A little after 3pm


“My boy!” Camille greeted as she saw the dark mop of hair poke around the open door and the cloaks pegs on the back of it. Seated in her armchair, the witch sprung to her feet and wrapped her arms tightly around the awkward first year. She swayed gently as they embraced, and smoothed his rebellious mop of hair with her left. Gracious, it was just like hugging Johann at the very same age. Her lips made a silent oh at the realisation, and it made it all the more difficult to let go of him.

Her cosy quarters were tucked up on the sixth floor beside her classroom. It had a fantastic view, especially in good weather. The living room of sorts was small, the floor space dominated by with two faded blue armchairs. They were embroidered with runes in gold thread. A small round table sat between them, sporting a generous tea tray from the elves. Even in September, a low fire crackled in the grate of the fireplace, and above the mantlepiece full of photographs was a stag in a Scottish landscape, who periodically bellowed and cantered through with his does. It was quiet, comfortable and a bunch of lilies perfumed the air.

“Let me see you, let me see?” She fussed, drawing him away and clasping his head with both hands to turn his face upwards. “You’ve got soil on your face. Here,” and before Feliks could protest, she dusted it from his forehead with her handkerchief. “Was it a very good lesson with Professor Prewett?” Owen was a very good male role model in Camille’s eyes. She would be very glad if Feliks also enjoyed his lessons. “How are you settling in?”

His head was full of the names of plants and their uses. Feliks could still smell the greenhouse on his clothes - he liked it, everything there was warm and earthy and he enjoyed getting his hands dirty. But he was tired after a long day of lessons and very much ready to see his Oma! Even if it meant she might tell him off for what had happened in Darkfall's class yesterday.

The young boy grinned, wrinkling up his nose in a mixture of embarassments and sheer delight as she fussed over him. He loved hugs! When he was in the Cottage the sisters never hugged anyone and the squibs  knew each other better than they knew him. So now he wanted as many hugs as he could get.

Feliks rubbed his forehead, as if still worried there was more dirt on it.

"Da! It was very fun. Professor Prewett let us handle plants!" he exclaimed excitedly and had to slow his thoughts down to be able to answer her questions properly. "I like it here. My housemates are nice. Not too boring." Feliks' smiled, sheepish. "And there is a Hufflepuff boy, Wesley, never boring. I may sit please?" his gaze shifted to the armchairs and then to the rest of the room, which he admired for a moment.

It was cosy and comfortable. Just like her.

“You may,” Camille agreed brightly, gesturing across to the one she had not just stepped up from. “And help yourself. All those plants make for a hungry boy.” The small round table might sate the hunger of a growing pre-teen, but she ventured that Feliks had a better appetite than Johann had ever exhibited at that age. Gosh, he really did look like him with that hair.

She settled into the chair opposite, and tapped the teapot with her almond wand. It set about pouring two cups.
“So you have found a friend?” Camille asked her new grandson, tentatively, “This Wesley?”

Professor Darkfall had written to her, of course, mentioning Wesley, but Camille wanted to hear it from Feliks before she judged. A grandmother had to trust her first grandson, after all. Even if he had arrived with quite a reputation from his mother.

“What’s he like?” She asked, “What have you been up to?”

He happily took his seat, reaching for a biscuit on the tea tray as soon as his Oma said that he could help himself. Feliks realised that maybe he was just hungry and not tired - the suspicion was confirmed when he bit into it. Tasty. He smiled at the witch through his enthusiastic chewing and nodded at her mention of Wesley.

This reminded him of why he was here. Professor Darkfall had said he would be telling on what had happened in Potions.

            “What’s he like?” she asked instead. “What have you been up to?”

"Wesley is nice. He tries to be nice. I think... he is bad at being calm?" Feliks tried to explain with a thoughtful wrinkle in his brow. He dusted his hands of crumbs, careful not to get them on floor. "I have been reading and studying. There is a lot I don't know. I'm excited to learn."

Even it meant sometimes being called an idiot by Professor Storm, or watching Wesley cause disasters in lessons. It was more interesting to learn from mistakes. "We learned flying!" he continued happily. "I think I like flying. Do you fly, Oma?"

“… He tries to be nice. I think…” Professor Duerr tried to listen and not change her expression at this description. Mr Wold did not sound like the most positive or well behaved friend. The fact he and Feliks had ended up in a detention together so soon was starting to make sense.

“… I’m excited to learn.”
“Good!”

“We learned flying! I think I like flying. Do you fly, Oma?”

It would not grow old to hear herself be called that. It warmed the bottom of her heart, and made her wish she didn’t have to steal away from Feliks in under an hour to teach the third years.

“I do, though not so often nowadays,” she replied, “I used to love it when I was young. Racing my brother and sister and friends, especially when we went away to the country, or to visit family with gardens well away from Muggles. We would swoop around trees, under branches, and do all sorts of reckless tricks. Especially Martijn - your great uncle Martijn - but we would dare him of course. Rather excellent fun.” She giggled to herself like a young girl.

“I apparate, pop from one place to another. Can’t abide the floo. What about you? I bet you’ll be playing quidditch the moment you get the hang of it.”

He tried to imagine what his Oma looked like when she was young - riding a broomstick through gardens, her dark curls as messy in the wind as his or Johann's. Did his great uncle Martijn also have hair like that? Feliks wanted to meet them all. Even if he had to write all their names down with the Spectres so he would not forget.

"Da!" he grinned at her words. "Like my papa! He played quidditch! He said he was a Beater." Feliks had read lots about Quidditch but he had never watched it being played before. "There are games next month, I am excited for them. I want to see the snitch!"

The description of the glimmering gold ball had always captured his imagination; he wanted to see it when it was chased and eluding the players.

Feliks added some sugar to his tea and drank it, blowing on the surface first. In the little pauses of silence, he worried when his Oma was going to bring up the Potions lesson. He put down the cup, making up his mind. "Oma." Feliks hesitated and clasped his hands together. "What did.... what did Professor Darkfall say to you? He told me he was going to tell you about, um. About what happened in lessons."

She did not seem angry but maybe she was disappointed in him. He didn't want to disappoint her so soon.

“There are games next month, I am excited for them. I want to see the snitch!”

“They are splendid fun, yes.” Camille agreed, “though they be so very rough.” She had winced at the way the students would fly into each other, and fall. Oh, goodness, the bruises and bones!

“Oma. What did… what did Professor Darkfall say to you? He told me was going to tell you about, um. About what happened in lessons.” The question had come sooner than she had expected from Feliks, but she supposed they would have to get round to it one way or the other.

“Why,” Professor Duerr asked, with an innocent tone that older children would suspect to be sarcasm, “what would Professor Darkfall need to say about what happened in lessons?”

He looked down at his hands, fingers twisted anxiously together, and then back up at the witch. Feliks wondered if this was his chance to try and explain the lesson from his point of view.

"Um. There was this girl sitting in front of Wesley and me. Her name is Elaine and her mama is a Spectre I think," or that was what Bellamy had told him after they'd been sorted into Slytherin at the welcome feast. "We were teasing, only. Wesley threw a piece of a black mamba fang into her curls and I thought it was funny."

Feliks breathed out, expression tense - he felt better for finally saying it out loud. "I did not know it would be dangerous!" he insisted in a clear voice. "It was a very small piece."

They had been taught otherwise by Darkfall, who administered an antidote to poor Elaine.

“… Wesley threw a piece of a black mamba fang into her curls, and I thought it was funny.” It was always best to hear it from his own lips, to hear his side of the story. Professor Darkfall had not known for sure[1] who had thrown the fang, though he had suspected Wesley Wold.

“I see.” Professor Duerr replied, with that motherly edge of disapproval. She could still use it effectively against Johann, and he would produce just the sort of guilty, weary expression her grandson was donning now. Wolfgang had always been the disciplinarian to snap, shout, bubble and boil, but disappointment was always worse from mother.

“Have you both apologised to the girl?” She asked, studying Feliks carefully for signs he had not. “And is she alright now?”

1.	6th September, 2011 Feliks

She saw? What did she see? Feliks felt awful about laughing at Elaine, now.

            "Have you both apologised to the girl?"

He hesitated. Had he apologised? They had been so busy in class, it didn't even occur to him. She had been so upset by what they'd done but the lesson moved on regardless. Feliks frowned at the tea cup he'd taken into his hands, annoyed with himself but also, for the first time, annoyed about the fact that it hadn't been his fault.

"Elaine is alright," he explained. "But I... um. I do not think I said sorry. I forgot."

“I am sure you can make amends.” Professor Duerr told Feliks, with a lift to her eyebrows to suggest it was his responsibility rather than a command. “And learn from this.”

At that, the stalling, tense moment was over between them (her first proper disapproval of him chalked off). The stag in the portrait above the fireplace bellowed faintly, and Oma re-offered the tea and biscuits. She didn’t want it to become cold between them, in any sense.

“Do you recognise anyone?” Camille asked, pointing up at the mantlepiece, where a line of photographs were grouped in frames. Her family, Wolfgang, a younger Johann, and now one of Balfour and Johann together, taken on their holidays. They moved too, though less conspicuously than the stag as he stooped to drink from the lake in the painting, pawing at the shore. “A little bird told me we might have some news later this week, and I have a premonition that the same bird might have sung to you.” She gave Feliks a smile and wiggled her eyebrows.

"Yes, oma."

Feliks did not have to be told twice that the right thing to do was to apologise to Elaine. He blushed and accepted more biscuits, picking up one that was coated in chocolate (he was very much growing to like chocolate). She was much nicer than the Sisters had ever been. Oma never made him feel like he was a bad person.

            "Do you recognise anyone?"

Dark, curious eyes snapped to the row of framed photographs and the biscuit in his hand was momentarily forgotten. How young Johann looked in that one photo! And how happy, in the more recent one. Feliks was smiling again when he looked back at his grandmother.

"It did!" he laughed, biting into his treat. "They both did. Papa hasn't realised a thing and Johann is so excited he hasn't noticed that papa wants to ask too."

It was very funny to read their letters. After they proposed, the two wizards would be so happy, and he would be closer to officially having two fathers. "What will change after they marry, oma?"

“They are quite the pair.” Camille laughed happily, the merriment taking years off her face.

It wasn’t the first time Johann had wanted to propose to someone, of course. Poor Hannah Bombay and that confusion! The same ring would not be appropriate for Balfour, so would be passed to Martijin for Alix as the next oldest male grandchild. Camille was so very glad that this time round, her dear son knew what he was getting himself involved in. That, and he was absolutely sure he was doing what was right, even before the young wizard sat opposite her had appeared in their lives.

“What will change after they marry, oma?” Feliks asked, inquisitive. Camille’s expression turned thoughtful and she looked to the mantlepiece where a newly-wed Wolfgang straightened his tie for the photographer and then looked to his wife and squeezed their entwined arms with a genuine smile.

“Ohhh, everything and nothing.” She told Feilks and looked back to him with a smile. “You will all still live in that big house, you will all still love each other, very much, but they will have made a solemn promise. To each other, before everyone. To be each other’s and nobody else’s. To look after each other whatever happens,” her eyes threatened to look back and she held her gaze. “When I was married, I became a Storm, but I don’t expect your father will do that. Traditionally, it is just the witches who do that. I don’t suppose they will change their names.” Camille hadn’t thought on it, or asked Johann about it. She had just thought that they would continue as they were.

“And I will officially be your oma.” She winked at him, “and you my first grandchild. Though my tealeaves suggested not my only for very long.” She beamed. “We’ll read yours when you’re done,” she pointed at his cup and reached for her own.

His gaze followed Professor Duerr's, settling on a photograph of herself many years ago. Oma was very beautiful when she was young and it was easier to see how much like Johann she looked. Feliks liked her hair. The man next to her, he knew, would have been his grandfather. He looked different from seanair.

It did not sound to the young wizard like many things would change after papa married.... but promises were serious things. Feliks did not like to make them lightly because he had been punished for breaking them before. He had a feeling that the promise between married people was different. The thought of it was nice, like a fairytale. Romantic.

            " Though my tealeaves suggested not my only for very long,his oma continued. “We’ll read yours when you’re done.”

Feliks took a generous gulp of tea, reminded that Camille had a lesson afterwards and he could not stay for long. "I will have brothers or sisters?" he didn't try to hide the hopeful smile on his face. "I want many! There are so many rooms in our house." More than Feliks could imagine being filled: he had slept most of his life with thirteen others in a long room.

"Why did Johann not have any?" he glanced back at the photograph on the mantle, then at his grandmother. "Did opa only want one?"

“Why did Johann not have any? Did opa only want one?”

Feliks posed a most innocent and curious question, entirely valid given his exuberance to gain siblings in that great house in Edinburgh. Again, he so very much reminded her of Johann, endeared by his choice to take on an appearance that resembled him.

“No, opa would have maybe liked another,” Camille replied, looking back to the photograph. “As would have oma,” she looked to Feliks, brightening her expression so as not to worry him. “But fate said otherwise.” Taken their second child and then brought no more. It was a private affair that her son was too young to remember.

“But Johann was just like you,” grandmother explained to grandson, “so keen to have siblings. Just like you he was lucky to have so many cousins and relatives instead. He had our undivided attention.” She lifted her eyebrows sagely at the first year, “because once you have siblings... you have to share the time and attention. You have to look after them too. But you know that? You know a little of what it is like,” Camille knew a little of what Feliks had known growing up, with the squibs.

“Your father does of course. He is one of how many, four?” Camille tried to recall offhand, trying to count on her fingers, a little lost on Spectre genealogy given their vast numbers.