Tanya Degurechaff

Sunday afternoon was a lovely time of the week to have 'tea time' with the Headmaster. Schoolwork was caught up earlier in the weekend so that all the students in the study group could enjoy some free time to relax and have fun. Professor Dumbledore always seemed to brighten up during our discussions when I was able to meet with him for tea.

Or rather, he had tea and I would enjoy some coffee. It was nice of him to go out of his way to ensure I had my preferred beverage when we met up. Today it was just going to be myself and the headmaster as Harry decided to have tea with Hagrid along with Ron, Hermione was spending time with Neville in the library, Seamus and Dean were outside playing a game, Lily was… somewhere, and Parvati and Lavender were spending time together looking at some magazines. I could have invited Draco I suppose, but I had not thought to do so during any of our interactions during the week. Perhaps I should mention it next time I see him.

As I arrived at the statue guarding the staircase to the Headmaster's Office, Professor Snape was coming down the steps.

"Hello Professor," I said to the man. Professor Snape looked at me down his nose, his robes fluttering around his body as he came to a stop.

"Ms. Degurechaff, shouldn't you be outside playing?" He asked me in the slow dramatic tones of his, pausing on words to give emphasis and subtle nuance.

"I might, after tea with Headmaster Dumbledore."

"Tea? With the Headmaster?" Professor Snape got one of his smiles that many called a sneer. I agreed that by traditional metrics it was not the nicest smile, but it fit the persona Professor Snape enjoyed portraying. A rather interesting persona for a drama teacher to take as the portrayal in the movies I had seen indicated drama teachers tended more towards colorful, exuberant, hippy-like personalities. For Professor Snape to take on a more somber, serious persona made me think he preferred the character roles that took a lot of careful nuance to portray properly, perhaps Hamlet.

"To be honest, I usually have coffee while he drinks tea," I paused as I thought about that for a moment. "Perhaps you are right, I should try the tea with the accompanying snacks. Thank you Professor. I will see you later."

The Professor couldn't keep the joy of his advice being helpful as a small laugh snorted out before he turned and strolled off. He did a marvelous job despite the slight break of character keeping his face from showing the happiness he was feeling.

Heading up the stairs, I found Dumbledore behind his desk in loudly pink robes. "Ah, Ms. Degurechaff. It is always a pleasure. Give me a moment and I'll get your coffee ready."

"Actually, sir, I was talking to Professor Snape before coming up and he suggested that perhaps I should actually enjoy the tea for tea time." I took a seat across from the Headmaster as he smiled broadly under the long beard of his, the corners of his mustaches curling up.

"Did he now? Well, I was going to brew up a spot of Earl Grey if you are interested." With a firm tap on his desk, the papers were cleared off and a tea set and a small tower of finger foods appeared.

"Yes please, sir."

Professor Dumbledore opened his tea pot, a beautiful piece that used the same magic in the portraits to have little animated butterflies dance across a field of flowers, and dumped in the loose tea leaves into the steaming interior, the hot water already contained in the pot. "Severus was telling me that you have a most wonderful singing voice, but that it was not in a language he knew."

I could feel myself blushing. I should have known singing the national anthem of the Empire might come back to bite me, but it was the first thing that came to mind. "Yes, sir. I enjoy learning languages, so I just sang something." Hopefully the Headmaster would take the conversational bait and move to the topic of languages instead of what specifically I was singing.

"Oh? I am a bit of a fan of learning languages myself," Professor Dumbledore said, thankfully going along as the tea sat brewing for a bit. "I've even learned a few magical languages."

"Magical languages?" An interesting notion. Were these languages that required a spell to speak?

"Yes. Mermish in particular is a fascinating language, changing significantly when spoken above or below water. Melodic below the surface, but above many refer to it as horrific shrieking."

"Interesting. How would one go about learning mermish if someone wanted to?" I had a few languages under my polyglot belt, getting into a magical language, even if it was one that I would never make use of, sounded like something interesting to explore while I was at this school.

Dumbledore's face fell a bit. "Unfortunately, that is a long topic. One I would love to teach, but interest in learning magical languages has always been low and I had to take it off the curriculum some years ago."

It was sad that the lack of interest in the past was messing with my opportunities in the present. "What about a club? If I got enough people interested, would you be willing to teach a language club?"

"Do you think there would be interest?" Dumbledore began to pour the tea, handing me a cup. I chose to take it straight.

"It doesn't hurt to ask, does it?"

Dumbledore gave me a small smile, but the drop of his shoulders made me believe he had doubts. "I suppose it does not. If you can get enough students to agree to a magical language club, I would be happy to help teach a language or two."

"Thank you sir," I said, helping myself to one of the cucumber sandwiches. While incredibly simple, the crisp and clean flavor of fresh cucumber in between two slices of buttered bread was a pleasing pallet cleanser. I was still stuck on the surface flavors of the tea, failing to pick apart the individual notes of how the various blended elements changed the experience. "There is orange in Earl Grey, right?"

"Hmm? In a fashion," my question seemed to take the headmaster off guard for a moment. "Bergamot rind. It is a type of orange, I believe, but Professor Sprout would be the better one to discuss the plant with. My knowledge of this plant ends with the fact it is used in making Earl Grey."

"That is fine sir, I was just trying to make sure of that so I can try to find the flavor."

"Exploring the flavor? Not many your age would bother."

If I was reading Dumbledore's emotions right, he was amused.

"It is nice to take a moment to delve into a drink and really understand the nuances. I am having a bit of difficulty with the tea, but that is probably just it being so different from coffee that I am still acclimating to the flavors of the tea itself."

Dumbledore stroked his long beard as he nodded. "Perhaps next time we should do a tea sampler? A variety of teas with differences you can try exploring."

"Would it be alright if I brought someone next Sunday?"

"Of course. Which of your friends are you thinking of bringing?"

"I think Draco would appreciate the opportunity to explore several teas."

Headmaster Dumbledore's eyebrow rose. "Young Mr. Malfoy? Of course, I will make appropriate arrangements for next Sunday."

—-

Harry Potter

Harry and Ron arrived at Hagrid's cabin in good spirits to see Hagrid tending to the garden in front of his cabin while his dog, Fang, was laying on the doorstep.

" 'Arry, Ron,'' Hagrid called out as he began wiping his hands clean. "Blimey, is it three already? Well, come on in lads and I'll put the pot on ta boil."

Heading into the cabin Hagrid set about getting a kettle over the fire before setting out his tea set. It was an old pewter set with dings in the metal making the otherwise plain set more visually interesting. On a platter next to the tea set, Hagrid set down some rock cakes and a jar of jam.

"How are ye' studies going?" Hagrid asked as he began heaping large spoonfuls of tea leaves into his pot, adding enough to make a very strong brew.

"Ugh," Ron groaned out. "Good I guess, but it feels like all we are doing is studying."

Harry laughed at Ron's complaint. "It isn't that bad. Imagine if Hermione was directing our study sessions."

Ron laughed too. "She would probably have us studying right now."

Hagrid gave a chuckle. "Well, I'ma glad ye' came ta visit and yer studies be good."

Harry smiled at the giant man and the three fell into a comfortable conversation with the two boys quickly realizing they should avoid the rock cakes due to them being as hard as their namesake. After most of an hour, the tea was drunk and the boys said their goodbyes with promises to visit again soon.

Making their way back to the castle, they saw that the grounds were busy with students relaxing.

"Want to play a game of wizarding chess when we get back to the common room?" Ron asked as the two boys took a moment to enjoy the castle grounds.

"Sure, just go easy on me this time."

"Yeah. Sure, sure." Ron laughed as the two boys began to rush towards the castle and up to the Gryffindor tower for their game.

Getting past the Fat Lady's portrait, the two boys were greeted to the sight of Lily with a bundle of cloth, thread, and a needle making a hand puppet. A puppet with red hair by the looks of it. Ron proceeded to politely ignore it and suppress the thought of who that puppet might be of as he went to the chess board.

—

Lily Moon

"Knight to f four!" Harry Potter confidently said, dramatically moving his piece into position.

"Ha!" Ron Weasley laughed evilly. "A beginner's opening!" He confidently moved a pawn into position.

"You may think that you villainous cur, but-"

"Lily? Are you having Ron and Harry argue?" Hermione asked, looking at the dramatic chess game between hand puppets on a tiny chess board.

"No. Ron is being an evil villain who stole all the garlic bread and the only way the heroic Harry can get the garlic bread back is by defeating the evil Ron in a game of chess! Like in those old stories about playing against death, except for bread instead of life."

Hermione did not look amused so Puppet Ron waved at the full sized Hermione.

Hermione sighed before crossing her arms. "Shouldn't you be doing some studying? What would Tanya say to you if she saw you playing with puppets while your grades are not doing good?"

" 'I'm not angry at you, just disappointed. Now what is the first exception to Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration?' The first exception is that food cannot be conjured, only multiplied, enlarged, or summoned. 'Good. Now what is food in this context?' Food is any substance that can provide significant nutritional value when consumed. In theory it is possible to conjure food-like substances that appear and taste like food, but would lead to a person slowly starving from lack of any nutrient."

Hermione leaned back as Lily's eyes went wide and she stared at nothing as she imitated herself and Tanya having a conversation. "Uh, that sounds correct. I think I saw mention of Gamp's Law somewhere, but I don't think we will cover that for a few years."

"Tanya says that if we are to get better at understanding our current work, we must understand the underlying concepts. Gregory, Vincent, and I are meeting her after she is done with having tea with Dumbledore to go over what we learned last week and why things work the way they do."

Hermione had not thought about what went on in the study sessions or how Tanya was focusing her efforts on the worst performers in the group, but the theory behind her methods made sense to the precocious child.

"Well, I suppose since you will be studying later, I will leave you to your… puppets," Hermione said before staring towards the stairs to the girl's dorm.

A few moments later Tanya entered the Common Room and Puppet Harry waved at her.

"Let me grab my things and we'll go meet Vincent and Gregory," Tanya told Lily as she headed up to the dorm room.

"Ok," Lily said, beginning to gather up her things, tidying up the area and leaving her things neatly in a corner, just like her mama taught her to do when play time was over.

"Let's go," Tanya said, bag slung over her shoulder before noticing Lily had puppets on her hands. "Leave the puppets."

"Can I bring one?" Lily asked, reaching into her bag and rummaging quickly before she pulled out a sock puppet with blue button eyes and yellow yarn hair and a black hat that looked very large on the puppet. "I made one of you."

A small curve at the edge of Tanya's mouth told Lily that the other girl was happy. Tanya rarely showed strong emotions and her usual 'happy' face was a smug smirk. This was much softer and Lily thought it showed genuine happiness.

"Just don't be distracting with it."