The laugh was a LeBeaubinger.

A storm warning, if you will. That abrupt change in pressure, the chilled rise of the hair on your neck, the shiver that came as survival instincts began banging gongs to signal the immediate need to duck and cover, seek safe shelter. But where was it coming from? A rightfully panicked, rapid head swing up and down the busy staircase would reveal nothing though the booming cackle echoed through the stone in a way that suggested its source was getting close, close, closer…

WOOSH!

Ferreole LeBeau, crowing like the eponymous wicked witch herself, zoomed at full speed like a screaming falcon through the wide, large window to the east (most mysteriously appearing to be missing its glass for a moment), seemingly unheeding of the scrambling, scattering and diving students. Without slowing for as much as a second, he scooped up a student like a football, in a grip surprisingly akin to iron bands for coming from the dark, gnarled hands of a 98 year old man. Prey acquired, he kept zooming across the short staircase, out the identical window to the east (also, most mysteriously, temporarily devoid of its glass for the span of time it took to escape).

Still without slowing, Ferreole deposited his purple-and-black bedecked teenage bundle on a broom that was waiting, which immediately shot off, student-laden, of its own accord alongside Ferreole's own.

He sat on his broomstick cross-legged, like one might ride a magic carpet, peg-leg poking out of the crazyquilt robes he was partial to, bells and streamers fluttering madly from his absurd hat in the chill fall air. He nodded with a scowl to his companion, as though they had just appeared of their own accord and he had only now recognized or acknowledged they were there. "Good day for a broomride." It wasn't. "Looks like rain!" It didn't. "Getting on, then? Eh?"

The brooms froze in the silence, as though sustained by the chatter and doomed to plummet miserably from the sky if not sustained by the boom and flow of human voices. He'd like to see that thrice-be-damned swamp lizard follow him out here. Hah!

Their headmaster was a madmad... and Odessa loved him dearly. As the milling students scrambled for cover Odie hardly batted an eyelash as she was scooped up and carried off. Things like this just happened at Salem, by the time you were a Freshmen if you didn't expect these impromptu meetings then you were ridiculous as far as she was concerned. It was meant to seem random, but the Senior often felt that they weren't really. Of course everyone was magical, they were witches and wizards - but Ferreole LeBeau had a special kind of magic, a kind of magic that was even more...magical than the most magic thing she had encountered any other time in her life. He seemed to know when a student needed him, and to care no matter how gruff he spoke or wild eyed he was.

Once placed upon her own broom she didn't bother to look at the man as they raced along, fresh air against her face felt too good to turn away. She didn't even roll her eyes as he mentioned the weather - weather in Scotland was awful. She missed the long lingering days of sunshine from home, and the way the trees would start turning colors soon. Everything here was gray, and depressing, and classes were too full - and she had no idea why they were mixed together because they ought to have been learning completely different things. Review was nice but she could not review for her entire last year of education. Also she was crap at making friends, people like Trace, Migs, and Dixie loved her because they'd known her. Meeting new people made her feel like she couldn't be herself.

Somehow, she had this feeling that LeBeau knew that so she didn't say any of it. She did give him a look when he asked how she was getting on, a look that said why ask stupid questions when you already know the answer, but she obliged anyway, "Alright, classes are classes. Dix is mad as a hatter, but then when isn't she? I don't know," she pursed her lips as she looked away, eyes focusing on the lake below, "It's just weird, not like home. I thought that'd be a good thing, an adventure - you know how I love those," there was a twinge of her former sassy sarcastic laugh there, "but it's just... I don't know. New people, new places, and I keep getting lost so I'm always late. I feel like everyone looks down their nose at us, and we happen to be just as talented as those Frenchy Llamas and Red Coat'd Durmmies". Sighing she tilted her face skyward, "And the fact that I care about any of this at all makes me feel like a whiny little bitch," she didn't even hesitate to use the word

Salem students had a rather strange relationship with their Headmaster to be sure, but it was one of the few constants in Odie's life. She liked it, even in the chaos there was a kind of order to it. "They've marked us as underdogs and it pisses me off, I mean Jesus, maybe it's a good thing they've counted us out - you should hear the shit the Llama's say about us, because they think we're all morons and only speak English and can't understand a word of French or Italian. Its as though they're suprised we can dress ourselves and it's offensive," and thus Odie shattered every illusion she'd ever created about not caring what people thought about her - except it wasn't really about her so much as her friends and Ferreole, the people she respected and cherished. It made her want to punch things - and Odie was far to apathetic to do that,  usually.