Naomi's head jerked away from the glassy surface, its the pelting shower of rain still echoing in her chilly ear as the warm chatter and clamor of the Three Broomsticks began to seap back into her hearing with a sense of clarity.

Suddenly, her dull, green gaze dragged back to the window: just a view of rainy Hogsmeade streets. Then her eyes sharpened and refocused onto her reflection: a wound ponytail of black locs and black coat in the same state as when she left the castle. Then her right hand pulled aside the coat collar and her gaze darted towards what it revealed: the fabric of a teal, block-colored hoodie, punctured by a pattern of dark rings.

It was a haunting reminder of her sleepwalking episode from Friday--a reminder that she quickly shoved back under the coat collar in favor of starting some Arithmancy homework.

Before she dozed off, she had set out some wooden scroll rods, which were on her right; pulled out her arithmancy textbook, almost stuffed to the brim with notes, which was also sitting on her right; and pulled out a roll of parchment and her color-changing fountain pen, which were to her left.…

..and clearly already in use.

In the same way her left hand gripped her wand in her dream, her fingers now gripped her fountain pen, the tips of which were covered in some sticky, black ink as they hovered over the final foot of a completed neatly-rolled scroll of parchment.

And it had been completed in ideographic (or was that logographic?) script…

Wasn't that--

No. She could worry about that in a minute.

Naomi dropped her pen, which was way too light, on the table and began to search around her corner of the pub for something that was missing from her line-up of school supplies.

But, before she found it, she ended up bumping into somebody, "Oh. Oops." came her distracted reply. 

It was a rainy fall day, and felt like the season of celebration and anticipation. There were birthdays this month, and pumpkin spice lattes to sip. The leaves had started to change to burnt yellow and orange, the air felt cooler, and she could nearly taste the cider wafting from the Three Broomstricks a few shops away.

Abby loved hanging out in Hogsmeade during the Hogsmeade weekend. Just a few years ago, it had meant meeting up with friends from Hogwarts and watching the students invade the village in droves. The students dashed into the shops now, shrieking about the rain. She'd missed last year's outing, but intended to make up for it, stocking up on sweets from Honeydukes to put in her candy bowl at the office.

Her little niece had also written to her recently, bemoaning the fact that she was too young to go to Hogsmeade. Abby carried a few shopping bags on both her arms, picking up a few things here and there to send to Sulwen as a care package. She wore a light green raincoat, and an umbrella with a flying Pegasus on it, just because.

Passing a window, she spotted a dark head of locks pressed against the glass. That ponytail looked familiar. As the girl woke, Abby recognized her face, and veered into the Three Broomsticks, trailing puddles of water from her rainboots.

She left her umbrella by the door, and slid her hood off her head as she weaved through the crowd to Naomi's table.

The girl was sleepily searching for something. Abby glanced at the ink stain on the parchment.

"Naomi!" She grinned at the bump, just barely refraining from hugging her. "It's Abby."

Her damp red hair and slightly sharper features confused some people who had known her years ago.

"Are you doing revision during Hogsmeade weekend?" Abby shook her head and gestured at Naomi's book. "No wonder you fell asleep!"

Naomi knew who the bubbly voice belonged to before her eyes widened and darted up to look at the voice's owner, who was happy and soaked with an armful of shopping bags.

• "It's Abby!"

"Who else would you be?" Naomi's lilt dripped with sarcasm as she took a moment to stand up next to Abby and examine the younger Reid sister's change in appearance.

• "Are you doing revision during Hogsmeade weekend?… No wonder you fell asleep!"

"If only."

The Slytherin spun to stand alongside the redhead as she jabbed her ink-stained fingers at the fallen fountain pen, stained with ink around its tip and grip, and then gestured her hand towards the scroll, covered in that  some type of script. Then Naomi pointed her hand back at her book, written in numbers and English, "Haven't technically started anyt'ing… not conciously, anyway." She twisted her lips into a pout, not happy to admit that, even if Abby was accustomed to non-European supernatural shenaniganas.

Then Naomi sat back down and gestured for Abby to sit as she gave up her fruitless hunt with a tired yawn, "Your day going any better? Or even your year?"

Abby blinked. Then she tilted her head back and laughed. She'd missed her!

"My year," Abby gently nudged her arm.

"Horrible, terrible, awful," she rattled off. "My day? Better than yours so far, seems like. Maybe we can even it out. Make yours better."

Abby leaned over the table, inspecting the odd script. "What did you write? Do you need a pen? Hold on."

She dumped her shopping bags on the floor and nudged them under the table with her foot. Then she rummaged in her tote bag, and placed a few random things on the table as she searched. The key to her flat, attached to a rose-gold flower key chain. The Ministry badge she used as her ID. A stack of stationary. Lip gloss. Old train tickets. Receipts. Aha! A quill. And a few muggle pens, each with little bobbling heads of Muppets attached at the end.

"Take your pick from Miss Piggy, Kermit, and Gonzo, or a quill," Abby gestured breezily, not caring that the muggle references might sail over her head. She scooped her other belongings back into her tote.

That pout had puzzled her earlier, and Abby looked at her curiously as she dropped into the seat opposite her. She seemed a bit out of it.

Abby's laughter was a welcome addition to Naomi's weekend, though she wasn't sure about the other girl's selection in pens. Naomi answered with an  uncertain hum that detoured into a curious tune as the red-head emptied the tote bag's contents out onto the table.
 
Naomi pulled the key and badge a little closer and flipped them over a few times before pushing them back over as the pens and quill hit the table and Abby sat across from her.

"Can 'dey translate 'tings in catchy songs?" Naomi picked up the piggy pen and wiggled it a bit with a smirk before setting it back down and looking at the scroll. "I'm honestly not sure what I wrote. My family has a script like 'dis, and we sometimes write in it, but it's more pictographic… 'dis is more…"

As she started unrolling the scroll and looking at the thick and neat letters, Naomi huffed, "rassclot! Abby, I don't write like 'dis."

Finally, she got to a part of the scroll that had a sketch inline with the drawing and she paused. It looked like rings of teeth thrown into a pile.

"But I seen it in a dream."

Abby returned her smirk with a smile as Naomi caught the reference. Made her proud! She hadn't missed how she'd inspected her belongings, either, but Abby didn't mind. Not with Naomi.

She scooted her chair over to the end of the table, partially blocking the crowded restaurant aisle. Abby peered at the scroll, taking care not to let her raincoat sleeve drip onto the already ink-stained parchment.

"I've never seen writing like that," Abby, little sister of a former Ancient Runes professor, admitted.

Her brow furrowed as Naomi's words sank in. The blocky, neat handwriting hardly matched Naomi's personality, that was for sure.

"What do you mean, you don't write like that?" Abby glanced at her, the cheer fading from her expression.

That sounded familiar! She attempted a smile, trying to understand how she'd dreamed it. It didn't make sense to her, and she shook her head.

She pointed at the rings of sharp teeth. "This does not look like a very nice dream."

How bad a year or day was her friend having?

While the Slytherin was hoping to just pass off the scroll as some sort of Ancient Runes homework (nevermind the fact she didn't take the class anymore), she smiled at Abby's good sense to huddle around the scroll, and giving them a sense of privacy in the busy pub.

But Abby's confusion and struggling smiles did not get past Naomi's observation, though she would pretend they did. And she would forget about the other troubling parts of her sleepwalking episodes for later.

"I don't t'ink niceness got anyt'ing to do wit' it," she rolled up both ends of the scroll so they only had to deal with the middle section of parchment, "I been helping other students. Putting dreams together for 'dem…" Naomi's voice lowered into a quiet and cautious lilt as she continued, "…and I just got back from learnin' abroad for a year and a half, so I'm thinkin' I picked up a bunch of pieces to a puzzle and my brain's doin it's best to put 'dem back together, wit' dreams, sleepwalking or… trances."

Which was as close Naomi was going to get the fact that she was aware there was someone, or something else in that dream—possibly multiple someones or somethings—and they knew she was there too.

"It always starts wit' me finishing somet'ing at school in 'di evening--lately its learning a transfiguration trick for Creatures class." Naomi used her ink-stained fingers to swipe up some water from Abby's dripping coat and then rubbed them together. They stayed splotchy and black.  "Then I go watch somet'ing happen in 'di lake, from our underwater dorms." She then took her wet fingers and wiped them across the parchment's neatly written script.  Only the paper got wet.

Naomi looked up at Abby and shot her a wide grin.

Kelvin hadn't been watching Naomi sleep or anything, that would have been weird but he hadn't made his way over to her while she had been.  Especially since he wasn't one hundred percent sure she was sleeping with the writing and such.  But she had picked up some interesting new talents while she had been away.

And he'd already had a few dreams with her assistance that had helped him out with schoolwork.  He wasn't sure he would have wanted any more dreams about potions the year before but they might have been able to at least help him pass potions.  So instead of bothering her Kelvin had been perusing the books he'd bought and enjoying a butterbeer.

But when he looked up again a woman was talking to Naomi.  She seemed to know her.  He hesitated before picking up his purchases and butterbeer and walking over.

"Hey Naomi."  He looked at the woman with her, "Hi..."[1]  Before he could think of anything else to say, or maybe because he couldn't, he looked down at the parchment and was immediately distracted.  He couldn't understand any of it. But he'd seen stuff that looked like it before.  And some of it looked like Mermish.[2]

"You know Mermish?" Kelvin asked, "I mean most of its not Mermish, looks different."  He pointed at a few of the symbols, "But that looks like Mermish."  He bent down to look closer at the bit of parchment that was still exposed.  "I'm pretty sure there's a book with symbols like those in the library."

1.	I don't think they've met.
2.	Permission from Zayzie

The relief Abby felt at hearing Naomi's explanation and seeing her usual grin was nothing short of immense. Naomi was okay. She would be okay. This was some kind of wackadoo magic acting up, not fog or dementors or losing yourself, she hoped.

Abby drew in a deep breath, let it out, and gave her a shaky smile.

She still didn't understand most of the things she'd just said, but Abby could work with that.

"So," Abby glanced at her dripping raincoat sleeves, and shrugged her coat off to rest on the back of her chair.

"You learned how to put together dreams for people while you were studying abroad?"

Her eyebrows drew together in faint confusion, wondering where she'd been and from whom she'd learned that sort of skill. It reminded her of Virgil's dreamwalking, and brought up a dozen more questions.

"And you felt influenced by something in your dream to-"

Abby looked up, startled. A young man stood there, holding butterbeer, and she'd bet ten galleons he was a student like Naomi.

"Hello," Abby said, about to introduce herself, when he leaned in and mentioned mermish. Mermish!

Giving Naomi a surprised look, she hopped up from her seat, snagged a chair from another table, and sat again, opposite Naomi, where she could see the door and the people better. The seat in the aisle was left open for the boy, if he wanted it.

While Naomi could work with a sigh and a shaky smile, this was a sluggish recovery for She Who Rolls in Ancient Egyptian Mysteries Reid Jr. What had she said about her year?

Horrible? Terrible? Awful?

Hm.

With raspy hums of affirmation, Naomi nodded along with Abby's musings until they were interrupted by a familiar voice calling her name. She raised a brow up towards Kelvin until the Ravenclaw began to comment on the script. Mermish?

"Some Caribbean and Pasifika Mermish," Naomi offered, "You're right though, looks similar and kinda… old? No. Really old."

The Slytherin furrowed her brows then looked up at the younger Reid sister, who decided to jump up and continue her earlier game of musical chairs.

Naomi focused her gaze on the Ravenclaw and gestured it at the girl across from her, "Hey, meet Abby—does some nonsense at 'di Ministry and is kinda like my twin. Sometimes," a sly smile cut across her lips and she reversed the gesture an slid her gaze over to Abby, "And 'dis is Kelvin, my brother from another founder. Guess which!"

Kelvin nodded along as Naomi agreed that it was some kind of Mermish.  And smiled as Abby was introduced, chuckling at Naomi's introduction of him. "That's not fair, I could be a Gryffindor..."  Not that he wanted to be, or likely could have been.  It wasn't like there weren't bookish Gryffindors, just maybe not as many.  "Nice to meet you though, and I'm sure you don't do nonsense."

There was a part of him that wanted to ask about working in the Ministry.  Abby was at least close to their age, she might have better advice than an adult over twice it.  But Naomi's strange writing drew his attention back in.  "So why the mixed Mermish....let alone whatever the rest of that is."

All thought of more study dreams were pushed mostly out of the way as he stared at it.  He practically itched with the need to go back to the bookstore...or the library. Even if that would cut short the Hogsmeade escape.

Abby smiled hesitantly at Naomi's introduction of her, confusion flitting across her face as she wondered when they'd been described as twins. With their mischievous natures, she could believe it, but she couldn't quite remember it.

"Guarding Carstairs' desk and scolding Aurors is not nonsense, Naomi, it's very important work," she said with exaggerated seriousness.

"Kelvin knows. Must be a Ravenclaw," she teased, smiling at him.

Kelvin's question reflected her own lingering questions. She worried over what might have influenced Naomi's dream, changed her handwriting, and left a monster doodle on her scroll.

"Has this ever happened before, Naomi? Or to whoever mentored you abroad?"