13th December, 1888 — The Hogwarts Owlery

This was a feat. This was going to be the biggest damn feat of the year.

Aubrey had tried tactics like these, from time to time. He’d tried harder in the early days, back when he’d had hope. He’d tried in Master Urquart’s first year, but he hadn’t been much good at navigating the castle, in those days. (Given the hedgehog hurdle, obviously.)

Henry Davis

The outside of the parchment read in a scratchy hand. (By Aubrey’s hedgehog hand. He had discovered that quills were rather unwieldy when one was mere inches tall.) He had deposited the little (stolen) Gryffindor lion pin into the parchment, and rolled it up safely in the bottom of it with all his might.

Henry wasn’t a Gryffindor herself, but the moment he had seen it he had known, had remembered the gift she had gotten him for Christmas eleven years ago. She would remember too, she had to. This Christmas surprise would make up for a decade of absence, he was sure. She would figure it out. She would know.

Aubrey was going to explain his situation in full, too, of course, starting with It’s Aubrey. Help me. I’m a hedgehog -

But he had always known this was a risk. The goddamn owlery was in the furthest recesses from the Slytherin bloody dungeon, and he was exhausted from the journey alone, never mind having to wrangle the parchment and the pin and the bottle of ink with his hedgehog paws, in front of a whole host of hooting owls with their wings and beaks and eerie yellow stares that said we’re going to fucking EAT YOU.

Aubrey recognised his chances of getting chewed up and regurgitated into owl pellets were high, and getting higher the longer he spent here in plain sight of the horde. He tried not to think of it, just of Henrietta finally getting the news he was alive and saving him from this existence, just in time to be out of here and home again for Christmas. He was nearly finished scratching out his message on the owlery floor -

Only for a set of loud footsteps coming in the owlery door to give him a heart attack, or near enough, enough that Aubrey upset the whole bottle of ink he’d been dipping his paws in over his carefully-crafted, spindly handwritten message, covering it all in a thick black goop. SHIT FUCK SHITTING FUCK -

NOW WHAT WAS HE GOING TO DO?

Aubrey scuttled out of sight with ink-muddied paws, deciding to hide until they left. Maybe they would see his present, and the name scrawled on the outside, and send it to his sister. Maybe that would be enough.

On the other hand, maybe he’d get eaten by owls for bloody breakfast.

---

The following 1 user Likes Aubrey Davis's post:1 user Likes Aubrey Davis's post
   Aldous Crouch

---

Formerly known as Davis, Elijah Urquart's pet hedgehog.

Sloane was, for all intents and purposes, still feeling particularly bitter this holiday season. How had the year gone from such a great high of making the house team, to this, a letter in hand telling her parents she wanted to stay at school for the holidays? She wasn't so sure she wanted to spend Christmas with her family and the new addition to it.

She also wasn't sure enough of that decision to send the letter yet either.

She stomped her way up the owlery staircase, only slipping once, though now her hands were sore after catching herself. Each step closer had her losing her nerve however and as she reached the top she wasn't so certain about this. Ugh. Moving into the owlery, she took a look around and noticed a piece of parchment stained with ink. Had somebody been up here? "Hello?" She called softly, unsure if there was even anywhere to hide.

---

  

---

Aubrey had scurried under the canopy of the owls' water-basin that stood in the middle of the room, hoping none of the owls would see him there as much as he was concerned about whoever had come in. Hello? A voice came - a girl's voice, a kid's voice - and Aubrey flinched quietly, wondering whether that meant she'd seen the mess of a letter, or maybe a tiny trail of pawprints through the ink. He licked at his front paws to get off the sticky black stuff, and then retched loudly when he got ink on his tongue.

Stupid. His tiny hedgehog brain was making him fucking stupid.  

Giving up on getting the ink off his hands and feet (and probably spattered over his squishy white stomach too, ugh) Aubrey instead decided to focus on the biggest issue here, and inched a little forwards from under the stone water-basin, trying to get more of a look at the student than just their feet. Would she spot him from up there -?

---

  

---

Formerly known as Davis, Elijah Urquart's pet hedgehog.

Taking another look around Sloane realized she was very much alone in the owlery at the moment. Maybe she was overthinking this. Parchment on the floor of the tower where the post came and went certainly wasn't all that unusual, now was it?

Sloane stuck her hand in her pocket for her own letter and moved to tie it up to the nearest agreeable owl. She sweetened the deal with a little treat and a big horned owl dolefully obliged without much fuss. She nearly hesitated, but decided it was now or never and so she sent the large grey owl on its way before moving back to the parchment on the floor.

It was stained with blotches and... footprints? Rodent footprints. Sloane bent to examine it a little closer, eyes gazing across it to see if she could make anything out.

---

  

---

She was going for the letter! She was! Was she looking at it? Could she see anything??!? Was there enough left of it to send it????

He wasn't sure there was, but maybe... Maybe if he came out, she would be smart enough to figure it out. That the hedgehog pawprints all over the messed-up parchment was not his only handiwork, but that the rest had been written in his scratchy scrawl. Aubrey had been around enough hedgehogs in his time to be sure that ordinary hedgehogs were not clever enough to do that.

He wasn't sure any unsuspecting student had the smarts to unravel this mystery, though. Still... it was worth a shot, wasn't it?

Besides, even if she didn't, he didn't want to get left up here in the owls' lair.

Aubrey breathed a deep breath, steadied himself, and skittered out from under the water-bath towards the girl. Oi, he declared, squeaking a little to get her attention, over here, then.

---

  

---

Formerly known as Davis, Elijah Urquart's pet hedgehog.

Reaching out to pick up the parchment, Sloane was a little baffled by what she saw. It appeared to contain some writing beneath the footprints, though she was having a hard time making out what it had said before the spill. She wondered if somebody had dropped it or perhaps there was a mischievous little creature around stealing people's post.

She didn't have long to examine the parchment when a distinctive little squeak interrupted her musings. Turning, she found a familiar little hedgehog scurrying out from beneath something nearby. "Well hello there," She grinned, still crouched and reaching out to the little guy.

---

  

---

Now that he was out in the open, he could see up to the student's face better, and recognised her as one of the Gryffindors, in whose common room he sheltered more often than any other (Slytherin's didn't count: that was a dungeon in more than one way). And this girl was Small But Loud, a combination that did well enough to catch his attention, even before the opportunity of being fed things. And sometimes her hair changed colours.

If only she could figure out enough that he would give anything to change into something else, too.

With a little sigh, Aubrey balanced as best he could and lifted an ink-blackened front paw in his best approximation of a human-style wave - before the ominous owl hooting around him became too much, and he scurried forwards with a snuffle into the safety of the girl's hand.

(One thing he had learned as a hedgehog was that all owls were part of a conspiracy - an evil, predatory cult. They might have bewitched the rest of wizardkind into thinking they were soft and smart and useful birds, but oh no, not him. Owls were from hell itself, and Aubrey knew the truth.)

---

  

---

Formerly known as Davis, Elijah Urquart's pet hedgehog.

Quirking her head to the side at the mannerisms of the hedgehog, Sloane scooped him up easily, noticing the faint paw prints he left on her hand. "Was that you writing letters?" She joked, entirely kidding. Sloane assumed the little guy had wound up here by mistake and gotten spooked by the owls. That would make sense anyway. Otherwise she had no idea how he would have even gotten up here!

Waving the parchment at him that she still held in her other hand, she mused aloud, "A little hedgehog love letter?" Now that thought was highly amusing. "If hedgehogs did write letters what would they write about? She placed her new companion on her shoulder, a favorite haunt of Barnabas' and tucked the parchment into her pocket absentmindedly. Her errand was accomplished and though she was still a little uneasy about it, there wasn't anything to be done about it now but everything fall where it may.

---

  

---

Aubrey nodded his head vigorously, though he didn't think she could see the motion, never mind take it for what it was. Any attempt to explain further was disrupted by her movements -

Flobberchops! Aubrey always forgot what a strange sensation it was to be on a shoulder: more so than a pocket-ride or squirming tight in hand, it gave a wobbly illusion of being human again, seeing the world from great heights. "Great heights", as if this tiny lass was part-giant, psht.

Grateful as he was to be escaping this kankedort - bloody owls and their malversations - Aubrey was more than a little exasperated by her following questions. You're not taking this seriously, kiddo, he put in, with a little hedgehoggy huff in her ear. Don't be daft, he snuffled on, always mildly pleased when a human presented him with the opportunity of a little feigned conversation, as frustrating as it was for his eloquence to go uncomprehended. Hedgehogs are dumb buggers, they can't write. (He puffed up his spines a little at that: he had to take his opportunities for superiority as they came.) He had had limited success in conversing with hedgehogkind, still an awkward foreigner among them after all these years, so he wasn't even sure what they'd make of love... though he supposed even hedgehogs could suffer a little satyriasis here and there. Not that Aubrey would, ahem, know anything about that. (He'd been lion-drunk on overripe fruit a time or two before, and...) Nevermind.  

Maybe they'd write letters about the man trapped in their midst, Aubrey put in pointedly. So where are you taking me, scamp?

---

  

---

Formerly known as Davis, Elijah Urquart's pet hedgehog.

Sloane pondered her own hypothetical question as she moved to descend the stairs of the owlery carefully. Nimble as she may be, the steps leading to and from the tower were decidedly icy this time of year and she would hate to go sprawling down them, especially with her little cargo. "You must have adventures to write about, considering where I've found you." She mused aloud with a chuckle. This wasn't the first time she'd come across him on his own, but then again if she had to live in the dungeons she's probably try and get out as much as possible too. She hadn't any idea what Barnabas got up to during the day either, but he seemed to always be around when she needed him at the very least.

"Dangerous choice today though, you could have gotten eaten. Your letter that important then?" She was just kidding, but had always had a creative imagination, and so hadn't the slightest reservations about having a one-sided conversation with a hedgehog that didn't even belong to her.

Halfway down the stairs at least her mood was slightly lifted by her discovery. A good distraction at the very least. "I could go for a snack, how about you?" Little though she may be, Sloane was an active girl and snacked often.

---

  

---

Coming down, terrifying as it was perched on a shoulder and descending the steep, slippery steps, was mildly more enjoyable than hauling himself up them on foot - paws - so although he dug his claws in a little more than usual, Aubrey was feeling quite self-satisfied, all of a sudden.

Still exasperated, too, of course, at the thought that this lass didn’t know the half of his adventures, however hard he tried. He tried his best to pull a Serious Expression and incline his head in a nod to say that yeeEEEEeeesssss of course his letter had been important, he hadn’t meant to trek all the way up here for nothing! -

but Aubrey was rather beyond hope at this point, so he gave up and just nuzzled her ear emphatically at the mention of a snack. Indeed! (He so did like being served! He had always done the serving, as a footman.) But where was she going to find a snack, halfway down the Owlery Tower? Where were they going next?

---

  

---

Formerly known as Davis, Elijah Urquart's pet hedgehog.

Sloane was still kind of lost in her own thoughts, but mildly paying attention to the hedgehog, and she could have sworn she saw him nod. Then again she was going down the stairs, perhaps it was just a natural bobbing from the motion.

At the bottom she took a turn toward the kitchens. "Since I cannot deposit you back in the Slytherin common room," Sloane was almost positive the boy who kept the hedgehog was a Slytherin. "And I probably shouldn't take you with me to the Gryffindor common room, I suppose we'll have to snack in the kitchens." Which honestly, since the discovery of how to get in, was the best place to snack. "I could go for some biscuits myself, but I'm sure the house elves can find you whatever you like too." What did hedgehogs eat? Probably not all that different from rats in the end, but Barnabas ate just about anything you gave him, so there was that.

---

  

---

Aubrey and the girl were having quite a companionable conversation, he decided, as they descended the stairs together, the young lass doing most of the work. He listened to her logic with his ears pricked, delighted to hear he would not be abandoned back at the Slytherin Common Room. He had seen enough of that room for the rest of his life, thank you very much.

So he waited, on his best behaviour, on her shoulder until they got to the kitchens, aiming rather for a biscuit himself, and sure he could pounce upon one of hers to explain that desire if given half the chance. In order to show off his intellect properly, Aubrey made a scratching movement at her shoulder to get her attention, and then positioned himself - precariously, trying not slip off her shoulder - so as to deliberately scratch the pear on the painting with his spiney back, knowing tickling was the way to open the portrait door. (He’d known that since his schooldays; one of the most salient things he had learnt in his only year here.)

And ordinary hedgehogs? They damn well couldn’t do that. Hah.

---

  

---

Formerly known as Davis, Elijah Urquart's pet hedgehog.

Upon arrival at the portrait of the pear that led to the kitchens, Sloane had learned that tickling the pear in the painting was the way to go, but apparently so did her hedgehog friend! Before she could make the move, his little scratches at her shoulder made her pause and then he was able to do the tickling himself!

Mouth agape, Sloane looked at the little critter as best she could, given his position. "You write letters and you know how to get into the kitchens, are you an animagus I am not aware of?" Wouldn't THAT be weird! She was joking of course, Sloane assumed Barnabas knew how to get into the kitchens as well if he were feeling industrious, but probably not through the portrait!

The frame swung open, allowing for Sloane to carefully step through into the kitchens itself, the warm smell of freshly-baked good wafting directly at her, making her mouth water. "Ah, well, I suppose this is a good place to know how to get into." She chuckled to her companion. Many young ladies her age would probably frown upon carrying on a full conversation with a rodent, but Sloane was not like most young ladies her age. "Now, let's find some biscuits."

---

  

---