the Founder's Legacy

Chapter 6: Head in the Clouds

Riley's POV:

     "Go again Miss Ravenclaw. You may have an impressive last name, but your flying skills are sorely lacking." God damn it I wish I wasn't distracted. I was losing focus and costing myself house points and a spot on the quidditch team. Fortunately, Professor Weasley was being lenient on me in terms of house points, seeing as how I was in his house. As for the Quidditch team on the other hand, that was an entirely different matter.
I was blaming everything on that god damn, attractive as hell and yet mysterious Grant Gryffindor. I was turning into an idiotic little schoolgirl, who had a crush on the tall, dark handsome man that every girl in the school was fawning over. Exactly the type of girl I didn't want to be. But for some reason, ever since I laid eyes on him at the sorting ceremony, something about him had stuck with me.
            No, I couldn't think about him. I needed to focus on me and my flying. Cause otherwise, there was no way in hell I was making the Quidditch team. With Professor Weasley's words still ringing in my ears, I decided to rerun his course. I blocked everything around and tried to focus on the one thing I wanted, that coveted spot on the Gryffindor quidditch team.
            I was angry at myself for failing so miserably the first go around. I was angry that my head was constantly lost in the clouds now and not focusing on what needed to be done. My broom seemed to match my anger and determination as I began flying at breakneck speed. I felt long hair trialing behind as the wind rushed pasted my face. I ran the course almost through sheer muscle memory. Higher, further, faster, the words echoed in my head. I had seen the words on a poster for a muggle movie and they had stuck with me.
              I took the curves more sharply and crisp, I let completely loose, with a complete disregard for my own safety. I drifted through the final turns and came to a drifting stop right in front of Sebastian. His expression betrayed nothing. Come on professor, give me something. Tell me I did better, tell me my flying was better.
              "That was better, but you're trying too hard and overdoing it. Miss Ravenclaw, you have immense talent and potential. I can see that flying is a passion of yours and that you want to do great things with it. Tell me, do you want to play quidditch?" What kind of question was that???? Of course I wanted to play. That was a dream of mine. Some people wanted to teach, some people wanted to be an Auror. But me, I wanted to play professional quidditch someday.
              "That's my dream professor. I want to play professionally someday." It was strange fully admitting it to a professor. Sure, My parents knew, but telling a professor in my first year strange.
              Sebastian faintly smiled and I could see why Celeste Malfoy (now Weasley) had fallen for him. Even if he was older, he was still so incredibly handsome. "Well Miss Ravenclaw I'll say this, you have talent, passion and determination. All of these things are good. But, you're trying too hard. You want to prove to everyone that you're the best and that you're more than just knowledge. That pursuit of perfection can be a fatal thing. I've seen it devour wizards and witches before and nearly destroyed them. For now, I'm considering recommending you to the house captain, but you have a lot of work to do. Dismissed." Sebastian had gotten this sad eyed look in his eyes, as if he had personally experienced the downfall of friends due to the pursuit of perfection. Was he talking about himself, Celeste, or headmaster Malfoy? It was no secret that he was close with his brother-in-law and of course the story of Celeste was the worst kept secret in the Wizarding word. The ministry had to do a lot of cover up for their story, but people still knew what happened. Was I headed down the road of self-destruction due to my pursuit to prove myself?
             I didn't want to think about the question that Professor has posed to me. It hit far too close to home and it was uncomfortable. My time at Hogwarts was supposed to be amazing and enjoyable, but it was fast turning into a period of overthinking, worry and dread.
             I had to hustle to my next class, but even then, I was still late Defense Against the Dark Arts. First Sebastian and now Celeste. And I knew she wouldn't be lenient on me. I burst into class late and instantly greeted by the stare down of Celeste. "Miss Ravenclaw, I expect there is a reason you are late to my class?" Her tone was deadly serious and shook me to my very core.
            "Apologies Professor, I ran late on my flying trials with Professor Weasley. Won't happen again." I was really hoping that the tardiness I was beginning to experience wasn't going to become a habit of mine. Celeste didn't even crack a smile or change her gaze. "I don't care if you were with my brother the headmaster, you are still late and that is unacceptable. I'm going to scold my husband for starters. As for you, 100 points from Gryffindor, plus a stint of detention doing research in the library on dark witches. I expect a report on them from you once your detention is finished."
              100 fucking points AND detention, all for being late once???? Celeste was not messing around with punishment. I wanted to fight back against such a harsh punishment, but if I did, the penalty would be even worse. So, I bit my tongue and sulked the entire class. My bad mood from this morning had only gotten worse as the day progressed. Grant was still on my mind, I couldn't focus on any class and now I had found myself in detention and on the bad side of the scariest person in the whole school. Great start Riley, great start.
                Class mercifully ended and I was able to depart in peace. But, Celeste had added one more thing for my detention: immediate effect. Fucking wonderful, I couldn't even enjoy what was left of my day, I had to go spend it in the fucking library. I couldn't not catch a break. Ever
                I took my time getting to the library, which of course only allowed my mind to drift back off towards Grant. Why was I so infatuated with him? Sure he was devilishly attractive and the heir to the Gryffindor name, but other than that, there didn't seem to be anything special about him. So why was I so focused on him? Why would my mind keep wandering back to him? Was a mental clock starting to tick and push me towards a relationship? It shouldn't have been, I still had plenty of time in my life. But I had been so adamant about not getting into a relationship here that perhaps my mind was rebelling. I couldn't say for certain, all I knew was that he was becoming a constant fixture in my mind and I really, really didn't like it.
By the time I got to the library, it was mostly deserted. But that wasn't surprising, it was the middle of the day after classes were already over with. Students were enjoying the rest of their day and not studying more. Great, all alone, save for the librarian. But to my surprise, there was another student present.
                He was slightly humming to himself as he put books back in there proper places. Great, I am the only one here for detention. He wore a simple sweater and a pair of jeans, looking very much like he belonged here at the library. His brown had a slight curl to it. He was attractive, but more in a cute way, not the dark mysterious way that Grant was.
                I let him go about his work as I tried to figure out this stupid report that I now had to do. It shouldn't be that hard, there were plenty of dark witches to write about. As my mind raced on what to write, a book suddenly flew off the shelf, striking me in the shoulder. What the fuck was that about??? Books flying off the shelf?? I picked up the book and it turned out that it was a history of Prisoners of Azkaban. Well, how convenient.
              "I'm terribly sorry about that, the books sometimes have a mind of their own. You're lucky it got you in the shoulder and not the head. This is one the thicker tomes in the library." The attractive student was standing close by, taking a break from shelving. Magical school, flying books that read your mind. Made plenty of sense to me.
               "Let me guess, detention from Professor Celeste Weasley? It's been happening a lot these first few weeks. Unsurprisingly, Slytherins that except from her wrath. Prefects and heads of houses have complained to the headmaster but he hasn't a thing about it yet."
                "You're observation is spot on. I showed up a few minutes late to class and she docked us 100 house points and detention. Worst of all, I was with my head of house, her husband non less!! It's outrageous punishment for a first time infraction." I finally got a chance to let loose some anger. I had no idea who this student was, but he seemed genuinely interested in my problem, like all he wanted to do was take a weight off my shoulders.
                "That's Celeste for you. She's a damn good witch. Would have finished top of her class if she hadn't been in the same class as her brother. They ended up finishing one-two. One top of Ravenclaw, one top of Slytherin. Oh, I'm terribly sorry, where are my manners. Hayden Hufflepuff, at your service." That explained a lot. He was a Hufflepuff, being a people person was in his DNA. That meant that three of the four descendants were here, right now. It wouldn't surprise me if the Heir of Slytherin was skulking about in the dungeons right now.
                "Very nice to meet you Hayden, I'm Riley, Riley Ravenclaw." I felt all my troubles seem to vanish. My head wasn't lost in some guy, or detention, or school or anything. I was here in the moment, being myself. Haydens eyes went bright a the mention of my name.
                "Remarkable! All four descendants of the original founders attending Hogwarts at the same time. The odds of that happening at astronomically impossible. And clearly all of the current batch weren't sorted into their ancestral houses. You were sorted into Gryffindor, not Ravenclaw, the heir of Godric was sorted into his arch rivals house. Then there is me, a Hufflepuff sorted into Ravenclaw. And last but not least, the heir of Salazar Slytherin himself sorted in Hufflepuff. It's unbelievable."
               "You seem to know quite a bit about all of us. Have you researched us?" A Hufflepuff in Ravenclaw, that explained a lot about his behavior. Plus a Slytherin in Hufflepuff? Salazar must have been turning over in his grave. But Hayden was right. All the founders here at once and not one of them in their respective houses. What were the odds?
              "I only had to learn of you and  Mr. Gryffindor's house. I know a bit about the heir of Slytherin because I'm currently dating her." Oh, well okay then. I hadn't expected that. I guess I needed to be a little more careful around him, no matter how comfortable he made me feel.
              "Oh, well in that case I'm going to return to my report if that's okay with you. I don't want anyone getting the wrong idea, especially a Slytherin."
              "Sabrina's bark is worse than her bite. She might share the Slytherin name, but that's not who she truly is, though she tries to be. I think the weight of her name weighs heavily on her. In any case, I do have books to shelve. It was a pleasure meeting you Miss Ravenclaw." A part of me wanted him to stay and talk more. But, it was the right thing to do in letting him go. I had a report to do, he had work to do and a girlfriend to get back to.....
             No, I couldn't keep going on like this. Now I had two attractive men in my head. I really was turning into a lovesick schoolgirl. Get it together Riley, you're better than this. You don't need a tall, dark, handsome, mysterious man in your life. No matter how attractive he is. And you certainly don't need to be messing around with the boyfriend of the Heir of Slytherin. Focus girl. And so, that's what I did.
           I immersed myself in books and writing, all the while, Sebastians words about striving for perfection rang in my ears. The pursuit of perfection can be a fatal thing. It was true that I wanted to be the best at everything. Flying, class, Quidditch, everything I tried I wanted to be the best at. And I had been fine up until now. But the minute I walked into these hallowed halls, my pursuit of perfection had gotten me detention already, a warning from my flying professor and perhaps the failure to make the Quidditch team. So much for being the best.
Even this report was not going well. I was determined to prove myself to Celeste that I was now overthinking this report. Was there anything wrong with not being perfect 100% of time? Was there something wrong with being the best 90% of the time and not being the best the other 10%? That was something I was now going to have to think about, cause clearly I wasn't myself.
I got up in disgust from my table. I was overthinking, thereby making myself angry and unable to focus. My head was spinning with so many different thought paths. There was the omnipresent Grant, flying, schoolwork and now Hayden was even making an appearance. Then there was also the added bonus that all four descendants were here at the castle all at once. I needed to deal with one issue at a time. The most pressing issue was this stupid report. Focus on that, get it done, then I could focus on the soup of emotions swirling around in my brain.
My fingers ran across the spines of books sitting on the shelves. What to find, what to find?I needed a book that would help me, I needed a book that would allow me to finish this report. Dust began to gather on my fingers as I began to find books that no one had touched in years, maybe even decades. As I walked along the shelves, my fingers stopped on a book. It was sticking out more than the other books. My initial thought was that someone hadn't pushed it back far enough on the shelf. But, the book still had a fine layer of dust, meaning it hadn't been touched in quite some time.
            The book was extremely old, well worn, with a bluish tint on the cover. There was no title, no markings, no author. Nothing that said what this book was. My curiosity got the better of me and I decided to flip through the book. The first thing that caught my eye was that only one person seemed to use this book. The checkout initials constantly read R.R. Weird, but okay. But as I kept reading through the book, notes began to appear scribbled on the side. Notes denoting spells, patterns, incantations, different ways of looking things all appeared in the margins of this one book. Was this someone's personal book of spellcrafting? And why did it decide to find me?
             The backend of the book contained information on the original founding of the castle and school. Dark wizards and witches had attempted to stop the founding. Was the is Rowenna's original book of spellcrafting???? Those initials appeared throughout the entire book, and the handwriting was eerily similar to old documents of Rowenna's that we kept in the Ravenclaw vault. It had to be hers, no doubt about it.
             But that still begged the question: why did the book find me? Did it know I was a descendant and needed it? Did it know that three other descendants were here as well? The darkening library seemed to whisper to me in the darkness, an unnerving sound if I had ever heard one. I was beginning to suspect that maybe the odds of all of us being here at once had been stacked in the favor of something we couldn't comprehend. I didn't know what was happening, but I was damn sure that I was going to find out. As soon as I got Grant Gryffindor out of my damn head.....