In Her Eyes

Chapter Three

Alastriona rose early in the morning.

She always stayed in her fathers old room, it had been cleared out since his death all those years ago but some things still remained, like his quidditch posters and Ravenclaw banners that he'd stuck onto his walls.

Alastriona sat on her bed reading when there was a tap at her window, she grinned when she saw a familiar large brown owl at her window, she let the owl in and gave it some hazelnuts from a bowl next to her bedside, Arwen loved hazelnuts as she'd found out last night. The owl dropped the letter by her side and perched on the desk next to Arwen, Alastriona ripped it open.

Dear Alastriona,
Hope you're having fun in Scotland, can't wait to hear the accent when I see you next.
I've decided to spend the rest of the summer with Blaise which I'm sure I'll regret because he can be the most useless wizard at the best of times really. We'll probably just go to Diagon Alley every day and drink butterbeer until we explode.
Now I was just wondering if you had any notes you could lend me for that stupid History of Magic essay we're supposed to do, Blaise is nagging me about getting my homework done early, bloody twit he is.
-Theo

Alastriona grinned at her friends letter before walking over to her trunk and grabbing some of her notes from her History of Magic class, she went to the little desk in the corner and stuffed the notes in an envelope before scrawling out a letter to Theo,

Dear Theo,
I'm absolutely sure you'll have lots of fun staying with Blaise, plus he told me he has an amazing library- you should check it out! I can't believe it'll be weeks till I see both of you, I'm already missing everyone!
Good luck with the History of Magic essay, let me know if you need any help with it,
-Alastriona
P.S no exploding from excessive butterbeer consumption, please.

Alastriona left the letter with the brown owl, it was ready to take when he was ready to fly but Alastriona didn't want to pressure the poor creature, it was a very cold morning.

She made her way downstairs and found her grandpa already fixing a pot of tea. "Good morning!" He greeted her cheerfully, he came up and hugged her before kissing her mess of red curls.

"Take a seat, little one." Alastriona sat down as her grandpa placed a large mug of tea in front of her, "Now tell me more about yer friends at Hogwarts, yer nanna was hogging ye all last night."

Her grandpa took a seat opposite her as he stirred honey into his tea. "My friends are amazing, I have Darcy and she's in Hufflepuff with me, she hates vinegar like the smell and taste of it- all of it really. She's really good at Charms class and is good at Herbology too, which is great because she'll usually help me out with it because I'm dead awful at Herbology. We're both friends with Theo and Blaise, they're from Slytherin, they were a bit hesitant to be friends with us during our first year just because a lot of students from Slytherin don't want to hang out with Hufflepuff's."
Alastriona shrugged and smiled. "They just ignore all the other students now. I made a new friend this year! Her name's Dawn and she's two years above me and my other friends but she's really nice and funny, she teaches us advanced spells too which is fantastic! She's spending her summer in Romania at the Dragon Sanctuary there with her parents."

Her grandpa smiled back at her, he loved the way her dark eyes lit up as she talked about her friends. "Wow, a Dragon Sanctuary? Sounds dangerous, is she a Gryffindor then?"

Alastriona shook her head, "No, she's actually in Ravenclaw, but she's always wanted to see a dragon up close before. She really loves animals and she took me to see the unicorn herd in the winter! They were beautiful, grandpa!"

"Is it safe to go watching a herd of unicorns?"

"It was with a class, don't worry."

He hummed, not sure if he believed her or not but happy not to interrogate, "And what about ye classes? How have they been going?"