Cryptic Houses and Fallen Heroes PV Adonis

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Interacting With: @Adonis Thorn
Mentioning: Solomon Lear • Jo Morgan • Nora Jensen • Finnley VanCleaf

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[font=Segoe Print] Rafael supposed he’d always been a seeker of answers.

Jaded truths, mysterious clues. Cryptic Houses. Fallen Heroes. Everything about the school was a big fat question mark, a whirlpool of possibility sucking up all the young Captain’s time and energy. It was no secret, no hidden fact that Potter was rotting about in Azkaban, the result of his supposed illegal activities in the school. A’ murderer of Umbridge’, the news articles called him, a man who’d sorely lost his mind. And, who knew, the news articles might have been right. But the facts were out there, in the Gryffindor Common Room, deep within the confines of the office of the late Headmaster, Solomon Lear – strange love letters, a mysterious school nurse, a wand of cherry wood and phoenix feather, in the possession of an esteemed prefect. It was all too curious, the facts, enough to warrant a bit of looking into, if you asked the child. There was simply too much riding on this particular mystery, after all. If not Potter’s integrity, then it was the honor of his own house, the knowledge that Gryffindor could never again be esteemed as the noble house. Potter was not guilty, and everyone knew it.

But what was even stranger, enraging as much as it was mysterious, was the ignorance exhibited by his fellow classmates – odd it was, how everyone seemed to just… continue on their day to day, as if nothing strange, abnormal, were going on within the wall of the castle, as if a woman hadn’t died just within their collective midsts. As if the Slytherins weren’t cursed, the Hufflepuffs on fire, conspiracies lurking just about every corner. A fact that did little to solace the Gryffindor Captain. By god, there was something afoot, and everyone with a head upon their shoulders could surely see it – and yet, it was as if there were covers over the eyes of his peers, shading them from the truths at hand. Strange factors in play, connections to hags, love, and an evil blood war somewhere in the distance. If no one else was going to do something about the facts at hand, then Rafael sure as hell was.

There really wouldn’t be another reason for the Gryffindor to be in the library, classic hoodie pulled over his fluffy hair as deep brown eyes scanned the manifold shelves of the ‘D’ section in the library. He idly supposed he’d never been too fond of the grand room, the environment thick with must and laden with nerdy Ravenclaws cramming Gryffindors, Slytherins with nothing better to do but stir up discord. Certainly not the list of places to find the Captain, but answers warranted sacrifice, something he was no stranger to. After all, being the flighty boy he was, he knew the concept of Risk and Reward well. He must have looked shady, he supposed, crouching over the bookshelves with his hands stuffed in his pockets, shoulders hunched as if the activities he partook in were illegal. And in a way, he supposed, they were – who knew who to trust with these secrets anymore, who was working for Finley? Or the crazed staff? The teachers, he had learned, certainly didn’t have the safety of the student body in mind, if his conversation with the Slytherin HoH was anything to go by. Or the stunning performance of Lian’s snake Transfiguration during the Blossom Ball. Too many factors to see to, not enough trusted students…

But that didn’t matter. What did hold importance, was the matter of the hags.

After his conversation with Jo and Nora in February, the boy’d been thoroughly convinced of the presence of hags in the mystery one called the Potter Case. After all, the evidence was everywhere – within the letters of Lear and Umbridge, the Sleeping Draught the Headmaster so eloquently insisted that they make in Hogsmead. All connections to the horrendous creatures, a fact that had been made more than clear by his best frenemy during their discussions. Elliot and Nora hadn’t shared any good answers, but it wouldn’t be long now until he found his evidence. Jo had collected an assortment of books, books he was keen on checking out. It was only a matter of time before the secret was out, Raf just had to prove it at this point. But what could he do? What could he find, that Jo had missed?

His eyes would finally catch the title of one of the books on the shelf – The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection. Perfect. Slender fingers tucking themselves into the shelf, he shortly pulled out the large book, clutching it in two hands as he observed it in awe. Perhaps he would finally get the answers he sought… [/font]