"Ah ha," Master Walter breathed, from right over her head — startling Violet a little, she didn't hear him coming. "This is coming along quite nicely."

Violet grinned, her feet swaying in the air a little. "Thanks!" After learning with him for, like, a couple years now, she was very much aware that Master Walter didn't say things like that just because. If he said it looked nice that was because he actually thought it looked nice.

They were still working on light and shading and textures and stuff, trying to make things look more natural, which could be really really hard to do. It involved a lot of tiny tiny little lines and stuff to get details so small that they were supposed to blend together in a way to get it to look the way you wanted — and it was hard to tell if it was doing that right when you were halfway through making it, or sitting up close actually doing the painting part — and also slowly putting it together with layer after layer after layer on top of each other. Master Walter sometimes had her practise, taking a small piece out of her sketch and just getting the shapes and the colours in that one spot to come out right, and then repeating it in the big version.

She was getting better at it! It was really slow work — quicker than it used to be, since she got good enough with magic to carefully dry off the layer of paint she was on and start the next one right away — and it didn't always work out, needing to start over when it came out looking wrong for whatever reason. And a lot of the time she wasn't actually trying to make it look real, more like what it looked like in her head? When she thought about it, like. But Master Walter said that was fine, if you wanted something to look exactly realistic you'd just take a photo instead — but painting was art, which sometimes meant making things look better than in real life, or at least different, so.

The thing she was working on now was based on a photo Muime took of the kittens, which Violet then turned into a sketch, which she was now turning into a painting. They were keeping the kittens in Violet's bedroom for now — Mum had carved a ward into the doorframe quick to keep them from sneaking out — until they were a little bigger and they didn't have to worry about them falling off of things and hurting themselves. (So, probably not until Violet came home for Christmas.) They didn't make a stinky mess, thankfully, since they just went in the little sandbox Mum got — Muime said cats had really sensitive noses, they didn't like smelly things being around either, so they'd just bury stuff (which could then easily be gotten rid of with a quick cleaning charm). They did kind of make a mess out of her things, though, if she wasn't paying attention. She put anything that would be bad for them to get into, like paints or beads or jewellery or anything small enough for them to swallow, over into her art room before letting them out of the cage, but that didn't mean they didn't make a mess out of anything else. They knocked over her pencil tray a couple times now, sending them rolling all over the floor, and they loved digging around in her dresser drawers, if she left one cracked open by accident they'd go digging in there so fast. If she didn't want her underwear or her socks or whatever scattered all over the room, she had to remember to make sure they were fully closed each time, because they made such a mess...

Also, sometimes they woke her up when she was trying to sleep. They'd attack her feet through the blankets, or burrow under the blankets with her and crawl around, wake up with a kitten kneading on her somewhere, one time she woke up with one of them (couldn't tell which) nuzzling up against her face, which was very cute, but sweetie, I'm trying to sleeee-eep...

They were kind of a pain at times, but she loved them though, they were so cute! She just about died every time she fed them, all letting out tiny little mews, rearing up onto their back paws and batting at her skirt, and when she was, like, reading or drawing or something and one crawled into her lap and snuggled up to sleep, aaahhh, melting.

Violet ended up calling her kitten — the one with the white patch on her belly up to her chin, and on the front two paws like little socks — Sparks, for reasons that apparently only made sense to herself. She was sleeping in a patch of sunlight the afternoon they brought them home, and the silvery parts of her fur went all glittery, but Mum and Muime weren't sure how that turned into Sparks, exactly. Mum named her kitten Diana, like, after her grandmother? That was what Violet assumed at first, thought it was kind of cute of her, but it turned out that was a coincidence — she'd been thinking of Diana the goddess, of the wild and hunting, because cats hunted things, and the moon, because she was all dark and had big silver glowy eyes, so.

Between Sparks and Diana, Sparks definitely liked Violet best — she was always trying to get her to play with her, or would hop up into her lap to knead at her, or just curl up to nap. Diana also wanted to get her attention sometimes, or would come for scritches, and of course she'd always be very sweet when it was food time, but she didn't do it as much as Sparks. But, yeah, Sparks might like Violet more than Diana, but she was pretty sure Diana still liked her more than any of the other people in the house. It was because of her fairy-smelling magic, she thought? All the kittens had been crawling all over her back at the shop, so. Diana would play with or take scritches from Mum, and also Muime sometimes, but she didn't get as snuggly as she would with Violet, and she did not like being picked up by them, at all. Not that either of them really liked being picked up — Violet thought because they had all the energy, they wanted to be able to move — but she didn't resist when Violet did, and she did when Mum or Muime tried it, so. But Sparks was more skittish around Muime and Mum, so, Diana liked them more than Sparks did, but Diana still liked Violet more than them, because apparently kneazles really liked Violet just because.

Which she was still feeling special about, so.

Anyway, Muime got a rope basket from somewhere, they put an old blanket in it, and that was the cat bed. It was next to the head of Violet's bed, where it would get some sun from the window — the kittens liked the warmth, apparently, when they took naps it was often in the sun. Sometimes both of them would curl up sleeping together in the basket, which was very very cute.

Muime snapped the photo of them sleeping in the basket nearly a week ago, and that was what Violet used as a base to make the painting she was working on now. Getting the fluffiness of their fur to look right was hard, and the way the sunlight would play off of it, but she thought it looked pretty good? Like, the little fluffballs all squished together in the painting looked fluffy, even though they were just made out paint, the tiny narrow little streaks of paint laid over each other to imitate the texture of the fuzz. It wasn't perfect, she could actually make out a couple spots where she got a stroke slightly wrong, breaking up the pattern she was going for a little bit, and she didn't think the glazing had turned out quite right, but she thought it was looking pretty good? Master Walter said he thought so too, and he didn't just say things like that to be nice, so.

The painting wasn't done, though. This was her, um... third day working on it? She thought it was the third day. Anyway, she'd been focussing on the kittens, getting the fluffy fur with the sun playing off of it to look right, and the basket with some folds of the blankets poking out here and there was about done, but the floor, partly wood tile and partly the rugs she had in there, and this end of her bedframe were still looking pretty basic. The simple shapes, and some of the colours and lines, but still missing a lot of the texturing, like, the veins in the wood and the woven patterns in the rugs and the glare from the sunlight. From how many paintings she'd down now, she knew this would still need...another two or even three days, maybe? But those were kinds of things she'd painted before, and the fluffiness of the kittens was the hard part, so.

A finger floating a sliver over the paint (still damp in places), Master Walter said, "The layering over the blankets here and where the sun is hitting the fur is very well done. You have— Oh, hold on." Seemingly out of nowhere, he just walked off, disappearing off through a door into the back rooms.

...Um.

He was only gone for a minute, coming back with a canvas frame. "See, if we look here," he said, holding the frame up next to the kitten painting — oh, that was the view of the square at home, from her window, Violet recognised it right away...even though it didn't look very good. She could tell immediately that the perspective was off, something about the angle of the houses and how the trees were standing and the goalposts back there not looking right, and various objects looked very flat, things mostly solid blobs of colour. It was clear she'd tried to mix in multiple colours for things, to get it to look closer to how things looked in real life, but she really hadn't done a very good job, blobby and flat-looking. The shadows especially looked very bad.

She didn't actually remember making this one, but it must have been ages ago. Looking at the two paintings side by side, one from what must have been early in her lessons and the other done just now, the difference was obvious.

Master Walter spent a bit comparing the two paintings, pointing out the the things she'd learned how to do right, and how that affected how the end product looked, Violet listening and kicking her feet. Trying not to give away how kind of confused she was — he was being weirdly nice at the moment, that was all. Like, yeah, she was a lot better than she'd been— October '89? Really? She didn't think it was that long ago. (Must have been one of the first oil paintings she'd ever made, they only started lessons in summer of '89.) Anyway, it was a little odd that he was spending so much time talking about this, but, she guessed, it was going to be a while before they could have another lesson, since Violet was going to be away at Hogwarts and everything. She wasn't supposed to be leaving school all the time, so, they basically wouldn't be meeting in person at all until over Christmas...which was going to be the longest they went without a lesson for two years now, by like a lot.

...She kind of felt like she was going to miss Master Walter. Was that weird?

But anyway, it was a little out of character, making a point of talking about how well she was doing, but this was their last lesson before she'd be gone for a while, so, maybe that was why. She didn't really know what to say — like, yeah, that tree in the old one didn't look right, and her mixing was much better now, and obviously she hadn't really known what she was doing with her brushstrokes starting out (she remembered she was actually using knives for everything), and she basically hadn't been diluting her paints and glazing properly at all, which made everything look really weird and blunt, yeah, the texturing was much better! — just sitting here kicking her feet and now and then agreeing with whatever thing Master Walter just said. She didn't know what to do when someone was basically just saying a bunch of nice stuff about her. Besides thanking them, she guessed? But that didn't really seem right at the moment, so...

Eventually Master Walter was done with this whole thing, setting the old painting down and saying it was time to wrap up for the day — that was why he'd come back to check on her in the first place. She was supposed to take this painting home and finish it, okay, she could do that. She quick finished the little bit of the shadows of the bedframe she'd been working on over here before hitting the frame with a special drying charm Master Walter taught her — it worked slow, it would take a minute or two before the painting was actually safe to move, so Violet went about washing and packing up her stuff.

While she did that, Master Walter talked to her about her 'homework'. Not really home-work, since she'd be at Hogwarts, but. They couldn't just have her not do art stuff while she wouldn't be able to make it to lessons, because then she'd get out of practice, so she was supposed to keep up with it while she was away. Master Walter — or maybe actually Allison, Violet wasn't sure — worked up a schedule for when she was supposed to be reading things by. There had always been books and stuff she was supposed to be reading, that they'd talk about when they weren't working on something — or, sometimes Master Walter would ask questions about it while she was working on something, it depends. Mostly art history, but as they went along there was more literature (mostly poetry, blech) and theory, like complicated philosophy that Violet didn't quite follow sometimes. (She was a little young for this stuff, she thought.) It was mostly neat stuff to think about, though! but she didn't really like poetry much, she didn't think she had the brain for it. She and Master Walter would be talking about whatever she was supposed to be reading by letter. He did understand if she couldn't keep up with the schedule, what with school work and new friends and everything, it could be adjusted if she fell behind, whenever she got around to it was fine.

Violet was supposed to sketch something every day — even if she could only spare, like, a half hour for it, even if it was less than that, as long as she picked up a pencil and made something every day, that was good enough. That actually wasn't different from normal, she'd done something almost every day for years straight now. (She'd gone through so many sketchbooks.) She was supposed to make a proper complete drawing once a week — in whatever medium she wanted, pencil or pastels or ink or charcoal, whatever, and of anything she liked, just as long as she made a thing every week. That might sound like a lot, but since it was just a drawing it wasn't actually, she could knock out a pretty nice looking drawing in pencil or ink in, like, an hour or two? Doing that once a week wasn't difficult at all, and probably actually less than she was doing already just playing around when she felt like it — but she was going to be more busy at Hogwarts, so. She was supposed to send them to Master Walter when they were finished, just so he could take a look, he'd get them back to her when he was done looking over it, with his notes.

She was supposed to make a proper painting once a month. That was actually a pretty big assignment, because a nice proper oil painting could take a lot of time — it was only one a month, though, so that wasn't so bad. (Especially since she could use one of her drawings as a base for it, get some prep work out of the way first.) Master Walter wanted her to paint things at school, either the grounds or in the Castle itself, and keep in mind what they'd been talking about with colours and textures and stuff. And yeah, she could play around with chiaroscuro-type stuff — she should be able to find some neat places in the Castle to do that, keep an eye out for it.

Violet had a feeling that how much extra stuff she made, more than Master Walter assigned just for fun, was going to depend on how much homework she got for classes, and how many people at school she got on with. (And also maybe how distracted she got with embroidery and lacemaking.) She'd definitely do the minimum he was asking for, though, she could do that.

By the time Master Walter was done explaining all the stuff he wanted her to do while she was away at Hogwarts, she had all of her things packed up. She didn't have a case for the canvas on her, Muime had apparated her here carrying it, they could just do the same thing the other way around. Which meant that was it, they were done — Master Walter seemed to think so too, trailing off and staring over at the ceiling the way he did when he was trying to figure out if they were missing anything. Any second now, he'd start leading her back to the office, where Muime was waiting to bring her home.

Which meant this was the time.

Violet took in a long, slow breath. "Um, um, Master Walter? I have a...a thing."

He turned to look at her, one thick eyebrow curling up. Except, not looking straight at her, because Master Walter was even worse at eye contact than she was sometimes — Violet was pretty sure by this point that Master Walter was autistic too, or weird at least — but definitely watching her. "What is it?"

If she tried to talk around it, Violet knew she'd end up stammering, or talking in circles, so the only thing she could really do was, just, spit it out. "I'm Harry P-P-P– Harry P– I-I..." She huffed. "Harry Potter. Me."

His eyebrows crawling further up his forehead, Master Walter's eyes moved to hers — which just made Violet glance away now, down at the floor, nerves crawling over her shoulders. "Really."

"Mhmm. I, I, it's g-going to be in the papers, in like...a couple weeks. So."

Master Walter just...stared at her. Not saying anything, for long seconds, just, staring.

As the seconds went by, Violet felt her shoulders tense up, her skin crawling, nerves bubbling in her stomach. She thought she might be blushing a little, ducking her head, she didn't know what—

"What about the apprenticeship?"

Violet blinked. "What?"

"The contract, the one you and your mother signed when you started with me. That was for Violet Black. But if you're Harry Potter, what does that mean?"

"Oh, um, um..." Violet swallowed. "Um, Mum says that's fine? She, she, it, with G-G-G– the bank, you can have an alias, and... They know, it's fine."

"All right." Master Walter turned around, started walking toward the door out to the front. "Come on, then."

Violet just watched him walk away for a couple seconds, before scrambling to sling her bag over her shoulder and pick up the canvas frame. She caught up to him in the hallway, frowning up at his back from a few steps behind. "Um...?" There was something she meant to say, but she wasn't sure what, the pressure of words hard in her throat but nothing occurring to her.

He glanced back over his shoulder at her. His voice low and kind of grumbly (maybe annoyed), he said, "Does you having been Harry Potter this whole time affect your ability to do that?" pointing at the canvas.

"Um...no?"

He shrugged, spreading his hands a little — as though to say there you are, then. And then he faced forward again, and kept walking.

...Okay.

Violet guessed she wasn't really surprised that Master Walter apparently didn't care, she was just...a little bemused, she guessed. She'd expected more than that, was all? Harry Potter was kind of a big deal in magical Britain, and she knew normal people were going to find it weird that she was 'supposed' to be a boy (the ones who didn't just shrug it off as metamorphs being metamorphs anyway), so, she didn't know, she expected some reaction, maybe some questions...?

She'd like to think Master Walter, just, not caring was a good sign for how this would go with everybody else, but she didn't think it was going to work like that. Master Walter was a bit weird, so.

Back in the front room, Muime and Master Walter talked for a minute, and soon Violet and Muime were leaving. They walked for a minute to where they were allowed to apparate, and a blink of crushing blackness later they were standing in the living room at home. "This is coming along nicely," Muime said, while Violet tried to shake off the bleh of being teleported around — she still didn't like apparation. She was looking at the canvas, Violet gave it to Muime so she didn't drop it if she got dizzy from the apparating. "That's amazing, I have no idea how you got the fur to look like that."

"Carefully."

Muime laughed, which was a little confusing — that hadn't been a joke. "Did you need to do anything before your friends come over?"

"Change clothes, that's it." She was in her painting dress right now, just plain boring linen that she didn't care if she got stuff on it. "Is Susan here yet?" It wasn't until after the words came out that she realised that was a stupid question — Muime had been at Master Walter's the whole time, she wouldn't know.

But, before she could say never mind, Susan's voice came from the kitchen. "I'm in here, Violet."

Oh! Okay. Muime set the painting down on the sofa, which was good enough for now, Violet dipped over by the front door to kick off her shoes, before continuing on into the kitchen. Susan was sitting in one of the stools — her pretty red-pink hair was getting proper long again, held back in a twirling plait, dressed in rather plain linen trousers and shirt, dyed a pale greyish-blue, the only decoration little curling yellow and green embroidery at the hems. She had some kind of magazine or something, Mum standing across the counter leaning over to read along with her upside-down. By the smells in the kitchen, Violet guessed Mum had already started making lunch, must be in the oven.

"Hey, darling," Mum said. "How was your meeting with Master Walter?"

Violet shrugged. "Okay. We mostly j-jeh-j– only t-talked about my assignments for while I'm at school. Hi!" she chirped, hopping over to wrap her arms around Susan — which was a little awkward, with her sitting on one of the stools, but.

Susan let out a little huff, worming one of her arms out of Violets' so she could snake it around her shoulders. "Hello. So how much homework did Marlowe give you?"

"Not a lot — have more r-r-rreading to do, and I'm s'posed to draw things. There's a schedule. Anyway," letting go of Susan and taking a step back...and then glancing over her quick to make sure she hadn't just gotten paint all over her clothes, forgot. "I'm g-g-gone-g-gch—" Violet sighed. "Changing, be back."

On her way up the stairs, Violet noticed that Muime went back for the painting, was showing it to Mum and Susan. That was a little silly — it wasn't even done yet! — but okay, she guessed.

Violet opened her bedroom door, stepped inside, and pulled it closed again — Sparks was already bounding across the room toward her. "Oh hi!" Dropping down to her knees, letting the strap of her bag droop off her shoulder, Sparks was already here a second later, her fur faintly glittering in the light, looking up at her with big shining silver eyes. "Yeah, I'm back, hi!" She gave her some ear scritches, Sparks leaning up into it, but she had too much energy to sit still, rubbed her side against Violet's leg, letting out a little mew, circling around behind her...and started sniffing at her feet. "Ah, that tickles, hey..."

Diana was slower to get moving, hopped out of their basket next to the bed, stretching her front paws out, the little black tuft at the end of her tail sticking way up over her head. Must have been taking a nap. She trotted over just as Violet was standing up, and soon she had both kittens following her around and mewing at her, tiny and soft and precious, rubbing themselves against their legs. "I'll be back with lunch in a few minutes, okay, sweeties." She started pulling her dress over her head, but before she had it all the way up there was a sudden yank — one of the kittens must have grabbed at the hem. "Hey wait, no, let g-go of that..."

Violet stuck her dress way up at the top of her closet, where the kittens couldn't reach — she didn't want them licking at the paint stains — picked out a skirt and a loose short-sleeved blouse without too many dangly bits or anything. (The kittens would just grab at those, so.) Getting the shirt on wasn't a problem, but pulling the skirt up Sparks and Diana kept pouncing at the fabric, getting in the way. She plopped down onto the floor again, scritches scritches scritches, Sparks licked at her wrist, Violet couldn't help giggling a little, that also tickled.

Since they were being a pain about playing with her skirt, Violet searched around the room for a moment, Sparks and Diana both following after her and letting out hungry mews, until she found one of their toy balls, stuck with colourful little feathers. She tossed it across the room, the ball letting out little jingling noises as it bounced, both kittens tearing after it, ended up in a tumbling tangled mess as they both tried to pounce on at the same time — and giving her enough time to pull her skirt on. Violet kneeled down next to them again, scritches scritches, Diana ended up on her back, holding onto her wrist with her front paws and gnawing on her knuckles — that tickled! — Sparks standing up on her thigh to mew in her face. "Hi, sweetie! I'll be back with food soon, okay?" Scritches down her back, Violet leaned down to kiss the top of her head, Sparks leaning up to rub the side of her face along her chin, aaahhhh, why are you being so sweet, Violet had to go...

(Because she knew Violet was weak and would give her treats if she was adorable — Violet had a feeling that Sparks, at least, did that on purpose. But it was lunch time, she couldn't give them treats right now.)

"I have to go." She wormed her hand out of Diana's grip (getting a little scratched up), gently lifted Sparks out of her lap, giving her another kiss on the head before setting her down again. Popping up to her feet before Sparks could just jump right into her lap all over again, "I'll be right back, sweeties." Both kittens followed her back to the door, letting out pathetic little mews, Sparks rearing up to bat at her skirt as she picked up her bag. It was very sad, the way they watched her step outside, the enchantments Mum put on the door not letting them follow her out, closing the door on them behind her — it was very hard leaving them behind when they were being so cute.

Violet quick dipped by the art room to drop off her bag — she probably should have done that first, but she'd wanted to see the kittens — before going back downstairs. Mum had mostly already done the cooking for lunch, but Violet helped finish up anyway. There was some shredded pork and mushroom sauce stuff that would go on buns and be sandwiches, and some chips, made out of potato and carrot wedges — these were from their garden, they were purple! There was also going to be a fruit salad... thing, but some of the fruits in it Violet didn't like much. She planned on just giving those to Susan or Lasairín, so. She also didn't really like eating hot sandwiches, especially ones with messy things that might escape and get on her fingers, but she could just eat it with a fork, so.

The platter of chips was out on the counter, Violet giving them a stir around, the steam coming off them smelling so good and herby, Mum dividing out the sandwich stuff, when the back door clicked open. "Hello!" Lasairín chirped, sticking her head through the door. "Good, Willow's here, we're not early, then?"

"No, come on in, we should just be a minute..."

Lasairín, Damhnait, and Síomha (Nic Mhathúna) came into the kitchen before the door was closed behind them again — the kids in their block Violet was the best friends with, who she really thought should be told about the Harry Potter thing before it was in the papers. She thought about asking Caoilfhionn, but they weren't that close, really, and Éimhín and Lasairín kind of played off each other, if they were both here they might kind of take over the conversation too much and things would be happening and Violet would chicken out. (Which was why Susan was here, for moral support.) Lasairín could just tell her cousin about it later.

Besides, Muime pointed out that the girls might have awkward questions, that they might be embarrassed asking about in front of a boy. Violet wasn't sure what kind of questions she was thinking of, but sure.

The other girls didn't know that there was anything out of the ordinary happening today. There wasn't very much longer that they'd be able to do anything, so they kind of just thought it was a goodbye lunch before she left for Hogwarts? There was still a little bit left before the end of the month, but Lasairín and Síomha were both starting academy too (though Damhnait was continuing on into the higher-level craft school), so they were all busy with their own getting-ready-for-school stuff, and there was the wedding!

Not the real big proper wedding party, that wouldn't be until around, like, Christmas or Easter or something, but the legal wedding. They were going down to somewhere in Sicily, where Mum and Muime would sign some papers in some office somewhere and have a nice dinner out on the beach, with some family and friends and stuff. Violet thought about inviting some of her friends, but they had their own life stuff they were doing, and also it wasn't so easy for everyone else to just pick up and go to a foreign country for a couple days — passports weren't really a thing on the magical side, so you could go basically wherever, but there was still money stuff to worry about and, you know, their own lives. But even then, it was just supposed to be a family thing, so. Susan was going to be there (and maybe Amelia), but that's because Amelia's grandfather was Mum's godfather and she kind of ended up an honorary member of the family because of that, Amelia even called her Aunt Cassie and everything...

Violet wasn't sure how much the wedding coming up soon should count? Like, after signing the papers and stuff Muime and Mum would be legally married, but only in magical countries that recognised it — Britain didn't let two women marry at all, so it wouldn't be legal here. They were mostly just doing it for, like, when they were travelling outside of the country, to make some of that stuff easier, especially if there were little kids later. Also, there was some complicated legal thing to do with the adoption they'd be doing, Violet didn't follow it exactly, but! It was still exciting, and Muime was going to be part of the family for real, and they were going to have a whole party on the beach and it was going to be nice!

(It was stupid that it wasn't legal in Britain, but it was legal in Sicily, so there.)

A platter was loaded up with a bowl of the sandwich filling and some buns and a bowl of the chips and the fruit, with some plates and utensils and stuff — and two little plates of kitten food, ground-up meat and eggs and stuff, which looked gross to Violet, but Sparks and Diana seemed to like it, so. They each picked one of the magic sodas, Mum popping off the caps for them — except Susan, who was having her usual special tea for Seers — and there, that was everything. Passing her strawberry pop bottle over to her other hand, Violet drew her wand (her old pear one) and cast a levitation charm on the tray. Carefully, keeping her eyes on the tray as she walked, she floated their lunch on over to the stairs, took the steps one at a time, slowly, making sure the tray didn't tilt too much...

Violet stepped into her bedroom, and the kittens were immediately there, rubbing against her legs and mewing up at her. "Just a second, sweeties, I have to put this down first." She had to be even more careful now — if she stepped on one of the kittens she'd probably drop everything, and also she would have stepped on one of the kittens — but as soon as the other girls came in behind her they fled, Sparks and Diana both darting away to hide under the bed.

"Hey, it's just me," Lasairín said — she met the kittens a couple times now, Sparks at least would accept scritches from her but Diana was still more shy. She went over to Violet's bed, dropping to her knees and twisting around to look underneath. "I'm not scary, remember?"

Before Violet could get to it, distracted with setting the tray down on the table, Susan said, "You probably shouldn't hover like that. You don't want to make them feel trapped."

"I wasn't hovering..." Violet could hear the pout on Lasairín's voice without looking.

"We should leave them alone to eat, anyway," said Damhnait. "Will they be too shy with us in here too?"

"I'm putting their plates under the bed with them. They'll eat down there, so long as we don't b-b-bother them." The tray safely set down on the table, Violet picked up the cat food plates, dropped down on the floor by the bed next to Lasairín. Leaning over, she slid one of the plates under the bed, pushing it way back there close to where Sparks and Diana were hiding, and then the other one. "There you are, sweeties. Come on," she said to Lasairín, tapping her arm, "let's l-leave them alone..."

The table and chairs set in her room was fine when Violet first got them, when she was really tiny, but it was years later now and they were starting to get a little small — not too small, just, kind of cramped, a little bit. They spent a couple minutes putting together their plates, everyone else chatting about something but Violet not paying that much attention, focussing on what she was doing too much. There was a bit of oil (butter?) in with the chips, she was a little worried about them being on the same plate, she didn't want it to soak into the bread! But, after kind of hanging up over that for a few seconds, she realised there were a couple extra plates. Mum must have given them more than they needed so Violet could put her stuff on separate plates, to keep them from getting into each other — and there were two extra she could use, which was good, because she didn't want the fruit salad getting mixed in with the stuff on the chips or the sandwich stuff, that would be gross.

The other girls thought Violet was a little silly for eating her sandwich and the chips with a fork, but they were used to her being a little silly by now. There was a bit of teasing, but it wasn't even mean teasing. She didn't want to get it on her hands, okay! Like that, Lasairín already got a blob of stuff dripping on her thumb. Sure, she could just charm them clean, but that wasn't the point!

(Just watching the other girls have little bits of their sandwiches escape while trying to eat them or getting the grease from the chips on their fingers was making Violet feel slightly sick, but she kept that thought to herself. One of those autism things, she thought, she could just be weird about this stuff sometimes — it wasn't their fault that the same things didn't bother them, so.)

For a little bit, they mostly talked about the kittens, because kittens, and then about school. It was cool that Síomha was continuing into academy — they were always pretty sure that Lasairín was going to go, but they didn't find out about Síomha until, like, March? The academy level was way more expensive than the craft school, and it took longer for people to finish up to a point that they could get a job and start making money, so not everyone could go. Lasairín's tuition was being paid for by the Caoimhes — she was actually more closely related to the super-important Gaelic family than Violet thought at first, through her grandmother — and they also bought her a new wand and everything, but the Mathúnas could only send so many of their kids to academy, Síomha had done well enough in school so far that she got picked. (Sort of like their Síomha, the difference was that Muime's family normally sent nobody to academy, they made it work special just for her.) She didn't get a new wand, though, one of the old wands her family had worked for her — it was pretty common for older families who at least had some money to have some old wands tucked away, though normally nowhere near as big of a collection as the Blacks had.

Apparently the person who last owned Síomha's wand died in the Rebellion. What they called the Rebellion (in Gaelic) was a whole thing that happened in, like, the 1910s to 30s or so — it was the last time the Gaels actually tried to break away from the Wizengamot and have their own country, and also there was some other stuff going on, it was complicated. It came up in History class at school, but besides that nobody really talked about it much. Lots of people around here had family who'd been killed by the Ministry people, or who died in Azkaban, so, nobody really wanted to think about it, sensitive topic.

Though, it was technically a sensitive topic for Violet too — one of the last events of the Rebellion, after it was practically already over in the early 40s, had been a really big bombing of the Longbottoms' family manor. The explosion had been strong enough to get through the wards and completely flatten the gardens and smash a big chunk of the manor. There happened to be a family reunion of some kind going on at the time, which had included the Potters, most members of both Houses alive at the time were all killed. Auntie Lise said the only reason she and Violet had ever even been born was because Charlus didn't like crowds and was a big botany nerd, he'd been out in the forest poking at plants by himself when the bomb hit.

But that couldn't be the reason why Síomha changed the subject right away, because she didn't know about that yet.

Lasairín spent a lot of the conversation about school pouting down at her chips. Yeah, it did kind of suck that they were going to different schools. Violet couldn't just go to an Ollscoil instead...and also she thought it was too late to switch now? But no, she had to go to Hogwarts for reasons. (And also she couldn't let Susan go to Hogwarts alone, because Violet had to make sure she always had things to eat.) Violet was going to miss her too — leaning over in her chair for an awkward little half-hug — she would be back for Christmas! Though, there might be wedding stuff going on then. But if there was Lasairín could come! And she would write her all the time, okay? Yeah, it wasn't the same, and it would still suck, but Violet guessed that was just life sometimes...

(Randomly, Violet wondered if anyone back on Privet Drive missed her after she just disappeared one day. Probably not.)

After talking around about that kind of stuff for a while, their lunch was mostly gone, just nibbling on the remaining chips and bits of fruit. The kittens finished their lunch too, Sparks had snuck under the table and hopped into Violet's lap — she was sleepy, though, like they usually were after eating. (The amount of food they were given every time looked so big compared to how tiny they were, but apparently that was just how much kittens ate when they were still growing?) She kneaded at Violet's stomach a little, but pretty quickly curled up to take a nap. Not that she was actually getting much sleep, Lasairín leaned over to pet her, Sparks letting out annoyed little mews, grabbing onto Lasairín's hand and lazily gnawing on and licking her fingers, Lasairín letting out high little giggles...

Susan gave her a look. Yeah, this probably wasn't a bad time.

"Um." The other girls turned to look at her, Damhnait cutting off in mid-sentence — oops, Violet had been in her own head, hadn't noticed she was talking. "Sorry, um. I, I had a thing, that I w-w– thought you should know, first."

There was a couple seconds of silence, before Lasairín, still trying to rub Sparks's belly without getting her fingers too scratched up, said, "Okay? What's the thing?"

Same when she was talking to Master Walter, if she tried to get too clever with it and make it a whole big thing, she'd end up tripping over her words and turning into a stammering mess. So she just blurted out, "I'm Harry Potter." Oh, came out smoother that time...

Nobody said anything for a few seconds, Lasairín — her face closer to Violet's than normal, leaning over to reach Sparks — tilting her head to frown up at her. Everyone was confused, she was pretty sure. "What do you mean?" Síomha asked.

"...What I said? You know, Harry P-P-Potter, is me?"

Still frowning at her, a little slowly, Lasairín asked, "Is this some joke I'm not getting?"

"No, she's being serious," Susan said when Violet didn't answer right away — suddenly nervous, worried this was Lasairín reacting badly, and... something was about to happen. "First time I came over, my mum told me we'd be meeting her aunt Cassie and Harry Potter. I was a little confused at first when I saw Violet but, you know." She shrugged.

"But that can't be right, can it?" Damhnait asked. "I mean, isn't Harry Potter... I don't know, Dumbledore sent him somewhere, I don't remember."

"Yeah, he sent me to my mother's sister's family, and they were mean. Um." It didn't really hurt to talk about it anymore, or make her nervous or whatever, but she'd rather not think about the Dursleys at all if she didn't have to. "R-r-rr— When we first c-came here, I said my family was b-b- bad, and Mum took me from them? Yeah, that was them."

"..But wasn't Lily Potter muggleborn?"

"Mhmm, they were muggles. I d– I deh, I didn't know magic was r-rreal, until the same day we met," with a little nod at Lasairín — they first met when Violet was checking out the back garden while Mum was looking at the paperwork for the house, that was the same day. Felt like forever ago... "I could change myself, but, I thought I was j-j-just a freak or something, I dunno."

There were a couple questions about how Violet Black became a thing, but it wasn't that bad, actually? They already knew most of this, sort of, since she'd never really lied about it — that Mum got her out of a bad family was common knowledge, and that Violet was with muggles before, so. (She guessed it was only that Harry Potter hadn't known about magic that made it seem like it was a new thing.) Everybody knew that Violet Black hadn't always been her name, just, they'd thought it was only the Black part that changed. That Violet never really lied lied about any of this before made it kind of easy to explain, just, yeah, those mean people she was with before were Lily Potter's relatives, and they were keeping it secret because people were stupid about the Boy Who Lived and everything, and Mum thought it was safer this way — not totally secret, though, Dumbledore knew what happened, and Mum told the Director of Law Enforcement right away. Yeah, Susan knew about this the whole time, but she couldn't tell anyone, it was a secret...

Mum already told Violet that Gaels didn't care so much about the Boy Who Lived stuff — the war with the Dark Lord was a British thing, it mostly left Ireland alone — so they didn't make so much of a big deal about that? Not that much was changing, really, it was just going to be in the papers soon, and after that she'd just be Violet Potter, so...

"Why are you a girl though?" Lasairín blurted out, randomly. "I mean, I know you are a girl, we've had baths and stuff, but... You know what I mean? You were a boy to start off with, right?"

"Um...no, actually?"

Lasairín blinked at her. "What?"

"It's complicated, but, Mum says my father g-g-gave me a potion, when I was, was, was– before anyone knew, and said I was a boy? Like, I was a g-girl first, I mean."

"...Why would he do that?"

Violet shrugged. "Stupid noble family l-llegacy stuff?" All the other girls at the table (except Susan) made a face at that — to normal people, the nobility had a reputation for being very weird and kind of creepy about things sometimes. "I feel better this way, c-c-can't explain it. I can be both, I used to g-g– be punished for being the wrong thing, all the time. Mum let me try being a g-giirrlll that first day, and I never went back, so."

"So wait, that day we met was the first time ever you were a girl? Like, not your body, I mean like telling people and the name and everything?"

"Mhmm."

"Weird, I would never have guessed that..."

And...that was basically it, actually. There were a couple questions about what was going on, like, how and when they were telling people and how that was going to work. It was all arranged, it was going to be in the paper, after her name was called up for the Sorting at Hogwarts — mostly because Violet had the thought of surprising her cousin Draco with it because he was mean and she didn't like him, and Mum played along with that for some reason? Violet hadn't really expected her to, but, okay. (Lasairín found this very funny.) And yeah, she wasn't a Black legally, and yes, she was technically Lady Potter, that was still a whole thing. Just, she only wanted to tell them now because she thought it would be...bad, for them to learn about it in the papers and not from her? Or indirectly when it got around to them later, she was pretty sure the article was only being printed in the English edition...

Violet didn't know what else there was to say — it wasn't that complicated, really — and it seemed like the other girls agreed? Their questions ran out after a while, and they, just...moved on. About school stuff, and about the kittens (because kittens) and a thing about one of Damhnait's cousins, and some politics stuff that Violet didn't follow, and nobody else really did either. They were mostly just repeating what they heard their parents or other adults say, so.

No, she didn't hear about that! Dáire Ó Broin was arrested way back in the Rebellion (that time coming up twice in one conversation was kind of a lot), and he finally died in Azkaban pretty recently? Like a couple years ago, there were vigils and stuff when the news got out — Violet missed it, they were out of the country at a duelling thing at the time. Anyway, when people died in Azkaban, the family didn't get the body back, just disposed of there on the island. Some people at Glaschú (Glasgow, that is) made a little memorial instead, invited his family and everything when it was dedicated. Not just for Dáire, there'd been riots in Glaschú when the news got out, the memorial was also for the people who died during that, but primarily for Dáire.

And someone vandalised it! Threw paint all over it, and alchemical stuff that ate into the stone and ceramic, it was ruined. That was so mean, why would somebody do that?! (Well, because he was in the Rebellion, she guessed, but still!) The Ministry basically refused to do anything about it either — Susan seemed a little embarrassed (that was her mum's Department's job), admitted a lot of people at the Ministry didn't take things Gaels cared about very seriously — Lasairín heard some people with Saoirse had offered to look into it themselves. Well, Violet hoped they found them then! That was just mean...

(Later, Susan would ask Violet what she thought the Saoirse people who do to whoever was responsible if they found them — which, well, she guessed she didn't know? They couldn't just report them to the Ministry, she guessed, since they didn't care, but. Get them to apologise and pay to fix it, maybe? Something, at least, you know?)

(The way she asked, Susan made finding who did it sound like a bad thing.)

They talked about other things, but not any more about Violet being Harry Potter. One of them would give Violet a funny look now and then, but...this was good, she thought? Like, no one was getting angry or calling her a freak or anything, so, yeah.

Apparently some kids around here (mostly people they knew from craft school) were putting together a game of iomáint starting in an hour or so, and yeah, Violet could play! Lasairín was a little smug about it, like, of course Violet was going to play — she already volunteered her for the same team Lasairín was on. Damhnait and Síomha weren't playing, though, neither of them liked iomáint much, but Lasairín and Violet should just go without them. Susan wasn't coming either, but that's because she was getting tired and wanted to steal a nap before dinner. (Being a Seer was hard sometimes.) She just had to change, and get her camáin...oh, and she guessed ask her parents if it was okay. She didn't think they would say no, but.

There was still some time before they had to go, but pretty soon after Lasairín mentioned that they started saying goodbye anyway. Though, that ended up taking longer than it really needed to, because there were kittens. They were in here talking long enough that the kittens were already starting to wake up from their after-food nap, and Diana was a little less shy about there being strangers in here now — at least comfortable enough to play around chasing after balls and stuff, anyway. Sparks was the brave kitten, she got a lot closer to the new humans, sneaking up to sniff at them. She sometimes even let the other girls pet her, but she wasn't nearly as snuggly with them as she was with Violet...

...or even Lasairín, apparently? Sparks was starting to actually like Lasairín, which Violet thought was a good sign for her getting along with her roommates at school, so.

Eventually, though, Violet loaded all of their lunch things back on her tray, and they went downstairs. After a round of goodbye hugs and good-lucks for school — the second not really necessary, since they'd all probably at least see each other before then, and the first was a little silly for Lasairín to do, anyway, since she'd be back after changing — and then Lasairín and Damhnait and Síomha were out the door and gone, leaving Violet and Susan alone in the kitchen.

"So, how'd it go?" Mum said, startling Violet a little. She was standing in the doorway into the dining room, hadn't been there a second ago.

"Um, I think it went g-good?"

"It's too early to say." Violet blinked over at Susan, who shrugged back at her. "I'm sorry, Violet, but sometimes you're pretty bad at reading people."

...Fair.

"Lasairín will be fine — I think she thinks it's kind of cool her dlúthchara—" Best friend, the word Lasairín used, said a little sarcastically. "—is Harry Potter. I bet she'll be bragging about that after the news comes out." That was silly, but Lasairín could be pretty silly, so. "But Síomha thinks it's a little weird that you're not a boy anymore."

"She does?" Violet didn't even notice...

Susan shrugged, looking a little awkward. "I think so, sorry. She might get over it? Damhnait is pretty quiet, but, she's really sweet, and the goodbye hug seemed comfortable, so, I think she'll be fine. Síomha's the only one who was a little off."

"Oh. Okay." Two out of three wasn't so bad, she guessed?

If Síomha didn't want to be friends anymore, at least she'd still have Lasairín and Damhnait. She could live with that.

"Anyway, some of the kids are playing iomáint, c-c– can I go?"

For some reason, Mum was smirking at her — Violet didn't know what she'd just said was so funny. "Come back at a reasonable time for dinner. Oh, and ask Síomha if she wants to come with. She's upstairs in the office right now."

"Okay! Thanks, Mum." She skipped over to give Mum a quick hug before turning right around and starting for the stairs. "I have to go change, see you later, bye!" Oh, and her camáin should be tucked in a corner of the entryway, by the shoes, and she probably didn't need to bring balls, they should have those already...