Ruby could understand where her father was coming from with his questions. Soph assumed he held some slightly Marxist views, so Ruby wasn't surprised by his attempt to ensure his daughter wouldn't be subject to slave labour by a professor who would exploit her skills for her maximum profit.

"We didn't really discuss this in great depth, but Professor Shacklebolt assured me it wouldn't get in the way if my personal pursuits. Truly, Papa, she offers to take me under her wing, since she is quite esteemed in this scene herself. She has written a book and published tarot card decks. It truly is hard to make much of a career when you are nobody. Oh - and she did tell me you can write her yourself if you have any questions, so... You can do that? She truly is a marvelous woman and I wish I had a processor like her... In the years that I needed it, at Hogwarts."

  

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"If Professor Shacklebolt is as wonderful as you say," Balt answered, "I should be foolish indeed to even attempt to forbid it."

Not that he truly expected forbidding would do much good even if he were inclined. After all, Ruby was his daughter, and once certain of the rightness of a thing, was highly unlikely to abandon it.

"I confess, I am glad to hear it won't stop you from enjoying the trappings of the Season should you choose, even though the life of a debutante is not, pardon the pun, in the cards for you. I think, though, it best that I meet your professor—just to soothe any lingering, paternal concerns," he added with a wink of conspiracy.

Balthazar Urquart had never wanted anything but happiness for his children, even if such a thing did not look for them as it did for him. He knew that Topaz's circumstances had closed, locked, and downright vanished certain doors for them, and so while he might still hold minor misgivings, he was relieved and gratified that Ruby had found a path to walk that called to her so.

  

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"It is arranged then, I will write to Miss Shacklebolt to see when it is most comfortable to visit."

With that out of the way, Ruby turned her attention to a different matter: "I hope that trip to Italy we were talking about still stands? I confess I was much more excited about that than the Season and... I've made a good friend who happens to be Italian."

She smiled shyly.

  

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"It does, of course, though I imagine it would be late in the summer, rather than earlier," Balthazar answered. "Now dependant upon your employer's need of course."

He studied his daughter carefully, not certain whether to trust her shy smile.

"I confess, I was not aware there were an overabundance of Italians at Hogwarts."

  

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At her father’s comment, Ruby thought that it was perhaps reckless to be so ready to tell him of Mr. Zabini. Like most fathers, he would worry that Savino would lead her astray. Then again, he couldn’t really judge her for writing to a man, when he himself had eloped with her mother. And she and Savino Zabini were hardly about to elope!

“He is not a Hogwarts student, but rather a scholar of Divination,” she said carefully. Not too far off the truth, though he was in fact for his grandfather’s business. “I met him at Crowdy library, one time I went with Topaz. His name is Savino Zabini.”

  

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His daughter considered a grown man to be her friend.

Balthazar's chief concern was not, as one might think, with propriety; his trust in his daughters was almost absolute, and he was satisfied that Ruby understood the weight of scandal upon a family all too well already. No, his concern was simply the usual abject horror of a father realizing his daughter was growing up swiftly indeed. Time was the enemy of fathers everywhere.

"It is good that you are making acquaintances in a field that you are so passionate about," he answered after a moment, meaning it even in his disquiet. The name Zabini was, of course, not unfamiliar, though the given name was not one Balt recognized. "And as an Italian, I am sure he can give a list of sights that cannot be missed."

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Ruby smiled, glad that her father hadn’t overreacted on the mention of an adult male who wasn’t a relative making her acquaintance. Not that he would, not when he’d allowed Delight to work around men.

“He’s given me a book, actually, though it was in Italian so I had to translate some bits on my own,” she explained. “Oh, I’m so glad to have met him! He’s the only person I can talk about things like... astrocartography! I suppose you more than anyone knows how it pains you to want to discuss things and to have no one to talk about them with... nobody who would understand, or be interested!”

  

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"Not even your soon-to-be employer?" Balthazar asked, eyebrow raised. Professor Shacklebolt seemed a safer choice for friendship than some strange Italian man.

  

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Blushing, Ruby said: “Well, Papa, it’s different...” She didn’t know what much else to add. She bit her lip and looked down shyly.

  

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Different. Balthazar was swiftly beginning to see just how it was different, and was not certain he cared for that at all.

"Well then," he offered after clearing his throat. Daily he missed the children's mother, but in moments such as this, it became less yearning for his partner and more yearning for someone who would know what to say in these situations. "I am pleased, Ruby," he settled on, "that you have found something in life for which you are passionate."

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