24 November 2009
Tuesday.  12:15pm

"Clementina Ainsley?"

Knox Greyfriar had stopped short and was now regarding a young blonde witch with some surprise.  He was clad in the plum robes of his office, but they were open to reveal his shirt and waist coat, and he was wearing his own black cap bearing his family's crest - not the traditional purple one of the Wizengamot.  The old wizard, former Hogwarts Headmaster, was in the atrium cafeteria hunting out his lunch, but he'd spied a face he hadn't seen in a good long while.

A former student.  "It is you! Of course it is.  Ainsley, it's good to see you.  You look very well."

Without invitation or even the hesitation that his boisterous greeting might be unwelcome, the old Headmaster greeted one of his many former students with warm familiarity.  "How are you?"

Lunch wasn't looking good.  Tina sighed glumly at the row of slightly-fingered sandwiches.  Then again, it wasn't as if she really could afford to eat out . . . she picked up the least maimed of the ham sandwiches and had gotten in line to grab a bowl of the invariably over-salted soup, when she heard her name.  Her whole name.  She flinched involuntarily and turned to greet none other than her old headmaster!  Well she'd known he was part of the Wizenmagot, hadn't she?  The knowledge did little to settle her surprise as the man swept through the crowd of disgruntled ministry workers like a bowling ball through a row of pins.

"Proffess--er, Greyfriar?  You're looking purpl--er, well." she stumbled over her words, righting herself gracelessly.  In fact, Greyfriar looked old.  Better than her father, who had begun to look shockingly frail in the past year, but old nonetheless.  His eyes, long traced with signs of laughter, now also showed some signs of worry, and his hair seemed whiter than Tina remembered, though no less thick.  His plum-colored Wizenmagot robes made him look more regal than ever. 

"Me?" she squeaked, shoulders rising a little under her own robes.  "I'm fine, good, well--intern in the Department for Magical Creatures, if you'd credit it, hihi."  She felt herself rambling and hastily punctuated the wayward sentence with one of her hiccuping laughs.  Calm down, she decided.  I know this man . . . sort of.  Well, more than some former-students, I suppose. 

"Ahem."  And as many humans do in times of stress, Tina fell back on etiquette in lieu of thought.  "How are you?  I was just about to sit down for lunch, if you'd care to join me."

There was a second delay out of shock, and then another out of disbelief, before her brain finally caught up with her manners.

Bloody hell.  I just asked a W-Elder out to lunch.  I'm well fooked, I am.

At the last minute, she remembered to smile.

Fook.

Perhaps some of the people in the queue behind them might have become annoyed.  Knox Greyfriar had budged in to greet Ainsley and in the process had leaned over to select a pre-packaged cheese sandwich for himself. 

"My thoughts exactly," he agreed happily.  "We shall have a seat and you'll tell me absolutely everything.  Here: let me, please."

He ushered her forward in that way that he did.  In that way that showed how accustomed he was to being listened to.  "Come, Ainsley, allow me." 

He stepped up to the till and paid the checker the among to cover both their meals and then Knox led the way to a table, one set into a nook in the glossy black stone wall.

Greyfriar settled in and opened the wrapper of his sandwich. 

"So! The Department for Magical Creatures? How do you like it? I heard Griffon Manley's just quit.[1] That's a shame.  All your doing, I suppose? I can just imagine."

The old wizard was as pleased as he could be to see one of his students all grown up.  She looked both young and adult at the same time.  The same face, the same self, but wrapped up differently.  No uniform, and here: here at the Ministry where the world turned. 

1.	November 15; In Which Griffin Manley Leaves the Ministry link

Tucked into the nook of the wall, Tina was able to relax a little.  It always helped to get your back up against something solid, and she like being able to watch everything at once.  She felt more in control that way.  Still, she picked nervously at the wrapper of her ham-and-cheese before turning to take a sip of tea and burning her tongue.

"I, ah, like it well enough," she replied, smiling tightly through the pain.  His teasing would have left her flustered four years ago, but after learning to deal with James and his friends, she'd learned to ignore that kind of thing.  "Manley was . . . well, I guess I didn't get to know him very long, but I would have liked to know him better.  We're all kind of . . . lost without him."

Lost meant different things to different people.  Some of her coworkers had taken the absence of authority as an opportunity to really run wild, while others had turned brooding and solemn.  She didn't much care for either reaction, and she was looking forward to getting a new Head.  Whoever the ministry appointed, they'd have their work cut out for them.  Most of the department had been there since forever, as far as she could tell, and wouldn't take kindly to having a strange bureaucrat appointed over their heads.  But then, as far as Tina could make out, nobody within the Department was exactly lining up to take Manley's place, nor was there anyone who obviously fit the bill.  It was a bit of a mess, to tell the truth.

"Don't suppose you're willing to drop a hint as to his replacement . . . ?" she asked, half-jokingly, half-hopefully, grinning lopsidedly. 

Knox unwrapped his cheese and vegetable sandwich on rye and munched on it happily, totally at ease.  He loved talking to people, sharing his opinions, and ask prodding, inappropriate questions.  He did seem to notice that Miss Ainsley wasn't totally comfortable with the situation, but he just attributed it to his station and the normal Lunch-With-Your-Teacher thing that young folks did.

He hmm'd and yes'd as she spoke, and then when she was mostly done, he suddenly stood.  He just used his wand to summon over a couple of napkins, which fluttered towards them like giant white butterflies. Knox snagged them out of the air and wiped the crumbs from his beard.

"If only I had that kind of influence," he mused.  "I might lobby strongly for Maya Irene-Strangely, although she'd never take it.  But it's in Zephyr's[1] hands now!  We'll just have to pray she finds Manley's equal in both management and hygiene."

He stirred his tea.  "No, my dear Clementina, my influence is limited to internships, apparently."

Knox had put in a good word - a good many good words, in fact - for Clementina as she left Hogwarts.  He didn't expect that her grades had been quite enough for the Ministry to fall over backwards for her, so he'd intervened with Griffon who'd been only too happy to take his recommendation.  He hadn't followed up, though, so busy was life at the Ministry.  But now, look! Here she was! In the post and looking rosy.

He felt quite proud of himself.  He smiled.

1.	Perseoplis Zephyr, Minister of Magic

Preoccupied as she was with butterfly napkins and Irene-Strangely, Tina nevertheless felt her mind snag on something her old headmaster had said.

"Internships?" she asked, a little more loudly than she'd meant to.  Unnerved by the revelation and exasperated by his smile, she wasn't sure whether to thank him or rebuke him, and so settled for forcing him to spell things out.  "What do you mean by that?"

Her sandwich lay forgotten on the tray next to her too-hot tea, hands twisting into knots upon her lap.  Of course, if Greyfriar had had his hand in things, that explained a lot really.  It made more sense than the ministry hiring her by mistake, her previous theory, but was somehow much less reassuring.  As long as her position in the department had been a mistake, nobody could expect much from her (except for Tina, who expected rather a lot from herself).  But if Greyfriar had used his influence to win her the position out of some obscure line of reasoning, then things suddenly became much more complicated. 

Tina liked complicated spells.  She loved complicated magical glitches.  She even enjoyed complicated philosophy books and their outlandish theories.  But a complicated life?  She would much prefer to live a life of simple anonymity.  When people like Greyfriar started interfering, life threatened to become anything but.

Again, Greyfriar allowed himself to ignore Miss Ainsley's squirming.  She should be pleased, shouldn't she.

"I spoke with Manley on your behalf," he admitted without shame.  It was a common enough thing for Headmasters and bombastic old men to do.  "I didn't think your  marks would place you high on the priority, so I illuminated your other qualities."

He laughed.  "Merlin's bones, I will never forgot those stunts you pulled with...ah, what was the group?  W.A.M.C.H.O? W.O.M.B.A.T? You remember, how you and your friends organized on behalf of Centaurs?  Very bold, very bold, Clementina, and it was a shame to have to shut you down, but it showed real promise.  Guts.  Exactly the kind of thing that department needs."

Greyfriar really was amused thinking back on how much of a handful that whole thing had been.  But it had just gotten far too dangerous to be tolerated.  Not without heart though, and Greyfriar really loved heart. 

He smiled at her.  Did she not remember it all as fondly as he did?