Chapter Twelve

The Thirty-First of October rolled by in silence. Amidst people cheering for the holiday themed dining hall, in the middle of the dinner hall, I ate in silence and pondered my life choices. Soon enough, a panting Quirrell would step inside the hall and yell about a Troll in the dungeon. Soon enough, we'd all be sent to our rooms in wait. Soon enough, two first years would end up fighting a giant troll to save another first year girl.

They'd manage, and everything would end up in glory.

Then, the reason I was chewing on my dinner was because I was waiting for Quirrell's abrupt entrance into the room. He had left a while before, and was clearly in the process of instructing the troll on what to do. As if on cue, someone tapped my shoulder and caught my attention.

"Happy Halloween!" fizzy-hair said with a forced smile.

"Happy Halloween," I returned, not really understanding the cheer, but accepting it all the same. I furrowed my brows. "You arrived only now?"

She grimaced and looked away. "I was...late, because of studying."

"Ah," I nodded, wisely. "That is something that might happen, getting lost in one's own world." I glanced to my side, and then scuttled slightly to the right, moving my plates and the dishes at the same time. Then, I tapped with the open palm of my hand on the table. "Nitwit, can I get another set of plates here, please?"

As if on cue, they appeared.

This wasn't wandless magic. This was wisdom and tickling a pear down in the bellies of the kitchen. The strange words spoken by Dumbledore weren't mysterious magical keywords tied to runes or something like that. They were simple Elf names, who lived in the kitchen, and would listen in and help those in need.

"Want to sit and tell me what you studied recently?" I asked, with the nonchalance of someone who would burn down the apartheid one uncaring action at the time.

"H-how did you do that?" fizzy-hair asked in disbelief. The sad thing was that I couldn't really tell her, since I had no prior knowledge of the kitchen, saying I had gone inside the kitchen and listened in to the House Elves would do absolutely nothing but make me spout some drivel. Thus, I picked the better option.

"Magic," I twirled my fingers, "wisdom, wits and knowledge."

"Can I even sit here?" fizzy-hair asked.

"Good question," I replied. "Professor Flitwick!" I yelled, waving my hand towards the diminutive man by the professors' table. "Can my friend who's in Gryffindor sit by my side?! We're discussing magical theories and I think it would be silly to do so from one side of the room to the other!"

Professor Flitwick blinked, stood slightly up, and then gave a nod. "That is quite the endearing sight, Mister Umbrus. Ten points to Ravenclaw for such vivid devotion to studies."

With his permission thus granted, none of the other students said a word about the Gryffindor taking a seat by my side. Then again, I realized they weren't even bothering with it to begin with. The older years had better things to do, and the younger years didn't really care.

Perhaps later in the year, with the Quidditch matches and the House Cup coming nearer, they'd change their tune, but until then, it was just picking a spot to sit down for lunch and dinner.

"So," I said once she took a seat. "What were you studying that got you so caught up you forgot to come down for dinner?" I queried her as I grabbed hold of the closest bowl, passing it to her. "Don't you know that food's important?"

"It was History of Magic," fizzy-hair answered quite quickly. "The founding of Hogwarts was a fascinating subject; even now, large parts of its dungeons are left unexplored-"

As she kept on speaking, I grinned and nodded every now and then. People didn't really need much to flock to someone's side. They just needed someone willing to listen to them, hear them out, politely speak and show interest in what they did. Now, just like back during my first childhood, such things had never changed.

"Troll!" Quirrell actually interrupted fizzy-hair's words on the unknown seventh tower of Hogwarts, or something like that. "Troll in the dungeon!" he exclaimed, proceeding to most valorously faint a second later.

"Isn't he a renowned Troll hunter?" I said offhandedly, "Why is he fainting from something like a single Troll?" but my words were drowned by the people screaming around us. Children, all of them. It was just a Troll, and we were wizards. Someone could throw the beast a curse and be done with it. First years, stop screaming your lungs out. I'm trying to finish chewing on my mashed potatoes.

"Prefects, bring the students of your houses back to their dormitories," professor McGonagall said.

"Slytherin's dormitories are in the dungeon!" I yelled.

"Mister Umbrus, no, you cannot bring your dinner up the Ravenclaw tower!" professor McGonagall answered, staring at me as I had, indeed, been holding on to my plate and my fork.

"But it's my dinner!" I stressed out, much to the disbelief on the faces of those around me. It wasn't like there was anything to worry about. Honestly, this level of shocked surprise in everyone else was what was worrying. It was just a Troll. An Avada Kedavra or a Sectumsempra would deal with it easily. Hell, a Wingardium Leviosa dealt with it in the first place!

"You heard the Deputy-Headmistress," one of the Ravenclaw prefects said staring straight at me, "Leave it."

"You will pry my dinner from my cold dead hands," I retorted snappishly. "It's just a Troll, not a Dragon or something."

I took a spoonful of the mashed potatoes as further accentuation of just how much I cared about not being allowed to bring my dinner up with me. The Prefect spluttered, but thought better than to take away points from his own house. Hence, I ended up victoriously bringing my dinner with me up the flight of stairs to the Ravenclaw tower.

"Listen here," the Ravenclaw prefect rounded up on me after everyone was safely inside, "We do have our oddballs," he added for clarity's sake, "But there's a time for everything and a free-ranging Troll isn't the time to get your dinner finished."

"But how would I be an oddball if I didn't want to finish my dinner with a Troll nearby?" I retorted, puzzled by the prefect's logic. "Being an oddball does mean doing odd stuff in wildly inappropriate moments, does it not?" I had finished my dinner in the meantime, thus, I hazarded tapping on the wooden table nearby. "Oddment? You can take the dirty plate and the cutlery, thank you."

The plate and the cutlery disappeared in an instant.

I then beamed a smile at the Ravenclaw prefect's expression. If I had a photographic machine, I'd take a picture. I didn't have one, so all I could do was try to remember this day, and the poor boy's expression.

The Troll in the dungeons was dangerous...

...but more dangerous was the Troll-me.