Image credit: hermionesclone

At the top of a long spiral staircase on the west side of the castle, you come to the entrance to the Ravenclaw common room. The door bears no doorknob or keyhole, only a bronze knocker shaped like an eagle. For those able to answer the knocker’s riddle, the door will swing open to reveal an airy, circular room. The room boasts one of the best views in the castle, overlooking the school grounds and surrounding mountains.

The room is decorated in varying shades of blue and bronze, from the silks adorning the arched windows to the starry-patterned midnight blue carpet. If you happen to look up, you’ll see the same stars reflected in the domed ceiling. Even the furniture follows the blue and bronze color scheme, with plush blue chairs and sofas topped with bronze cushions scattered about the room. Portraits of famous Ravenclaw alumni hang on the walls, and a white marble statue of Rowena Ravenclaw herself stands beside a door at the opposite side of the room, Through that door you’ll find the stairs to the dorms.

THe common room is designed to be warm and inviting, so why not curl up with a good book and make yourself at home?

Aurora was quite fond of her common room, it had one of the best views in the whole castle, it was warm and inviting and she enjoyed the colour blue but boy was it a trek up and down the staircase every time she returned from lessons on one of the lower levels. That coupled with the fact that her closest friends were Hufflepuffs and Slytherins and therefore all the way in the basements made it just the slightest bit inconvenient. It wasn’t so bad when her sister Ariadne had been there too for she could bother her for attention and company but she didn’t seem to be so compatible with her fellow Eagles. She had nothing against them, she had tried her hardest to find things she had in common, but the truth was that she wasn’t the most Claw-like Claw. Reading was boring, studying would last a total of ten minutes before she’d need to get up and move about and there was nothing appealing about playing a game of Chess.

Instead of any of the above activities, the fourth year could be found sitting atop a large pillow she had borrowed from one of the sofas and placed on the floor over by the windows. In front of her was a pile of daisies she was weaving into one another to make the daisy chains she and Anna had started in Care of Magical Creatures. Unsatisfied with just making a flower crown for the Unicorns they had spotted in the forest, she had decided that each of the horses in the stables deserved their chance to feel beautiful too.

Molly simply could not wait to own her very own broomstick so that she could float herself all the way up to the Ravenclaw common room. That would be allowed right? For her to just enter via a window??? Up until now she found the venture up the stairs fun and full of adventure, but the novelty was starting to wear off. Thankfully the room was beautiful enough to make up for that. She absolutely loved being in Ravenclaw.

Thinking she was alone, Molly’s usual smile had faltered a bit and she rubbed her forehead from feeling extremely tired. It had been a long day of schoolwork and she could feel herself about to explode. In her opinion, one lesson per day would be best and she would absolutely ask her dad to write in a letter of recommendation to whomever that would concern. Perhaps the headmaster.

The first year immediately noticed an older student making A DAISY CHAIN!!!! And despite her exhaustion, Molly just couldn’t resist interacting with her. Maybe the kind and pretty fourth year would make HER one as welll. “Oh, pretty!!!!” She exclaimed and flopped down onto a pillow that she had just grabbed in front of the girl, one hundred percent creating a big floof of air that two hundred percent raised some daisies off of the ground. “Hello, you don’t mind if I watch, do you?” PLEASE BE FRIENDLY.

Molly would place a 50 knut bet right now that she was the friendliest person in the world.

The joining first year was very lucky in that Aurora WAS a very friendly person and the flutter of air from her plopping the pillow down and creating a sort of daisy confetti didn’t annoy her. In fact it momentarily distracted her by how pretty the effect was as the petals came tumbling down and settled onto her lap and surrounding floor. She scooped them gently back into a pile before turning to the new girl.

“Sure! I was making them for the horses in the stables but you can have one if you like?” She nudged one of the completed chains towards her fellow Ravenclaw. “You can help make them too, if you know how to. Or I can teach you if you don’t? I used to make them in the school field at my primary school.” Sadly it wouldn’t be long before the daisies disappeared from the grass as winter took hold in Scotland but that made the return to spring even more exciting.

The fourth year had a habit of overwhelming the younger Claws with her enthusiasm and fast speech but her new companion seemed equally as peppy and wouldn’t be frightened away if she continued to talk whilst her fingers worked away. “I’m Aurora by the way. Are you enjoying Hoggies?” How could anyone not? It was magical!

SHE KNEW IT. If only she had actually made a 50 knut bet with someone, she would be quids in and ready to spend the lot at Honeydukes in Hogsmeade. Money wasn’t something she’d really been supplied with during her time at Hogwarts, but thankfully her appetite was completely fulfilled with the glorious feasts.

“Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!” Molly jumped up onto her elbows but tried to remain calm and gentle when she offered her a completed daisy chain. She placed it onto her head as a crown and beamed. “Awww, you’re making them for the horses? Do you have enough daisies? I would feel terribly guilty keeping this one from one of the creatures.” She would happily settle for wearing it for a few minutes now before returning it. They wouldn’t last forever, would they?

But in answer to her question, “YES, I’d love to help you. I have made them before but I wouldn’t say I was very good at them.” It was a little fiddly and she wasn’t the best at that kinda thing. She knew she definitely couldn’t make them as nice as this girl had.

“Hi, Aurora.” She had forgotten about introductions. “My name is Molly. Oh, Hogwarts is brilliant. I’ve never seen a place quite like it, but we don’t really use much magic at home.” They were a bit off the grid, but since joining Hogwarts, she could not see why. Magic was incredible.

The first years enthusiasm made Aurora’s cheeks hurt from grinning in the sort of way when you saw something impossibly cute like a kitten playing with a ball of yarn. “You’re welcome!” she replied with equal amounts of pep. It was hard to find another Ravenclaw who could tally the fourth year when it came to that department.

Judging by the huge pile, and that the Hogwarts grounds seemed to breed the flowers during the summer months, she was pretty certain that she wouldn’t run out any time soon. “I suppose I could always try the Doubling Charm if I do run out. I’ve never tried it on a flower though.” She couldn’t be sure it would even work on such a target nor could she guarantee that it wouldn’t go wrong along the way and the common room wouldn’t become flooded with daisies by accidentally creating the Domino Curse instead.

Aurora wouldn’t say she was an expert at them either but the sheer quantity that she was producing meant that she was starting to form a sort of rhythm that made them a little easier. “The trick is to always use your thumb nail.” She waggled her fingers at the younger student, displaying her short but maintained nails, her thumb nail just that little bit longer than the rest. They weren’t painted, nor were they particularly clean having spent the past hour working with the flowers that had left a slight green residue behind. She had grown up over the summer and had several makeup lessons from her older sister but that didn’t mean she was no longer willing to get her hands dirty, that would be far too boring. “Have this pile and if you get stuck I can help you.” She gently picked up a small quantity of flowers and placed them on the girl's cushion.

She’d always liked the name Molly. She supposed it was because she grew up surrounded by fantasy and fairytales and the feminine names had been quite prevalent in those. She shared her own name with a Princess, for Merlin’s sake, how could she not love being lost in the land of make-believe. “My Ma doesn’t use magic much either. She’s Muggleborn and didn’t develop magic until she was my age. She uses it to make things easier sometimes but most of the time you wouldn’t even know. My Mom uses it a lot though.” It was a nice juxtaposition, the best of both worlds she supposed.

It felt like these two were destined to hang out with each other, their energies matching and even fuelling each other. It was just a shame that they differed in ages but hopefully Molly had found a friend in this fellow Ravenclaw.

She gasped, not even considering using magic to duplicate the chains. She often forgot that they were free to use magic within the castle wall, not that she had learned tooooooo much as of yet. “That’s a great idea! Oh, please show me how to do a doubling charm!” If she was comfortable and wanted to, of course.

Molly instinctively curled her fingers into a fist when Aurora showed off her well maintained nails. Hers were… bitten, not very pretty. She smiled at the advice, however, and soon reached out to have a go at making her own. It was very fiddly work, and she was having a bit of difficulty. “Thanks.” After a few attempts and a few split stems, she was clearly becoming frustrated and flicked the one she was working with away. “I’m not very good at it.” It seemed she much preferred watching Aurora do it.

“Oh really?” That was very interesting to Molly. She loved hearing people’s stories, as well as sharing her own. “Do you have any brothers or sisters? I have two mums, too. Kind of,” if that’s what Aurora meant by Ma and Mum. “A mum and a step mum.” Thankfully there was a lot of love within her family, and a lot of siblings, too! “My mum is a muggle.” This fact alone was AWESOME, she thought. “And my dad’s side of the family live a bit off the grid.” Magic-wise, anyway.

Molly need not be concerned that Aurora was three years above her in age, the Ravenclaw had a habit of trying to accumulate friends in all the years anyway. Those in the upper years she sort of latched onto in the hopes that they’d accept her whereas the younger ones she had tried to adopt into her circle as a kind of guide to life at Hogwarts. Whether she was the best role model for these youngins was up for debate but she liked to think she was friendly and a good student enough to support them anyway.

Oh no.

Well now she had been put on the spot and had to attempt a spell that she wasn’t one-hundred percent sure she could remember. “Umm.. I think the incantation is Geminio and you just sort of..” She flicked her wand in the direction of the daisy chain a couple of times, watching as it duplicated again.. and again.. and again.. “Oh no! No no no no! How do I make it stop?” She tapped her wand on the cushion which swiftly duplicated too, raising her up higher off the ground until suddenly all seemed to stop. She smiled sheepishly at the first year. “Like that I guess?” What she lacked in booksmarts she made up for in generally being a good person.

Having those extra copies was likely a good thing judging by how frustrated Molly was getting over piercing the stems. She collected those that had split and placed them away into a bag to decide what to do with them on another date. Maybe she’d offer them to Mitsuki? She’d often seen her making something-or-other out of crushed flowers and now that they were friends (in Aurora’s head anyway), she might appreciate them.

“Mhmm..” She replied, tying off the final flower to make the perfect circle. “An older sister called Ariadne who graduated last year and a baby brother called Ander who was born in September. I haven’t met him yet though.” She was counting down those weeks though. As for the situation with her Mums, Aurora didn’t have any issue in proudly correcting any assumptions. “My Ma and my Mom are married” she smiled. No step-mum situations here. “Like they live in nature?” she enquired, images of her dad’s family living amongst the fairies and picking mushrooms and making nettle soup coming to mind.

Molly was positively thrilled that Aurora knew the spell in question, even more so that she wasted no time in giving it a go. Hopefully she would teach it to her, although she was unsure on how complicated it was or if it was age appropriate. With her eyes widened, her smile faded just a tad when the spell kept on spelling. This could end up disastrous. “Ahhhh!” She exclaimed dramatically, but dissolved into giggles when the cushion duplicated as well, raising Aurora higher. “Yep, I think that worked!” More giggles.

She examined the extra daisy chains to judge how much of a replica they had turned into, and they looked pretty perfect, in her opinion! “Thank you! You’re so good at magic!” Molly quickly complicated before placing a daisy chain onto her head, like a crown.

“Awww, you haven’t met your baby brother? That’s so sad!” Molly said with an exaggerated sad expression. She loved her siblings and couldn’t imagine life without them. It made coming to Hogwarts particularly difficult as most of them who were of age didn’t possess magic, the others too young to tell. She did hope she shared the abilities with at least one of them in the future. “I have 5 siblings in total. Three sisters, two brothers.” Some of them were half siblings but that didn’t really mean much to Molly.

“Errmmmm… yeah we definitely are a nature family.” Was that the official term? “We travel a lot and were homeschooled. Until now, obviously. she giggled. “Mostly my dad and step mum don’t practise much magic.” It meant her knowledge of magic wasn’t as much as your standard wizarding family.

Aurora was living proof that things didn’t always go well the first time that it was attempted and yet she wasn’t the sort to give up straight away nor did she become frustrated with herself. More often than not the Ravenclaw was able to laugh at her own ineptitude because magic going wrong would never NOT be funny. Plus when another was laughing at her mistake it made her laugh even more and soon enough there were actual tears welling up the fourteen-year-olds eyes from giggling so much. “The view is much better from up here!” she remarked, still slightly hiccuping from the giggling fit she had just experienced.

The previous disaster was evidence that maybe Aurora wasn’t at good at magic as Molly was making out but she appreciated the compliment nonetheless. “I try” she answered also placing the daisy chain on her own head tilted back slightly like a fairy’s tiara.

“No not yet” she pouted. It wouldn’t be long before she did but to a young lady it seemed like f o r e v e r. “He was born after we arrived at Hogwarts by literally like.. days. Because boys are poopy like that.” As in they always left her waiting for longer than necessary. “That’s a big family! My Ma’s brother has SIX children and most of them now have children too. There’s so many of them.” And yet her Mom had no siblings at all and so there was a lack of cousins on that side.

The more she thought about it, the better living in nature sounded. Aurora was fond of animals and creatures and plants and she wasn’t the most materialistic person who usually enjoyed being outside. “Oh. Did you live like a muggle then? Do you like muggle films and.. did you have a television?” So many important questions!