All Board! Ⅳ
After Rowan finished consoling Lorcan D'Eath and Glenda Chittock, she exited their train compartment leaving them with their friends, Jacob Clayton and Gilderoy Lockhart. Lockhart may be incredibly annoying at times, but he did his best to cheer up his friends. He immediately launched into a tale about his two older squib sisters, Pauline and Sophie Lockhart.
Apparently, over the holiday, Sophie had brought over her beau, Timothy Heskel, an A.P.D. officer to meet the family. Well, Gilderoy with the aid of Pauline had tested the young man's resolve by adding hot spices to his plate of pie and the young man's eyes had started watering not long after! Which Gilderoy proudly said was his entire idea!
Further down the train, Rowan shuts a few train compartment doors or opens a few that are filled with an incredibly loud racket. After some time, she sighs and leans against the train. Severus should be helping her patrol the train, but she could see the anguish in his eyes at Lorcan D'Eath's tears. The wound was rawer and deeper for Severus than for her. It was both a blessing and a curse.
Rowan stretches her neck from side to side. She would just have to keep an eye on Severus with everything else that was going on. At times like these, she did sincerely wish she could split herself into two. (And there was always the option of a time-turner, but frankly, she didn't think her sanity would survive…)
Knowing that the lunch cart lady had yet to stop by Rowan continued to patrol, before reaching Terry's compartment. He had waved to her early on and she knew that Severus, Sirius, and James were likely inside as well. Without hesitation, she opens the train compartment door to see Sirius and Terry's faces both brighten up and turn gloomy at her appearance. She hides a knowing smirk knowing full well that they both thought she was the lunch cart lady.
"This scene seems vaguely familiar," James muttered under his breath recalling how he met Rowan just only a few months ago on September 1st during the Hogwarts Express.
"So, do you have any food?" Severus grumpily asked with his arms crossed over his chest.
"Even if I did, I certainly wouldn't share my snacks with you, Severus," Rowan darkly retorted causing Severus to have the grace to flush with guilt and shame.
"Snacks?!" Sirius immediately asked as metaphorically his ears and tails perked up like an adorable puppy.
Rowan snorts and reaches into her pocket before tossing a sandwich and chocolate frog at Sirius and James. She hands one to Terry too, before hurtling the sandwich and chocolate frog at Severus's face. Severus lets out a loud muffled, "Oof," of pain at being painfully smacked in the face by the chocolate frog and sandwich.
Rowan gently reaches down to pet Alchemy, who is stretched out in his own corner. Alchemy loudly purrs and shows her his fluffy tummy. She gives him some belly rubs, before sitting back to eat.
For a time, the only sounds heard in the compartment are the sounds of chewing. Halfway through his sandwich, Sirius keeps glancing at Rowan's hand and then at James's hand. "So," he said with a mouth half full, "you are engaged now, right? So, how's that going to work and all?"
"Have you not any sense for tact?" Terry irritably hissed. "Geez, you really are a mutt."
"What you're acting like you're not curious too!" Sirius loudly protested.
"I may be curious, but I have sufficient dignity to keep my mouth shut," Terry snapped back.
"Enough," Rowan coldly said causing both boys to stop in their tracks. "It is not anyone's business but James and my own."
Terry glares cockily at Sirius, who wilts sadly. "I just worried that our friendship might be tense, I mean, I'm good friends with both of you and I don't want to stop being friends," Sirius said rather forlorn.
Terry snorts sniffling a laugh. "Please Rowan won't even have to do anything to James since Severus will surely get to James first."
Severus flushes brightly as Terry points at him. "And we both know that Severus is just as protective of Rowan as she is even if Severus or she will ever admit to such a thing. Why else do you think Rowan mostly ignored Lily for most of the past semester if not for Severus?" Rowan pointedly concentrates on her sandwich and Severus loudly coughs, before loudly chewing his food in reply.
"See what I mean," Terry smugly said, before munching on his snacks again.
"Makes sense now that I think about it," Sirius admitted, before glancing at James. "Don't worry, Jamie, if Rowan goes against you, I'll have your back."
Rowan loudly snorts as James pats Sirius on the shoulder. "Thanks, Siri for the offer."
"I've always got your back, mate," Sirius confidently declared, before hungrily devouring the rest of his sandwich in one big bite.
"Ug, how vulgar and crude," Terry grumbled wrinkling his nose at seeing Sirius's bulging cheeks. "And this is the Heir to the House of Black," he privately thought to himself. "Yup, Black family is utterly doomed if they don't marry Sirius off to Tiffany. Completely and utterly doomed."
The train compartment falls into silence before the only sound is the crinkle of chocolate frogs being unwrapped. Sirius opens his first and takes a bit of chocolate frog, before glancing at the accompanying wizard card. "Oh, I've got Cliodne?" He furrowed his brow. "Who the heck is that?"
Severus loudly sighs and drily answers, "An Irish Druidess who first discovered the properties of moondew."
Sirius shrugs and tosses the card at Severus, who dodges and hands it over to Terry to gift to some of his younger cousins who collected the wizarding trading cards. "What about you, Severus?" Sirius asked.
"Dorcas Wellbeloved, the Founder of the Society for Distressed Witches," Severus mumbled.
Rowan frowns not for the first time. The Society for Distressed Witches was a charitable foundation created by the witch Dorcas Wellbeloved designed to provide assistance to witches who are improvised, emotionally troubled, or otherwise down on their luck. The foundation had been established before 1904 before the founder's death. Then why did the heavily pregnant Merope Gaunt take advantage of these services which would have been existence in December of 1926.
It's just there something seemed to be off by the entire situation. Rowan understood that Merope Gaunt was sheltered and may have not known there were such services available. But Merope Gaunt could read and there were certain to be flyer's about especially in the poorer sections of the wizarding world including in Knockturn Alley or Diagon Alley. Surely on Merope Gaunt's way to Borgin and Burkes to pawn off the family locket, she would have surely read on. And yet she chose to ignore the pamphlet and instead ended up giving birth on a cold winter's night at a muggle orphanage.
Arguably Merope Gaunt may have been suffering from pre-postpartum depression which can occur and very likely would have occurred considering that Tom Riddle Sr. had abandoned her. That is not to say that Merope Gaunt's actions are excusable because she committed an act equal to rape by forcing another to be with her and worse forcing them to have sexual intercourse wither her. Tom Riddle Sr. may have been a vain man and his actions even seemed callous, but the pregnancy was not a desired nor planned one with his choice of partner but rather a forced one.
It certainly would have explained Merope Gaunt's unhealthy state of mind towards the end of her life. Unfortunately, Merope was a product of her terrible pureblood upbringing. It rightly showed in the manner she had elected to find a partner or rather magically induced a fake romantic relationship. It certainly would make sense why Merope would have lost even her will to live after giving birth to her son. There really wasn't much of a reason left for her to live.
Merope Gaunt would promptly pass away after giving birth and naming her son, Tom Marvolo Riddle. It would have been far better for Merope to have found a nice wizard, but then again as sheltered as she had been it was unlikely. Tragically, after her death, the baby, Tom Marvolo Riddle was left to the tender mercies of the muggle orphanage.
"Falco Aeslaon," James interjected pulling Rowan out of her thoughts, "the first recorded animagus in existence from Ancient Greece."
"Nice," Sirius said giving James two thumbs up.
"Grunhilda of Gorsemor," Terry drily murmured. "An accomplished healer, she was a one-eyed, hump-backed witch that developed the cure for Dragon Pox."
They all pause and gaze expectantly at Rowan, who glances at her card. "Cassandra Vablatsky, a famous seer and author of Unfogging the Future," (and who would not pass away until 1997). She tosses the card to Terry, who carefully puts them away to owl them later to his cousins from the Hogwarts owlery. The girls would be absolutely thrilled.