Opacity PV Aida Finished

Dee listened to Aida's explanation quietly, her eyebrows drawing together, forming a deep wrinkle. This... couldn't be common thing... right? Just some house-elves going rogue. Not like they were drugging the whole school. Right? But even if it was just an isolated incident, it sounded pretty terrible. Drugging students... making them forget? Forget what? She shivered, drawing her knees to her chest and wrapping her arms around them. Certainly the purpose hadn't been to have Celynne, an older Ravenclaw student, fourth year if Dee remembered correctly, forget Aida's and Alexander's names, that didn't make sense. But what then?

She waved away Aida's apology with an offhand gesture. Not like she was in any position to be mad at people for keeping things secret, she hadn't told anyone about her grandparents' letter. Letters, now. Not her parents, not Ileen, not Aida. And yet, it felt like Aida should be telling people. "Have you reported this to an adult? A professor, maybe?" she asked, a trace of urgency in her voice. It seemed hard to believe that the adults wouldn't care if house-elves were robbing students of their memories. "Our Head of... okay, no, maybe not him. Professor Browne, maybe? Or Cy, or..." Both of them were a lot more approachable than Professor Iwasaki was. Honestly, it was hard to be less approachable if one tried, and of course Ravenclaw had gotten stuck with him.

But Aida's next words jarred her back to their current time and place, instead of events that had happened last May, reminded her of why she was sitting here, and her expression turned blank within seconds, wrinkles smoothing out, opaque. No, she didn't want to talk about this. No, she wasn't able to talk about this. It was easier to focus on other people's problems than her own, consider the possibility of a conspiracy that had elves drugging students, than face whatever her grandparents had written in that letter.

She remained silent for a moment, seconds ticking by, before finally she sighed, lowering her gaze to her knees. Of course Aida had seen through her. "Yeah," she muttered, quietly. Where Dee usually seemed to exhibit a clear light, bright and brilliant, she was now muddied, dimmed. "I just gotta work through it myself first, yeah? And you're... you're not a bad friend, Aida." The words were awkward on her tongue, forced, but she meant them, was just bad at expressing it. It wasn't Aida who was the problem here. It was... Why couldn't her grandparents just leave her alone? They had for 11 years, and it had been a lot easier that way.

@Aida Mòrsgor-Ama Ellwood

"Have you reported this to an adult? A professor, maybe?" said Dealla.

“I… just don’t know any grown-ups I can trust. If I tell the wrong person they’ll just completely wipe our memories, and then not only will we lose any ability to figure things out but I’ll be breaking my promise to remember. I figure it’s a mistake that we learned as much as we did. So you see, I can’t just tell anyone. I know I can trust you, though. I just hope learning this doesn’t come back to haunt you… it would be my fault if anything were to happen to you because of this. I’m sorry, I should have given you more of a choice to not get involved before I went and blabbed all this to you.” Aida looked a bit sheepish as she spun the fishing pole between her fingers.

"I just gotta work through it myself first, yeah? And you're... you're not a bad friend, Aida."

“I… Thanks. I guess I needed to hear that. I feel like a bad friend. If only I were stronger, smarter, less… simple…” began Aida, remembering all of the progress and solutions that had been made by Alexander with his increasingly frequent deceptions. “If only I were not such a weak inhuman child then maybe I could have fixed all this,” gushed Aida within a single breath. “I want to be strong enough that you can all rely on me, and I’m really sorry I haven’t been…” It was clear that Aida still faulted herself for Dee’s decision to work through it herself, regardless of how self-centered such blame really was. “I will try to not be such a liability, like I was in the forest, okay? I’m so sorry…” Aida’s face twisted as it struggled to hold in the tears.

@Dealla Prince

Dee stared at Aida in disbelief. "You think the professors are in on this?" she asked, trying hard to mask the doubt in her voice. It just... that couldn't be true, right? Right? Dee didn't just assume that every adult per se was trustworthy, nor did she particularly like or confide in all of the professors, but... this just couldn't be true. The thought that the very people who were supposed to keep them safe couldn't be trusted... I know I can trust you, though. Dee tensed, a frown creasing her forehead. Of course Aida could trust her but... that sentence had just effectively ensured that Dee wouldn't tell anyone. It made her feel like she was bound, held by a promise she hadn't even made, and she didn't particularly appreciate it. Although she didn't think that it had been Aida's intention, she couldn't help feeling backed into a corner.

Letting out a deep breath, she tried to force the tension out of her shoulders, listening to Aida apologise, but not for what bothered her. She shook her head. "I'll be fine, don't worry about me." Would Aida? "Thanks for telling me. It's... something to think about." Her head was swimming with new information, and she wasn't sure what she was going to do about it.

And still, she preferred it to talking about herself. She couldn't blame Aida for thinking that was odd, unusual since Dee as a rule did not need much incentive at all to talk about herself, her day, or her entire family history. She drew her shoulders in, uncomfortable. "Aida, that's not it," she said, struggling to put into words why she couldn't talk about this without actually saying anything. "You're wonderful, you haven't done anything wrong." She blinked at the mention of the forest, trying to push away the pressure that seemed to settle around her, weighing down on her. "The forest? No, you weren't... I barely managed to help at all, too." Not that she hadn't blamed herself too, struggled with the feelings of having been helpless, useless. She had taken comfort in the familiarity of potions and vowed to be better prepared next time. "We were... that was an impossible situation. We would have all been dead if not for Professor Equinox." Who might have been her first choice to talk to about odd things going on around the castle, but who had left.

Suddenly it felt hard to breathe. What was she supposed to say here? Obviously, the only thing to help Aida's feeling of being a poor friend was to confide in her but... she couldn't. Selfishly, maybe, but saying things out loud made them more real than hiding them in her trunk, and she wasn't ready for it.

Abruptly, she pushed herself up onto her feet before she stopped again, looking down at her white-haired friend. "Sorry," she said softly, inadequately. It was unsatisfactory, should be accompanied by an explanation, but there were no words left in her. "Good luck with your fishing," she added, the words feeling empty, and already moving to leave, "and cook for me some time, yeah? I have to go."

But go where?

@Aida Mòrsgor-Ama Ellwood

Dealla’s sudden move to depart came as a surprise to the white witch, who did not understand what had just happened. Even though freedom-loving Aida would never want to make her friend feel tied down, Aida failed to understand how her words had impacted Dealla. That Aida had in effect implicitly bound Dealla to secrecy without even asking never occurred to her, and so Aida jumped to another false conclusion: Dee must be upset that she was dragged into this without having had a real chance to decline. Aida decided her apology had simply not been good enough compared to the gravity of the situation she had thrust upon her friend, who was usually such an outstanding ball of sunshine. Thinking back to the words of the house elves, Aida recalled that some thought it better to forget certain terrible truths than to live with them. Now Aida couldn’t offer to Dealla the opportunity to forget the dark conspiracy the house elves had wanted to “protect” the student body from knowing.

Aida had not actually expected absolute secrecy from Dealla, or at least, that had never crossed her mind. What Aida had been thinking was that she trusted Dealla to not wipe her or Alexander’s memory. (With Celynne having drunk the drugged tea and visibly forgetting everything, it was likely too late for her.) Aida had tried to be careful by intentionally holding back the most private details about Alexander to respect his needs and not impose that information on Dee. Yet, Aida had not held back the most important detail: something foul was afoot possibly affecting all of Hogwarts including specifically named people. What Aida really feared was creating blowback for Alexander, but it hadn’t occurred to Aida to ask Dee’s sworn secrecy because Aida already trusted in Dee’s judgment.

With Aida being such an honest dunce at manipulation, she could not comprehend how her actions could accidentally manipulate those around her. Thus what Aida had seen as an affectionate declaration of trust in fact risked coming across as something much worse– yet, she might never know.

Aida figured she had done enough damage with her words, so she nodded silently as she watched Dealla turn to leave. There, I have alienated someone again. Someone important. There’s just no hope for me in this human world, thought Aida morosely. It was times like these that she mourned having put away her old dreams of returning captive magical beasts to protected wild places. That kind of calling came easily to her, unlike the web of deceit and treachery that she now found herself tangled in. Yet, Aida would never choose to forget what she knew now, Alexander or not, and so she took another step farther into her spiral of self-abandonment.

Forget breakfast, or lunch, or whatever it is, thought Aida, deciding the only thing to do as soon as Dealla disappeared was run.

@Dealla Prince