Isaac was not a man who drank often.  Entering The Three Broomsticks, he pushed his usual behavior aside as he ordered a firewhiskey.  He could smell the potency of the liquid the moment it was placed on the bar in front of him.  Once a year he found himself sitting before a glass Ogden’s Old, preparing himself for the familiar burning sensation, and always on May Third.

In his younger days there had been one person, and one person only, that he would drink firewhiskey with.  As he took a moment to reflect, her face flashed in his mind.  The memory of the smile she always seemed to reserve just for him that made her eyes sparkle and dance caused a slight melancholy one to form on his own lips.  Ten years had flown by, and yet it seemed like yesterday that everything had changed with one sentence in a letter from his mother.

He could still feel the heat of the South American rain forest; still smell the freshness of his surroundings after the rain as he thought of that letter.  He had been so unaware that everything had come to a head on the grounds of Hogwarts.  He had also been completely unaware of the danger the girl with sparkling eyes was putting herself in until it was too late.

Raising his glass slightly as if toasting the air, he said softly, “To you, Marian,” before taking the first sip.

Dreogan entered The Three Broomsticks partly out of curiosity, partly because since deciding to lurk about Hogwarts for the remainder of Remembering Day happenings, he found little to do. Partly because he was curious who might be there. Dreogan still hadn't seen the Grimlish sisters.

The place was crowded, like everywhere, he supposed.

The bar was full of chatty witches in pastel hats and one tall man with maroon hair. . . that had to be a wig. And one man drinking in a moping sort of silence that Dreogan had seen well on the faces of his companions from Israel. Grieving.

The crowd, almost sensing the gloom that hung about the man, had not neared him, leaving a barrier of emptiness about two people deep. Dreogan was hesitant; it was the only opening. He'd order his drink and  be gone, leave the man to his drinking, which appeared a serious business.

"A butterbeer," he told the bartender quietly. Sure, it was warm outside and it was a winter's drink--the bar tender looked at him questioningly--but it was a reminder of his winters visiting his gran in England.

Dreogan was a nostalgic eater, that was for certain.

The bartender went about preparing the drink, a bit of a smile on his face, and Dreogan nodded to the man silently, finding it more awkward to deny the man at least an acknowledgment of his existence. The corners of his lips turned down and his brows knit, however, as his thoughts turned to some unpleasant memories of his own. Yes, Dreogan was looking forward to the comfort drink.

After the first sip, Isaac cringed at the taste for a moment.  He took a moment, allowing himself to adjust to the flavor before downing the rest of the drink.  He set the glass down as he noticed another man enter and make his way to the bar.  Assuming he was just another one of those seeking to join in the Remembering Day festivities, Isaac didn't pay him much mind at first.

Everyone in the bar seemed content to leave him to his drink, and familiar burning that had filled him slowly started to recede.  He knew he should order something a bit more...mild.  Another glass of firewhiskey would certainly see him stumbling a bit on his way back to his quarters at Hogwarts and that wouldn't do any good.

As he looked over at the bar, weighing his options his eyes met the new comers and he nodded in return.  With a sight sigh, he looked back at the empty glass before rising, taking the glass with him, and crossing the room again to go back to the bar.  He set the glass on the counter before taking a seat a few stools down from the other man and ordered a butterbeer to try to mask the taste of the firewhiskey.

While he waited for his drink, he looked over at the man again.  He could have easily ignored him, gone back to moping alone, but that wouldn't really do him any good.  So, he decided to engage in conversation, by motioning to the tall man with his eyes saying, "Slightly amazing, isn't it, the characters this place brings in around Remembering Day?"

Her violet high-heeled shoes banged loudly against the wooden floor with each step Demetra took. Maybe the idea of stopping around Hogsmeade village wasn't so wise after all - she surely attended funerals that were more cheerful than this wretched place. After a sigh, she fixed her usual, disinterested facial expression and continued her noisy walk towards the bar. She didn't plan on staying here long - there was no point, simply because she had no friends here, she wasn't familiar with any of this.

At the bar, she stood next to a couple of rather miserable looking men, then offered them both a very dramatic smile. Not bothering to see their reactions (if any), Demetra carefully took off her strikingly violet, lace gloves and politely demanded a glass of brandy from the bartender. It was pretty depressing how everyone was just sulking in their own little corner. She was usually good at starting random conversations with unlikely people, but today she had no inspiration or desire. But then one of them suddenly spoke, and as per usual Demetra was the one to retort first.

"Slightly amazing, isn't it, the characters this place brings in around Remembering Day?"

"It is amazing, if you fancy funerals," she said bluntly. And she was right - this place was as amazing and exciting as a train wreck. As her drink arrived in front of her, Demetra raised her glass and offered another smile to her depressed companions. Now that she had a better look at the second one, with the slightly unkept hairstyle, Demetra was sure he was from the Ministry. Well, that didn't mean much to her, other than knowing she wasn't the only one who was slacking off a bit.

Dreogan could not help but glance towards the door when the loud, rhythmic clacking seemed to fill the Three Broomsticks like some reverberating, hollow pulse.

Ah, Miss Crouch. Dreogan had been meaning to speak to her--she had served as an intern in the department he currently worked in, and had been on the look-out for a couple of assistants for the summer.  But now, perhaps, wasn't the best time.

At the sullen man's comment, Dreogan looked towards the tall man and gave a subdued smile which quickly wavered and then vanished at Miss Crouch's off-colour remark. Dreogan wet his lips and said, reaffixing his laconic smile, "I'm not sure how amazing it is by comparison. I've never been to Hogsmeade before. Do you come often?"

Anything to keep the conversation off funerals. What could she have been thinking on such a day? Levelling his thoughts, he decided that of course this was his first impression, not a tabloid story, and anyone was liable to an errata now and again.

Of course, Dreogan now realised he had, perhaps, implied that the man was a frequent drinker. Yes, anyone was liable to an errata. But hopefully this one would not make it into print, or into a first impression.

"Miss Crouch," Dreogan said, not wishing to exclude the young woman from conversation--only her remarks. He extended his hand. "We've not met, but I work for the Department of International Magical Cooperation. Dreogan Eleor." He looked to the man. "I'm sorry. I've not met you. . . I've only one hand at liberty," he said, nodding to his butterbeer in the other, "but as soon as Miss Crouch is done with it, I'll shake yours." He gave a grin now, genuine.

The sound of someone approaching caused Isaac to turn to look at the woman who had just entered the bar.  Her blonde hair certainly stood out among the small crowd and he nodded slightly when she offered a smile.  He turned his attention back to the other man as from the corner of his eye he saw her remove her lacy purple gloves.

Her comment about funerals caught him a bit of guard as his eyes focused on the woman once again.  That certainly had not been what he had meant, but the comment was fitting in a way.  He raised an eyebrow slightly as he looked her over, trying to determine the best response.  The other man, however, chimed in first answering his statement.

"I'm not sure how amazing it is by comparison. I've never been to Hogsmeade before. Do you come often?"

“Usually only on student weekends,” he offered.  “But then I spend most of my time on the look out for trouble makers.”

As the conversation turned away from him, Isaac took a sip of his butterbeer, enjoying the less potent drink.  He knew the name Crouch, but didn’t comment.  Perhaps lineage could have something to do with the woman’s sullen and blunt attitude towards the festivities.  As the man stated his name though, Isaac turned to look at him again.

Several letters had been exchanged in regards to possible interns for the Ministry between Isaac and Dreogan.  Isaac couldn’t help but wonder at the odds of the unscheduled meeting.  After trying to arrange an actual time, he mused for a moment about how some things were better left to chance.

“We’ve only met through letters…I’m Isaac Fraiser, the Muggle Studies professor at Hogwarts,” he told him.  Then to the woman he added, “Pleasure to meet you as well, Miss Crouch.”

Demetra showed no reactions while one man literally cringed at her simple statement and the other apparently decided to ignore it. From the conversation that ensued, she guessed the younger looking man was a lecturer at Hogwarts, or at least that he worked there. She couldn't blame him for retreating to this village, living in the castle with all those students seemed like a tedious job. She looked at her drink and tried to place the man with the scruffy hair - she was sure he was from the Ministry...however, before she reached the conclusion, he spoke her name.

Her eyebrows flew up as she did not assume the man knew her name. Smiling politely, she shook Eleor's hand, suddenly remembering where she probably saw him. There were so many faces in her old Department and she sort of lost track. Some years passed since she worked there anyway. "Pleased to meet you, Mr. Eleor!" she said in her usual, cheerful demeanor - totally the opposite of the bitter, smug manner in which she spoke just a moment ago. " So, how are they treating you at the good old Magical Co-operation?" She was glad she left the Department, but she would usually talk about it as if it was the most exciting thing ever.

Then the other man introduced himself, however Demetra didn't know of him, then again she knew very little about the teachers at Hogwarts. But it seemed he was acquainted with Mr. Eleor here, which was quite amusing. She raised her glass as he addressed her and smiled broadly. " Likewise, Mr. Fraiser."

She wondered what was the connection between Eleor's office and the Muggle studies Professor, but the only thing she could think of were the internships. And that she knew only because she was supposed to get a new intern from Hogwarts this summer. However, Demetra never really enjoyed the company of children or teenagers, so she skillfully avoided that matter (for now). But admittedly, she wouldn't mind if her new intern turned out to be as hard working as a house elf and made good tea too.

"Are you looking for interns already, Mr. Eleor?" she inquired quite carefully, still with a bright smile, trying to cloak the competitive note.

"Professor Frasier! Yes--Isaac!" Dreogan said, not attempting to mask his surprise--of a pleasant sort--and now shaking the man's hand genuinely with a smile to match. Dreogan felt he ought to have know, but of course also knew that there would have been no way to tell. Still, Professor Frasier had been far from what he had imagined him to be.

For one, he was not old. For two, he was not bald. He was not sure why these two particulars had stood out amongst any other physiognomies, but they had. "Well this is quite unexpected, and a pleasure to finally meet you in person."

 He returned to Miss Crouch, whose demeanour seemed to have improved considerably, and fortunately, too. "They're very cooperative," Dreogan said with a smile. "I'm not usually at the Ministry much, but the department has been kind enough--that is I requested--a month or two to take a break from travelling. Catch my breath; my secretary's on maternity leave. Travelling really is much easier with her there. Add to that that I'm currently understaffed and, well, the paper and desk work tends to add up. Of course," he said, now looking between them, hoping to engage Frasier in the conversation as well, "they have made it clear that this opportunity--she being gone and my being here--is singular and particularly conducive to interns, yes," he said in a playful, round-about fashion, wondering how she might have guessed that. Office gossip perhaps, though he hoped his work was not subject to comment much.

"Professor Frasier and I have been talking about interns; you know, I was once a professor of Muggle Studies, as well." He looked at Demetra as he said this; Isaac already knew. "At Laevenstrome--a graduate institution in America." Talking about work was, undoubtedly, not the most diverting of subjects, but it seemed to bring them together and lately, seemed Dreogan's primary concern. "I'd imagine, Miss Crouch, that Professor Frasier would be happy to direct some of the next trouble-makers your way on the next student weekend." He grinned, wondering how she would take the joke; Dreogan had a great respect for lawyers--particularly defense attorneys--but had to admit it took a sort of temerity to enter the field.

Isaac was certainly surprised by the sudden change in Miss Crouch.  Her rather bright and warm smile was certainly a contradiction to her entrance.  He tried not to let it show on his face however, as he returned her smile with one of his own.  He felt the tension from the earlier events of the day, the blasted fashion show he had volunteered himself for, fade away as the firewhiskey seeped through him.

He didn’t comment as he shook Dreogan’s hand, allowing him a moment to speak with Miss Crouch about interns.  He knew most of what the other man was telling her already from their letters.  He had compiled a short list of names to pass onto the other man of those he might recommend should they be interested.

As Dreogan spoke with Miss Crouch he took a sip of his butterbeer, but kept his attention on them.  He gave a slight chuckle at the joke about the next student weekend and pointing out the trouble makers to the woman.  He wasn’t entirely sure what she did, but there was obviously a bit of rivalry, at least on her part. 

“Indeed, I know of a few rather charming students that might interest you, Miss Crouch,” he said with a playful smirk.

Dreogan was pleased at Isaac's diplomatic and teasing amendment. He'd not be half bad at dispute resolution! Of course, most teachers would be cut for such a job; the classroom could be a positive warzone, if you had the right -- or arguably, wrong  -- class.

"Well," Dreogan said with a crooked smile, "she can take charming. Give me the troublemakers. I'm not afraid of a challenge." He winked to Demetra. "Besides. It's only for a month of the summer. Not much can go wrong in that time."

He was quiet a moment. "And how are your classes. . . Isaac?" he said, just barely stumbling over the man's name. He'd begun to address the man by his first name in letters, but it felt so different to do it in person, particularly to a man he had only met moments ago. Still, from what he could tell from the letters, there was an easy sense of communication. Very few protective barriers; it seemed the man was more than willing to be open, and Dreogan appreciated that. A welcome change; even from his usual composure.

Isaac laughed a bit despite his more sullen mood at Dreaogan's comment about trouble makers.  Clearly he had never met some of the troublemakers in his class.  In a month's time they might very well bring down the entire Ministry with the antics.  Of course there were thankfully only a few students in his class that he put into that category.  Most of them were Muggleborns who thought they already knew everything that could be learned about the Muggle world.

"I don't think anyone has had a productive class since the beginning of last week," he answered Dreogan.  "I had been hopeful that once the holiday celebrations are officially over it will be back to business as usual.  Unfortunately, given the events of the other day I'm not so sure now if that will happen."

He hadn't been there, but he had heard nearly every detail of the Memorial Ceremony's events...from fellow professors, students and, of course, The Daily Prophey.

"Yes. I hope you got all the information you needed to stuff into their heads there before the holiday," Dreogan said. "I learned by my second year to have their final examinations before Spring Break; it was a bit of a stretch, but the first part of the course was mostly lecture, the second discussion; then came the exam. The break. And after, we did a series of field trips. Pedagogically, of course," he said with a sigh, "that doesn't seem to make the most sense. You'd ideally want them to experience, read, and discuss simultaneously, but logistically it's the only way I could pass as many students as I wanted. Besides, they didn't tune out for the last portion; they were interested enough in the excursions that they actually came to class. That's maybe a different problem than you encounter at a boarding school; but remarkable for a commuter campus like Laevenstrome." He blushed, realising perhaps this sounded like boasting. He quickly added, "But I'm not sure if I would do it that way a third year-- they were bored out of their minds the first third of the class." Dreogan felt a slight pang; he missed teaching. It had probably been his favourite job.

He imagined the sort of troubles Isaac encountered on a daily basis were different than insubordination, sloth, and attitude. There might be a little bit of that, but Dreogan had found it difficult to teach students that thought him to be roughly the same age. But with children . . .

"You don't teach the first and second years, correct?" he asked. "At least you get the other professors to temper them a bit before they're placed in your classroom," he said optimistically.

But the optimism could only last so long. Yesterday's happenings were mentioned and Dreogan took a long sip of butterbeer. "Yes," he agreed quietly. The hostage . . . Leon Carter . . . he had read he had died from injury. The thought made his blood boil and his temper flare.

That had not been handled as it should have been. From what Dreogan had managed to see, there was little show on the side of the Ministry of compliance; and what was more, Kingstreet's wand had not been confiscated. He saw how it had happened. Compliance was the most counter-intuitive motion: to give up all power to the adversary, but it worked. The adversary attempted to gain a hold over authority, to level the playing field. But the more powerful and expansive the authority, the more impossible the task. A momentary victory, which could be overturned only moments afterwards, if handled properly.

And the Ministry of Magic was one of the most powerful magical authorities out there. But they had not been willing to yield even the slightest and what was more, they had not anticipated that the threatened party, Kingstreet, would not either. They had allowed her to remain in a position of power despite her predicament and the obvious inability to act rationally and disinterestedly. The result? In their insistence on remaining in control, the Ministry had allowed victim and antagonist to overpower them and the Ministry had gotten nothing from it but two corpses of their own.

Dreogan was disappointed. He was desperately trying not to be angry. He told himself that they had done the best they could, to the best of their knowledge. There had been a time even in Kibbutz Erez where the society refused to give in to the demands of terrorists and kidnappers. Dreogan's father was a victim of that time. Dreogan himself had helped to bring about a gradual change in this mentality, with increasing success. Perhaps it was time to speak to someone at the DoMLE.

"Were you there?" he asked in a muted tone. Perhaps that had been the cause of the drink; how terrible, to have been personally acquainted with either victim.

Isaac smiled slightly as Dreogan described his teaching experience.  He could imagine working in a commuter school came with it's own set of difficulties.  Sometimes he wondered if it would be easier to not be responsible for the children once classes were done.  Yet, he knew there was more consistency and discipline in a place like Hogwarts.  Having a personal life though was next to impossible.

"Yes, I get the inside track on all of my students before they actually enter my classroom," he said in reference to the years he taught.  "It does give me a certain advantage the first time they walk through the door.  I know nearly everything I need too about what kind of student they are, but they have no real clue what to expect from me."

Turning back to Remembering Day, Isaac's mood dropped a bit.  The night before he had returned to the castle to find the students who had been present in various states of anger and sadness.  He had been up until the wee hours of the morning trying to calm as many as he could, acting more as a therapist then a teacher.  The of course he had to pull himself together in time for that bloody fashion show.

"No," he said.  "I was actually just down the road from here keeping an eye on a pair of students who had been wandering alone.  I watched the fireworks and was completely unaware of anything going on at the pitch.  Were you?"

Dreogan grinned at his description of first-day classroom dynamics. "Ah, the element of surprise. I hope you used it to your full advantage," he laughed lightly. Dreogan himself filed in with the students and settled himself amongst the desks his first day of class. Appearing only a year or two older than most of the student body, Dreogan had seized the opportunity to hear just what the students' expectations were of the course and himself.

And what they would do if the teacher didn't show up in the first five minutes. Maybe sly, but vastly amusing.

Less amusing was the surprise of Remembering Day. "I was there, yes," he replied, disappointed Isaac had not been. He wanted to hear someone's opinion, someone who could view the matter analytically, with the eyes of an enlightened observer. He looked down at his tankard as he spoke. "Some surprises there, too. It seemed well-planned out. And the Ministry, less so," he said. "Still," he conceded, "one can never take into account everything. We all did what we could to bring order," he said, nodding and now taking a sip of the butterbeer. That was not the cause of the man's drinking, then. "Yet another thing to remember . . ." he stated slowly. Dreogan said nothing more, allowing the silence to come between them. The man would say something if he wanted and if he didn't, Dreogan could small talk for days.

Isaac nodded slightly in agreement before taking another sip of his own drink.  The Memorial Ceremony was truly just another event to add to the list of things that needed to be remembered.  Two men had lost their lives and countless others had been injured.  So many students who had been too young to truly experience the horrors of the second war would never be the same after witnessing the atrocities.

“It’s a growing list,” he said after a moment.  “And it’s all so senseless.  It seems my fate that when these things occur I should be somewhere else completely unaware.”  He shook his head, taking another sip.  He couldn’t blame himself for that most people would say.  He couldn’t have possibly known his best friend would be going to lose a life or death battle with one of Voldemort’s followers.

“It was ten years ago today I found out everything that happened,” he told Dreogan.  “I was working on research in South America at the time and I remember looking up and seeing my mother’s owl flying towards me.  I had some idea of how bad things were getting, but when I saw that owl I knew something big had happened.  My entire world changed with that one letter.”

Indeed it had.  Sometimes he could still see her.  Blonde hair, crystal clear blue eyes…she had captured his attention from the moment he saw her on the train during their first ride to Hogwarts.  Of course he had convinced himself that they would never be anything more then friends.

“My best friend from school was killed on Ministry business sometime just before the attack on Hogwarts.  I heard her partner was a follower of the Dark Lord and he may have had something to do with it.  Like I said…it’s all so senseless.”