December 1st, 1892 - Zelfred's House

Orion had a wetnurse, of course, but she vacated his bedroom whenever Zelda had company. She'd taken Rowan up for tea after work, and took the squirming baby from his wetnurse's arm and settled him on her lap. He reached for the buttons of Zelda's dress but could not get a solid hold on them.

She used to see Rowan every day, or close to it. Now she saw Rowan — some weeks, when their schedules aligned. This felt different, too — like she was entertaining, or trying to, rather than just chatting with a friend. It had to keep being worth it for Rowan to visit her.

The Baby would be four months old this week. "He's started to laugh," Zelda informed Rowan, feeling a little like she was giving a book report. She did not have much else to report on; being a wife was different than the projects she'd maintained when she still worked in MA&C. "How's your week going?" Certainly Rowan had something of interest happening; Accidents & Catastrophes was always like this.

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Rowan Yaxley

  

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Given that she almost always had talked to Zelda at work or soon after, Rowan had scarcely seen their place. It was certainly different than their usual setting, but Zelda was still herself; just married and with a child and not working, which Rowan missed dearly. But sitting with Zelda now, her friend looked content; at least happy, especially with Orion in her lap. Rowan for one couldn't stop smiling as soon as she laid eyes on the baby. She could already see that he had some of Zelda in him, though she hadn't spent nearly enough time with him to be able to articulate this in a comprehensible fashion.

"Zelda he's absolutely adorable," She gushed, reaching out a hand to Orion as she beamed at him. "My week has been busy, there's one particular case I wanted to ask your opinion on but I'll tell you about that in a minute. Before I forget—" She reached into her bag and brought out a second bag filled with small parcels. She set them on a free space on the table. "For Orion's first Hanukkah!"

There was one parcel for each day. Each member of her family had contributed to the gifts, with her mother and Maisie helping with knitting a few clothing items for Orion. Papa and Grayson had found a few trinkets that would all form a mobile once put together. It wouldn't be for another week or so, but Rowan wasn't sure if she would see Zelda before then so she'd hurried her family along in producing the gifts.

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"Rowan!" Zelda gushed. Her eyes crinkled at the corners with genuine delight when Rowan said Hanukkah. Now that she was a Darrow, Zelda was never sure that people remembered that she was also Jewish — she attended Christmas festivities, but they never felt entirely natural to her. "You're the best. Thank you."

She missed MA&C suddenly, fiercely; she wished she was caught up on Rowan's life and Rowan's cases, and that seeing her was an everyday occasion. She shifted the baby on her lap.

"Do you want to hold him?" Zelda asked. "And tell me about the case. Please."

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At Zelda’s exclamation, Rowan grinned widely, glad that she could add to her friend’s delight. She wanted to see her expression when she saw the cute matching outfit that her mother had knitted for Orion, but she looked forward to the letter of what she thought of it. At the offer of the child, Rowan nodded, reaching into her bag to hand the file over to Zelda before holding her arms out to Orion.

As she hoisted him into her lap, she cooed softly, hoping that the change of people wouldn’t be too startling to him. “It was a case about a month back. I got called to a situation in London where a wizard had spiked the drinks at a gala for fun — with amortentia, among other magical-inducing qualities —” Here, she nodded towards the file to indicate she’d find more details there: transfiguration charms gone awry, muggles being levitated 50 feet in the air, and one man’s head being turned into that of a bullfrog. What had started out as merely a case of eccentricity on the part of the wizard, devolved into something that would surely have haunted the muggles for the rest of their lives had the MA&C squad not shown up on time.

Bouncing the knee with Orion on it, she paused to give Zelda a chance to look through the file and murmured little sounds at the baby once more, her right hand becoming a fascinating wiggling object for his eyes to follow as it moved through the air.

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Zelda began flipping through the pages Rowan had given her. It felt like something was sparking in her brain, like she was using it in a way she hadn't in a while — Zelda took her time perusing the file, and it was another two or three minutes before she looked back up at Rowan and her son. The baby was content with Zelda's friend; and Rowan was more comfortable with infants than Zelda would have expected.

"Did you find the wizard?" she asked, "And does he hate muggles?" People liked to cause that sort of chaos, sometimes — and even if they didn't hate muggles, it was easier to meddle in their world than with other wizards.

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As she spoke, Rowan eyed her friend carefully. She recognized the hungry glint in Zelda’s eye when she riffled through the file, and she felt a pang of nostalgia for the times gone by. It was a familiar routine that they went through, except at their desks back at the Ministry. Here they were even enjoying a cup of tea, same as they used to do every day. Except now, Zelda was a mother and had a darling little baby who was currently cooing in Rowan’s lap, watching Rowan’s fingers dance around the air in front of him. Withdrawing her hand, Rowan took another sip of tea, before she leaned over her to her free side and pulled out her wand. “We did apprehend him. He said it was half and half.”

She prodded the air three times in front of Orion, depositing three gently glowing little sparks in front of him. They fluttered up and down in front of the baby in a little synchronized dance. It was the same charm her mother used to keep Rowan and her siblings entertained for a while, warm to the touch but bobbed around when the air around them was disturbed. They would only last a few minutes, enough time for Rowan to show Zelda the schematics of the building. “He wanted to amuse himself. Says that he didn’t mean any harm, but they suspect something more sadistic than that.” There was no surprise there; too many wizards found amusement in tormenting muggles, claiming their intentions were harmless.

Another wave of her wand saw the air above them light up as a golden thread drew its way into a 3D model of the building. Rowan sighed. “That isn’t the troubling bit, though — well, it is but that’s for the investigators to decipher —” Thank the lord. Rowan didn’t have the patience to interrogate beyond asking witnesses what they experienced. “The troubling bit for our department is that we can’t figure out the wards he put on the building. They were here, here and here —” Three larger sparks appeared surrounding the makeshift model, pulsing to indicate the reach of them. “We’d removed all of them at first, but then we keep getting reports of muggles entering the room unable to get out…” Which would suggest that there were more they couldn’t detect. “And we can't find any indication of a perimeter.”

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Her baby was grabbing at Rowan's lights, and Zelda felt like a pressure in her brain was lifting. That was odd, and she knew it was odd — they were talking about someone who targeted muggles and hurt them, because he could, and she was relaxing? She tucked that self-concern away, to be thought about later, and focused on the schematics Rowan was showing her.

"Could it be in the foundations?" Zelda asked. "If it is, the spell wouldn't have an outward radius — just a downwards one." It would, of course, have been a weird and messy way to cast the spell — but people who broke the law to torment muggles were rarely concerned with the proper way to cast.

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This — this was why Zelda shouldn’t have left. Rowan was sure of that now. It felt like old routine, bouncing ideas off of someone else. And someone with a mind as brilliant and capable as Zelda’s belonged in the field. Rowan wasn’t too sure about her position, but it wasn’t something she was ready to confront yet. She just wished Zelda was back.

“The foundations…” she echoed, her eyes wide as she deposited another light on the floor of the plan. “What an odd choice for a wizard to do. Why would he want to cast something like that?” His motivations were hardly pure, but Rowan couldn’t help but wonder why some of the people they encountered did what they did. Her thoughts were interrupted by the baby’s cooing again, and she looked down to realize that the child had inched her hand up from where she was holding him around the waist and grabbed her thumb. She laughed softly, indulging him and leaving him to his devices. She’d made sure she wasn’t wearing any jewelry when she headed on over to the Sanditon.

“How did I miss that…” Rowan murmured to herself, waving her wand to make the schematic slowly rotate in the air. “I could have sworn I checked.” At least she thought she did…

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"Everyone misses things sometimes," Zelda offered. However, Rowan didn't usually miss things — and neither had Zelda. She glanced at Orion, with his chubby fist wrapped around Rowan's thumb. Zelda had given it up for him. But she wasn't sure that it was doing either of them any favors.

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At Zelda’s response, Rowan caught something in her tone of voice. She might have been mistaken, but she looked over at her friend anyways, and paused for a few seconds before replying: “You don’t usually miss things.” It was an opening if Zelda wanted to take it; even then, Rowan wasn’t sure if she was going to press the issue if Zelda didn’t want to.

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Zelda shrugged. "I think you have rose-colored glasses* on," she said. Rowan had given her a window, and Zelda recognized it. But she wasn't ready to go there.

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an idiom which started in the ~1840s based on google, woohoo!

  

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Rowan knew Zelda was smart enough to recognize an opportunity when she saw it. And Rowan was also smart enough to not press the issue with Zelda. Nothing good usually came with it. So she merely laughed. A tiny hand pressed against her jaw, demanding more attention. “I’ll tell you what I do have, is complete adoration for this little one.” She beamed down at Orion before gathering him in her arms for a hug. “I hope you know this means he’ll be spoiled rottten; by both me and my family. Any time we hear word of Orion getting sick, you’ll receive a huge package from my mum.” Well versed in Chinese medicine, her mother would no doubt include many different herbs to be brewed for teas and tinctures.

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Zelda laughed at Rowan. "Oh, I was expecting as much," she said, "And I always love mail from your mum!" Rowan's mother made Zelda feel mothered, in a way that she hadn't since her own Mama had died. And she was glad, for Orion, that he would have some form of grandmother even with both of his biological grandmothers having died.

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“Oh dear, don’t let her hear you say that,” Rowan volleyed back as she bounced her knee, beaming at Orion. “She’ll never cease sending you parcels, you’ll have so many clothes you won’t know what to do with them!” This was true, except Rowan wouldn’t be one to stop her mother; would probably be pitching her ideas of things to send Orion on a weekly basis. “Although I don’t think there’s any such thing as too many clothes for you, little one.” She added, scrunching her nose at him. She didn’t want to hand her back her son just yet, but nevertheless, she sent a rueful glance towards Zelda. “Promise me I can visit as every so often?”

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   Zelda Darrow

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"You can visit whenever you like," Zelda said with a grin. It wasn't like she had much else to do.

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