Thus far, Rorie had remained about as relaxed as a violin string. Pulled away from her home in Scarborough, the young witch - she was a witch! dear god help her - had found a compartment on the train and kept herself there. And when they’d passed a field of horses, and one of them reminded her of her precious beauty? Well, that’s when the waterworks began. Had it not been for Auntie Dido, Rorie would have been a complete wreck leading all the way from Platform 9 ¾  - who in god’s name had thought about platforms being in quarters? - to when she saw Auntie at the staff table (where she’d made Aunt Dido swear she would be multiple times).

Sure if she’d looked around at other children on the train Rorie should have been put at ease. But she couldn’t think of anything besides the fact that she wouldn’t see Beauty for at least three whole months. Who would feed her the special oat recipe that she had made for her? Or exercise her on days when the sun was shining like a golden flame above the hills she loved to run over? And - horror of horrors - who would help her with her hair in the mornings? Only mama knew which potions to apply that would make sure her hair wouldn’t dry out too much during the winter.

All of this fretting mulled over the girl’s mind as she made her way to the boats. It was dark out, but she thought she saw two people out of the corner of her eye who seemed nice. So she inched closer to them, only slightly startling when the girl immediately turned to her and introduced herself. And her brother.

“Hi.” She said quietly with a slight wave, noticing that the girl had hair that looked similar to her own. “I’m Rorie.”

What in the world were cushioning charms? She’d heard the exclamation from the boy, and could only infer by his excitement that it was some sort of spell that either summoned a cushion for the user, or perhaps padded one’s fall. Before she had time to ask though, he’d introduced himself and she gave him a nod. Looking at his outstretched hand, she smiled gratefully and blushed because no one had ever done something that gentlemanly for her before (other than her brothers or father), and clambered into the boat.

“Erm - no I haven’t,” She responded to Georgie with unease. She knew about houses and roughly which house meant which kind of personality, but frankly she hadn’t thought about what house she would be. “But my auntie Dido was a Hufflepuff. She’s the divination teacher at the school.” Rorie didn’t know how much confidence she had in her voice; frankly she was just trying to keep up after ‘cushioning charms’.