Samantha was in need of some rest and relaxation. She headed upstairs to her dormitory, carrying her kitten in her arms. When she reached the dormitory, Samantha found the bed that had her trunk and headed straight for it. She carefully placed Tabitha onto the bed before taking off her shoes and hopping onto the bed, herself.

"Well, what do you think, Tabitha?" Sam asked her kitten and Tabitha replied with a purr.

It was very quiet in the dorm and Pietra didn't mind it at all. She was seated cross-legged on her bed, furiously scribbling away at the sketch pad that was resting in her lap. She was entirely devoted to drawing as much of Hogwarts as she could so that she could send them to Rigo. He always enjoyed her creations and she enjoyed the thought of him getting to see what it was like here. Plus, it was a way for her to channel her homesickness and brother missing into something constructive. That was always a good thing, too. There was only one problem with her current activity, she was accidentally making charcoal marks on her duvet. Whoops.

She put her sketch pad aside and wiggled towards her trunk, looking for something to clean it off with. No messy beds, please and thank you.

Paloma stared at the notepad, and the pile of books she had to read, which she was anxious to, but had no energy at that moment. Also, there was a small pile of her summer pictures she had to pin to her bed board. Siiigh. Maybe that would clear her head of small tasks to accomplish big ones?
Quickly, she ran to the dormitories from the common room to open her trunk and look for the pins.

As she entered, she saw one of the girls she shared the room with, a bit too much covered in charcoal, for maybe some art project. "Hi." she greeted, directing her steps towards her trunk to look for the pins. As she searched through, a pin pinch got her right index finger. GREAT. Another injury? “Ow…” She complained, going to sit on her bed and wondering if she had some band aids. None, that she remembered...so, all was left was courage to speak to the blonde roomie, or hold the pain until she bled out.

“Ummm...by any chance, do you have a bandaid…?” She asked the girl, raising her hand and showing her the small but bloody injury.

She didn't look up when she heard the door. To be honest, she'd been mostly keeping to herself when it came to her roommates. She was sure that just because they had to share a room together didn't mean they wanted to be her friends, right? They all surely had their own friends...

She wasn't a rude girl though, so she did glance up after a moment and smiled at the girl's greeting. "H-hi." But that was all. She looked like she had something important to be doing and Pi wasn't one to bother people when they were doing things, important or not. Pietra wiggled around, trying to get the light to hit her sketch pad at a different angle and glanced over silently when her roommate injured herself. None of her business though... she wasn't rude... she went back to her work until she was pretty sure the girl was speaking at her. "Oh... s-sure." She did, in fact, have one. Rigo had packed a lot of things into her trunk without her knowledge, and first aid things were definitely in there. Nudging aside her papers and things, the blonde scooted back to her trunk, "Just one?" Or did she want more? Pi had plenty thanks to her over protective older brother. Plenty to share.

Paloma smiled and walked towards next where her roommate was, searching in her trunk for the band aid. "Yeah, just one. I just need to not worry over a pinch while I do what I intended when I got here." The picture pinning project, that is.

Just then, she noticed the reason why the girl was covered in charcoal smudges: the sketching. "That's...amazing. Very detailed..." And the lighting on the drawing, perfect. She was about to say that she used to do something like that, but in oil paint, and that ballet happened in her life, but probably the girl wasn't so interested, and she had to continue making her perfect sketches.

With a small nod, Pietra handed over the bandage and whispered, "Here." Under her breath and almost too low for the other girl to hear anyway. She felt her cheeks heating up as she realized how long she'd been keeping herself away from most of the other students around her. She definitely needed to try harder to be friendly and not so scared. She was trying to think of something polite and nice to say but she was beat to it. Pi glanced at her sketch pad with quick eyes and turned back to look at the girl again. "O-oh. T-thank you." What was with the stuttering? This was not a helpful thing when trying to make friends with people. People were going to assume that she stuttered her way through life all the time.

"Sorry that I.... haven't... introduced myself properly yet..." And that she'd been hiding for the most part.

With relief and a smile on her face, Pal took the bandaid and unwrapped it slowly. "Thank you." She noticed the cut had stopped dropping blood, so it was to be safe now.

"Can I...take a look at it?" She asked, hoping the girl would allow some insight into her skills. "To see your technique..." From artist to artist, there had to be some sharing right?

She had really wondered why the girl in front of her hadn't really been seen around much in the common room, but just at the Great Hall on the first night at the castle, and maybe some classes. "That's easy to arrange." Paloma answered stretching her right arm and opening her hand for a shake, "I'm Paloma, Paloma Robles, sixth year...Nice to meet you." She was about to include the word finally there, but making the girl blush a little bit more could cause some tomatoe-y situation.

Penelope was sitting by the window with her sketchbook, drawing the amazing view of the school grounds. Ravenclaw tower had a great view of the lake, the forbidden forest, the herbology greenhouses and gardens, and the quidditch pitch.

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Narrator

Though the growth of the sinkhole began to slow down, it didn't stop before it reached the stands. The second set of goal hoops had long ago succumbed to the collapse, and now the stands themselves began to tremble.

Shake, shake, creak, creeeak, snaaaap SNAP!

The first section of bleachers came down and disappeared into the black hole. Like a set of dominoes, the rest of the stands began to fall, section by section. In less than a minute the stadium ceased to exist, having given way to the sinkhole that by now had reached its final size.

What just happened to the quidditch pitch? Ravenclaw tower now had a view of the lake, the forbidden forest, the herbology greenhouses and gardens, and a giant sinkhole where the quidditch pitch had been. If anyone had been on the pitch... Penelope hoped that anyone who had been on the pitch was smart enough to get away from the pitch before it had completely disappeared. How could the whole pitch just collapse into a giant sinkhole? Could it be that whoever threatened the school had somehow destroyed the pitch? Was this a natural phenomenon? Surely any natural cause would not have swallowed up the whole pitch without taking more of the ground with it, or perhaps it would have only taken part of the pitch. This did not look like an accident or any natural occurrence. "The quidditch pitch... it's gone!" Did anyone who was not outside or looking out a window know about this?

Samantha got up from her bed and headed to where Penelope was. When she looked out the window, Sam clapped her hands over her mouth in shock and fear. "What?! How did that happen?!" Samantha said in a panicked whisper.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ginevra

Samantha got up from her bed and headed to where Penelope was. When she looked out the window, Sam clapped her hands over her mouth in shock and fear. "What?! How did that happen?!" Samantha said in a panicked whisper.

Penelope hugged Samantha and stayed there for a moment. She was scared and shocked that the pitch had disappeared. "I don't know, a sinkhole just opened up and swallowed the whole pitch." How could a whole quidditch pitch just be swallowed up like that? What if more sinkholes opened up? What if someone had been on the pitch? "Samantha, will you come to the library with me?"

Samantha wrapped her arms around Penelope. "I hope nobody got hurt out there," Sam replied as she let go of the younger Ravenclaw. Samantha smiled when Penelope asked her to go to the library. "Sure, I'll come with you."

"You're welcome." And she was, too. Pi certainly didn't want her getting blood on her things, blood was unsightly and sometimes stained. She continued to blush when the girl asked to see her sketch. She hadn't ever really shown off her art to anyone besides her brother and her boyfriend and her parents, but it might be a nice thing to get some constructive feedback from a peer. She offered her sketchpad somewhat timidly, but pretty sure that it would meet approval considering it seemed like it already had.

With her free hand, Pi shook her roomie's hand and offered her a smile. "Pietra Moretti, sixth year too." Obviously, since they shared a dorm room and all.

Paloma grinned and took the sketchpad from the girl's hands. One by one, but just a few, she examined them. Each sketch, she blinked at the great and delicate work she put into them. "You are definitely an artist, besides..." She pointed to her coal-coated clothes, "...it's perfect." She gave the pad back to the girl and sighed. "I would have loved to continue learning that, but ballet took my full time." She shrugged.

"Pietra." She repeated her name, in order to remember it. "Nice to meet you, for real..." Since they had only met eyes maybe in the halls and before going to bed.

It was time for Jasmine to clean her fairies' little home so she returned to her dorm room. She decided that she would put them in a fresh jar and then clean the dirty one. This way she could easily alternate between the two jars. She set the girls down on her bed and retrieved a new jar. Since they had recently had their exercise, she didn't feel the need to turn them loose.

Jasmine opened the clean jar and then opened the dirty one. Placing the clean jar on top of the old one, she encouraged the fairies to make their way into their new home. They seemed a bit reluctant, but finally crossed the threshold. Once the transfer was completed, Jasmine placed the top on the jar.

Now all she had to do was clean the dirty jar and she would be all set. Taking out her wand, Jasmine said, "Scourgify". Then she proceeded to clean the jar and the lid until they were sparkling like Sparkle. Checking on her fairies, they seemed to be quite comfortable in their alternate home.

Somehow, Soph had made it ALL THE WAY to her dormitory from the grounds withOUT her two fairies flying out of the jar even though the lid wasn't on it.

THAT was an impressive feat. She couldn't WAIT to tell Tobes how much progress she had made in such a short amount of time.

"Go on, be free," she urged them as she entered the fourth year girls' dormitory, and... they didn't budge. Maybe they didn't understand her? "You can come out nowwww," she tried again, smiling and using a gentle tone, and started to tilt the jar on its side so they would realize she was going to turn it upside down so they'd fall out - she didn't need to do that, though, as both Lily and Zelda flew right on out as soon as the jar began to turn.

Beautiful.

Each fairy took off in a different direction, one was more timid about its surroundings than the other. Soph watched with a smile and moved to sit on her bed - when she got there, she slipped her wand from its holster and peeked inside the jar. It didn't look filthy or anything, but if SHE had been living in a small space like that... well, she figured her fairies would appreciate her taking care of their home.

"Scourgify," she cast on the inside of the jar, then threw in a, "Tergeo," just for good measure. She lifted the jar up level to her eyes so she could see through it clearly - there were lots of fingerprints clouding the glass, so she cast, "Scourgify," multiple times to remove the grime on the outside of the jar. That way, the fairies could see out of their home more clearly and... well, they'd probably be pretty happy with her, right?

She was all about earning their appreciation and friendship right now, and so far, they seemed pretty happy. Maybe... she'd take them down to the common room? See how they liked being around all those people?

Layla wasn’t sure how she was feeling right now. She wasn’t happy, she wasn’t comfortable and she really didn’t want to be here but she was. And she was doing as she had always done, brushed off her emotions and hidden them under her usual grumpy unapproachable façade.

She entered her dorm room tossing her bag down by the side of her bed and flopping onto the mattress with an inaudible sigh. She was alone it seemed and the room felt oddly quiet without the others there. A part of her wished for their presence although she did enjoy time to herself. The peace, the lack of giggles and going on about some boy or whatever. Her dormmates were crazy and unfortunately for the Ravenclaw she had grown oddly attached to them.

The blonde kicked off her shoes and nudged them under her bed out of the way before she picked up her charms textbook for a bit of light reading whilst she had the chance. Exams were coming up soon, the prospect of having to take OWL’s in subjects she was still not entirely familiar with was a scary thought and she had to get in as much reading as she possibly could. Revising a week before was really not a good decision. She wasn’t lazy nor was she stupid enough to think that no preparation could get her through without failing. As a ‘new student’ in the sense that this was still her first year, Layla wasn’t going to let herself be made a fool of.

She briefly glanced at her watch to check what the time was. It wasn’t late yet and she was unsure whether the other two would return at any point soon. She continued on with the reading, trying to focus on remembering the purpose of each spell within the chapters but nothing was going through for thoughts were still running through her head. Annoying emotional thoughts she wanted rid of.

Layla Ackerly did not dwell on feelings for long yet here she was straight-faced staring blankly at her bedcovers deep in her own mind.

Two of Clara's favourite things: Studying (reading) and her best friend (Eden).

Right now she had both so she was in quite high spirits. She always felt a lot better after doing some reading and 'getting the brain juices flowing' as Eden would say. "Shall we call it a day, Edey?" She didn't want to over-work herself and she could see that Eden was itching to go elsewhere. "I think I saw Layla pass through here a while ago, so ... to the dorm?" Recently, Layla had seemed to have a lot going on. Clara worried about her - something which was surprising in itself, considering how much she'd disliked Layla at the beginning of term.

With a flick of her wand and a few muttered spells Clara gathered all of her books and put other things away before looking up at Eden and waiting. C'mon, bestie.

Eden jumped at the first chance--packing her books up super quickly--and streeetched. "THANK MERLIN." She said quickly. She was practically jogging back to the dorm, too--definitely ahead of Clara. She had a red velvet cupcake waiting for her and she knew Daisy needed to be fed eventually--later, though.

Entering the dorm, the QUIET dorm, she spotted Layla, smiled, and waved. "HIiiiiii Lay--" she said as she dropped her stuff next to her bed and FLOPPED onto her bed. MERLIN. She was tired. She kicked her shoes and put her hands behind her head. Yep. She would feed Daisy laterrrrrs. "Layla will have to come to our next cram session--" she said with a stifled yawn. "It would be better to have more brains present, you know?" she shrugged and shut her eyes. RELAXATION, YEAH.

"How was your afternoon, love?" she asked Layla, suddenly rolling on her side and grabbing one of the red velvet cupcakes from the box that Clara gave her. "I would offer--but I REMEMBERED you don't like sweets--" SIGH. Eden would just be a HUGE lard and eat it all herself, yes. Clara sometimes wanted to help her eat her sweets--but SIGH.

Alas, the problems of a sixteen-year-old girl with a sweet tooth but not a big enough tummy to FIT all the sweets in.

Layla knew that the peace and quiet wouldn’t last long. It was as if her dormmates had an extra sense that let eachother know when one another was lonely. A part of her wanted the company but the other half wanted to be left alone.

But they were stubborn, or Eden was anyway and before long they had walked straight in on the blonde all smiles and bounces and affectionate. Once again, mostly Eden. Clara was her usual self. She placed the book down on her bedside table knowing that she wouldn’t be able to concentrate on the words anymore. “Hey” she offered what was supposed to be a smile but it probably came out false and her tone of voice was the complete opposite to Eden’s bright and cheery one. Clara got the same smile too. “I ain’t a great group studier.” If that was a word? She kinda liked sitting by herself and recording notes from her textbook.

Besides, she was sure that Clara wouldn’t like her invading on their ‘bestie bonding time’ or whatever it was they called it.

“Fine.” She responded. Layla didn’t like divulging her thoughts and feelings with anyone else and these two were no exception. In fact, she hadn’t told anyone and she was planning on keeping it that way. No one needed to know why she was feeling so down and she wasn’t going to let anyone know either. “Just been sat here readin’ for a bit. An’ I went for a run earlier.” Small talk was just awful. As for the ‘love’ nickname, Layla had just ignored that completely.

“Ain’t that I don’t like them, just don’t eat them” she shrugged. Why wasn’t Clara eating them anyway? She felt like she should probably engage the redhead into the conversation but the blonde really didn’t have anything to say and they had might as well just speak amongst themselves anyway.

“You alright?” Yeah. That was all she had to ask and it was directed at both of them too. And for some reason it sounded more South London than usual. Thinking of, she wanted to go back. Normal friends, normal school, uncomplicated life.

Clara had known that Eden was going to want to stop studying at the first chance she got but she didn't know she was THAT eager. Eden has set off at a jog, leaving Clara behind, and there was no way she was going to jog to catch up. Not unless she wanted to end up flat on her face; even a slow jog wasn't for the uncoordinated. "You should be thanking me, not Merlin!" She called after her best friend. She doubted Merlin had anything to do with bringing an end to that studying session. That was all her.

The redhead entered the dorm soon after Eden and wasted no time in putting her books down at the end of her bed. She'd organise them later. For the moment they were in piles of three or five and she was content with that.

Finally, she looked up and gave Layla a smile as she received one herself. “Hey, Layla.” She might have said more if it wasn’t for Eden taking over with ALL the conversation. Clara moved to flop onto her bed while Eden was talking and considered the things she was saying. Cram session? She’d hardly call it a cram session. She didn’t cram. Her brain didn’t need to cram. “I wouldn’t call it a cram session,” she said honestly, voicing her thoughts, before turning her head to look at Layla, “but you’re welcome to come if you want.”

Honestly, Clara ignored the rest of what Eden said to Layla. She knew some of it was probably sweet-related as she hadn’t stopped talking about sweets all day. Slight exaggeration, but, oh well.

Having already been in her pyjamas, Clara simply slipped under her duvet before focusing her attention back on the other girls’ conversation. Layla wasn’t a great group studier? Somehow, that didn’t surprise her. Obviously, she was unaware that part of the reason was that Layla didn’t think Clara would want her there – but that wasn’t really the case at all. She’d grown a lot more accepting of Layla over the month and that included being okay with doing things as a group and not just with Eden alone.

The only thing that stuck out as Layla spoke was the running thing, which Clara made a face at, but that was all. It was that time of day that Clara usually became more distance and often grumpy, though the grumpiness hadn’t hit just yet. She just wasn’t interested in talking a lot. “I’m alright, yes,” she said, shrugging. Like Layla, she wasn’t really one for small talk either. It usually fell to Eden to fill the silences.

OOOOOoooOOOooooh.

Layla wasn't a group studier? Eden could have figured that, honestly. She nommmmed on her cupcake and just shrugged. "Yeah-but if you ever want to--offer stands." She said softly. Her head turned slightly in Eden's direction and shruuuuuugged more. "Nah--it's not cramming--we're actually gettin' a head start on things--" YEP. Ravenclaws...FOR THE WIIIN. "Can't be failin' our OWLs." Layla's influence was clearly showing itself right now--but maybe that was because Eden just liked the comfort of speaking in such a way. It felt less forced...less posh. Not that Eden was. Her Irish was definitely shown through when she was mad or upset--but normally she kept her dialect to a minimum.

She finished her cupcake and sat up, wiping her hands on her covers...because Eden was just SO clean like that..pfffft.

Her roommates were such....talkers. NOT. Eden a lot of times found herself talking...responding..talking..YEP. "Yeah--I'm all right, too," she said with yet another shrug, and she leaned over her bed and dug through her trunk to try to find some spare parchment. "Ruuuun. I need to run extra tomorrow--" she nodded at the cupcake wrapper--which she WOULD be throwing away, yes, no need to bugger her. "Need to...write some letters--" she said, seeing as neither of them wanted to talk....or anything.

She just started her letter with.... 'Dear Mam...' and then looked up. "What's the bloody date today--" she couldn't remember--

To Layla it looked like Clara wasn’t nearly as enthusiastic as the brunette was. Although she was sure that it was usually that way. Eden was the bright bubbly bouncy one when she wanted to be and the other two were more.. mellow. To go along with the craziness that was the students at this school it was almost as if they were the perfect description of the seven dwarfs. The blonde knew she would be grumpy, the brunette had to be happy and as for the redhead, that was a difficult choice. She folded her legs under her as she watched her dormmates enter the room.

She could come if she wanted? The sixteen-year-old would’ve grunted at the ‘offer’ which she didn’t exactly consider one anyway. “I’m alright thanks.” Didn’t want to intrude on ‘bestie bonding’ anyway, nor did she think that studying in a group would be particularly useful. Too many distractions not enough ‘studying’.

Clara went quiet and Eden started yapping on about something-or-other and the Ravenclaw nodded along as if she was truly listening to what she had to say. Truth was Eden talked too much but the girl was easily offended and so Layla never voiced that opinion. As for the way she was talking, she got a look. If there was one thing that irked her more than anything else at this school it was how terribly ‘middle class’ a lot of the students were and how inferior they made her feel with her south London accent. It was irritating and she was fed up of the shrill posh voices after about 10 minutes of listening to them. Eden often ‘copied’ her accent. “If you’re tryin’ to do my accent you ain’t doin’ a very good job.” Why she didn’t speak in her native accent was beyond her, Layla spoke exactly how she wanted to.

The fifth-year girls dorms weren’t particularly awkward. They got along with each other, eventually anyway, and they sort of bonded over this and that but today nobody except Eden appeared to be in a talkative mood. In fact, Clara was saying even less than she was which was pretty unusual. Layla wasn’t in the best of moods and the straight-faced expression that laced her lips was evidence of that. She didn’t often smile anyway and usually it was quite an effort to do so. She couldn’t help the small snort though when Eden wiped her hands on her bedcovers. Kinda gross but pretty amusing. She really didn’t give a monkey about what people thought about her sometimes, did she?

“I know it’s a bit hypocritical for me to say cos I’m usually the one that don’t wanna talk but we ain’t gonna bite your head off if you speak up” she tried to joke towards Clara, the smallest hint of a smile on her face. Seriously? Don’t make things awkward again.

Once again Eden babbled on and the blonde shot an amused look towards the redhead imitating someone talking with her hand. “She could talk for England..” Or Ireland. Whatever.

“Look at a calendar” she suggested at Eden’s question leaning back against her headboard with a little more force than intended. She rubbed her shoulder at the slight pain it inflicted before picking up a pillow and stuffing it behind her as support.

Jasmine was preparing to do her Divination homework which she knew was a hopeless case. The students were charged with finding Snow White and bringing her back to the Evil Queen, better known as Professor Cassie. Really? She tried to think of ways that she could complete the assignment, but right now she was stumped. How she was going to accomplish this was a mystery, but Jasmine knew that she had to come up with something good. Maybe she could get a classmate to dress up as Snow White and turn herself in. Knowing that the possibility of that was slim to none, she continued to think.

Jasmine decided that she would try scrying first. Taking out the small mirror, she laid it on her bed. Then she began to concentrate on clearing her mind of all stray thoughts. For some reason, it seemed easier than usual today. Her mind wasn't completely clear of thought, but it seemed better than it had on any previous attempt. Even if she didn't find Snow White, this was good practice for her real scrying. She still had a date with that crystal ball after all.

Sitting cross legged on her bed, Jasmine gazed into the mirror, her face a picture of concentration. She was giving this an honest try, even though the premise was rather ridiculous. "You never know", Jasmine thought. Something might actually appear in the mirror. And so she stared and waited, but alas, nothing happened. She didn't even get any smoky swirliness. Strike one.

Maddie sat on her bed surrounded by small patterned pieces of paper. She had a book open to her left, one Dora had sent her a while back. And as she folded the blue polka-dotted paper in her hands, she glanced at the book every now and then for direction. She was going to make a winged horse and she was going to do it well.