Raven | 𝘙𝘦𝘨𝘶𝘭𝘶𝘴 𝘉𝘭𝘢𝘤𝘬

Chapter 44

It was no secret that Alexandra lacked tolerance when it came to surprises and mysteries. She just wanted to get to the bottom of it soon, no matter what it was that had resurfaced her curiosity.

     And at that moment, as Regulus kept dragging her to different directions and up the castle, he refused to tell Alexandra where he was taking her and she was growing impatient.

     "Can you at least give me a hint as to where it is that you're taking me?" Alexandra questioned.

    "Okay, here's a hint: it will be worth the wait," Regulus said with a grin. That didn't help her to ease her curiosity at all.

     But at last they finally stopped when they reached the seventh floor and went through the corridor to their left. Alexandra was confused as she came upon nothing interesting in the hallway and became rather disappointed.

     "I don't understand..." she said with a frown as she looked around her.

     She felt slightly disappointed, because Regulus had said that it was going to be worth the wait, but now she was faced with an empty corridor with nothing interesting inside it.

     "Why do you have to be so impatient all the time?" said Regulus, but then reading through her expression, he let out a chuckle. "Like I said. It's going to be worth it."

     "What are you talking about?" she mused.

     "Okay... what does your dream place look like?"

     "Ooh! I would love to visit the land of Narnia if it existed! Have you read the book? It's really fascinating!" she said with glee, clapping her hands together in excitement.

     Regulus rolled his eyes at that. "Yeah, I need you to name something more realistic."

     Alexandra let out a sad sigh, knowing well that she was being insensible for thinking that she could ever visit an imaginary land where all the magical creatures lived in harmony, along with talking animals and ancient kingdoms.

     So after thinking it over, she finally answered him and said, "Probably a huge library. Even bigger than the one my grandpa has."

     By those words, the grin returned back to Regulus's face. So with that, much to Alexandra confusion, he started pacing back and forth over the wall in front of them with his eyes closed, as if her were thinking hard on something.

     But just then, Alexandra let out a gasp as she looked up and saw a door appearing right in front of them. "Where did this — how did this —"

     "Have you forgotten that magic exists?" Regulus said as he watched her amusingly. "C'mon. Go inside."

     Alexandra hesitated only a second longer before she finally walked forward and pushed the door open. But the moment she stepped inside the room, her jaw dropped and her mouth fell open in awe at what she saw inside.

     There, right in front of her, was the biggest library she had ever seen in her life. Fifty times bigger than the one in his grandfather's mansion. There were shelves after shelves from the floor to the high ceiling, filled with hundreds or even thousands of books.

     The floor was covered with a fancy red velvet carpet and the ceiling was painted with wondrous clouds that moved and divine angels who fluttered their wings gently above them.  

      "How did you even know about this place?" Alexandra said in a hollow voice, too busy looking around her to even glance back at Regulus.

     But he didn't mind. He just stood back with his hands in his pocket, watching her with a smile spread across his face. He enjoyed seeing her like this; wondrous and happy, with that glimmer of excitement in her eyes that she always had.

     "This is called the 'Come and Go Room'," said Regulus. "The house elves told me about it."

     For the first time, Alexandra finally tore her eyes away from the books and looked back at him. "The house elves?"

     "Yeah, there are many of them here working at Hogwarts."

     "Yeah, I know that. Hagrid told me. But I'm just surprised that you'd find one, let alone talk to them."

     "Well, it was only two years ago. I couldn't sleep for some reason and stayed up till four a.m in the common room, until I finally saw one pop up there for cleaning. Poor thing was so ashamed that I had seen him, because they believe that a sign of a good house elf is that they are never seen. But I tried to calm him down because he kept crying and — why are you looking at me that way?"

     Regulus stopped in mid-sentence as he caught Alexandra smiling at him with a glint in her dreamy eyes.

     "Nothing." Alexandra just shrugged and tried to shake the matter off, but it was far from nothing.

    She had never met someone in her life that payed respect to a house-elf. Let alone a wizard from the kind of family that Regulus came from. Purebloods like his family usually were even worse than others when it came to treating house elves.

    But here Regulus was, talking about that house elf as an equal, telling her about how he had even tried to comfort the poor elf when he was crying.

     "So anyway," Regulus cleared his throat, continuing, "the house elf said I could visit him in the kitchens whenever I wanted something and told me how to get in there."

     "Ooh, really?" Alexandra exclaimed in excitement. "You know where the kitchen is?"

     "Yes." He nodded rather smugly. "I started visiting the house elves often from then on, and one day one of them told me about this place. The Come and Go Room. It appears to someone in need and it turns to anything you seek."

     "Anything?" Alexandra repeated with amusement and Regulus nodded in respond.

     "I come here a lot when I want to be alone, although I've never asked for a library to appear," he said, looking around him proudly. "The house elves reckon no one else knows about this room. Not even Dumbledore."

     "I don't think I would ever want to leave this place..." Alexandra said as she turned her eyes back on all those books that were waiting to be read.

    "You can come here anytime you like, but for now we only have forty minutes to the start of our first class," said Regulus, looking down at his watch.

     Alexandra was disappointed. She didn't want to leave this place and wished to stay here for hours. But just then, before she could say anything else, Regulus closed his eyes as if thinking about something.

      Moments later, a table with two armchairs around it appeared out of nowhere next to them. With that, Regulus dug into his bag and took out wrapped up toasts and set them on the table.

    "I nicked these from the Slytherin table today for our breakfast," he said with a grin. "Now go ahead and choose a book."