Romilda.
"What the hell," whispered Romilda.
"Marry Christmas, girlfriend," Millicent whispered.
"You … want me to wear this?"
Millicent's eyes widened the tiniest amount, in a way that didn't mean surprise.
They meant interest. Desire.
"When? and why?" demanded Romilda.
Millicent stepped closer until there wasn't a pinkie's breadth of air separating them, she whispered, warm breath across Romilda's cheek, "I want you to wear it, whenever you want to be just chilly enough to need to snuggle me."
Romilda shuddered and backed away.
Millicent looked disappointed, "It's charmed to always be almost warm enough. You can't catch a cold wearing it, but … it will always go better with snuggles. Even in the hottest summer."
"Merlin," grunted Romilda, "You're crazy."
Millicent's mouth grinned, though her eyes were still concerned and disappointed.
"I don't know what to say," said Romilda.
"Say 'thank you'," said Millicent, "then bury it in your trunk either forever or until you want it, just wrap it up carefully first because lace."
"Alright," said Romilda.
"Oh, one more thing," said Millicent, "Come here," she led her to the door, where she pulled aside a wall calendar that Romilda had always thought looked out of place. But now she saw it covered up part of the runes warding the door. Millicent pointed to the runes for cleanliness, sharpness, and silver.
"What?" said Romilda, but she could already guess, from the blood trickle from there down to each of three partial palm prints in blood, each with a circle inked around it, one labelled 'me', one labelled 'RonW', and a tiny one labelled 'Scuffle.'
"Promise me that you will never use access to my room to hurt me or steal from me or spy on me or my things. If you want to borrow something, ask; if you want to have something as a gift, beg; if you want to know something, ask; if you need to know something, demand. Don't sneak, don't be shy. I'm older, either I've thought it through already and won't be embarrassed to be asked, or … I won't have, and will deserve to be embarrassed because I didn't think of it already."
"I don't think that's quite how it works."
"I don't care how it works for other people," said Millicent, "I like people who talk first, not sneak around to find out an answer that probably is wrong, incomplete, or out of date, and then think that they know me."
"Yeah, that makes sense," said Romilda.
"Good," said Millicent, and grabbed Romilda's hand, slammed it hard against the rune of sharpness, and held it until Romilda stopped trying to drag it away and realise why she should not do that. Then Millicent snatched it back off and pressed it firmly next to the other palm prints for another several seconds, then pulled it away and cast a healing charm.
"I've got some murtlap essence," said Millicent, "if you have potions, herbology, or care tomorrow, or just don't think it will finish hardening before you need it otherwise."
Romilda shrugged but kept instinctively cradling her hand, even though it didn't hurt anymore, and the skin was completely closed up again.
Millicent crossed to her desk and came back with a quill, to encircle the new blood smear with ink, and label it, 'RomV'
"Do you want murtlap?" said Millicent and took her hand again, casting the very gentlest cleaning charm Romilda had ever felt. Millicent held it until the blood was gone from her skin.
Romilda examined her palm, then flexed it, "I think I'll be fine."
Millicent smiled, "Do you want to verify that the door will unlock for you?"
"Sure," Romilda said, and went out and pulled the door closed.
It made the 'ub' sound of a bubble unpopping, the sound of a room sealing.
Romilda leaned close, breathed on it, and pressed her palm into the cloud of condensation. It unlatched and let her push it open.
She went in.
"Good," said Millicent, "are you spending the night?"
"No?" said Romilda, "um, may I?"
"Who's going to stop you?"
Romilda blinked, if no one else in slytherin could get in here, and no one in gryffindor knew where she was, nor cared.
Who indeed.
Romilda shrugged.
"Alright," said Millicent, "next question:"
"Hum?" said Romilda.
"Do you want to try out your nightie?"
There's little enough of it, I'm not sure it qualifies as a nightie. Less of a nightie, more of a not a nightie. Or … More of a nought … or a knotty nought … or a naughty knotty nought.
Romilda giggled.
Millicent smiled but seemed to know that she didn't know what was funny, but seemed less sure whether she should know why Romilda was laughing.
"Sorry," said Romilda, "A pun, I … probably a relatively old one, never mind."
Millicent's eyes went interested again, "Tell me?"
"There's so little of it, it seems less than a nightie, more of a naughty knotty nought."
Millicent smiled and nodded, "naughty nighties are an important part of the gift economy. Even if I did have to make this one myself … since I wanted it an unusual shape and colour."
"Right, makes sense," said Romilda. You didn't understand my pun, but then I'm not sure I'd understand anyone else explaining my pun, except maybe in written form. Also, it might have been too big of an insult towards your work on it for you to be even able to understand it. So, err, to change the subject…
"I guess I'd rather try it on where I'll be able to see a mirror, and no one … unexpected will walk in on me."
Millicent grinned and nodded eagerly.
Romilda doffed her winter robes, but when she started on her jumper buttons, Millicent held up her hand.
"It's loose enough that you can probably try it on over your clothes if you'd rather."
"Oh," said Romilda, and picked it up and slipped into it.
She got it settled, then examined the springiness that let it imitate the outline of quidditch armour pads. She ran her hand across it, hard enough to verify that it wouldn't be overly scratchy to sleep in. It wasn't. It was nice. And she could feel the marginally greater warmth on her arms, where Ron's gift only covered her shoulders, torso, and thighs.
She looked up.
Millicent nodded, "it seems to fit the way I wanted."
Romilda smiled and glanced in the mirror.
She didn't see burgundy lace, she saw actual quidditch pads, over an actual quidditch jersey.
"What?" she said, she looked down, just lace over her regular clothes.
"Glamours," said Millicent, "Selective glamours, what you see in the mirror right now is what everyone else sees."
"Ok," said Romilda, "how?"
Millicent grinned, "I had to isolate the different glamours, compile them into charms, (I found a book that led me through all of that part), make an enchantment that was compatible with non-woven cloth and could anchor the glamours properly, (I had to figure that out from three books), and the selectivity ward, I based it on blood labels, again because it was familiar and easy, though I managed to leave the palm print out because that would … never mind, then I had to compile all that into a charm since it wasn't parchment, stone, or leather so just a rune ward wouldn't work."
"Alright?" said Romilda, "Wow, that sounds like a lot of arithmancy."
"Oh, it was," said Millicent, "but most of it built on things I'd already learned how to do, so it was a fun challenge, rather than a discouraging one."
Romilda nodded.
"So do you like the result?"
"It's … less scary than I thought it would be," said Romilda.
Millicent smiled, "Then for the last part," she crossed to her desk, sliced out a tiny scrap of parchment, pierced a hole in the middle, and tied a string to it, then went to the wall and dabbed a tiny bit of the fresh blood onto it, and brought it over to Romilda.
"Tie this around the low part of the inner collar."
"Alright?" said Romilda.
"Take it off first, if you need to."
"No, it's fine," said Romilda, though it was hard to work under her chin with wisps of thread.
"Or take it off and let me do it, I've gotten good with little threads and knot charms, and—"
"No, it's fine, I almost have it," said Romilda, and then she did have it.
She tucked it inside the way she thought she was supposed to and glanced in the mirror.
She was … she was exactly as naked as she had expected to be if … if she'd dared to undress before she put this thing on. She shivered and looked down.
She was still in all her clothes except her robes. With puffy burgundy lace clouding around it all.
Burgundy lace with very naughty glamours enchanted into it.
"And this is how you want to see me?" said Romilda, glancing in the mirror again. All her stomach freckles were visible. She looked away.
Millicent smiled and went to her desk, sliced two more bits of parchment, and deftly tied a string to each. She poked her finger and put a drop of blood on one of them. And brought them back.
"For when you're ready for me to see through your clothes," whispered Millicent, "and another for when you want Ron to."
"Oh," said Romilda, "Yeah, I see."
Millicent watched her while she stared at the wall above the nightstand for several seconds.
"And you can flip the tags back outside when you don't want to be seen," said Millicent, and demonstrated just that, though she fumbled enough that Romilda remembered Millicent couldn't see through the lace right now, even if Romilda could see the reflection of Millicent's hand brushing closer and closer to her bare breasts, but when she looked down, Milli's hand was four layers of fabric away from Romilda's skin: a shirt, Ron's toasty warm vest thing, and however many layers a bra was constructed of.
Then the blood label was outside, and the reflection in the corner of Romilda's eye changed from white skin to burgundy padding.
She shivered and met Millicent's eyes.
"Are you alright now?"
"I was never not alright," said Romilda, "I was just … thinking."
"That's allowed," said Millicent, "but … if you don't talk, I can't be sure it's not a panic attack or something."
"What's that?"
"It's like several orders of magnitude worse than embarrassed, except it's fear err … themed. Some people shiver or flinch and you can tell what's going on, or mistake it for 'being a bit chilled', others just go absolutely still, little kids are often the worst, it takes them the longest to realise that no one can tell by looking that they are scared until they explain what they are experiencing because no one else is experiencing it."
"Oh."
"Of course, some kids run around screaming when they are scared, but usually once the fear ratchets up enough to be called a panic attack, the 'freeze' response seems to be the most common."
"Alright," said Romilda, "how do you know all that?"
"I had one in 1992, November 8th to the 10th, and another the next year on June 2nd, that one eased off more gradually over several days, but I was at home with less of a schedule to keep so the exact moment that I could go back to functioning normally stood out less."
"Oh," said Romilda.
"Luckily, I wasn't the first one to get one, and Professor Snape already knew what to look for and was looking for them, so he caught mine fairly quickly."
"What's the … treatment?"
"The long-term treatment is meditation, and knowing that fear is both a valid emotion, and a valid motivation set, but outside of the correct context the body's 'fear response' can be fairly useless, and might even be problematic," said Millicent, "But the short term treatment is: breathing calmly, or doing muscle relaxation exercises, or contradictory: doing celebratory dance or they say jumping jacks."
"Breathing exercises are what worked for me. Do you know how, if you smile and concentrate on the fact that you are smiling, it can make you a little happier? It's kind of similar: If you breathe calmly and concentrate on breathing calmly, you can convince your body that the fear response isn't the way you are choosing to deal with the thing you are afraid of right now. If you're worried about an episode of accidental magic happening because of the fear, a calming draught should help with that, but it doesn't treat the underlying symptom, nor beyond that to the foundational cause."
"The celebratory dance thing … I can explain the logic the way it was explained to me, but I've never gotten it to work, so…" she shrugged, "basically, normal circumstances say, you get scared because you've gone on an adventure and gotten into trouble, what do you do when you get home? You dance around and/or explain loudly to your friends how exciting it was, but it's over now, and they should all celebrate with you that you survived, etc. So you pop your subconscious mind out of its 'the world is a scary place and now I'm scared all the time' rut by jumping into the 'Celebrate with me that I just survived a dangerous adventure!' antics."
"Hmm, alright," said Romilda, "But … what were you afraid of?"
"Your sister hasn't told you about the '92 school year? Or the Heir of Slytherin fiasco?" Millicent asked and looked at her curiously, then sighed, "Well … the other thing you have to understand about panic attacks, is, that it's not just the size of the response that is out of proportion, sometimes there's nothing to be afraid of at all."
"Oh," said Romilda, "and I suppose that if there are calming draughts, there could be the opposite."
Millicent blinked, "There could be, that is a horrible idea, do not invent those."
Romilda shrugged.
"I'm serious," said Millicent, then intoned, "may anyone who ever attempts to isolate such a recipe, die of a self-induced heart attack, terrified and alone, while testing their product. Long before they think to test it on anyone else."
Romilda blinked, "Oh. Oh, I see."
Millicent nodded and looked away, "anyway, what was really happening was that someone found a basilisk hidden in the school, possibly one left behind by Professor Slytherin, (but possibly from a Care of Magical Creatures professor or a DADA professor with an out-of-proportion sense of risk). They kept intermittently letting it out and it petrified some things, first was only Mrs Norris, which no one cared about directly, though it made those of us with cats worry. Then a ghost and one of the popular first years got petrified, and I realised that any of us could be next. That's when I had my first episode. Anyway, a few of the others had their first episodes when the second or third human got petrified. But yeah, I had been mildly worried about Scuffle, so when a human was petrified I knew right away it could be me next. Anyway, Snape and Pomfrey got me through it, and gave me enough exercises, that when the later events happened I was fine. Or rather, I could keep myself calm enough to function.
"No, my second episode happened when we found out that the problem monster was a basilisk. And that it had been impossible luck that everyone had been merely petrified, instead of the much more logical outcome, they could have all died. Or to put it differently, we could have all died. But since by that point, the monster was also reported dead, so there was no longer anything to worry about. But as I said, panic attacks aren't always logical."
Romilda nodded.
"Oh, and the other treatments are hugs, and moving the danger away from the child or the child away from the danger. But those are temporary symptom reducers, to get them responsive again. The ideal cure is to help them get conscious control of their fear response."
"That makes sense," said Romilda.
And Millicent glanced away hard. At the door.
Why?
"Do you want a hug?" said Romilda.
"God, please," said Millicent and lifted her arms enough for Romilda to slip in and under them and squeeze.
Millicent's heart was going at an … unusual speed, so much for 'having gained a strong conscious control of her fear response.'
"Thank you for explaining all that," said Romilda, and more to the point, "Thank you for worrying about me, that I might have had a problem with finding myself suddenly nude when I hadn't meant to be. I guess if it hadn't been in private I might have had more trouble dealing with it."
"If you weren't having trouble dealing with it, what were you thinking of?"
"Whether I'd ever show you or Ron, and how I would know that I was ready to, or anything."
"Oh, I see," said Millicent, "That makes sense too."
After a few moments, they let go.
"Thanks for the Christmas Present," said Romilda, "and the door password, whatever it's called for your style of lock."
"'Ward access', is the general term," said Millicent, "And you're welcome."
Romilda nodded, "Thanks for that, and the hug, but … I'd better go before curfew, and I probably won't be back … on school nights."
Millicent smiled then her eyes went interested, but her mouth went firm, "good, that sounds like a wise rule of thumb."
Thanks for agreeing with me and respecting my thought process or decision or whatever…
She made her way up to gryffindor tower, using the secret passage tapestry that Ron had shown her.
.
Her sister was in the common room.
"Hey Emma," she said, "What're you doing in here?"
"She's making sure I know not to break your heart," said Ron.
"How would you do that?" said Romilda.
"I think the general method is telling you that I love you if I don't," said Ron.
Of course, you love me, how else would anyone explain how nice you are to me? Not that you've ever said so … and the name of our club is 'tell, not assume,' maybe he doesn't love me, or maybe he doesn't know yet. Is it possible to love someone and not realise?
Romilda raised an eyebrow, "That …" she'd just heard an in-depth discussion about the difference between knowing about something worth being afraid of, and actually being afraid, being two very different things.
So feeling love towards someone, the emotional experience, ought to be a different thing than recognising that emotion and knowing what name to put on it, and that might be different than doing the correct exercise to gain conscious control of that emotional response, which would also be a different thing than choosing to love someone, either in the sense of choosing by habit to do caring things for them or to choose by habit to exercise conscious control to feel love towards someone.
I wonder if love is an emotional response that even can be consciously controlled.
"Yeah, I see how that would do it," said Romilda she frowned at Ron, "Don't do that to me and I won't do that to you."
He nodded, though his lips twitched like he wasn't sure if she was joking, or deadly serious.
Then again, Millicent had said, that smiling can influence happiness a little, and breathing calmly can influence calmness a little, so acting loving should affect feeling love. At least a little?
She turned to Emma, "I'm supposed to ask you about an 'Heir of Slytherin Fiasco' the year before I started?"
"Ugh," said Emma, "Yeah, that was awful, how much time do you have?"
Romilda shrugged, "did it give you panic attacks?"
"No?" said Emma, "we just stayed away from that floor and hallway as much as possible, not that there are all that many alternate routes to the great hall. But two alternate routes are enough when the other option is getting petrified and unable to attend classes until some rare magical carrots happen to ripen."
"Oh," said Romilda, "alright."
"There wasn't that much to it, just rumours about a prankster that could outwit both the defence professor and the headmaster. They never did catch them, he obliviated the defence professor and got away, while Ron and Harry defeated the monster or something like that."
Ron snorted.
Emma turned to Ron, "It was conclusively proved that it wasn't Harry, right?"
Ron frowned for a long time, "Yes, definitely."
"That answer took too long," said Emma suspiciously.
"I had to think back," said Ron, "I normally think about the things that everyone knows, and therefore shouldn't jump to stupid conclusions, like that Hermione was one of the people petrified or the times that he was somewhere public during a petrifaction. The way you asked, I had to think back to the other things I know, for instance, I think I was his alibi for all the attacks except the one where he was in hospital. Unless you also don't count the last one. We split up just before the end, I guarded the obliviated defence professor, while Harry went and took out the monster."
"Do you really think it was killed?" said Emma, "and not just locked up again, still waiting to be let out again?"
Ron raised an eyebrow.
"Emma, Don't say things like that," said Romilda.
"Ask Harry to see his basilisk skin armour sometime," said Ron, "There's a difference between full-depth leather and the horny top layer that snakes discard every few months to few years. And his armour isn't crinkly and fragile."
"Ah!" Emma smirked, "well then."
"What does it look like then?" said Romilda.
Ron shrugged, "Like dark grey dragon hide, except the scale pattern is a smooth snakeish pattern, rather than the rougher pattern you expect in lizards. Except it's fairly obvious if you look closely, that it started green before it was stained a dark blue because at some angles the green still shows through the stain."
"It was as big as a dragon?" whispered Emma, "Don't basilisks max out at like wrist-sized?"
Ron nodded, "I think that's just what size they are normally harvested, reptiles keep growing as long as there's enough food. If this one was left by a founder a thousand years ago?" Ron shrugged, "But yeah it was as big around as a dragon's neck, not as pudgy a stomach, but long enough tail to make up for it."
"No wonder he walked up and took that dragon out like he'd done it before," said Emma, "and didn't feel like getting as close to do it again."
Romilda shuddered.
"Pretty much," said Ron, and yawned.
"I'm going to bed," said Romilda, "Emma, don't miss curfew, especially not by arguing with a prefect."
"Oy vey," said Emma, "Tempus."
Ron laughed. Romilda climbed the stairs to her room.
"Wait a second," Emma muttered behind her, "What had it been eating?"
"Sewer rats and spiders, maybe?" suggested Ron.
"So … do we need to install something else to be eating whatever it was eating? If it got huge, there might be an infestation it was suppressing."
Romilda froze on the steps.
After much too long a pause Ron said in a persuasive tone, "There are plenty of normal snakes in the forbidden forest, I'm sure one of them can move in if there's a need. And lots of us have cats."
That was a good point, Romilda relaxed and continued up to bed.
.
Ron tried to roll over to get comfortable, but found he'd dragged his pillow into the wrong place and couldn't just roll without untangling first, except…
It was heavy and warm and not a pillow.
He knew exactly what it felt like to snuggle a girl because he had held Millicent and been held by Millicent, but she'd never ventured into gryffindor tower before, and he'd held Ginny and Luna but that was way back when they were tiny enough to need that regularly. And granted: Millicent usually let him sleep after they'd worn each other out, but that was only for short naps and usually in afternoons, not in the darkened tower and near midnight.
From her size, the black ringlets of her hair, and the material of the self-warming night dress, he knew exactly who this was.
More gently he reorganised himself into a comfortable position and then closed his eyes again.
For about a minute he wondered if she was here because she wanted and deliberately planned to take their physical affection to the next level, or if something had happened over the Hols to precipitate this change, or if it was more of coming back from Hols had left her depressed or homesick or … it could be anything. He decided not to worry about it until she was ready to explain. He drifted off, with a vague wonder what his dorm mates might say in the morning.
Then she rolled over.
"Romilda?" said Ron.
She opened her eyes, "Hey Ron," she whispered, "Do you want me to go?"
"No, you're fine," said Ron.
"Then I won't apologise for being here, only for … not asking permission first?"
Ron nodded, "Sounds correct, but why didn't you wake me?"
"You are amazingly hard to wake," she said.
"Hmm," said Ron, "the others will tell you that's because I snore so loud that I've learned to ignore myself."
"And if that's what the others will say … what will you tell me?"
"That Seamus must be louder than me since he wakes me up and I don't wake me up."
She chuckled.
"Hence leaving the sound-dampening charm turned all the way up on my bed curtains."
She nodded, then rolled and slid over, so she could prop her head up on her elbow.
"I apologise for being hard to wake," said Ron, "and given that you arrived and fell asleep without waking me, I can easily grant you general permission to visit and fall asleep, visiting and keeping me awake will need more specific permission, which may be granted on a case-by-case basis."
"Thank you," she said, "That makes sense."
"I want to say something about not laying on my arm so that it goes numb, but I'm not sure … anyway, I suppose learning those sorts of things may take practice."
She nodded, "You think I'm going to do this a lot?"
Ron shrugged, "I have no idea, There are lots of reasons to and not to. I'd have figured that the main reason not to was waking each other up, but if that only goes one way, … well, I'll try to be more careful. And it will remain your decision when to visit, and not just because the stairway wards would stop me from visiting you."
She nodded, "There is that."
"So that leaves, the main reason not to is what other people will think. And I can figure several ways around that, depending on what you want."
"Hmm," said Romilda.
"So, what do you want?"
"I'm not sure."
"Then let's back up to: what did you want that made you visit tonight?"
"Oh," said Romilda, "I had a terrible dream."
"What about?"
"A hidden monster lurking around the school, eating you and Emma, before I even got to know you."
"And Millicent?"
"No," said Romilda, "She was safely stuck in the hospital wing, while Professor Snape yelled at her to 'keep breathing,' and 'stop being afraid, because it wasn't helping,' except technically being stuck there did help her, at least in my dream. And anyway somehow not meeting you meant she only had her cat to hug until I showed up. So then she had two cats to hug." Romilda shrugged, "did I mention I was a cat, I think I was Emma's cat actually, but after she got eaten I was alone until I found Millicent in the hospital half frozen in fear, and half snuggling her cat. But once she had both of us she woke up and moved back to her room."
"Wow, that's dense," said Ron.
"You don't have to call me stupid," said Romilda, "It was just a dream, I know it was just a dream and the basilisk is dead."
"Not that," said Ron, "dream symbolism, there was a lot of it packed into your dream."
"Oh, Do you want to hear the rest of it?"
"Yes, please continue."
"Alright, umm, there wasn't much more, we lived there in fear, but no longer stuck frozen, you know. Of course Scuffle and I didn't know what to be afraid of, only that Millicent was afraid. Eventually, Harry went to face the monster and didn't have you to help and died, and gradually the monster came and killed or petrified everyone. Including us, even though we were behind wards."
"Did you ever see the snake?"
"We never saw the monster," said Romilda, "we never knew it was a snake. Was it a snake?"
"That's what Hermione and Harry say. Hermione read a book and figured it out and was in the process of bringing us her notes when she was petrified."
"Oh, wow, that was an even closer call than I thought."
Ron reached out and placed a hand on her arm, "Yes, and no, as soon as Hermione knew what it was, she started looking around each corner with a hand mirror to make sure to get at most petrified, not killed, and it saved her life."
"Oh."
"Anyway, yes it was a very large green snake, if you didn't see it as a snake then…"
Romilda frowned, "There were three snakes or illusions of snakes? Scuffle's tail and my own, and a kitty toy that Millicent used to tease us and get us to play."
Ron nodded, "Fair enough, on and around Millicent's bed?"
Romilda nodded.
"What were your emotions about the snakes, both the toy and your and Scuffle's tails?"
Romilda shrugged, "Fear, surprise, recognition, excitement, play," a shrug, "camaraderie, cuddles, comfort, sleep, then starting all over with mistaking a different tail for a snake, et cetera."
Ron nodded, "good,"
"So … do you know what it means?"
"I know the gist," said Ron, "I can tell you some, and you can probably fill in some more without help. If you want help with specific symbols or if you're not satisfied with me remembering the most common meaning, but you expect one of the more uncommon meanings to apply, we can look them up tomorrow."
Romilda nodded, "Go ahead."
"To start with, remember that dreams take place in your head, and they usually mean things about aspects of yourself or your circumstances, for instance, Emma and I and the Monster in your dream probably pointed to aspects of yourself, the monster might be something about yourself that you don't like, Emma probably represents aspects of yourself that are similar to your sister, or that epitomise sisterliness or whatever, similar for me, the fact that we died, might be that you're feeling a need or desire to suppress those aspects of yourself, or for that matter that the part of you represented by the monster is suppressing the part of you represented by us, and you resent the loss."
"Ugh, what?!" said Romilda.
Ron shrugged, "Similarly, the aspect of yourself that Millicent represents, goes through a plot arch, abject fear, horrible but sufficient care by Professor Snape?"
"Might represent my Dad," said Romilda.
Ron winced, "Possibly. Or a professorial, aspect of yourself, or…"
"A police sergeant aspect of myself?"
Ron nodded.
"Alright, then … two cats."
"Cats can represent lots of different things, one of the main ones though is 'feminine mystique', which is not just sexuality. It's also beauty, motherhood, gentle persuasion, the angry mother-bear attitude that you never ever want to get on the wrong side of, and a bunch of other things too, some of which, as a man, I'm probably ill-equipped to completely understand."
Romilda snickered.
"The fact that 'Millicent' was cuddling them, implies that you need to nurture or make friends with, or whatever, that aspect of yourself, except that there were two cats, and you didn't just snuggle them, for their benefit, you were also enhanced by the bond. I think that's fairly clear that there are not one but two aspects of femininity that you need to nurture in yourself, and that will make you stronger. Though I don't try to guess what they are."
"Alright," said Romilda, "and the fact that it was Millicent who was the human doing the snuggling, and I was one of the cats, what does that mean?"
"Possibly nothing, or rather it just means all of them could be aspects of yourself nurturing other aspects of yourself. Possibly your magic sneaking in, to alert you in a dream that your subconscious already had co-opted to tell you about or reassure you about your worries… that your animagus form is to be a cat."
Romilda's eyes popped very wide, and she sat up.
"Please," said Romilda, "Please tell me that you're not joking?"
"I am not joking," said Ron, "a friend of a friend has been dreaming that she was a horse for years, then she took the animagus seminar last year, and now she can turn into a horse that looks exactly like her dream. I'm not promising that, merely saying that it is an additional possible reason why you might appear as a cat in a dream."
"Oh," said Romilda, "alright," she sighed and lay down again with a smile on her face, "alright what's the rest?"
"Snakes also can mean lots of things, but snakes in bed almost always mean sexuality," said Ron, "that it was repeated, might mean to emphasise that this is a thing you are worried about, or it might mean to reassure you that it will often happen the same way, in the same order, there's fear and excitement, recognition, play, camaraderie, comfort, relaxation, and yes, possibly sleep."
Romilda stared at him with a wrinkled nose for several seconds, then sighed and relaxed, "And then?"
"You tell me?"
"The monster comes, and everything ends."
Ron nodded, "We never get so powerful or so secure that we cannot destroy ourselves. So be careful. But also enjoy what you've already earned, in the season it exists, there's no point in putting off forever the enjoying that you've earned, waiting until you've earned some 'perfect amount' of it. There's every chance that what you work to accumulate in one season of your life might no longer be helpful in the next season."
"Like what?" said Romilda.
"I don't think this is your problem, but for some people, it is: grades. When we get out of school and into a job, the grades won't matter, just the mastery of the subject. The two are correlated, but not exactly. You can memorise all the words but not understand them, or you can understand them and forget the sentences used to explain them. Even forget the proper words to use, but the magic will still work."
"I thought most people will still need the incantations, forever."
"I'm not talking about the incantations, I'm talking about the theory, if you really learn the theory, you can forget about what words one author used to explain it. And pick up a different author who has chosen to describe the same thing with different words, and it will make perfect sense, because it will, on the whole, still mean the same thing. Or the same author translated two decades later by a different translator.
"Also there are hints here and there throughout my books and from some of my older brothers that … the charms with incantations aren't really for us to use every day, but for us to learn how to construct charms that do the things that those charms do. Like a baby kicking its legs and waving its arms to learn how legs and arms work, but someday will take apart that kick and that arm wave into its component nerve impulses, and string them together into a completely different order, to climb to its feet and take a few steps, and in another few years, it will be running around for the fun of it, and in another few years won't even have to think about it."
"That's a completely different idea of what wordless magic is intended to be," said Romilda.
Ron shrugged, "I'm not there yet, but … well, the animagus transformation is wordless, and I can see where, if I try, I can watch how my other charms shape themselves. I imagine that it is possible to shape my magic into new charms, without incantations, and without following a single prescribed pattern, only pulling in the shapes from lots of charms I've used before, that each have an aspect that I want in my new charm. But … that feels like … trying to jump up and run when all I've done so far is inch along the ground. All I can do is hope that the curriculum teaches a bunch of useful stages of development in between, because the idea of painting new charms in place and hoping they don't backfire because I didn't completely understand which part of another charm does what … is rather daunting, you know?"
"Sure," said Romilda.
"Anyway enough of that example, if you want another: hum … toys," said Ron, "first you want one set, then you've mastered everything that set can teach you, and you want the next set. … and someday the process repeats when you want the best toys for your children to play with, but know that they will outgrow them eventually, the same way you outgrew yours."
"Sure," said Romilda.
"So, Back to your dream?"
"Hmm," said Romilda and rubbed her neck, "That's kind of less of a nightmare, and kind of a lot more of one than what I thought it was. Except …"
Ron waited.
"Except you're saying that the monster might not be … an obsession that takes over my life, it might just be … whoever I'm supposed to grow up into next, and I shouldn't hide from it, but I also shouldn't seek it out and suicide into it early either?"
"Without knowing what it is," said Ron, "I can't advise you which of those is more likely, but I think, it might just be fear of the unknown because it is unknown. The monster finds you and then everything ends, maybe the monster also ends, because then it will no longer be unknown, and it will no longer make sense to fear it."
"So to summarise …" said Romilda, "It could be an obsession that takes me over and destroys all other aspects of myself, it could just be my next life stage, that I don't know enough about it yet to predict, but when it happens it will change a lot of my motivations, or it might be anything and everything that I don't yet know, that I'm afraid of because I don't yet know them."
"Sounds right," said Ron, "There's secondary characteristics of a bunch of your other symbols that I think sort of tie together with 'the fear of the unknown' interpretation but I didn't mention them because they are secondary and I haven't memorised them well at all, and I don't have my divination textbooks in front of me."
"That's alright," said Romilda, "it was just a dream, you know? It freaked me out to start with, and I had to make sure you were still here, kind of as proof that everyone else is also probably still here, but beyond that … the interpretation is nice to have but I didn't … just, 'thanks,' you know."
Ron smiled, "It's all right, it's hard to not always be worried about something or other, and when your subconscious has something to say about it, it will send you coded pictures in your sleep. You can spend the time to decode them if you want, or you can muddle through the regular way without reading the headlines from yesterday, hoping for hints on what to do differently today."
Romilda shrugged.
"Or … another approach is," said Ron, "you can skip the decoding step, and just think, 'but what do I want to do about it?' and make something up, let it be as thematically appropriate as you can, but work towards whatever feels like the best possible resolution within the context of the dream. Usually that … well often it works is all."
"Give me a for instance?"
Ron shrugged, "I shouldn't do this, mostly because this is way too closely picking on my reality rather than yours, but … you could: instead of going to Millicent to give and get the self-care you need, you could first go find Harry Potter, help him kill the monster, and only then when the world is somewhat safer, go to Millicent to get your share of the care you need."
"Fair enough," said Romilda.
"Good," said Ron, "now your turn."
"What?"
"What I said isn't the one and only correct answer. It's your dream, and your imagination, your answer is bound to be better than mine."
"Can I say, 'Go out into the forbidden forest and eat all the things until I'm bigger than the monster and come back and kill it myself'?"
"Sure," said Ron.
"Can I say, 'convince Millicent to take Scuffles and I home before the monster comes again'?"
"Sure," said Ron.
"Which one should I say?"
"That is not for me to decide," said Ron, "It's your life, and your unconscious mind that you are instructing how it should be encouraging you to develop while you're busy concentrating on other things."
She frowned, "What do … the things I said mean?"
"In your original dream, we never saw what kind of monster you were afraid of losing yourself to, in your first alteration, we see you intentionally feeding one of the aspects of your feminine side until it is overwhelmingly powerful, or at least powerful enough to destroy the unseen thing which you once feared. Without knowing what the monster is, nor which aspect of the feminine you chose to empower, the idea of it being powerful enough to overwhelm a less desired aspect of yourself might be very positive, or it might be a shortsighted plan, and a worse monstrosity than the thing that you never looked at."
"But given that the monstrosity was going to destroy all the rest of me, destroying it first might still be justified."
Ron nodded, "Agreed. if we're going with the 'an obsession which could destroy all of you but itself' interpretation, then yes, strengthening any of the other aspects of your personality to deal with it, but leaving the rest of you intact would be better than letting the obsession develop and take over. You might still end up being somewhat dominated by a weird obsession, but at least it was one you chose, and one you fed over time, rather than it taking you over all at once."
"And my second 'alteration'?"
"Let's see, you retreated," again Ron paused to choose his words carefully, "and you preserved the aspects of yourself that you had left and had control over, whether that 'retreat' counts as 'running away and not facing the problem,' or as 'leaving the problem aspect alone until the rest of your character is strong enough to deal with it,' or as 'rejecting it early and completely, and refusing to let it linger near and feed on your thoughts,' that depends on you."
"Or maybe it's retreating from one system where the monster exists and is a problem, to another system where it is irrelevant."
"Ah," said Ron, "Perhaps." A pause, "Is that what you meant?"
She frowned, "I'm not sure, it's kind of what that move might mean to me in the waking world if I was a cat. But we're talking about a dream, and I'm not a cat, nor can I change who's sister I am the way a cat can."
"I bet you can," yawned Ron, "But I expect it takes a god-awful amount of paperwork, and gold, and parental consent forms, and who knows what else."
"Yes, well," said Romilda, "Go to sleep. Do you want to send me away first?"
"No, I … I'd kind of rather you stayed," said Ron, "but neither will I stop you from going if you prefer."
Romilda rolled her eyes, and whispered, "Tell me how you really feel."
"I want you to sleep as best you can," said Ron, "I want you to go where you estimate will be best for that."
"I don't … have an estimate for that yet," said Romilda, "May I stay, mostly to learn that about myself."
"Yes, you may," said Ron, "And welcome."
Romilda smiled and lay down again. And kept smiling as they both closed their eyes.
.
"Romilda, where were you?"
"What?"
"You weren't in your bed, or in the shower, where were you?"
Romilda rolled her eyes, "I was in Ron's bed."
"No way!"
Romilda nodded.
"Why?"
Romilda shrugged, "Right after New Year's hols, and terrified of classes starting again, bad dreams, and he's the prefect who's been most approachable to me lately."
"Romilda and Ron? / sitting in a tree?" chanted Orla tentatively from the doorway.
"Shut up, go away," said Romilda, "there hasn't been any kissing."
"But you've got to admit, he wants into your robes," said her roommate.
Orla's face went scarlet and she hurried away.
"No," said Romilda, "I'll admit he's hansom, but as it turns out, he's already got a girlfriend."
"Aw!" said three girls in mixed despair and predatory vicarious elation.
But the amusing part is that his girlfriend also has a girlfriend.
Romilda smiled and got in line for the shower.
"I notice it's interesting," said one of her roommates, "that Romilda is the only one who knows Ron has a girlfriend."
"Which means," said her conversation partner, "that at least once, she's bothered him enough that he had to mention it."
"Oooh, that's right … That means Romilda wants into his robes."
Romilda blushed, "Wanted," she said without turning around.
"What?" said excited voices.
"I said, your logic only proves as much as 'wanted' not all the way to 'wants', and anyway, it leaves out the possibility that without me wanting anything, he could misinterpret that I wanted something, and decide to tell me about his girlfriend. Or I could have asked him for help with revising, and he could have introduced me to his girlfriend for tutoring."
"Really?" said Orla, "what's she tutoring you in then?"
"Potions and History," said Romilda, "What are you doing up here again, Orla?"
"Checking if the line is shorter up here."
"It's not, go away."
"It is actually," said Orla, "There are fewer girls in your year than in mine, and anyway, once I'm last in line it doesn't much matter which line I wait in."
"It does if we tell you to go away."
"Oh let her stay," said Romilda.
"Thanks, Romilda," said Orla, and darted in for a quick hug, then returned to the back of the line.
"Romilda, Why?"
"At the very least," said Romilda, "To keep the conversation away from people wanting into people's robes."
"I don't see why," said Orla, "we talk about who likes who in my form too."
There was an awkward silence while they contemplated the difference between the two topics.
"You know what?" said Romilda, "I've changed my mind, why don't you go wait downstairs."
"Humph, how about upstairs? There are only four girls on the next floor up, and only three in the year above that."
"What? How does that work?"
"Hermione, Parvati, and Ginny have moved to the astronomy tower already."
For a moment Romilda wondered if Orla was going to pout, but she just rolled her eyes and flounced off.
Everyone turned and stared at Romilda.
"What?" said Romilda.
Several shrugs.
The brat is going to make me regret that later in study group.
.
She did.
...-...
{End Chapter 16}