Headmaster Brockert
January 15, 2016 6:22 PM
Returning Feast by Headmaster Brockert
Another midterm had passed with dull parties and inane chatter and his own house, his sanctuary , filled to the brim with the irritating sound of children. He now had nine grandchildren, eight of them girls, ranging in ages from Amethyst, the baby at about a month old to her nine year old sister Emerald. In between them were their sisters Ruby, Topaz and Sapphire and their brother Jasper. Then there were Ben and Shannon's three girls, Allegra, Esme and Isla. Not to mention Mortimer's three other sons and their wives.Okay, he'd admit to himself that he felt something that he assumed was love for his grandchildren but that didn't mean the noise level didn't get rather annoying. Especially when one was only capable of communicating by screaming and crying. Sometimes he envied his older brother Zachariah with only two grandchildren, one whom was thirteen and one whom was twelve. Owen and Angelique were way past the screaming and crying stage.
Anyway, now everyone was back at Sonora for the second half the year and he couldn't be happier to have an end to all the holiday crap. He stood to give his few remarks. "Welcome back to Sonora. Hopefully you all had a nice holiday." Yup, one more meaningless platitude after a season of them. At least he knew that was the case, some actually thought people meant things like that when it was really just politeness. A thing that was said automatically. Even shopkeepers said it to customers and everyone knew they certainly weren't thinking of the customer once the transaction was complete. Or vice versa. And Mortimer was doing the same thing, just saying it because it was customary.
"I'd also like to congratulate Teams Five and Fifteen on their first place tie on the Challenges after our first event." He might as well congratulate them. Even though he didn't really care who won these silly games any more than he did about who won Quidditch."The rest of the results are posted by the door"
Mortimer sat down, and food appeared. The students were free to eat and converse. He personally preferred the former.
Subthreads: Time to make it count. (Tag Eleanor) by Leo Princeton with Eleanor Vandenberg, Nellie Vandenberg
Exhausted but getting Enthusiastic again by Natalie Varth, Tepp with Gabe Valenti
All good things must come to an end. by Alistair Johnson with Artemis Leithan
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Headmaster Brockert
Returning Feast
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Alistair Johnson
February 03, 2016 1:18 PM
All good things must come to an end. by Alistair Johnson
Alistair had not been looking forward to the return to Sonora but his mother was right; it would do him good to have his mind taken off things. The midterm break had started out full of cheery, sociable festivities but ended on a very different note. In the days leading up to going back to school, Ali had been somewhat sulky and short-tempered and remained distant from the rest of his family. It hadn’t taken a genius to figure out the reason for his change of mood.Following recent events Alistair had discovered a wider range of emotions inside of him than he’d previously believed existed, not that he would share such information with anyone. However, it was one particularly emotion that stood out more than any others. Anger. He knew that he’d put his reputation on the line by dating at such a young age, especially since the girl in question played Quidditch and didn’t seem to conform to a number of society’s expectations, but he had made the decision that she was worth it. But now anyone who had doubted his relationship had just been proved right. Alistair was never wrong… Only current evidence clearly suggested the contrary. Besides this angry position of his, the thirteen year old couldn’t deny a feeling of loss. Not only had he broken up with his girlfriend but he’d also fallen out with one of his oldest and best friends and that was perhaps the saddest thing about the whole affair.
Although he was still feeling gloomy, the last thing Alistair wanted was for people to think he actually cared about someone else that much. At least he had his pride intact, thanks to his quick acting. He hated to think about the situation he could have been in if he had let things lie for a while. He made sure not to look about the room when he took his seat at the Crotalus table. It wasn’t as though the young Quidditch Captain ever paid much attention to the rest of the school (aside from a select few people) but he was conscious of the possibilities of seeing Joella and that was certainly not what he needed right now.
Alistair was used to having a good head on him but there were so many burning questions running through his mind, mostly relating to the crumpled messy letter in his pocket. He didn’t want to think about the whole drama anymore but there seemed to be a constant battle going on in his brain that wouldn’t let up. He seemed to be mostly over the irrational melodramatic feelings and was unfortunately beginning to consider her side of the argument as actually possibly conceivable, much to his surprise.
“Sorry, did you say something?” The fact that the headmaster had finished speaking was only brought to Ali’s attention when his neighbour began to direct conversation at him. “Forgive me, I have a lot on my mind,” he added apologetically, ashamed of his uncharacteristically vacant behaviour. “Did you want something passing?”
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All good things must come to an end.
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Artemis Leithan
February 23, 2016 11:03 PM
time for a fresh start by Artemis Leithan
Artemis listened politely to the Headmaster's speech. She hoped to make more friends this term. Last term, she had barely gotten used to being separated from her twin, who seemed much more amenable to this change in their circumstances than she was. She needed to prove her independence from Arthur, at least to herself. He seemed so much more self-assured than she was, and she was painfully aware that their worlds had begun their inevitable divergence. Someday, he would be a great diplomat, and she would be the wife of whomever she was betrothed to. Of course, he would be betrothed, too, but he would have a life, a career, apart from his spouse, while Artemis would have only her marriage to sustain her through life.She had found a seat at the Crotalus table while Arthur seemed intent on getting to know his own housemates. The Headmaster's remarks were brief, and Artemis was soon distracted by the entrancing dishes on the fully-stocked table. Somehow, Maryland-style crab imperial always appeared near Artemis at the table, probably due to some helpful house elf recognizing her favorite food always eased her homesickness. It was smooth and delicious, just the way it was served in her family's home. She silently breathed a thank-you to whatever house elf was responsible and helped herself to some other delicacies as well.
Artemis was seated next to one of the older boys. He was the quidditch captain of her house, she understood, although there had been no quidditch games this year. That must be unpleasant for the players, she thought. Not that she minded doing challenges, but first-year students knew so little magic that they were of little benefit to their teams. And certainly, her parents would never allow her to play quidditch! It was too unladylike for her, despite her natural affinity for flying. Arthur would be allowed to play, but never Artemis, and she grudgingly accepted their restrictions.
The boy beside her seemed lost in his own thoughts. Perhaps he wasn't interested in conversation, at least with a first-year student. On the other hand, Artemis was brought up to be a proper pureblood lady, and proper pureblood ladies made it their business to engage others in conversations, ideally about their companions. She was honor-bound to make some attempt at drawing him out, successful or not. Gracious ladies did not appear overnight, it took years of developing casual conversations to launch a career as a socialite witch, and it was her responsibility to learn this, at least as much as anything she was explicitly being taught at school. Someday, her future husband would appreciate her for her excellent social skills or be mortified at a socially awkward wife. She had been far too shy her first term to develop her social abilities, and it was time to begin working at them.
She leaned towards the young wizard next to her and inquired, “How are quidditch practices going? Will we have enough players for a team next year?” He didn't pick up on her comments at first so she repeated them. “No, I was just asking about whether we'll have enough players for a quidditch team of our own next year.” She added, “I'm sure it would be nice to have our own team.”
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Artemis Leithan
time for a fresh start
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Alistair Johnson
February 24, 2016 5:00 PM
Half wishing I could do the same. by Alistair Johnson
On any other day, Alistair would have loved to spend a feast talking to someone like Artemis Leithan, and perhaps the best thing for him to do right now would be to try and pretend it was one of those days. That probably wouldn’t have been a difficult thing to do, considering how faking a lack of feelings was pretty much what he’d been attempting to achieve ever since the issue with Joella had begun, only Miss Leithan chose to bring up one thing that could easily add to Ali’s already fairly foul mood.In all fairness, Quidditch was what he was known for at Sonora and what he loved more than anything so he really shouldn’t blame Artemis for thinking it was a good conversation topic to take up with him, but the whole lack of players situation was just so depressing, that and the fact matches were cancelled for the whole year. Quidditch practice continued as normal, at least as normally as it could now that they didn’t have the numbers of Teppalus and had no matches to work for. Turn out at practice was just so poor and Ali didn’t like to be reminded of failure. Well, technically nothing was his fault. If it weren’t for him they probably wouldn’t even have had Teppalus for the past few years. It was more like Crotalus had failed him, and themselves. Did they really all lack house pride that badly?
Alistair knew he shouldn’t take any of his problems out on Artemis and he certainly didn’t want to make a negative first impression but there was a part of him that just… couldn’t be bothered right now. What was the point in taking a remote interest in a girl when girls were evil? Okay, girls weren’t evil. Crotalus girls were the best creation ever made (minus Uzume Shinohara of course) and there was no reason to believe that Artemis wouldn’t be as pleasant to talk to as Caelia and Kelsey, although admittedly her being two years younger might make things a little different.
The third year bought himself some time by serving himself from a nearby pasta dish, not wanting to appear rude for not responding instantly but needing a little moment to draw on what positivity he could find in him at this point. “Unfortunately, practice isn’t great,” he admitted slowly before expanded further, “Teppalus splitting up has left Crotalus very short on players and not having matches can take away a lot of the motivation for training. Ideally I want to be working the team extra hard but it is difficult when players aren’t fully committed.” The first year probably didn’t even care to know this much but Ali was currently of the disposition that if that was the case she shouldn’t have asked in the first place. “As for next year, who’s to say? I’ve been hoping each year that we’ll get an influx of Quidditch-playing first years but it never turns out too well for us. There’s still a chance, I suppose.”
Alistair paused and forked some food into his mouth. That had been an awful lot of talking for someone who had spent the past few days given everyone around him the silent treatment (well, almost) but of course his mother was right; it was good for him to take his mind off things. As dismal as the Crotalus Quidditch team’s prospects were, it was still a sport that Ali thoroughly enjoyed to play and conversing with a good sort of people like the Leithans was something that could also entertain him so it was probably a good idea to continue.
“I’m sorry, I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced,” he realised suddenly, aware that he hadn’t spoken with this particular housemate before but seen her around. “I’m Alistair Johnson of the Arizona Johnsons. I don’t suppose you are at all keen on Quidditch?” It might seem a farfetched question to ask as she had probably brought the subject up more for his benefit than hers but recently it had been brought to Ali’s attention that girls could surprise you.
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Half wishing I could do the same.
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