April 13th, 1890 — A Classroom

Ruby and the rest of the NEWT year Divination students had some project on crystal ball reading. They were supposed to look at the crystal ball for ten students and then write a paper about what they discovered. Ruby had gotten some of her friends to spare some time to help her and the rest would be OWL level students of Divination.

After she was done with a Miss Browning, Ruby checked the next name who had signed up to help her. Her heart sunk when she saw the name Fawley. At least it wasn't Cordelia Fawley. Her fellow Gryffindor was one of the few people that Ruby could say that she properly hated, and it was Fawley's fault. She and her best friend, Miss Borgin, had always tried to make Ruby's life difficult. She had been relieved when Miss Borgin didn't return to Hogwarts, but she still had to deal with one of her worst enemies being in her House and a prefect, on top.

"Miss Fawley," Ruby acknowledged the girl when she sat across her. Her voice was strained and she tried not to make eye contact with the girl. She had probably been sent by her sister to make her life difficult in some way.

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Cassia Fawley

  

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set by MJ

To her surprise last year, Cassia discovered that she had rather a knack for Divination. Since then, she'd tried almost everything related to the subject - palmistry, tarot cards, and tea leaf readings, in particular, were her favorites - though Arithmancy was the one she struggled with the most. Having boasted no prior affinity for sums and figures and being of a more emotional rather than logical temperament, it was only fitting that the art of fortune-telling by numbers wouldn't come naturally to Cassia, and she had dropped the class very early on in the semester.

To the point, when Cassia was approached by one of the older students to help participate in a NEWT Divination study, she had been more than happy to accept and now found herself sitting in one of the wooden chairs dotted about the room as she waited her turn to go next. Her chin rested lightly in the palm of her hand as she stared out of the glass-paned window, noting the way the late afternoon sun shone gold over the rugged school grounds. It would make a lovely painting, she mused, though her glossy reflection in the glass made her aware of just how incorrectly she was sitting, and her governess' stern voice appeared in the back of her mind as she sat up a little straighter and placed her hands primly on the neat folds of her student robes. Hopefully, it wouldn't be too long now until she was called up; she was starting to get a little bored.

Finally, her name was called, and Cassia looked up from her hands and over at the person who spoke. She winced internally at who would be her partner for the next half hour or so. While Cassia herself bore no ill-will towards the older Gryffindor, it was no secret that Cassia's older sister and her best friend had been less than... civil towards the Urquarts after one of their own - her current partner's twin sister, no less - was turned into a werewolf. It was a hatred that Cassia never could understand; it wasn't as if Topaz Urquart had chosen to be infected, and yet, Cora and the former Miss Borgin had been rather cruel to anyone supportive of the disgraced family. It was hard to see and hear of her sister in such a harsh light, but with Beatrix gone now, Cassia was now hoping that Cora would be less under her friend's questionable influence and become more of the kind and understanding individual Cassia had always known her to be.

But the damage had still been done, and cautiously, Cassia took her seat across from Miss Urquart, her eyes also averted. "Miss Urquart," she responded a little shyly, unsure of what to say or where to begin. This wasn't exactly what she'd been expecting when she signed up to do this. Though she supposed that the only thing she could do was move forward. There might be bad blood between her sister and the other woman, but she couldn't let that affect her relationships with others when Cassia herself had nothing to do with it. With that in mind, she lifted her eyes from the table to Ruby, giving her a small (albeit forced) smile in the hopes of showing that she meant to no harm. "Shall we begin?" She asked kindly.

  

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All kindness in Miss Fawley's voice was lost to Ruby, who wanted to find proof that she hated her, on a subconscious level. As such, she translated Miss Fawley's forced smile as a fake smile, the sort you gave to people you didn't like and you wanted them to know that you were forcing it. Her kind tone sounded like feigned kindness. In sort, Ruby was so caught up in her narrative that Miss Cassia Fawley hated her because her sister had been cruel to Ruby, that her brain was trying to look for proof that that was the case. She wouldn't believe the opposite, no matter how hard Cassia tried to show her the opposite.

"Yes," Ruby replied sharply. She placed her fingers on the orb and tried to relax.

The problem with crystal-gazing was that it required from the diviner to relax their brain and get in touch with their third-eye, something that Ruby found difficult when the person across from her was Miss Fawley. She kept thinking about Miss Fawley's sister, about how cruel and terrible she was. She was replaying interactions she had had with the Gryffindor in the past, harsh words coming from her mouth which still made Ruby angry, because she hadn't thought of the right comeback then and she now had so many different things she could have said as a response.

She tried to use a meditative practice they had been taught at the class and focus on her breathing while she merely observed those thoughts, without attaching meaning to them or an emotion. It was hard. She would latch onto a thought about Cordelia Fawley, like a hook to a fish and then spiral into negativity.

"I don't think this will work out, Miss Fawley," Ruby finally said and huffed. "Something is blocking me from getting in touch with you, on a vibrational level." The truth was that Ruby was creating that blockage and in a back room of her mind, she knew that very well.

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set by MJ

Ruby Urquart

Cassia's eyes widened, a bit taken aback by the hostility in the older student's voice.

Perhaps she had underestimated just how deep Miss Urquart's resentment went. Which was understandable given the strained nature of her and Cora's relationship, but certainly didn't warrant being ill-tempered towards Cassia herself.

With her hands clasped firmly under the table to keep from biting them, a nervous habit that her governess was forever despairing of, Cassia leaned forward in her seat and kept her voice low when she next spoke. "Have I done something to offend you, Miss Urquart?" It would be one thing if she had, which would explain the Gryffindor's rude behavior, but Cassia couldn't see how she could have. They hardly ran in the same circles, to begin with!

  

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Why couldn't Cassia Fawley just leave? Ruby didn't want to interact with her, or any Fawley for that matter. They could be cruel to her and her family for no reason. Why was she getting interrogated about the reason behind her behavior? Had Cassia Fawley ever asked her tyrannical sister as to whether any of the Urquarts had offended her?

"Your family has done a great deal, Miss Fawley," Ruby replied coldly. "Though I suppose it is my family that insulted yours first!"

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set by MJ

"By my family," Cassia started, trying to keep her face composed though her voice was uncharacteristically cool, "you mean my sister?"

While her usual tactic of dealing with difficult people was to "kill them with kindness", Cassia was struggling to find it within herself to keep being civil to Miss Urquart when it was obviously clear that the Gryffindor didn't want to extend the same courtesy to her.

  

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Miss Fawley had some nerve to get offended.

"Yes, your sister," Ruby replied cooly. "Who has been hateful and unkind to not only my sister's family, but her friends, too." Poor Holliday had certainly suffered by Cordelia Fawley et al. just as much as Ruby, simply for being friends with Topaz. "Tell me, then, why should I want the company of anyone related to your sister, when she has been so unkind to people who have done nothing previously to slight her? That says a lot about your upbringing if you parents have raised children that attack people who have done nothing wrong to them. I do not wish to associate with her or anyone from your family."

The Urquarts had suffered by something that wasn't Topaz's fault. On the other hand, Miss Cordelia Fawley had actively made enemies out of other people. Her actions had consequences.

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set by MJ

Cassia's face grew warm as Miss Urquart spoke, a familiar dreaded lump forming in her throat. She had always been an angry crier, but it wasn't against the other woman herself but rather at the situation as a whole. She wanted nothing more than to come to her sister's defense, to say that the Miss Urquart was wrong about her, that the accusations against her were unfounded and Cora would never stoop so low to be cruel to those in worse situations than her, but Cassia knew that she couldn't. And that, perhaps, was the most upsetting part of all.

"You're right, this isn't going to work out." She softly echoed Miss Urquart's sentiments from earlier, trying to keep her voice level and devoid of the distress she felt within. She reached to sling her bookbag over her shoulder, though she held the older Gryffindor's stare for a moment longer. "For the record, though," Cassia continued, "I'm sorry for the pain my sister has caused you and your family. I know it doesn't excuse her actions but on behalf of the rest of my family and me who bear the Urquarts no ill-will, I'm deeply sorry."

She longed to say more, but Miss Urquart had made her position abundantly clear, and there was no need to prolong the conversation any further. With that, she slung her bookbag over her shoulder and pushed her chair back. The legs scraped softly against the floor as she stood up, and without a backward glance, exited through the classroom door, the tears she'd fought to keep at bay finally trickling down her face.

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   Ruby Urquart

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Ruby had wanted to hurt Cassia Fawley with her words, but her success had brought her no joy. On one hand, it was satisfying that the Hufflepuff had been verbally defeated because she couldn't justify her sister's behavior. Cordelia Fawley couldn't be excused even by her own sister. This clearly showed who had the moral high ground.

Yet, Cassia Fawley wasn't like her sister and Ruby sensed that by the way the Hufflepuff had left. If it had been Cordelia Fawley, they might have been with their wands out by now, who knows. The Hufflepuff, on the other hand, had seemed genuinely upset and ashamed about the accusations against her family.

Ruby felt kind of bad. But the Urquarts had been wronged time and again and part of her was satisfied that someone else got to feel bad for something their sister had done (or not really done, in Topaz's case).

It was sad, though, and Ruby felt somewhat guilty for upsetting Cassia Fawley, not that she would ever admit as much to the sister of one of her biggest enemies.

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set by MJ