Main Story Related Library De-Liberation Open

Entering thread with @Alan Vanes

Interactions: @Evelynn Decipio | @Saskia Nicholson  | Open to other interactions

Permission to godmod Saskia granted

The library wasn't an uncommon hideout for the knowledge-obsessed Thora. But then, with the wealth of hobbies plaguing her time, you could really find her anywhere. The Hogwarts Library was where a thirst for answers could be quenched. It was probably one of the best work environments you could have, without the distraction of yelling or loud noises. So, other than the row after row of books that greeted the eyes of everyone who entered, Thora'd never taken a fancy to it as a place where she found people. It was more of a daily routine that she stopped by to perhaps pick up a couple books.

That was, not until today. Thora hadn't even found her way through the library doors before nearly bumping into a girl with brown hair much like her own but had quite a few inches on her. Saskia, Hufflepuff Quidditch Co-captain and someone Thora'd come to see as a friend. Or, at least close to one. "Hey, Saskia," the Slytherin beamed at the girl. "What brings you here? I was just going to go inside, and I mean, you can come if you have time… And if you want…"

Why did she have to be so pathetically, humiliatingly awkward around even people she was comfortable with? Thora wouldn't believe for a second that people ignored it, friend or foe. It was probably one of the most prominent things that would someday make her stand out from a crowd, however she tried to fit in. Awkwardness just invited itself into Thora's speech sometimes. She would get better. She just had to.

Apparently, though, the Hufflepuff didn't seem to have too much of a problem with it as the two found themselves walking into the library. Thora glanced over the serene scene, taking in the musty scent that defined pretty much the only quiet place in the castle. But then the redhead poring over a considerably-sized book caught her eye, and for once Thora wondered if she'd seen the girl before. A Gryffindor first year with red hair… Evelynn? A fellow artist and SWAG Club member, the young girl seemed nice enough. But as the brunette walked a bit closer out of curiosity, careful to tread likely, it was the book that caught her eye.

Thora was too far away to read every word of the title, but she'd seen enough. Stopping short, green eyes widened as the word "hags" registered in her brain, triggering memory after memory that she'd done her best to hide away in the shadowy corners of her memory. From skimming a few books, the girl knew that hags were not good news. The Hogwarts students didn't have any business with the creatures, did they?

All of that said, Thora knew full well that there were things--decidedly inhuman things--at the wizarding institute. Either that, or someone had made it seem that way. Encounters of her own that fateful night just a week prior hadn't soothed this fear of her. No, her paranoia had just escalated. But if Evelynn was doing what Thora thought she was doing, she had the right idea. If you wanted answers, you had to find them, didn't you?

"Evelynn," Thora whispered as she neared the table. Then, glancing down, the girl let the doubts catch up to her. Most people came to the library to work alone. Not to be bothered by a whole bunch of students. Speaking of which, there were two other boys who had seemed to have made the same choice as her [assuming Alan is present]. Maybe she hadn't made the right decision after all.

"You want any help?" Accepting assistance was honestly a matter of pride and personal dignity. That was what Thora had learned, living among a house of self-preserving people who seemed to care more about reputation than teamwork. When the girl asked the question, she really did mean it. While Evelynn probably wasn't aware, the second year could possibly offer not just a bit of help, but a bit of information. And with all the chaos that had been raging through Hogwarts, wasn't sticking together just what they needed?

| Open to Interactions |
interacts with @Ruka Tân
mentions: @Evelynn Decipio

The third year groaned, when Ruka would not stop bugging him about going to the library and Alan could find no reason why the other kid would even want to go there. Didn't they have enough to read with their school books already? What did they need more books for? Not that Alan hated learning about new and old stuff, but he hated the idea of learning by reading. He would much rather have it told in exciting stories or lectures. What was reading even good for? It just took so much more time than listening to a story, which deemed reading quite in-effective in the young lion's eyes.

"Fine", he muttered, stressing the letter as he began to follow the shorter boy to that dreaded place. As soon as he entered, Alan was sure that the librarian was glaring at him, probably remembering the ruckus he had caused the last time he had been there and Alan did his best to avoid her gaze as he trailed behind Ruka, while glancing around in the huge library. He was wondering whether there might be some books about creatures that did not consist out of 99 percent text. He sighed and nearly stumbled backwards when the copper haired boy shoved a book into his arms. Alan nearly dropped it, but got a grip on it at the last moment, rolling his eyes at the other kid as he glanced down to see what book his friend had chosen. The Witch Trials? Ala frowned at the title, having no idea why Ruka would be interested to read about it... but then he just shrugged to himself and continued to follow Ruka around the library, nearly walking into him, when the boy stood still and nudged him with his ellbow.

The for once taller boy followed hos gaze and his eyes widened slightly. So she was the victim from that crazy girl at the Valentine's errand? He wondered, recognizing her to be the girl from the S.W.A.G club. She was also the girl that had bolted from the common rooms, after another student had puked, but Alan could not really take offense in that, because she looked rather pale after Ga-...lton had vomited just like that. "Yeah... you're right... th-that's her..", he mumbled, confirming his thought with a slight nod, as if that would make any difference.

Alan himself would have probably never walked over on his own accord, but Ruka had no worries like that and Alan was kind of impressed how the younger boy could just walk over and speak to people, whereas Alan just followed quietly, nodding to Evelynn as some sort of greeting and offered her a nervous smile.

Outfit
(Pinterest Re-Colour)

Bastille as a rule was not exactly "involved". He might play Quidditch casually, but he had yet to show up to try-outs or try to play for the Gryffindor team; he would do some errands because he was asked, invited, or just ended up at them by accident, but he didn't seek them out himself; and, most importantly, he was not in clubs. He didn't do clubs. They required expectations and frankly weren't all that interesting. Maman professed the whole point was "common interests" and "making friends" but Bast just wasn't all that concerned about making friends, personally. That would require him to actually like people, and he only liked some. 

The library, however, was a social setting that he would frequently partake in. He liked the library. It was quiet, had nice lighting, and he could wander off to find a book to distract him if he got bored of his work. He'd rather be in the library than in his common room. Which how he found himself inadvertently getting involved in Club Business that morning: by heading towards the library as was habit and, upon noticing Eve tucked away in the corner, approaching her. Might as well sit with one of the few lions he liked, even if it looked like she was gaining a bit of a crowd about her. 

"You alright, then?" he greeted her amicably, voice low to avoid pissing off the librarian. His gaze flickered over the others gathering around her — four students that Bast didn't actually know — and he nodded vaguely, as if to indicate that his greeting now included them as well. He dropped his bookbag on the ground and sat across from Eve, evidently not bothering to wait around and ask for permission like some of the others seemed to be, and leaned forward slightly to peer at the odd assortment of books and leaflets she seemed to have spread about. "What in Merlin's name are you up to, Eve?"

Directly interacting with @Evelynn Decipio, indirectly greets @Alan Vanes, @Dan Palmer, @Thora Larkston, & @Ruka Tân. 
Clarification: "you alright" is a Britishism for "how are you".

Interacting with @Ruka Tân, @Alan Vanes,
@Thora Larkston, @Dan Palmer, and @Bastille Aurelius
Mentioning @Saskia Nicholson and @Jack Burnett

The movement of someone entering the library flickered ahead of her. Evelynn lifted her attention briefly from the tome splayed out upon the table to cast a cursory glance at whom. She'd recognized one of them, Vanes, from S.W.A.G and an encounter in the common room earlier in the school year; one that she would sooner keep well buried in her memories lest the associated images — and her lunch — come spewing back to the surface. The other individual had been mostly blocked by Vane's profile, and so she hadn't gotten a good look.

No one of consequence presently, she concluded quickly, returning back to her reading. Something in Holidays for Hags drew her brows to crease and she dipped to the side to pull from her bookbag another couple of books: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, and The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection. She rifled through the former hastily. Hags... hags.. Where...She reached the end of the book without finding what she was looking for. With a perplexed look, certain that she must have missed it, she flipped backwards again through the book, taking extra care once she reached the H's.

"How is there no mention..." She hissed under her breath in annoyance.

No matter.

She deposited that to the side and moved to retrieve the second of the books she had just withdrawn when something caught her ear: the conspiratory tones of whispering nearby. Given that Vanes and his comrade had entered and stopped at the very nearest shelf to the entrance of the library, that put them no more than a few paces away from the studious redhead.

"—poured tea on at the Valentine's party."

At that distance, even when speaking in hushed tones, it was easy enough to overhear — although perhaps not in the exact words that had been used — what had been said. Evelynn didn't quite make out the muttered response, but she didn't need to. Nor did she want to. Fingers lifted to comb her hair back and then pull it around, allowing it to fall in a curtain to veil her face (and the barely perceptible burn across its left side) from their view. The muffling of sound was an added bonus, and with a defiant flare, she dove headstrong into the book, opening to a random page.

"The hag is a child-eating creature of human appearance, though likely to have more warts than the average witch."

Really what else was new...It was basically the description everyone had received ever since childhood. Even still, Evelynn had to admit it would be helpful to know what to look for. How to identify them from the average witch. She read on. Eyes: green, among others. Not helpful. Skin: pale. Okay. Warts. Ugly. Old. Honestly, they could be describing her grandmother. But then they mentioned something rather peculiar.

"They have four toes on each foot, have a taste for the flesh of human children, and possess rudimentary magic similar to that of a troll."

Evelynn shivered involuntarily at the latter portion of the information, not particularly keen on the bit about wanting to dine on kids. She had been quite hoping that everything she had known about hags from games would prove to be incorrect. So far, though, it seemed like it was lining up uncannily accurately. So much so that she was beginning to wonder if perhaps the inventor of these fantasy games was actually from the wizarding world. Still, the bit about the toes would be helpful.

She was just considering this latest identifying information when another individual (@Dan Palmer) entered the library. She glanced up briefly to take a look, eyeing him skeptically. Had he been dressed in his quidditch uniform of green and silver, she might have recognized him. As it was, he was garbed in what looked like cargo shorts, and — her gaze drifted down his legs — bare feet. Five toes, she counted. Not a hag. Still, she marked him as a little peculiar, noting that it must have been frigid as all hell to be walking the stone corridors without stocking or shoe.

A voice, the same she had heard earlier but much closer, pulled her from her thoughts. Snapping her gaze around from the strange barefoot boy, it came to settle on the speaker (@Ruka Tân).

"Burne—" She cut herself off, brows raising. "Oh, sorry." she corrected herself, thinking at first glance that it was @Jack Burnett who had approached her. "I thought you were someone else."

She paused to consider his question as it caught up to her as well as return the quiet smile that Vanes had offered in greeting.

"Er, yes, I suppose so. If you'd like," she replied, still a little taken aback by her mistake. Admittedly, the boy who had spoken had a remarkable resemblance to the Slytherin with whom she had conversed in the potions classroom, and then again at the Tea Party. Not to mention... "Wait, isn't that Burnett's hat?"

Before an answer could be issued, however, she heard someone whisper her name and turned to see Larkston approaching alongside another unfamiliar face (@Saskia Nicholson). In their wake, Evelynn briefly noticed the return of the barefoot boy who took a chair at the other end of the table at which she herself was seated.

"Hello," she smiled coyly, feeling just a little perplexed by this sudden perceived popularity. "I...actually, y'know what, I'd love some," she said, answering Thora's unsolicited offer of help, and then, "Er...yea, something like that? I suppose?" In reply to the question posited by the barefoot boy nearby.

Admittedly, she did find it a little peculiar that the Slytherin second year had asked her that so out of the blue. It certainly wasn't Evelynn's first notion when she saw someone sitting absorbed in study at the library, to ask them if they needed help, regardless of whether they were a friendly acquaintance or not. That was usually a solitary effort. In this case, strangeness aside, it happened to be that Evelynn was just studying. Perhaps these individuals weren't exactly who she was hoping to "run" into, but that didn't mean she couldn't wrangle their support; maybe even pawn off a task or two if she could swing it.

Another voice piped up as yet another figure joined the growing group. "Oh, hey Aurelius," she greeted, lifting fingers (but not the heel of her hand) from the surface of the table in a little wave. She wasn't really sure exactly where the two stood, and the familiarity with which he addressed her always made her a little squeamish. "Yea, I'm good," she replied, the other hand — which had previously been cupping her cheek — now rubbing at the back of her neck.

"I'm... well..."

She gave a look around to everyone who had gathered. A look of uncertainty, her mind wondering briefly about sharing what she was up to with so many unknowns. But wasn't that why she had made the club in the first place? Wasn't this why she wrote to the Headliner and submitted those After Hours articles? The student body needed to know. There were things happening and they all needed to work together to get it sorted. Whatever hesitation she might have felt faded. In its stead, the look she fixed to each of them was one of collusion.

"I'm trying to figure some things out. Hags, first of all. I'm trying to find out anything I can about them. How to identify them, their powers, how to protect against them, whether there's a connection somehow to these—" She idly gestured to the open sketchy diagram of the Tapestry of Desire (to anyone who recognized it) with labels pointing to various aspects of the artwork. "—how to defeat them, where to find them...everything.

"And then there's—" She continued, glancing down to a stack of what appeared to be old issues of various Houses' newsletters. "—these that I think might have some sort of connection with everything that's been going on. I just haven't read through them yet." She looked back up. "But there's stuff happening, and Professor Lear is still missing, and a bunch of us are trying to figure out why. I was hoping to catch up with some of them today."

"So if you want to heeelp~," she trilled, glancing sweetly over to Thora, "that would be lovely." She leaned back in her chair, ran the palms of her hands over her hair, collected it together in a fist, and then tied it up into a pony, very much ready to get down to business.

Interacting with @Alan Vanes, @Evelynn Decipio
Mentions kind of @Dan Palmer, @Bastille Aurelius, @Thora Larkston

Interacting with @Ruka Tân
mentions @Evelynn Decipio

The third year was not all too sure, what he was supposed to do here. There were books, but books weren't really of use for anything. So the Gryffindor just followed Ruka around like a lost puppy, carrying the book he had chosen and even followed him to the table where some other students had gathered. Apparently the library was a more popular place than Alan had imagined, but he also was not really surprised by it. A lot of people liked to read; Alan had no idea why they liked to torture themselves like that, but who was he to judge?

When Ruka leaned over to him and asked him, something, his brows furrowed slightly. "Hags?", he clarified, in a hushed whisper as he stared at Ruka in confusion. What was this about hags? He glanced at all the material that had been spread over the table and shrugged his shoulders in clear confusion. "no... d-do you?", he asked back, his head slightly tilted as he tried to scan the articles on the wooden surface. But of course there were too many letters and paragraphs as that he could actually find anything important at first glance; so the Gryffindor just shook his head again.

Interacting with @Ruka Tân, @Alan Vanes, @Bastille Aurelius, @Dan Palmer, @Thora Larkston, and @Saskia Nicholson

Although her gaze had been primarily fixed upon Aurelius and the rest of the growing crowd during — what she had thought to be, at least — her clear and concise explanation, the whispered admission of incomprehension did not go amiss.

"I'm talking about this!" She replied as loudly as she dared, hands gesturing to her plethora of notes as she glanced over to Ruka. "To everything that's been going on around here."

It was clear with one look at the Gryffindor pair that this wasn't going to cut it.

"You know…" she started again. "Like with all that stuff we found about the tapestries in the common room—" Surely fellow Gryffindors would have heard all about that by now, right? Everyone always said that news traveled fast, and what was better than gossip about a mystery in the heart of the Gryffindor common room? "—and how Professor Lear is missing—" Really, that should have gone without saying. "—and the half-giants attacking the ball—" Everyone in the school knew about that one, she was sure. "—and the hag in the Forbidden Forest—" Obviously. Was her reading material not hint enough? "—and all the Daily Prophet articles about the stolen potions ingredients, and the Squib retaliations, and the murders, and poisonings."

She'd begun to look from person to person to see if any of what she was saying was registering. To see if any of them had been paying attention to what had been going on under their very noses both at the school and nearby in Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley over the past few months.

"Surely you all have heard about all this…" She said, brows pinching with a growing sense of skepticism. "Anyway," she continued, idly waving a dismissive hand, reaffirming to herself that there was no possible way that they didn't know about this. "I'm pretty sure it's all connected somehow. I'm just trying to figure out how, and I'm trying to figure out where the heck Mr. Potter's wand is hidden."

She paused, then, mentally checking herself.

"Well...no..." she said after a moment. "That's not quite right. I mean...that is what I'm doing generally, but right now I'm trying to learn as much as I can about hags because if we're going to be having to fight them, we'll need to know what to expect and how to protect ourselves."