what we didn't have before (tagged)

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Comarth and Tontas were seen off from platform nine and three-quarters by their Father: both his Mother and older brother, Leythan, were absent this year. It didn't mean very much to Comarth who was watching him board a train, but as he glanced across the platform and his peers, he thought he should be feeling some kind of emotion. People were hugging, kissing, crying.

He felt nothing but the warmth of a good breakfast inside of him, which was plenty enough to keep him happy for a few hours.

Tontas had already buggered off to find his own friends, so Comarth made a start on finding his. That's right: this year he had actual comrades, so he already knew things were going to be slightly different.

Craning his neck high above the crowd, he only spotted Hector Burke. Was a Melanthius Burke there too, with the rest of his family?

@Melanthius Burke @Dahlia Travers @Bellona Lestrange

Now that she was seated in the compartment, Sakura opened up her travel bag to take out the jewelry box that contained the crystal Hector got her; the lights of the compartment, though it was nothing compared to natural lighting, allowed for the crystal to shine and sparkle. It was such a beautiful shade of blue, and helped her feel closer to the world she and her brother were becoming acclimated to.

Her minute of admiration for the gift was quickly disturbed by the entrance of a young boy. He was very energetic, much like Minnie, except his speed and cadence startled her. Throughout the compartment, her kitsune could be heard whimpering slightly in fear.

"Hello," she greeted calmly with a bow of head, still having the courtesy to give the boy a smile. "I have not heard of it either, I am sorry." Sakura wanted to be polite and not turn him away, but she didn't want her brother or their kitsunes to be disturbed by his erratic behavior either.

@Comarth Selwyn

Hearing the luggage fall back onto the trolley, Thius let out an exasperated sigh as Comarth ran out to disturb the Tokugawas.

"That bloody idiot! I told him to be patient with them, and he's doing the bloody opposite!" Shaking his head, Thius finally took off the gaudy hat that sat on his head. "When he returns, he will put the trolley out!"

Once he finished storing the rest of the luggage, Thius sat down and took a long, deep breath as he observed Nightstar, his eyes gravitating to his girlfriend's behind. "Don't worry, babe, we got the entire ride to see him covered in scratches."

@Bellona Lestrange

"No? So you haven't heard of seven being gathered under the Eastern skies, who can change from man to dragon, a secret society who pledge their allegiance to the Grand Master Azure, and with their power will set the world aflame when first covered in darkness? They're all dragon animagi, but they have renounced their human image by placing dragon's heartstring into their own, and with it be forever powerful as not just animagi but a blurred hybrid of human and dragon--"

He went on at great length in high speed, not paying the least bit of attention to their discomfort. When he showed no signs of actually stopping, the boy interjected in a slight lull where Comarth drew breath:

"I think I recognise this. It's a children's storybook in our country, to help us learn the Chinese star constellations of Seiryu."

"But it's not just a story book! That's what they want you to think! The Order is real - there's startling evidence of it!"

He wasn't going to let up without being physically dragged away, it seemed.

Bellona gave a long, heated sigh.

"Well, it's not going to be me pulling him out of there! Someone else must do it."

She collapsed onto the seat opposite Dahlia as though that was final.

"Dahlia, why don't you use your charm?" she teased, hating how Nightstar was settling with her.

@Melanthius Burke @Dahlia Travers

"I didn't think either of us wanted to, 'Ona. Yes, Travers, you'd be best to do it. He'd actually listen to you."

He threw the tacky orange hat onto Comarth's and Travers' side of the compartment. Sure, he had Head Boy power, but he wasn't going to waste his first proper use of authority on Comarth.

Thius felt a vibration in his pocket and pulled out his crystal seeing that his father had sent him a message. "I'm impressed my father actually remembered what the time is here. Normally, his internal clock is extremely off from all of the travel he does..."

@Dahlia Travers @Bellona Lestrange

Her discomfort was loud no matter how hard she tried to subdue it; Sakura didn't want to be rude to the boy after all. As she tried to scoot closer to the window, her kitsune covered its ears with their paws. Did people in Britain normally make friends this way? Was this normal here?

"I always liked that book growing up, it always gave me sweet dreams and well-rested after gazing at the stars before bed..."

Her voice was too muted to overcome the boy's hysterics.

@Comarth Selwyn

Dahlia rolled her eyes at Bellona's tone when she called her princess. It didn't matter how annoyed the other girl had been by the command, all that mattered was that she followed it. Dahlia continued to just rest her chin on her knees then as the cat was let out of her carrier and the black ball of fur made a beeline for her. And just like that, a very uncharacteristic smile came to Dahlia's lips. She liked cats. They were independent creatures who only gave the time of day to those who were deserving. Maybe she saw something of herself in them. As the cat rubbed against her leg, she reached her hand out and scratched behind her ears. "Hello pretty baby, you're such a smart girl, aren't you?" She practically cooed at the cat in a soft voice as she scratched her, ignoring Burke and Bellona, Comarth had run off somewhere , supposedly to Melanthius' inlaws' compartment, but she couldn't find it in her to care.

At least until Bellona said her name. Her eyes snapped up from the cat and the smile immediately left her lips as she stared at both of them. Why would Selwyn obey her? A huge sigh was heaved as she let her feet drop from the seat in front of her and onto the floor. She gave Nightstar one last scratch before cooing something about being right back after she fetched the stupid boy and then stood up. She marched right to the neighboring compartment where the door was left ajar and she could hear Comarth rambling on the other side. She pushed the door open, not paying any mind to the two new faces as her flame filled gaze landed on Comarth. "Burke and Lestrange will give me no peace until you've returned to our compartment and leave these two alone." She said, crossing her arms over her chest. "Well, I'm waiting." She was being impatient and bossy but she wanted nothing more than to just get back to her compartment and enjoy the trip as much as possible.

@Comarth Selwyn

He prattled on and on and on about his theory, to increasingly maddened degrees, to an audience that were dying on the inside. Getting to the really good part - where he recited bad Japanese - there was a disturbance behind him. He wouldn't have stopped talking or turned if it wasn't a voice he recognised, but now he cast his gaze to Dahlia as the remainder of his speech fizzled out.

"Oh."

It wasn't her instruction that had him gravitating towards her, he thought. It was that he realised how much time he had to question them, and it didn't have to be all at once.

"Fine - then I shall return," he declared, looking at the two of them, "I will speak with you another time about this." Nodding, he spun about and followed Dahlia back to their own compartment. Once back inside, he took a calculated hiss from Lestrange's cat before sitting down once more.

"Well they were disappointingly uninformative!"

@Dahlia Travers @Melanthius Burke

Once Travers had brought Comarth back into the compartment, Thius went off on him. "I promised my brother that I'd make sure Sakura and Saburo had a smooth transition integrating to Hogwarts, and there you were bloody bothering them as if they aren't going to the same destination! They barely know anybody in Britain, the last bloody thing they needed to deal with the moment they got on the train was your dragon-related rambling!"

Rubbing his temples, Thius quickly wrote a response to his father and put his crystal back in his pocket. Then, he turned to his girlfriend, grinning as he asked sweetly, "Babe, did you know that your freckles are like the constellations in the night sky?"

@Comarth Selwyn @Bellona Lestrange

Now that the strange-talking boy was away, Sakura smiled at her brother and their kitsunes reassuringly.

"He seems to be very fond of dragons," she said softly, chucking with her mouth covered. "We should figure out our crystals, and we can use them once we are at Hogwarts."

@Saburo Tokugawa

Dahlia didn't expect for her voice to even break through his tirade. He was going on about dragons after all, and usually nothing seemed to break him from the subject. But somehow as soon as she had spoken he had stopped speaking and turned to her. And he even followed her without complaint? What had gotten into him? Or maybe it was just that she had warned that all of the chaos was giving her a headache and making her murderous. Yes, that had to be it. Not whatever nonsense Bellona had spouted about using her charm. She knew charm was probably an area she was lacking in but she was okay with that.

She sat back in her seat and reached out to the cat to scratch her ears again as she hissed at Comarth. "That's a good girl. Tell him how awful he is for making me go drag him back." She once again actually smiled at the cat as she listened to Thius lecturing Comarth where the two transfers were concerned. Served him right for running out of there all half-cocked and making her follow him to drag him back. It wasn't her job to rein him in now was it?

@Comarth Selwyn @Bellona Lestrange @Melanthius Burke

Comarth was certainly looking at Melanthius as he raged at him, but he wasn't really listening too much. He was thinking about how he might question them further when they were all at Hogwarts, and thought how good they were at listening without interrupting. Most people wanted to interrupt, or not listen, or both. That was frustrating. He was very proud of all the knowledge he'd culminated whilst studying dragons over the past ten years!

Then he said what he said to Lestrange, and Comarth was brought back down to reality, feeling and looking sick.

He turned to Dahlia irritably. "There is a way of becoming a Dragon animagus. You believe me, don't you, Dahlia?"

@Dahlia Travers

She enjoyed watching Selwyn suffer. It was like seeing a damp dog come in from the rain and be scolded by its masters.

She sat in silence, smirking, although wishing Nightstar could get it together and realise who her owner was! Nightstar seemed to have taken with Dahlia almost immediately, but as her green eyes flashed in Bellona's direction, she knew of her familiar's true intentions. Her cat was trying to entice her with friendship. You see - she was such a faithful companion...

Bellona rested her head on her boyfriend's shoulder, and looked up to his compliments. "Which constellations can you see in my freckles? Trace them with your fingers if you like..." Yes - now they were shut up in a compartment together, they could be as affectionate as they wanted to be. All they had to challenge them was the other two, but Bellona was paying no mind to them for the time being.

@Melanthius Burke

His thumb began to caress her soft cheek until it landed upon the system of stars present of her face. "I see Lyra," Thius began, lightly tracing the constellation around her cheekbone. "And it's playing the most beautiful, soothing song through your voice."

Thius did tell Hector that he was at his most poetic verbally than through the written word, but he wasn't there to witness it as usual. Not like he'd want him to anyway; he'd probably forcibly separate them just because their knees touched or for some other equally insane reason.

He wrapped his free arm around her, looking deeply into her eyes. Merlin, she was genuinely the most beautiful woman in the universe, and it was only him who could see that.

Now he can focus on his lady until Head Boy duties would momentarily force him away later during the journey.

@Bellona Lestrange

”Anything is possible, even if it isn’t entirely probable.” she was throwing him a bone in her own way. She couldn’t just come out and comfort him and tell him that she believed him whole heartedly. He would probably take that as her mocking him anyway. But she believed that just about every legend had some sort of truth behind it. She smiled down at the cat who was now curled in her lap and scratched her ears a bit more. She had seen the cat be quite antisocial before and was a little shocked that she had chosen to climb into her lap rather than her owner’s but she wasn’t complaining.

Then the two lovebirds had to start their mushy talk and she immediately looked a little green around the gills. ”First I have to endure the incessant screeching outside our door, now this? Can’t you at least give us some reprieve until the train leaves the station?” she asked, knowing it would probably never happen but being hopeful it might.

@Melanthius Burke  @Bellona Lestrange  @Comarth Selwyn