To be or not to be, no, thats not the question....

[Alice Hills]

Alice sat down on the Great Lawn. All around her, there were people chatting and having fun but she couldn't be bothered to do anything. Picking up her bag, she pulled out a few books and stacked them next to her. The top one was a Shakespeare book, that she hadn't read in a while, and the others were school books. So far, she had read all her school books lots of times and knew a lot of them off by heart. Sighing at the prospect of nothing to do, she closed her eyes and thought about her time at HNZ so far.

She had arrived on the train with Tally, a close friend of hers, and came over to the castle. She had then been sorted into Ravenclaw, the house where she wanted to go, and now was waiting for lessons to start. She wasn't quite sure what she would make of them yet. She was excited at learning new magic, but she feared that she would be the bottom of the group. This was a worry of hers, how silly it sounded, but still, it worried Alice. She knew that some people in Ravenclaw could already do simple spells, like her, but she didn't really know that much about the other houses. Thinking about all of this, she didn't notice someone approaching her quietly.

 

[Samuel Sykes]

Alice must have been the only person who didn't notice Sam walking her way, simply because the fifth year boy was so tall that he cast a substantial shadow around him. Many of the tallest boys in his year were gangly and seemingly stretched from the sudden growth, but Sam was as much brawn as he was length for reasons only Merlin knew. Despite that, he moved like the shadow he cast and almost didn't notice the first year girl before he was right on top of her. A slightly ominous darkness settled over Alice before he skidded to a stop on the grass and let out a huff of surprise. "S-sorry," said Sam. Not so ominous after all. Sam was tall, strong ... and as fierce as a flobberworm.

By way of apology for scaring the first year, Sam sat down beside her with the grace of an athlete and offered Alice a tiny smile. "I'm sorry," he said again. "I almost fell on you there, didn't I?". To be fair, he had just circled around a small hedgerow or he would have moved out of the way long before startling her as he did. Or assumed he did. There was a small pause where he surveyed her kindly before he added "You look a bit lonely. Do you mind if I sit by you?".

 

[Alice Hills]

Alice looked up at the extremely tall boy and a startled expression crossed her face. "Hi. Um, yeh, sure." She said slowly, wondering whom he was. She hadn't seen him in the Ravenclaw common room yet, but he could still be in the house. He didn't look like a Slytherin, but you could never be sure. "Im Alice." She said, composing herself and smiling at him. "Im in Ravenclaw. 1st year." She added, still wondering who he was. She moved her books to the side and turned to him, taking in his height and strength for the first time. Although he seemed big, he was still very graceful and she smiled again, in spite of herself at his good looks.

 

[Samuel Sykes]

"I'm Sam," the Hufflepuff offered shyly. He'd thought that the girl was at least a third year. First years are looking older and older these days. And I'm too young to be thinking those kind of things! Sam thought to himself. To be fair, Alice was quite pretty, so his age-radar might have been off by a few notches. "I'm four years above you in Hufflepuff." Scanning the books stacked beside her surreptitiously, he noticed the Shakespeare book and made a note that the girl must be both quite advanced and also a muggle-born. He didn't do a lot of reading, himself, but then he would have been in Ravenclaw if he'd been inclined to do so. The only thing Sam read was a Muggle swimming magazine that ironically came by owl every day, and his school textbooks. He squashed the thoughts of that one book he'd nervously purchased in fourth year, 'Twelve Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches'. "How are you finding Hogwarts?" he asked Alice to take his mind off the embarrassing subject.

 

[Alice Hills]

Alice smiled at the boy. "Hi Sam." She said with a pleasant tone. She was in a good mood at the moment and meeting new people was something she was happy to do. "You're a Hufflepuff?" She asked gently. She still didn't know much about Hufflepuff's apart from the fact that they all seemed really nice. She saw that he was looking at her books and felt quite self-conscious. Already, for an 11 year old, her reading skills were very developed and she was told that she was ahead of many people because her favourite author was Shakespeare. She couldn't describe why she liked it so much, she just did. The language, the story lines, the way it normally took a while to discover the real meaning behind the words. Wondering what the boy was thinking of her, she nodded in reply to his question. "Yes. I love it so far. All of it. I mean, lessons haven't started yet, but i have already done a few spells and am starting to find my way around now." She said smiling. At first, she had found the moving staircases quite scary, but now she was used to them. Only a few days ago, when she was reading 'A History of Magic' again, did she discover that Rowena Ravenclaw came up with the idea for the moving staircases. Now they seemed a work of art, rather than a problem. "But im really looking forward to the lessons." She said smiling. She had heard a lot about them all, and they all sounded great. Well, she had her favourite ones to read about, but she wasn't still sure on the practical ones such as Flying and CoMC.