Making Friends

Mostly out of boredom, Rose was staying in her bed Monday morning. It was still dark out, although Rose didn't know exactly what time it was.

Also, Rose found it easier to hold a conversation without the possibility of being distracted by other people. She figured the chances of being caught by Mr. Filch were low, but she didn't want to risk that tonight would be the night he took a level in Rogue and improved his Perception Modifier.

<Anything?> she asked for the third time in as many minutes. <Eom.>

<Rose, I'm not going to work faster if you rush me,> her brother replied. <In fact, I might work slower to teach you patience. Eom.>

<You've already tried that, Sk'lar,> Rose replied, <and you know it doesn't work.>

<No, but I can pretend,> the Elf pathed. <I've been through everything Episti Academy's got on interplanar travel and the Great Wheel. There's absolutely nothing about the Rowling Plane. So far as I can tell, it doesn't exist.>

<What if the library's got hidden books?> she asked. <This one's got a forbidden section or something.>

<First, if it's forbidden, why'd they even bother telling you about it?> her brother asked. <They should just hide it and not tell anyone. Second–>

<Then it's not forbidden, just restricted,> her brother pathed. <Second, I'm the headmaster; Episti isn't going to hide anything from me, despite some of the staff still not liking me.>

Rose pathed.

<First, he hates it when you call him Professor Ozerl; call him Oz like he's asked you to. Second, he's your friend, not your teacher anymore. He was practically my father for five years, and I don't mind calling him 'Oz'.>

<Anyway,> Sk'lar pathed. <Getting back on topic, there's nothing to indicate that another plane even exists, especially not one that apparently shares many traits in common with the Material Plane. You said the Ethereal Plane coexists with it?>

Rose replied. <That means I can access the Ethereal Plane, right?>

<Researchers have proven that the planes make up some sort of topology,> Sk'lar explained. <The specific relationship between Material Plane, the Ethereal Plane, and the Plane of Shadow is one such that–>

<You are asking a professor,> Sk'lar replied.

<Fine, then stop using made up words.>

<Rose, for the last time, just because you haven't heard a word before doesn't mean I manufactured it.>

<Sure, it doesn't,> Rose replied.

<Still not making sense,> Rose pathed. <Explain it like I'm Carolina.>

<That's not fair,> Sk'lar scolded. <Carolina's–>

<Right, she's your girlfriend, and you've got to stand up for her honor,> Rose pathed.

<Sk'lar, you're being difficult again,> Rose pathed.

<I'm saying whatever plane on which you've found yourself doesn't make any sense,> Sk'lar pathed.

<Hold on, didn't you once say you could create a plane?> Rose asked.

<You're thinking of the spell genesis that allows me to create a demiplane,> Sk'lar replied. <That's different. It's a subplane of the Ethereal Plane, not an actual plane.>

<So couldn't the Rowling Plane be a subplane?> Rose asked.

<It's ninth-level, which prevents wish from replicating it reliably.>

Rose frowned.

<So just to recap,> she pathed, <the Rowling Plane shouldn't exist, but it does, and you've got no means of getting here.>

<Correct,> Sk'lar pathed.

<How'd you know its name?> Rose asked.

<It popped into my head when I used discern location to find you,> Sk'lar pathed.

<What if it's called something else to other people?> Rose asked. <Then what?>

Sk'lar pathed. <That's not normal for discern location. Normally, I get a sense of where something is, but I've got to match it to a name. I can use it as the target of greater teleport or find the path, as I've done before, but I don't get a name.>

Rose groaned.

<Probably, although I didn't recognize his voice this time,> Sk'lar pathed. <Probably trying to hide his involvement.>

<Why does EL like you lot so much?> Rose asked.

<Of course it does,> Rose pathed. <You know, everyone here talks with an Elven accent.>

<Don't worry,> Sk'lar pathed. <I'm sure it won't go as badly as Arcrel.>

<I'm not worried,> Rose replied. <I'm older now, wiser, and–>

<'Wiser'?> Sk'lar asked sceptically.

<Probably,> Rose pathed. <Why?>

<No reason,> her brother replied.

<I'm fine, Sk'lar. You don't need to worry about me.>

<You wouldn't be you if you didn't,> Rose pathed. <Thanks for helping me.>

<I'll talk to you later,> Sk'lar pathed. <Sk'lar out.>

Not a minute later, Rose heard a noise in her room. She pulled out her basket, then put on her goggles. As the goggles activated, she was able to see everything clearly for 120 feet. This outlined the small creature standing that stood next to her bed.

It was short, no bigger than two feet. The creature before her had rough and wrinkled looking skin, although Rose couldn't discern colour with no adequate light source. It's eyes were each about the size of one of the lenses on Rose's Rose Film Goggles. It's limbs were small and thin, and its hands looked almost like an infant's. A few strands of white hair were all it had atop its head, and its short nose drooped into a small hook on its face.

"Who are you?" Rose asked. "What are you?"

"Eeep!" the creature squealed. "Dripty is being sorry Miss; Dripty was not realizing you was being awake."

"Alright," Rose replied. "What are you?"

"Dripty is being a house-elf," Dripty replied.

"Oh. That's what a house-elf looks like."

Rose pulled out her boots from her picnic basket, tossed them on the ground, and hopped into them.

Dripty jumped back, startled.

"It's alright, Dripty," Rose said. "My name's Rose. Rose Peta-Lorrum." She curtsied. "It's nice to meet you!"

"It is being nice to meet you too, Miss Rose."

Rose opened her mouth to protest at being called "Miss Rose", then closed it. That had a ring to it. Miss Rose. Kind of like how Sarista the Unicorn always called Rose "My Lady". She wasn't sure why she liked "Miss Rose", but she was going to stick with it.

"What are you doing?" Rose asked her new friend.

"Dripty is collecting the laundry." Dripty motioned to a pile of laundry that Rose did not remember seeing when she went to sleep. "Dripty is taking it to be cleaned."

"Oh. Can I help?"

"Oh no!" Dripty squeaked, a look of horror crossing over his face. "You must not be helping Dripty, Miss Rose! Dripty must be doing laundry on his own."

"Hah! Male! I was right!" Rose exclaimed, jumping up and down. This earned her a confused look from Dripty. "I was guessing at your gender, and I was right!"

"Is that why Miss Rose asked Dripty if she could be helping him?"

"No, I really want to help. That was just a happy coincidence that I also managed to get an answer to my question."

Dripty shook his head, causing his floppy ears to swing to and fro about his head.

"No!"

It wasn't that Rose wanted to help collect the laundry, but rather that she had already made up her mind that she was going to help. She thought for a moment. House-Elves were supposed to be obsessed with working. What would a workaholic want? Probably to do more work.

Diplomacy Mod, don't fail me now!

"If I help you with this, won't that mean that you can get even more done than if I didn't help you?"

Dripty paused for a moment.

"Dripty is not supposed to be having any help!" he insisted.

"But with twice the people working, it will take half the time. Then you can get more work done."

Dripty considered this for a moment.

"Dripty guesses… But only this once!"

"Deal."

Rose helped Dripty collect the clothes. Wearing her gloves, it didn't bother her much. She had handled far worse, after all.

"Hey, Dripty, where do the house-elves stay when they're not cooking or cleaning?"

"We is staying in the house-elves' dorms, Miss Rose, right above the Great Hall."

"Are students allowed up there?"

Dripty stopped collecting laundry and stared at Rose.

"Dripty is sorry, Miss Rose, but Dripty is not knowing. No one has ever asked Dripty that before. Dripty is not being sure anyone has ever asked any house-elf that before."

"Would one of the professors know?"

"Dripty is not sure, but the Head Elf, Miss Atrien, would know. She is knowing lots."

"Would you please ask her for me?"

"Dripty will be doing that, Miss Rose!"

"Thanks," Rose said, dropping another pile of clothes onto the pile. How many clothes did Lavender have? "One more question, Dripty: Do house-elves really like working? All the books I've read seem to suggest it, but there's nothing dedicated to house-elves, so I'm not really sure. Also, for some reason, none of them have got a picture of a house-elf."

"Oh yes, Miss Rose, we is enjoying it very much. House-Elves is living to serve!"

"Okay," Rose said. "I guess if you love what you do, then you never have to work a day!" Rose grinned. "My sister said that to me once."

"That is being very true, Miss Rose!"

After a few moments, Dripty looked at Rose.

"Why is Miss Rose not being asleep?"

"I don't need much sleep," Rose replied. "I was talking to my brother a few rounds ago, and before that, I ran through my daily ritual of casting over 20 spells on myself."

"Really?"

"Yup! I recently made a lesser metamagic rod of twin spell to reduce the number of spells I need, and to cut my XP cost each day, but otherwise, I cast Choose Destiny, Stormrage, Speak with Anything, Foresight, Greater Dimension Jumper, Greater Visage of the Deity, Undermaster, and Shapechange, to name a few of them. Those are the ones from my Staff of Power Surge, which I designed and built myself. I've also got lower level spells such as divine power and swift haste persisted on me."

Dripty nodded. "Dripty is not understanding any of that."

"It's okay," Rose replied. "I get that a lot."

Rose and Dripty collected the rest of the laundry.

"Thank you for helping Dripty, Miss Rose. It was very nice meeting you."

"Likewise, Dripty."

Dripty gathered up the laundry and vanished with a quiet crack.

Rose hopped up on her bed, laid down, and stared up at the ceiling.

<Ref, what do I feel like doing now that I'm wide awake?>

<Yup!> she replied, grinning. <How did I ever survive when I needed eight hours to prep infusions?>

<You've never needed eight hours, Rose. Professor Ozerl gave you the ring of greater sustenance before you took your first level of Artificer.>

<Oh, yeah!> Rose exclaimed, grinning. <Good times!>

Rose laid in bed for six seconds before deciding that she was in desperate need of something to do. As Rose often did when she was bored, she took the first idea that popped into her head.

<I've got an idea, Ref,> she told him, grinning. <It's gonna be hilarious!>

After thoroughly greasing his hair, Draco Malfoy was ready for the day. Flanked by his two henchmen, he strode down the short passageway out of the Slytherin Dungeon. When he reached it, he found several of his housemates standing around the entrance way, looking rather confused.

What are these future henchmen doing now? he wondered.

"What's going on?" he asked.

"The wall moved aside to reveal… well, another wall," said one of his housemates whose name wasn't important to him.

"Don't be daft," Draco said, walking up to the wall. From this side, it should have opened automatically, but it wasn't budging. Perhaps it was stuck? He put his hands on it, and tried pressing against it, but it still wouldn't open.

"Way to show us what intelligence really looks like, Malfoy," the other Slytherin said. He sneered at Draco, who shot the boy a glare.

"If it isn't stuck, then it's got to be some sort of trick," Draco reasoned. "No way someone could actually put a second wall here." He looked the wall up and down with disgust. "Besides, how did someone know where to put it? No one's supposed to know where our common room is!"

"Obviously, someone figured it out!" shouted the other boy.

"What's going on?" a rough voice asked. Turning around, the boys saw Marcus Flint behind them.

Draco knew who he was; Marcus Flint was the captain of the Slytherin Quidditch team. Draco already planned on becoming part of the Quidditch team, so he had familiarized himself with the only person important to meeting that end: The captain.

Of course, the great Harry Potter didn't need to bother with such things, as he was hand picked by Minerva McGonagall herself. It disgusted Draco to see someone as undeserving as Potter be appointed to the Gryffindor Quidditch Team, despite it being against the rules. That reeked of desperation on the part of McGonagall; indeed, it was just an ill-fated attempt to win the Quidditch and House cups.

"We're trapped, Marcus," the other boy said.

"What do you mean 'trapped', Cassius?" Flint demanded.

"The wall moved, but someone set up a second wall behind that one," "Cassius" said.

"Move!" growled Flint, pulling out his wand. He pointed it at the wall, and shouted "Bombarda!"

There was an explosion around the wall, hurling dust and debris everywhere. As the dust settled, the boys saw that there was a small dent in the wall, but they still couldn't pass.

"Looks like we're stuck here," Cassius muttered.

"Quitter," Draco muttered. "Here's a mad idea: Why don't we try that again? It obviously did something the first time, so casting it a second time might actually get us out."

"Do you know how thick that wall is?" Cassius asked. "No? Didn't think so! For all we know, it might be twenty feet thick, so we'd be here all day trying to blast it down!"

"So we just wait here until we starve?" Draco demanded.

"No, we wait until Professor Snape gets us out," Cassius shot back.

"Where's Slytherin?" Hermione asked that morning at breakfast.

Rose just smiled to herself, and turned her attention back to her notebook.

George and Fred looked at Rose. They knew that look; it was the look of someone who was up to something.

"Did you have something to do with this?" Fred asked her, glancing over at the noticeably empty table.

"Of course not," Rose said, still smiling. "How would I even be able to conjure a large wall right in front of the entrance to the Slytherin Dungeon?"

"Who said anything about a wall?" asked George.

Rose's grin grew broader.

"No one."

Hermione gasped. "Rose, did you trap Slytherin in their own common room?!"

"Of course not," Rose said. "And no one can prove otherwise."

The Twins exchanged glances, then grinned at Rose.

"We are so keeping you!" they said together.

"We've never managed that!"

"And we've allegedly pulled some pretty crazy pranks!"

"I will therefore take your praise as a very flattering complement!" Rose exclaimed, beaming.

"You what?!" hissed Alex.

"I haven't done anything," Rose replied. "I've got nothing to do with that."

"For discussion's sake, let's say you did," Hermione said. "Why?"

"Hippothetically, I–"

"'Hypothetically'," Hermione corrected her. "It's pronounced 'hypothetically'."

"Hypothetically, I got bored and the sun didn't come up for another three hours."

"What if you got caught?" Hermione asked.

"Still speaking hypothetically, I made sure no one was around before doing anything."

Hermione fumed silently, but knew that there was nothing she could do about it. Even without the Weasley Twins encouraging her, Rose was self-assured that she was doing the right thing. There was no talking her out of it, but she was going to get caught eventually; Alex said everyone did.

"Oh, looks like Snape's going to go find his kiddies," Fred quipped, seeing the Potions Master storming off out of the Great Hall.

"How does he get his cloak to billow like that?" Rose asked. "I love it."

"How can you be so amazing, yet so fascinated by Snape?" George asked.

"Why do you two always take turns talking?" Rose shot back.

"Fun," the two replied in harmony.

"My best friend is like him," Rose said. Noticing the looks of confusion they were giving her and Hermione, Rose added, "Not her; my best friend from back home. I wouldn't have thought we'd be friends, so I think I can be friends with Professor Snape too."

Sally-Anne, who was once again listening in on their conversation, wanted to ask Rose if she missed her friend. It sounded like she did, but Sally-Anne wasn't sure, and she didn't want to upset Rose or draw attention from the Weasley Twins. What if they harassed her for it? What if they laughed at her? What if they made her feel worse than she already did?

Given all of that, Sally-Anne kept her mouth shut, and continued to listen, hoping she'd have a chance to speak.

Severus approached the Slytherin Dungeon, and found something he wasn't expecting: someone had erected a 10-foot wall in front of the entrance. Severus pulled out his wand and pointed it at the new wall.

"Reducto!"

The wall in front of him exploded, turning to rubble. As the dust settled, most of his house ran outside, looking more bitter than usual. Towards the front of the pack was Draco Malfoy.

"What happened?" Severus demanded.

"Someone trapped us!" Draco shouted.

"We couldn't get out!" added Cassius Warrington. "We tried everything!"

"All of you get to the Great Hall and get breakfast before classes start," Severus ordered. "I'll get to the bottom of this."

Severus stepped aside as his entire house swarmed out of their common room. He cast a standard set of analysis charms to determine what sort of spell trapped his students, but to his surprise, he found nothing. There were no traces of magic in the area, besides his own Reductor Curse and a few destruction spells, presumably cast by his trapped students.

Did the school itself do this? No, there was usually a residual trace of magic when the school reshaped itself. Not only that, but the school rarely reshaped itself this drastically and suddenly. So who did this? Students shouldn't be capable of casting a spell without leaving a trace; most of the staff couldn't do that.

Severus didn't know a lot about runic magic, but he was fairly certain that runes left some trace. So how had someone done this?

As Slytherin House entered the Great Hall, the entire Hall broke out in whispers.

Draco sat down at the table, grabbing up food while there was still time.

They had arrived just in time for the mail. As the owls flew over the Great Hall, a letter simply the word "Draco" written on the front was dropped in front of Draco. Opening it, he found that it had only a single sentence:

Did you like my surprise, Drakey?

He looked past the Ravenclaw table at the Gryffindors. Sitting there, grinning back at him, was the only one who dared to call him "Drakey".

Draco glared back at the mudblood. She would pay for this.

"You think you can get away with that, Mudblood?!"

Rose and Hermione turned around, and saw Draco Malfoy storming towards them.

"Which one of us?" Rose asked innocently. "Get away with what, Draco?"

"Don't play dumb with me!" he snarled. "I know it was you who trapped me in the Slytherin Dungeon!"

"You were trapped?!" she gasped, putting her hands over her mouth. "Are you alright?"

Draco clenched his fists, fuming.

"You'll pay for this, mudblood!" he spat.

"I still don't know to what you are referring, Draco," she said. Rose turned around, and began walking away from the Slytherin.

Hermione gave Malfoy one last look before following her friend.

Rose knew it was coming. She knew the second she turned her back what Draco would do, so she readied an action. Her suspicions were confirmed by the sudden impulse to duck.

Rose vanished as a hex was hurled at her. The purple bolt of light lanced through the space once occupied by Rose, and struck an unfortunate Neville Longbottom instead. His entire body froze up, stiff as a board, and he fell over onto the hard stone floor.

"That wasn't very nice, Draco," Rose said as she reappeared. "And not very smart, either. What's to stop me from going after you now?"

"You think you're fast enough, freak?" asked Draco, brandishing his wand. "I bet I can cast a spell before you even draw your wand."

"Now, now, Draco, you know I don't need my wand."

Draco and his took mooks leveled their wands at Rose.

Rose grinned back at them, almost daring them to try something.

The first-year Hufflepuff and Gryffindor students watched the group, not sure what to do. None of them wanted to get involved in a fight.

Hermione glanced at Rose. How was she staying so calm? Hermione was glad that for once Malfoy's attention wasn't on her, but she was afraid of what might happen if spells started firing. Why hadn't Rose just reversed gravity like she had a few days ago?

"What do you think will happen if you fire?" Rose asked the Slytherins. "How long do you think it will be before Professor McGonagall begins to wonder where her class is?"

Hermione looked from Rose to Malfoy. Malfoy looked like he was ready to unleash everything he had on Rose. Hermione tensed up, preparing for a fight to break out. Malfoy might be a decent shot, but Crabbe and Goyle didn't look too bright. If they missed, then Hermione would be the first one hit. She began to tremble. How did this keep happening to her? She had always behaved, always done as she was told. The staff should stop this from happening! Where were they?

"You've got a minute left to get to class, Draco," Rose said. "Do you really want to explain where you were?"

Draco snarled at her, then lowered his wand.

Sally-Anne, Hermione, and most of the Hufflepuffs breathed a sigh of relief. It was over; no one was going to get hurt.

"This isn't over!" Draco spat. He turned around to leave, his goons following him as he stormed off.

"If I had a gold piece for every time someone's told me that," muttered Rose.

She produced her wand, then walked over to Neville. She waved her wand, whispering something under her breath. Crouching down, Rose tapped Neville with her wand, and as she did, his body unfroze.

"Alright, then," she said, standing up. "We're off!"

Sunday morning, before the sun had peeked up over the horizon, Rose was laying in her bed, staring across the room at her friend.

For the fifth time that week, Rose had needed to use magic to get Hermione to sleep.

Hermione was overusing her bracelet, and it was starting to worry Rose. Rose had yet to devise a plan to get Hermione to stop pushing herself so hard, despite Rose's best efforts.

"Miss Rose?"

Rose was snapped out of her thoughts by a familiar voice. She looked around the room and saw Dripty beginning to collect the laundry.

"Salutations, Dripty!" she whispered.

"Miss Rose, you is having permission to come visit the House-Elf Dorms."

"Kethé!"

"You must be using the normal entrance, though," Dripty said. "It is being hidden by the statue of Helga Hufflepuff behind the teacher's table in the Great Hall. You must be tapping the statue three times with your wand to be entering."

"Alright," Rose said, beaming. "I'll meet you there in a few minutes, Dripty."

Rose activated her Fire Petal Cloak, and dimension doored to the Great Hall.

Dripty stared at the empty spot where Miss Rose had just been.

"Miss Rose is being a very strange witch," he said to himself as he finished his task.

After a few minutes of searching, Rose found the statue about which Dripty had told her. Across the back wall of the Great Hall, behind the teacher's table, there were four statues. This one was of a round, plump woman with curly hair and a dress. Despite being made of marble, her eyes seemed to shine. It was Helga Hufflepuff, known for her kindness towards all living things.

Rose wasn't sure what was going to happen when she tried tapping it with Serendipity; if the mechanism required an actual, magical "wand", then Serendipity would not suffice. Rose tapped the statue three times with Serendipity, and hoped that it would work.

Sure enough, the statue began to sidle off to Rose's right, revealing a winding staircase behind it. Rose could have sworn that she heard a quiet jingle in her head when the statue finished moving.

As she traversed it, Rose understood that the staircase was obviously not made for medium sized creatures, but rather for small creatures.

Rose climbed the staircase and found a small corridor at the top of it. It looked similar to all the corridors in Hogwarts; built with stone bricks, with torches lining the sides. She crouched down as she walked through the corridor. Even crouching down and being as short as she was, Rose barely fit inside the tiny corridor. Seeing a light at the end of the corridor, Rose figured that was her destination.

Rose came out in a small common room. The carpet was a shade of deep purple, and tapestries of gold, black and purple were hanging on the walls. There was a fireplace in one wall, and several chairs scattered around the room.

Shuffling around the room were a bunch of house-elves of all sorts. They each wore towels similar to Dripty's, but that was where the similarities ended. Some had big ears, some had smaller ears. Some had rough and wrinkled skin, and some had skin that was more smooth.

They were just like students; some were reading, some were drawing, some were playing cards, and two were even playing chess. But all of them stopped what they were doing when Rose entered the room. They all stared at her in shock.

"Dripty was being serious?" one of them gasped.

"Salutations!" exclaimed Rose. "My name is Rose Peta-Lorrum! Dripty said it was alright if I came up here!"

All at once, the house-elves broke into conversation. Some of them ran up to Rose and began to introduce themselves; others were a little more cautious of her.

"Settle down, everyone!" one of the house-elves said. This one looked older, and from the way the other elves immediately followed her instructions, Rose guessed that this was the "Head Elf" of whom Dripty had spoken. She spoke in an elderly, almost strained voice. Her head was hairless, and her ears and nose a drooped a little more than Dripty's did. Her towel was a little more regal than the others, and had silvery strands running around its deep violet base.

"Atrien is being the Head Elf," the house-elf confirmed. "Dripty is saying that you wanted to meet us elves?"

"Yes, Ma'am," Rose said cheerfully. "I'm not from around here, and I like to learn!"

"Most other witches is not wanting to see us," Atrien said.

"I'm not most other witches," Rose said, grinning.

"Atrien is seeing that," Dripty said. "Most other witches is being asleep right now."

"I don't need as much sleep as most people." Rose looked around the room. "This looks really nice!"

"You is sounding surprised."

"I didn't know what to expect," Rose said, looking back at Atrien. "Slavery's frowned upon in my home."

"House-Elves may be considered slaves in some parts," Atrien said. "But here we is well-treated slaves."

There was a quiet CRACK and Dripty appeared at the entrance.

"Miss Rose!" he shouted.

"Salutations, Dripty!"

"Now that you is both being here," Atrien said sternly. "Atrien must be telling you, Miss Rose, not to be helping the house-elves with chores. They is our chores, and you must be allowing us to do them."

"Yes, Ma'am!" Rose said, saluting.

Atrien eyed Rose.

"You should be getting back to your bed, Miss Rose," Atrien said. "You is not wanting to get in trouble."

"Right away, Ma'am," Rose said. She stood up, and curtsied. "It was very nice meeting you all."

"Likewise, Miss Rose," Atrien replied.

Many of the other house-elves waved to Rose as she left. It wasn't a long visit, but it served its purpose. Rose could reassure herself and her friends that house-elves were treated with respect and dignity.

Rose skipped off down the corridors back to Gryffindor Tower. Despite the Artificer's good mood, she couldn't help but feel like something bad was about to happen.

Bab 7: Making Friends

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Bab 7: Making Friends

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