Ink and Parchment ~ blood and bone

8

Severus returned to his scone.

~

After the fight her court had wasted no time in asking her why she had kept her parselmouth abilities a secret. And then they had to spend a further half hour explaining exactly what parselmouth abilities were and the history behind them. Then they had spent a further half hour plotting over how revealing these abilities, at least to the house, will have affected her standing as parselmouths were apparently revered by darker families. By the time Eliza finally got to sleep it was in the early hours of the morning and although a lacking sleep schedule wasn't anything new to her she still clung to her coffee at the Slytherin table like it was a lifeline in the morning.

Most of her peers didn't drink coffee which she honestly couldn't comprehend, how was pumpkin juice in any way or form better than a steaming cup of black coffee? She was greatly amused when Snape tried to sneak into her mind, probably trying to find out what happened to Blishwick. She was very thankful for Blaise's birthday gift, the look on Snape's face was priceless when he was faced with her occlumency barriers.

Anyone who entered her mind would find there was only one entrance, and seemingly no exit, just swathes of darkness stretching for miles and a key in the lock of the door. When faced with darkness the human reaction was to turn around and head to safety. In the darkness of the cellar at the orphanage Eliza had never had the luxury of escaping. Devil children needed to be punished after all. She used to find the dark terrifying, when she was younger she had thought if she was left in there long enough she would simply dissolve into the darkness around her.

However soon the dark became a comfort. There was a certain peace to being at one with nothing.

Thus it became the perfect barrier to protect her mind.

She was still laughing over his shocked face when they made their way to their first lesson of the year, Herbology with the hufflepuffs where Professor Sprout had them re-potting mandrakes. After that was Transfiguration with the Gryffindor's where Eliza took great pleasure into transfiguring her beetle into many different buttons in a myriad of colours. Once Daphne had gotten the hang of it the two girls had begun a competition to see who could transfigure the most garish button whilst Theo poked his beetle as it scurried across the desk.

After lunch they all headed towards their first defence against the dark arts lesson sharing despairing looks. Eliza had unfortunately sat down and read every single one of Lockhart's books and had taken great pleasure in writing down cutting notes in the margins of all the books. The books weren't even good enough to meet the standard of a novel never mind a textbook and she really wasn't looking forward to attending the class. Depending on how observant the twit was Eliza could just do self-study in the lesson. In fact she would have to sort something out for the older Slytherins, how they were meant to take their exams with such a-

Eliza's train of thought was cut off when a strange tiny blonde Gryffindor popped up in front of them rocking back and forth on his heels.

"Alright Eliza? I'm Colin Creevey, I asked the hat for Slytherin but it told me I belonged in Gryffindor" he said excitedly bobbing closer and Eliza exchanged puzzled looks with her court.

"Can I- can I have a picture?" he said holding up his camera hopefully.

"A picture" Eliza echoed blankly. He nodded and it looked like he was about to release another torrent of worthless babble so Eliza decided to cut him off for all their sakes.

"No" she said simply, nodding in parting and briskly walking away. Her court waited until they were a respectable distance away before bursting into cackling laughter. Eliza rolled her eyes fondly and ushered her still sniggering court into the classroom taking the seats at the back of the class. Eliza slid into her seat and began piling all of Lockhart's books in front of her one by one into a giant tower. In direct opposition Theo had taken out absolutely none of the books and simply plastered an innocent expression on his face when Eliza tilted her head in question. Daphne had taken her books and placed them on the desk to form a sort of battlement in front of her, probably so she didn't have to look at the real thing.