Asher was hurrying.  Not because he had anyplace to go, but because Asher Grin was the sort of boy who never, ever walked.  Anywhere.  He'd been down by the lake to investigate rumors of a giant squid living there that one of the older boys had told him.  After about thirty minutes of mucking about in the shallows he'd decided to run back to the dorm and fetch a net.  Not to catch the squid in, he wasn't silly.  Actually, he'd pretty much forgotten about the squid.  Now he was more interested in catching one of the weird creatures who were flitting around the reeds.  Not that he'd actually brought a net with him to Hogwarts, but he was hoping somebody else had. 

Half way back to the path, he realized he'd left his shoes by the boathouse and picked up his step.  The house was on the other side of the path and classes picked up again at sometime soonish (he was a bit hazy on this point; he'd dropped his schedule in the lake).  So he began to run.  He wasn't particularly looking where he was going.

Charles was walking down to the lake, thinking he might spend some time relaxing there, since it had been a while since he'd last been there. Quite suddenly, while he was thinking about a recent Charms class, someone ran straight into him.  Charles hit the ground hard, his bag sent flying in the collision. "OW! WATCH-" Charles yelled out, cutting off suddenly as he saw who had run into him. "Hi Asher. Forgot to look where you were going?" Charles said, grabbing his bag, which fortunately hadn't flown far. He would, however, need to get a new inkpot, and probably ask his older brother to clean the bag for him. Still, looking quickly in the bag, it looked like his books had largely been spared, though one might have an ink stain on the back cover.

Asher knocked heads with the other boy and stumbled sideways, landing in the long grass.  He scrambled to his feet, muttering apologies, and then realized it was Charles.  He brightened momentarily.

"Oh, hey Charles--sorry about that--I hope I didn't break anything?" he fussed, noticing Charles's concern for his bag.  Not waiting for a reply, he simply rushed over to have a look for himself.  "Oops!  I guess the pot broke.  Do you know, I've broken three of those this year all ready?  And I've lost one of my quills too.  Books all right then?"

His mother had been a bit peeved about the ink pots and last he'd heard she was looking into a spell to keep him from breaking anymore.  As for the quill, well, he was certain he'd left it in potions class, or possibly transfiguration . . . really, he was sure it'd turn up when he least expected it.  These things always do . . .

He picked a bit of straw out of his hair and grinned widely (or was that "wildly"?) at his impromptu companion. 

"So.  D'you know where I could get my hands on a net?"

"Yeah, the inkpot's smashed, but it's just soaked the bag itself. It shouldn't affect my books, but I'll need to get Josh to clean the bag later. I've got a spare pot anyway, which is unbroken, so I'll still be able to take notes in classes." Charles replied, brushing some dirt off his robes. Charles couldn't quite believe that Asher had broken three inkpots already, that was more than one per month! "Asher, how'd you break three inkpots? we're only in our second month back. Even the cheap pots usually don't break until they've been in use a month." Charles asked, incredulous. even Asher couldn't be that clumsy, surely?

"A net? depends on what you want it for." Charles said, not sure what Asher wanted a net for.

"Well, the first one I was trying to charm the water out of the ink and it kind of went boom a little bit," he explained with a shrug.  "Then I dropped one down a flight of stairs by accident," he emphasized, readily aware that certain people would suspect he'd done it on purpose, just to see what would happen.  "And then the last one honestly wasn't my fault at all."  The last one he'd set on a windowsill where it remained quite safe until someone tried to close the window.  Then it had gone 'splat' after falling four or five stories to the cobbled walk below.  He'd lost fifteen points for Ravenclaw, because it could have killed someone, even though, as he patiently explained, it wasn't his fault at all, really. 

Having cleared his name sufficiently for his tastes, he turned back to the much more important matter at hand.

"Anyway, I need a net like one you go frog catching with," he explained, gesturing a long pole and baggy net with his hands.  "There's these things in the lake down by the reeds, y'see.  But they're too fast and slick and I can't catch 'em with my hands.  So I need a net.  And now that I think about it, probably a jar too, in case they bite."

Charles just stared as Asher explained how each pot had broken. "Asher, you have the worst luck of anybody I know. Are you sure you haven't been bitten by any creatures recently?"[1]

"I'm not sure. Heliotrope LeJean'd probably have one, but then again, I don't know if she uses nets when she fishes. Otherwise, you're probably best off asking Hagrid. He might not let you borrow one, but he'd the most likely to help." Charles said, knowing that most teachers would discourage someone form fishing in the lake.

1.	I can't remember the name of the creature right now, but there's a magical creature that's bite causes bad luck. that's the creature Charles is referring to

Asher shrugged. 

"I get bitten all the time."[1]  It was true and it was also mostly his fault.  He had a habit of picking up, poking and generally irritating the heck out of anything he was curious about.  Sometimes he felt like all the things he was curious about had teeth, even (of late) some of the plants.  "I'm saving up for a pair of gloves.  You know, so I get bit less.  And burnt less."  He waggled his fingers.  Asher always had at least two different fingers in bandages, this time his left pinky and his right thumb.  Another cut on his right index finger had scabbed over.

"Never heard of Heliotrope, but Hagrid might lend a net!"  He said, looking a little more cheerful.  "I mean, catching things with nets--it's pretty much right up his alley, right?  It's probably right there in his job description."

1.	I think you're thinking of a Mackled Malaclaw (thank you HP wiki!)--nasty looking lobster type job.  But the bad luck usually only lasts a week, so it's probably just down to the chaos of Hogwarts plus Asher.

"Heliotrope's one of the hufflepuffs in our year. She's half-mermiad, so she spends quite a lot of time in the lake. She's quite nice, if you can ignore the fact that she's clueless about most human interaction, since she grew up amongst Selkies." Charles told Asher, wondering exactly how Asher had missed seeing their classmate. "Probably true, but remember Hagrid's a half-giant. His nets might be a bit big." Charles pointed out, Hagrid meant well, but didn't always remember that most people weren't half-giant.

"Oh, her!" Asher cried, "Yeah, I've seen her around.  I guess I just never connected the name and the face . . ."  Like many twelve year olds, Asher had as little to do with the opposite gender as possible.  Besides, Ravenclaws were legendary for their ability to memorize entire books but forget their neighbor's name.  "Do you think she'd lend me a net then?" he asked doubtfully.  "I mean, you're probably right about Hagrid anyway.  And besides," he continued gloomily.  "None of the teachers trust me with anything anymore.  He's probably been warned by now." 

Charles had to think about that one. "I'm not sure, honestly. I'm not sure if the Selkies even have an equivalent for borrowing something, so she may not understand what you're asking. Alternatively, she may even help you, it's kind of hard to predict." Charles said, it would be amusing to see, anyway. When Asher grumbled about the teachers not trusting him, Charles' mind went back to what Asher said about breaking three inkpots already.

Back to the Selkie thing again . . . Asher realized he really didn't know too much about Selkies, or anything at all, for that matter.  He'd grown up near--well, relatively near--the coast, and yet he'd never once been to see the ocean.  Suddenly this struck him as odd, even a little embarrassing, and he wondered whether Selkies even lived on the Norfolk coast.

"Hum," he murmured.  It meant he was thinking.  "Then I guess there's only one way to find out!"[1]

1.	So is there a way to invite someone to join a thread?  And/or do I start a new thread because he has to go find her . . . ?

Heliotrope, in fact, was in her default not anywhere in the castle location of the Black Lake. After this particular swim she emerged onto the the shore close to Asher and Charles, dressed down to her black lycra one piece and clingy lengths of lake greens.

And a snack. One fish, already dead by this time, that she had held to her lips as she tried to suck out its eye. She succeeded with a shucking sound, noticing the other boys.

"Hello Charles Harcroft," she remembered fm their time swimming together. It took her longer to place the other boy with a name to his face but eventually she recalled her soggy yearbook of everyone's name and faces. "And Grin Asher."

It took Asher barely a moment to connect the dots and recognize Heliotrope LeJean.  The fish helped. 

"Brilliant timing, LeJean!" he crowed, all ready racing back to the reed-choked shallows in his mind.  "We were just talking about you.  How are you for nets?" he asked, vaguely aware that he was tripping over explanations again in his excitement.  It was something of a bad habit and whenever he realized he was doing it, it made him nervous, which only made it even worse.  "They're in the shallows, the fish I mean, I mean I think they're fish, I mean--" he fumbled for a little while longer before giving up.  "Wanna come see?  Maybe you know what they are."

He gestured to Heliotrope and Charles to follow him as he nodded in the direction from which he'd come, away from the boathouse.

Charles was going to reply to Asher, when Heliotrope arrived. "Hi, call me Charles, though. No need to be formal amongst friends." Charles replied to Helotrope's greeting. Then he heard Asher bumbling through asking Heliotrope about nets. Amused, he reflected that if it were anybody else, he would suspect Asher had a crush on her.  Charles, however, knew Asher was simply nervous. "Asher found some fish in the reeds he'd like to catch, but they're slippery, so he wanted to know if he could borrow a net?" Charles told Heliotrope, knowing his half-Selkie friend would be confused.

Asher was pointing towards the reeds where there was some activity. "Slippery and may or may not be fish. Do you mean the grindylows or the powan?" One a water devil, one an actual fish.

"We do not have enough for net." In Loch Lomond a team of four to six dragged the net, besides those that chased the schools of fish into the net. In her webbed hand she held out the longest length of green to Asher. "You can use my Kelp Whip. Better for catching one fish."