Phoenix Zhang
19 May 2025, 02:23
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The library exuded a silence that belonged alone to old structures, a quiet and stillness — as if sound and noise had been absorbed into the building itself. Dominating above were windows filled with soft afternoon sunlight that streamed in and threw their soft beams onto patches that drifted through the air and onto the worn edges of the ancient wood shelves that extended up and along walls. Phoenix Harlow sat in a cozy corner in the back part of the library hunched over a table all but buried under looming stacks of rejected volumes, each and every one full of stories and knowledge waiting to be read and discovered.
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Date: 15/05/25 | Time: 16:50 | Outfit: Robes | CC: #english, mandarin
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Her essay on History of Magic remained in its place on her desk, alone and undisturbed for at least a solid fifteen minutes. The essay prompt for the subject read pretty simply and straighforward enough to quote: Where did the goblins choose to establish an significant center for operations for the significant revolt that took place in 1612? But then again, of course, "simple" does not necessarily equate to "straightforward."
Her essay is a virtual painting, textually overflowing with a compact network of notes, wise remarks, and carefully extended cross-references — lots of arrows written carefully in margins, footnotes double-circled and triple-circled for added emphasis. She idly nipped the tip of her quill softly and furrowed her eyebrows together in close concentration as she worked diligently.
"It wasn't Hogsmeade," she whispered so quietly that even the people closest to her barely heard her. "Not then. Later."
She flipped through a page in her textbook and glanced briefly.
The Leaky Cauldron became too conspicuous. Knockturn too far south. She glanced briefly out to the outer edge of the page, where printing touched upon it and to the faint map that had been folded back into the crease of the following chapter. And then she saw it. A small mark, almost erased by age. She smoothed her finger over it delicately, following lines within its form.
It registered for her. The plan, the strategy, and the renaming all made sense.
She sat up and dipped her pen into the ink and began to write tenderly with sensitivity. And then, without realizing she had said it out loud:
"The Yorkshire pig-faced inn."─────
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| 𝑰𝒏𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒂𝒄𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝑾𝒊𝒕𝒉: @none @Rafal Devereux | 𝑴𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒊𝒏𝒈: @ |
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26 May 2025, 03:24
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banner tba
No matter the amount of times Rafal enters the Hogwarts library, its ceiling-high grandeur never fails to take his breath away. The shelves upon shelf of countless tomes and studies, it might as well as be a dream. Whenever he is here, Rafal feels like he is more than an eleven-year old boy. He feels like royalty, the main protagonist of one of those volumes themselves, with infinite possibilities and no boundaries.
It is another one of those generic Hogwarts days - wake up, go to classes, eat. So on and so forth. Others might find this quotidian routine to grow steadily more tedious, but Rafal finds it nothing less than invigorating. He is genuinely enthused by, as horribly nerdy as it makes him sounds, the pursuit of knowledge.
He builds a fleet of wisdom around him, textbook and manuscripts of varying topics. Transfiguration is the subject the Slytherin is choosing to focus on at the moment, and it is perhaps one of the magics which has always ailed him more than others. The fact only grows to incentivise him more, however, and before long Rafal is completely immersed in his essay.
Rather funny that neither Rafal nor the person next to him notices the other's existence in the large time they are sitting so close, likely largely due to the fact that both of them are all but buried under their own respective book forts. But when his neighbour whispers something (in a low tone, but he hears it nevertheless - ), the first year is finally alerted to their presence.
And Rafal honestly wouldn’t have done anything with that information, he frankly has plenty on his plate at the moment and is not one to feel the need to exchange howdy-dos with every stray soul he came across. But what he hears next, makes all that suddenly irrelevant.
"Actually, it’s not." Rafal says loudly, before he can stop himself. He stands up so that he can see over the towering stacks of books, and faces the source of the voice. "It’s not the Yorkshire pig-faced inn."
Interacting with @Phoenix Harlow
All your blues like a mood ring changing colours
Phoenix Zhang
5 Jun 2025, 18:48
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Phoenix did not look up right away.
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Date: 15/05/25 | Time: 16:50 | Outfit: Robes | CC: #english, mandarin
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Her hand moved on, the pen rising and flowing out in purposeful script under the title she had written barely moments before. Yorkshire Pig-Faced Inn now strode across her page like a banner, though she had not meant to say that out loud. That just happened sometimes. When the answer arrived, it moved her and spilled out without thought. A side effect of being too focused, too immersed.
But now, there was a response. She halted
The sound sliced through the silence—boyish, jerky, shrill enough to cause one or two of her classmates to turn around. Seated, motionless, staring at the page, was Phoenix, one blink the only indication that she breathed. And then, laying down her quill in the tray beside the inkwell, sitting back a little in her chair.
There was no necessity to rise to discover who had addressed her. She knew the susurration of his robes against themselves and the tremble of uncertain confidence in his tone. Somebody thought he was correcting her.
She raised her chin.
"It is," Phoenix said flatly. Her voice was once more controlled, unemotional, but with the sort of self-confidence that sliced through readily to skepticism. "Not officially. But that's the idea." Her fingers tapped idly against the edge of her parchment, pushing wayward notes aside. She did not take the bait of his theatrics. She did not even turn fully around.
"It wasn't so named in any official statement, naturally," went on Phoenix, "but it was always referred to as such. Pig-faced wasn't an insult—it was a sign. A coded reference employed in Goblin correspondence. Presumably because of the carving above the fireside. Boar-like, tapering snout. And the landlord did have a mask on."
She turned one of the folded maps over and stroked the worn area which had previously been green
"Yorkshire, the fringes of the Dales. Not a long way from what would one day become a well-known apparition point for smugglers. The inn was away from the main road, hard to find unless you knew how. That's why they used it. Not because it drew attention to itself. Because it didn't."
"I didn't say it was the headquarters, official or otherwise," she went on, speaking more to her notes than to the boy.
"I said I told you it was the operations center. That's not the same thing. Tactically, that's where plans were funneled, revised, and sent out from. The inn owners—or the Goblins pretending to be owners—used the cellars. There's a documented attempt at a raid by a Ministry task force in 1613 that places the address. Though they didn't find anything. Since, by then, everything had moved."
She shrugged just enough, as if that sufficed. And to her, it did Phoenix returned to her parchment, her fingers taking up the rhythmic tracing along the edge of the page again. There was only one single moment of silence—like she was letting him sit there and try to pretend he hadn't said anything. And then, as though as an afterthought, "You're not wrong to think it wasn't. Most aren't. But you're wrong to say it."─────
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| 𝑰𝒏𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒂𝒄𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝑾𝒊𝒕𝒉: @Rafal Devereux | 𝑴𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒊𝒏𝒈: @ |
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