Before Henri could even catch her bearings and reorient herself to her new position on the sidewalk outside the Scamander home, someone had thrust a broom in her face. She let out a pitiful squeak and scooted backwards until she felt the branches of the hedge poke into her shoulders. She wished quite fervently that she could have just melted back through the hedge and into the garden, but apparently while the hedge had been willing to part and let her through up there, it was quite solid down here. Just her luck. Now she was outside (not just in the garden but actually off the property), she was alone, and there was a strange man trying to attack her with a broomstick!
He wasn't actually trying to attack her with a broomstick; he had dropped it. This did nothing to lessen her distress. She wanted to get up and run back inside before he had a chance to ask her what her name was — strange men always seemed to be doing that in Hogsmeade, and it made her terribly uncomfortable to handle her own introductions — but she had scattered the entire box of matches on the ground during the course of her fall, and she couldn't very well go back inside and leave them out here. What if the Scamander's cook couldn't light the stove the next morning and there was no breakfast or tea because of her? What if the housekeeper couldn't start any of the fires and they all had to wear mittens all day even indoors? (It did not occur to her that people usually accomplished these sorts of mundane tasks with magic; suddenly the entire happiness of the Scamander family seemed to hinge on this box of matches, and on Henri's ability to retrieve them).
The other factor preventing her from making a hasty retreat was that she was not actually sure she knew how to get up. Corsets weren't really meant for acrobatics. She had never been seated on the ground while wearing one before, and the one she was wearing tonight did not have a good deal of flexibility even at its loosest. Laced up as tightly as it was, she didn't think she could bend at all, which would complicate matters considerably.
"A what?" she asked, less because she had any desire to know and more because the way that he'd let his sentence trail off left her feeling strangely anxious.
Rune made this! <3
He wasn't actually trying to attack her with a broomstick; he had dropped it. This did nothing to lessen her distress. She wanted to get up and run back inside before he had a chance to ask her what her name was — strange men always seemed to be doing that in Hogsmeade, and it made her terribly uncomfortable to handle her own introductions — but she had scattered the entire box of matches on the ground during the course of her fall, and she couldn't very well go back inside and leave them out here. What if the Scamander's cook couldn't light the stove the next morning and there was no breakfast or tea because of her? What if the housekeeper couldn't start any of the fires and they all had to wear mittens all day even indoors? (It did not occur to her that people usually accomplished these sorts of mundane tasks with magic; suddenly the entire happiness of the Scamander family seemed to hinge on this box of matches, and on Henri's ability to retrieve them).
The other factor preventing her from making a hasty retreat was that she was not actually sure she knew how to get up. Corsets weren't really meant for acrobatics. She had never been seated on the ground while wearing one before, and the one she was wearing tonight did not have a good deal of flexibility even at its loosest. Laced up as tightly as it was, she didn't think she could bend at all, which would complicate matters considerably.
"A what?" she asked, less because she had any desire to know and more because the way that he'd let his sentence trail off left her feeling strangely anxious.