A letter to home .. ((Open))

Amelia made her way slowly up to the owlery, letter in hand. Every week she found herself here at least once, though she couldn't for the life of her figure out why she continued to torture herself with an impossible task. The spiraling stairs to the tower where the owls were kept led Amelia into the circular room with no windows, a considerable amount of owl droppings, and, unlike most days, another student.

Although Amelia would have preferred to send the letter off alone, the boy being there didn't present any significant hindrance to her completing her task. Nodding in his direction to show she had acknowledged his presence, Amelia crossed the room to where her eagle owl Aurora was perched, preening her feathers before the Ravenclaw redhead called her down from her lofty abode.

The owl lifted her wings and swooped once around the room before landing on Amelia's arm, her claws putting gentle pressure on Amelia's skin. She pulled from the pocket of her jeans a piece of parchment which had been folded and sealed with the green wax her family had always used for these purposes. On the front of the letter was written a name, in perfectly formed cursive.

Turning the letter so the boy could not see the name on the outside, Amelia moved herself and Aurora toward the window, tying the letter onto the bird's leg with a bit of twine. She pet the owl once before extending her arm out of the glassless window.

"You know the drill," Amelia said, lifting her arm to send Aurora into the air. She watched as the owl rose in the air, getting further and further away until Amelia could no longer see her pet. She didn't know where Aurora went each time she disappeared over the horizon, but somehow she always returned with a letter from him, and for that, Amelia was grateful.

Elijah picked up the candle stick and absent-mindedly began to play with the flame. He had experience fire in many ways and wasn't particularly scared of the little orange flame that was flickering on the wick of the candle.

Elijah knew he would be sitting in the Owlery for most of the night and he knew that the girl standing in the tower with him was going to be the only source of conversation he would have all night unless anyone else had to send letters.

"What is your owl's name?" Elijah asked, his voice thick with the Bulgarian accent that he had been taught to speak in. It was harder to speak English with an accent such as his and he often found himself tripping over the harder words to say.

Amelia continued to gaze out the window long after Aurora had disappeared, choosing to watch as the sun dipped behind the trees of the forbidden forest, signaling the end of another day at Hogwarts. The darkness which filtered across the ground sent shadows sprawling on the grass and stone paths which laced the landscape like little bits of Scotch tape holding the hills and valleys together.

Every time she sent a letter, Amelia would be flooded with memories of the post's recipient, wherever he was now. As to his whereabouts, Amelia was just as clueless as her parents. Although he had deemed her trustworthy enough to exchange letters with, he still didn't trust her enough to tell her where he had been hiding all these months; probably worried she would run straight to their parents.

Raoul didn't give Amelia enough credit. Although she hadn't been as fiercely rebellious as he had, she did not worship the ground her parents walked on. She obeyed their wishes, more or less, and grew into the child her parents had always wanted, but this didn't stop her from understanding that the pressure placed on her shoulders was likely too much for one person to bear. She understood why Raoul had left, but couldn't understand why he had stayed so distant from her.

Lost in her own reverie, Amelia was slightly startled when she heard a voice from behind her. The boy she had noticed upon entering had spoken, his voice thick with an accent Amelia identified as Bulgarian. It was not typical of students at Hogwarts to have such an accent, but she recognized it from some of the dignitaries who attended her parents' social gatherings.

"Her name is Aurora," Amelia replied after taking a moment to recollect herself, "It's Latin for dawn."

After responding to his question, Amelia took a moment to take in the boy's appearance. She didn't recall ever having met him before and she felt that with his distinctive look and accent he would have certainly made enough impact for her to have remembered. He was taller than she was with an athlete's build and brooding eyes. Realizing he might think she was gawking, Amelia tugged at the confines of her mind for a question to ask him in response.

"And what name did you give to your pet?" Amelia asked, realizing too late that she sounded like an echo asking him the same question he had posed to her. It was the best she could come up with on the spot, though, so she let it pass.

Elijah nodded in understanding and smiled at the name. It was a beautiful name, one that just rolled off of the tongue like a river that flowed down a mountainside. He put the candle stick down twisted the ring on his finger, wondering what to say.

The owl had no name, it was there for a purpose and one purpose alone; to sent letters to his parents. It was an owl without an identity of its own. If he could have a name and other things that made him unique when up against someone else then so could his little owl.

"Ziva." Elijah said finally. "Her name is Ziva. It means splendour in Hebrew."

As Elijah waited for the girl's reaction he took time to look at her, to take her in. She was tall but he would still be a little taller from what he could see. She had strawberry-blonde hair that seemed to just fall past her shoulders and her eyes were a brilliant, captivating blue.

Elijah instantly felt a need to have a pencil in his hand and some paper in his lap. He could see the different shades in her hair as the little light from his candle hit her. Her skin was pale and he knew if he walked over to her he could probably count every freckle on the bridge of her nose.

"I do not recognise you at all." he admitted. "And for that I apologize. My name is Elijah, Elijah Krum. What is your name?"

Elijah felt slightly, if not very, stupid. He was usually very accepting of people but he knew his art had ruled over him for to long. His desire to capture the person he meets n every way, smiling, laughing, crying, made him forget to know the person.

I have spent too much time in Paris. Elijah thought irritably.

Amelia was glad to see that the boy took both her answer and question in stride and did not dwell on the fact that she had perhaps waited too long to continue the conversation. She was also impressed by the fact that his owl was also named in a forgotten language. She had studied Latin when she was younger because it was the language of the sciences, a field her father dappled heavily in because he believed it would aid him in his research. She could speak and understand Latin well, although it rarely came into context in everyday situations. Latin wasn’t exactly a conversational language, but it did allow her to better understand incantations which were rooted in Laitn.

Nodding to indicate she had taken note of the owl’s name and approved of it, Amelia watched as Elijah’s eyes darted across her features, much in the way hers had done earlier. It was clear that he had much of the same observant nature as she did, but she couldn’t help but feel a bit scrutinized under his perceptive eyes. She couldn’t exactly blame him for wanting to take in her appearance without sounding hypocritical, but she also couldn’t stop the blush which rose to her cheeks under his gaze. She tried to hold still and refrain from fidgeting as he analyzed each aspect of her physical appearance one by one.

The fact that he did not recognize her did not surprise her, as most people in the school did not take notice of her on a regular basis. This was mostly self-inflicted because of the lengths she went to to remain anonymous and maintain her solitude. She would have suggested that he not apologize for his ignorance of her identity, but he sounded so sincere that she decided to let it pass.

As he introduced himself, Amelia closed the space between them and extended her hand toward him. His name sounded vaguely familiar for some reason, but Amelia couldn’t place it and didn’t want to dwell too long on it and make another obvious social mistake. Instead, she cleared her throat and made eye contact with the slightly taller boy, speaking over the wind which rustled the nests of the owlery.

“You were equally unrecognizable, but I thank you for the introduction,” she said, not completely able to stop herself from attempting to see more of him through the windows of his eyes, “My name is Amelia Lyons.”

Not so anonymous anymore, are you? Amelia’s mind probed, but she hushed it in the hopes that she might be able to seem slightly normal to the person with whom she shared the confined tower space.

Elijah could tell how her mind worked from the distance he was. She was hesitant, anybody could see that. Elijah didn't think he was intimidating if he was being honest with himself. When he smiled he looked like a puppy or a small boy in a toy shop and that was when he really, really smiled which was rare in itself.

The mystery girl had identified herself and Elijah took in the name with interest. Her surname was of French origin and then her Christian one Latin, with a touch of German but how old the actual German was Elijah had yet to look up.

She held her hand out to him and he looked quizzically at her. Sure, he knew how to shake a hand and other such mundane greetings but it all seemed so boring. People spent far too much time worrying about wars and school than focusing on the really important things which is probably why daily things like greetings were never changed and just overlooked.

However, it was rude to pause and/or stare at someone's greeting even if it was very overused and needed a change. Elijah jumped down from the window ledge and connected his hand with Amelia's. She had a warmth about her, something he hoped he hadn't lost to the winds that circled the Owlery.

"Well, Amelia Lyons." Elijah smirked. "It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance and I hope in future we will seem more familiar to each other. Now, what has got a pretty little Ravenclaw such as yourself out in a tower that looks as if it is ready to fall down, hm?"

Amelia worried for a moment after extending her hand toward him that she had been too forward, mostly because of the puzzled look the boy gave in response. His perch on the windowsill made him much taller than she was, forcing her to look up to meet his eyes. From his build, Amelia imagine him being just a bit taller than she was, if he were to come down from his perch that is. Instead, he seemed to be pondering what her offer meant and whether or not it would be appropriate for him to accept it.

Just another reminder why I don’t usually bother… Amelia thought just as she was about to pull her hand away and leave the owlery and the dark-haired person she had so recently met. Before she could rescind her offer, however, the boy finally jumped down from the window and put his hand around hers. His hand was much larger than hers, calloused from either work or quidditch. Her own hands were smooth from staying indoors and being forbidden to “rough house”, but the pads of her fingers were slightly calloused from playing violin for as many hours as was demanded of her at home, and as many hours as it took for her to fall asleep here at Hogwarts.

They shook hands as Elijah spoke, only ceasing the formal greeting after the boy had posed his next question. It seemed a logical one to Amelia, considering she might have asked him the same question if he had not reached it first. For the third time in their relatively short conversation, Amelia wished felt more comfortable conversing with others; if she had spoken up first, she wouldn’t have had to decide the most discreet answer to his question.

“For one of what I would guess are only two possible reasons to be in the owlery,” she said with a small shrug, her lips upturning just slightly as she noticed Elijah’s smirk, “To send a letter. From the candle you were holding earlier and the fact that your ring serves as a seal, I would guess you had similar intentions?”

Amelia didn’t mean to offput Elijah with her observations, but rather did not feel it was socially unacceptable to make them. People had a choice of what they wished to present to the world – more or less – so anything Amelia noticed or knew about her fellow Hogwarts inhabitants was a summation of what they presented and her over attentiveness, and the latter was only made possible by the former. From the way his eyes had grazed her before and the fact that her companion had noticed she was Ravenclaw without her explicitly saying it, Amelia guess Elijah had made a few observations of his own.

Elijah smiled slightly at her observations. When she had walked in he had merely received a glance and he thought that was the end of that but what she had just told him had proved otherwise.

Elijah's eyebrows knitted together in frustration and he sighed. He was tired and had lot on his mind, too much for a wizard who shouldn't have a care in the world. He wanted Ziva back before the hag decided to throw things at the poor little owl. By now it must have guessed that it should never stay long in Berlin or where ever is parents were.

"Unfortunately, yes, I had a letter to send." Elijah said, meeting Amelia's gaze. He dropped his eyes down to his hands and twisted the ring on his finger. He hated everything the piece of metal stood for and couldn’t wait for the time when he was free to do whatever he wished.

Elijah didn't know what it was but there was something about her that interested him. Behind the mask that was cloaking and obscuring her fair features from the world, there was someone there that had been through quite a bit and had a lot more taken from her than what was given back. Elijah wasn't perfectly 100% sure but she seemed like the socially awkward type that hadn't really experienced the horrors of human beings before.

"I expect you have a nicer person to write to than I." Elijah said, his voice cracking with sadness and anger.

He didn't want to think about his parents too much, let alone the hag Victor was married to. He sometimes wondered whether he was adopted and if so then he wondered if he could get re-adopted by someone who would actually love him. However, this was proved inconclusive when his mother's acquaintances would gush over how like 'Victor' he was.

Elijah didn’t seem perturbed by her observations, something which allowed Amelia to breathe more easily. Although she knew plenty about the students and staff of Hogwarts, and even about some graduates, she didn’t often let on to how much she knew. She found that the longer she could remain anonymous, the more she could learn. People often believed themselves to be more discreet than they actually were, and Amelia had found that many of her fellow witches and wizards had a lot to hide, but didn’t do a very good job of it.

Although his original response to her words was somewhat positive, she was surprised to see his face change abruptly, an audible sigh passing his lips. Clearly his mind had gone elsewhere because he had the same reminiscent expression that she often got when her thoughts wandered away from the present situation. Whatever he was thinking about, it didn’t strike a harmonious chord.

His words were bitter as he looked up at her again, his eyes a little more empty than they had been just moments before. She wanted to ask him more about it, but couldn’t bring herself to pry. As a private, introverted person herself, she knew how unsettling it could be for someone to ask too many questions about the part of your life you intentionally kept hidden. Clearly Elijah had his own demons, but it wasn’t Amelia place to inquire about their form. Some small hint came from the fact that his fingers dwelled on his ring when he spoke, but without knowing more about the ring she could not fully understand what this observation could mean.

The emotion Elijah was feeling threaded its way through his next comment, although she doubted he intended to show it. She could hear the tension in his voice, the reluctant admission shedding light on a darker, more angry young man. Amelia’s lips turned down at the tone of his voice, sounding defeated in a way she would not have expected from a boy who looked as if he could exceedingly popular if he so chose.

She didn’t know how to deal with the emotions of others, mostly because she didn’t deal very well with her own. Rationality had won out over emotionality long ago and logic dominated the way she thought and acted so much so that it had also breached the walls of her heart, taking over where spontaneity and feeling out to reign supreme. Although she could sense that Elijah was distressed, she didn’t know how to deal with it, how to help, or even if she could.

“Nice is subjective,” Amelia replied softly, some part of her pushing to reveal something which would level the playing field between them, the other part throwing up barriers to stop this from happening, “The recipient of my letters may be nicer than yours, but I doubt very much the responses you get are more frustrating than those I receive.”

His letters are likely full disclosure. You can’t even get a scrap of information out of the person who used to be your best friend.