The Novelle Diaries & The Wampus Cub

Chapter 6: A New Routine

As the sun peaked the top of its head over the expansive tree line of the Hogwarts grounds and set the waters of the black lake glistening, Wren awoke in her new surroundings. She had slept solidly, cocooned in her soft linens, too exhausted even to dream but now as her eyes fluttered open, she was refreshed and ready for the day ahead. However, as had always been her habit when sleeping somewhere new, she had woken up far too early. As she turned to the copper alarm clock on her bed side, she realised its hands only read five AM.

As she was never one who was able to roll over and go back to sleep she found herself dragging one of the blankets at the bottom of her bed over to the nearest window and settling down on the heavily cushioned window cill. She gazed out at the landscape that sprawled before her as she watched the sun climbing higher, shedding warm light on new features of the view.

It was the first time that Wren had seen any of the castle or grounds in the light and as the sunrise revealed its vastness her adventurous little heart began to flutter. There were forests and mountains, ruins and all manner of other buildings set in wide swathes of grass land and that was just on this side of the castle, who knew what else surrounded it. In her excitement she almost jumped up to grab her adventure bag and start exploring right away but decided to exercise some restraint and compromised to just continue looking out at it all. Besides she doubted that she would currently be able to trace her steps back to the moving staircases let alone the front door.

Five alarm clocks began to clang aggressively at seven AM and four much groggier girls joined Wren in the new day. Rosewaine seemed to be the most reluctant in this task, trying to shove her head under the pillow to escape the shrill sound. Eventually all the girls had collected themselves and donned their uniforms, proudly knotting their new Ravenclaw ties around their necks, then, once everyone was ready, they headed down into the common room, hoping that someone would be able to show them the way back down to the great hall.

To their relief, another perfect stood waiting for them by the common room door. A tall, rather serious looking boy with a long rectangular face and short brown hair with a cow lick at the front held a pile of folded paper by the door.

'Good morning, first years,' he greeted, obviously distracted a little by counting the number of children standing before him. Seemingly happy that all nine of the children were present and accounted for, he continued. 'Before I take you down to the great hall for breakfast please pass these out amongst yourselves.' He said as he handed the stack of papers to Leonie who began to distribute them. 'You should all have a time table and a map, please make sure you have both before we leave. Unlike some of the other houses we have a running streak of not losing first years for hours on the first day, we would like to maintain it.' The boy explained. 'Right, everyone ready?' And with that they followed him out of the common room and along the many corridors and stairs down to the great hall.

Wren was surprised to realise that she had actually remembered much of the way without need for a guide. Her sense of direction had always been rather good, most likely honed by her childhood spent in the expansive woodland that grew by the side of her house. It was easy to get quite turned around when all you could see were trees so it had become necessary to develop her inner compass.

When they reached the moving staircase they all sprinted down it, grabbing Leonie by the arms to force her to stay with the group until they reached the bottom. They were all very relieved when the stairs didn't move mid decent.

When they reached the great hall they found that they were amongst the first to arrive. There were a few groups of early birds grabbing toast and sausage from players that ran the length of the table but most of the seats remained empty.

As the first years began to find seats at the ravenclaw table, Wren realised that Zeddi and a few of his friends were sitting further along enjoying their English breakfasts. Happy to see a familiar face Wren skipped over to her cousin.