In the Shadow of Power - Hogwarts Legacy

Chapter 7

It was late the next morning when Alayna finally woke up. Imelda and Johanna were already out of the room and Nerida was just finishing getting ready. Alayna tossed off her covers and quickly set about getting ready so she wouldn't be late to class. As she was doing so, she was painfully aware of Nerida's presence lingering in the room. She felt really bad about yesterday. She hadn't meant to yell at Nerida, she was the one girl in Slytherin who had been nice to her since her arrival. Johanna just made her so angry and that had carried over. Not that it had any right to.

"Nerida..." Alayna turned around to face the girl who was slowly gathering her school supplies for the day. She took a deep breath as she gathered the courage to apologize. "I'm really sorry about yesterday. I shouldn't have yelled at you, you've been nothing but nice to me."

"Oh, Alayna, it's okay. Johanna is a piece of work and she drags Imelda into it too. I completely understand being heated after talking to her," Nerida stopped packing her things and walked over to stand by Alayna. She reached out to take her hands and smiled a little. "I really did mean it, about you standing up to her though. Most of the time I'm too scared to." 

"Thank you...I'm glad you're not mad. I wouldn't want to mess up a potential friendship with the only person I get along with in this room." The both of them laughed a little at the thought.

"Then we can both face Johanna together and have our own little gossip corner," Nerida grinned. "But seriously, I hope we can become good friends. I used to be close with Imelda, but we grew apart years ago."

"Did you get along with Anne? I heard about Sebastian's sister, she would have been your roommate right?" Alayna found herself asking.

"Oh, Anne," Nerida laughed a little, but there was a hint of sadness as well as an awkwardness there in her expression. "We were roommates, but I wouldn't say we were friends. She spent most of her time with her brother and Ominis. They made quite the trio."

"I see..." Alayna wondered what they had been like. From what she knew of Sebastian and how Nerida reacted, she imagined they were quite troublesome. "I should get ready for class!" She realized then just how late she was running. She left Nerida to prepare for the day and managed to make her way out of the common room in decent time. On her way up the stairs, she caught the behind of Sebastian exiting the door up ahead.

"Sebastian!" she called out just as the door closed. When she exited herself, she found him waiting just on the other side. 

"Good morning, Alayna," Sebastian flashed a tired smile.

"I heard you getting detention last night from Scribner. Thank you for not telling her about me," Alayna said. The two of them began walking in the direction of the Great Hall.

"Of course. At least one of us made it out of there unseen. Did you get what you were looking for?" His smile brightened a bit more.

"Yes, I think so. I found a book that I think may be important. I'm going to give it to Professor Fig after breakfast." She had it tucked into her robes' pockets for safekeeping.

"Important for what exactly?"

"I'm not sure. When we were in Gringotts, we saw a memory in a pensieve. The people in it mentioned some things about secrets and following a path," Alayna tried to explain briefly.

"That's all? It does sound confusing. I mean, no answers as to why you can see ancient magic?" Sebastian lowered his voice a little as they entered a hall with more students.

"None! I have no idea why, though it doesn't seem to be hereditary. There was another pensieve in the restricted section and it showed another girl who started as a fifth year like me. There's also an older man in the memories who can see ancient magic, but they're not related to each other." It felt nice being able to talk to Sebastian about these things. Professor Fig already knew about it so she couldn't exactly vent it out to him.