Amy continued to stroke his cat as she curiously watched the small boy before her. She really was a bit surprised, and somewhat impressed, that the young lad had not yet fled her. The Hufflepuff girl certainly knew that she was not making herself very friendly to him. It did impress her slightly, if she was honest, that Henry seemed to be preserving with trying to make conversation with her.

The 14 year old raised an eyebrow, it seemed that the little boy was not getting her, rather nasty, sarcasm in what she said. She was about to inform the first year that she was being sarcastic but the tentative smile on her face convinced her otherwise. Despite what some may think, and her actions might suggest at times, she was not a total cold and unpleasant person and she didn’t really have the heart to tell this boy that she meant that he was less intelligent than the cat. Something told her that would probably hurt Henry a bit too much and she really didn’t want to do that. Especially as he seemed to be friends with her cousin. Although, that being said, she still could not see why the boy was actually bothering her.

”The valleys? It is the area in south Wales where I live and were Merthyr Tydfil is. It is quite nice, very hilly as you can imagine, a bit remote. I like it there” home was home as they say and she could not imagine growing up anywhere else. Cities seemed to be too busy and too noisy for her liking. And she could not really image living anywhere else other than Wales. Well, apart from Scotland while she was at Hogwarts of course. But Wales was were her heart was at. As the old saying goes, you can take the girl out of Wales, but you cannot take Wales out of the girl. That was very much true of her.

Uh-huh… Amy said with a slightly concerned rise of an eyebrow. She really worried about her cousins overactive imagination sometimes and the eagerness that he seemed to have to share his weird monsters and beasts with other people. She wished that he had more self-control in that department. ”Dominic does have some very…interesting ideas sometimes” she concluded still sounding concerned. It was not a good way for the boy to make friends, but at least he seemed to have succeeded in doing that with this little Hufflepuff that was before her. 

”As far as I am aware there are not any, no” she admitted to Henry, believing that it was probably best not to delve any deeper into what exactly such a creature was. Knowing Dominic, he probably told Henry it was something horrific. She looked curiously at Henry as he pondered out aloud what they were called. Amy didn’t have the foggiest, Dominic had told her of so many different and weird beasts and creatures that she had lost track of them by now. ”A I said, Dom has a very active imagination.”

Loathed as I am to say this, and I am not saying this lightly…” she said with a bit of resentment in her voice ”….but….I think that, on this one thing, for once in his entire life, that my brother is right on them not going to cancel Herbology.” she hated admitting that Donald was right about anything. ”I would like for them to start teaching muggle studies again. I think it is important we learn about them. I think it is very important” she said calmly, trying not to give away too much to a boy that she did not really trust to be discreet.

She frowned as Henry conformed that Donald had been putting out his academic nonsense. ”Sounds like he was backtracking a bit…” the young Welsh witch shook her head ”As I said, he talks nonsense with that. Just ignore him,” she informed the young Hufflepuff sounding a bit dismissive of her siblings opinion. ”But what?...” she asked with a raised eyebrow ”…I don’t think you need to worry about any classes being any less important than another. All lessons have some value, even if it is just something you are doing because you are interested in it.”

”Well, he can be a bit sensitive about being called stupid.” she said, then again she supposed that most people wold find being called an idiot offensive. ”But it is a foolish position for him to take. Thanks for letting me know, I will keep an eye out on him and make sure that he does not do anything too foolish.” the fourth year might come across as cold and uncaring at times, but she did genuinely care about her family and friends. The young witch was super glad that her little Gryffindor cousin had someone as sensible as Henry seemed to look out for him. She shot the young lad a small smile. ”Hogwarts is fairly safe, but for someone who wants to do something dangerous, well there is plenty of danger about…” she shifted in the seat, Lancelot didn’t budge. What was really concerning Amy was if Dominic decided to go on an adventure in the Forbidden Forest. That would cause the small boy to get into a lot of trouble if caught, and there was plenty of danger in the forest for those sneaking about it. Maybe wisely, Amy didn’t tell Henry her fears.

”I guess he would be too embarrassed to accept my help. I would not use it against him or taunt him. I genuinely want him to do okay. I genuinely want him to succeed at transfiguration” she felt that the younger boy didn’t seem clear on where she was coming from. She was very protective of her brother, of course she was. She would do anything for him, even if she was not going to admit it. If there was any way she could support Donald getting better grades in transfiguration, in being more skilful at it, she would. Amy really did hate to see him be so upset over his failure at transfiguration, she really did. ”I do guess there might be an element of him wanting to succeed by himself without needing the help of his older sister” she admitted. She wondered why that was the case, personally Amy would take any help she could get. Boys are weird she thought to herself as she sibling’s unwillingness to accept her help. Of course, she didn’t want Donnie’s help with flying but that was different.

”He is a great flier, I think he is a real asset to the Ravenclaw team.” she admitted again, pride in her brother’s achievements coming out. ”I think he is probably one of the best seekers in Hogwarts” but then she was very bias over that. She hoped that the Hufflepuff seeker was not in ear shot of her saying such things. Although the Welsh lass was sure that they would understand if they were. ”Charms is one of my brother’s strongest subjects, but transfiguration is quiet important as well. “ When Henry said that he wouldn’t tell Don what she just said, Amy shot him a grateful smile “Thanks” she said. She knew that an only child would not understand such things, so she was glad that he was co-operating with her.

Amy watched Lancelot as he gave the younger boy attention. If Lancelot was anything, he was a good judge of character. ”I have, had him since before then, he is a very lovely cat” Lancelot started purring as Henry gave him attention. ”I think that the cats would be able to explore places that we can get too. They are smaller than us after all, and cats are very flexible and agile then we are, after all.” she gave another shrug to the boy. Amy was sure that the cats would have awesome stories to tell and had found all sorts of nooks and crannies that no human would ever be able to find.

”I am sorry to hear he is not getting on well with the other boys…” it actually made the 14 year old quiet angry, if she was younger, and those Gryffindor boys were bullying her cousin, then they would have been in a lot of trouble .As it was, the fourth year did not think her going and attacking a group of first years would end well for her. ”He does have a lot of interesting ideas and sometimes he can come up with smart things to say. It just a shame that he also talks a lot of guff.” the Welsh witch sighed heavily. They were all at a loss about what they could do to help Dominic with that.

”I am glad the does have a friend in the house though.” Lizzie sounded like a good person and she was glad that he had some company in Gryffindor. It could be terribly lonely in the castle if you had no friends in your own house, or even worst no friends at all. Dominic had Henry and Lizzie it seemed, and that was good. It gave her some reassurance that her cousin was going to be alright.

”Aha…” the young lady said slowly. ”I don’t like the way Don tries to get rid of Dominic sometimes. I just tell Dominic to go away if he is bothering me too much. Making up stories just feeds into his imagination and doesn’t help me.” it was something that clearly bothered Amy, it was something that she wanted to put a stop to.

The Hufflepuff female welcomed Lancelot back to her laps and stroked him ”I am sure he wasn’t going to eat you Lancelot” she told her cat in a soft voice. Certainly, in a lot more gentle and easy-going tone than she had been talking to Henry with. She glanced up to Henry when he asked about eggs and wool hurting animals. It was an interesting question and one where she was not entirely sure of the answer. Wouldn’t farmers look after their animals? It would make sense that they did, right? Amy certainly thought so.

”I don’t think collecting eggs would hurt chickens.” she said with some confidence ”And it is very cruel not to sheer a sheep, as the wool will build up on the poor creature and they get covered in tics and develop other issues from it, so it is kinder that they are sheered.” that was something that she was told by her aunts and uncles who worked on farms ”..and the same goes for cows. It is cruel not to milk a cow as their udders will hurt and they could get an infection from it and die” that again was something which she believed to be true. ”I think vegans have the wrong idea and put their own bizarre morality ahead of the genuine welfare of the animals” she concluded sounding confident in her ideas and view.

”No, not for just two people not eating meat. I don’t think you or Dominic have to worry about causing people to lose jobs. I will certainly carry on eating meat. And I am sure others will as well. So you will not cause anyone to lose their job, don’t worry about that.” she sought to re-assure the boy that, if he wanted to go vegetarian with Dominic, than that was indeed fine. It wasn’t going to collapse the entire rural economy of Wales, nor the UK come to it, just because two little boys decided that they were not going to eat meat anymore.

The teenaged witch frowned slightly when Henry said it was not nice to insult someone, she vaguely wondered if that was a knock at her for what she had been saying about her own brother. ”You are right, it does not make any sense. But this is what these people are like. Well some of them anyway. I think they believe that by shouting people down they can win the debate, but you are right. It is no way to convince someone.” it was a bit of an insightful comment from an elven year old boy if Amy was honest with herself. She was slightly impressed he came up with it.

Politeness was a basic virtue, maybe the basic virtue, when interacting with others. Of course it was, for who would ever be rude to someone without even the slightest reason. Admittedly, Henry couldn’t think of a single reason that would excuse bad behaviour, but then he couldn’t know everything. Knowing his limitations was also very important, very clever people had apparently already said that. Clever people had already said a lot of more or less clever things, and Henry tried to keep them in his mind, at least the ones that he understood. It was always good to have a second opinion from someone older and wiser though he often had trouble remembering who had said exactly what. Books, which were full of intelligent observations, were often pretty hard to read. It tended to be a little boring. But he could read them, and there was nothing wrong with sometimes needing a little bit of patience and stamina. Not everything could be easy. In fact, it was incredibly simple to choose wrongly, and Henry was very much scared of doing so. He didn’t want to hurt others by his decisions. So he did his best in conversations to listen and be attentive and, of course, polite.

For being polite, he didn’t need anybody else to tell him that this was the proper way to behave. His own conscience did not let waver in his conviction that it was right. Not being nice could insult the other person’s feelings, and that was the very last thing Henry wanted to ever do. It was the one constant in his life, the iron will not to act in a way that would make someone else suffer. Because once you started with such bad behaviour, you couldn’t know whether you’d be able to stop again. It was terrifying him. He wanted to be good and well-behaved, but then, sometimes, the rules he was given were a little ridiculous like that he shouldn’t climb up trees. It wasn’t too bad when he didn’t always listen to them then, right? But how had he come to think of disobedience again just because the girl he was talking to (or was he even — he wasn’t too sure about that) seemed a little unwelcoming.

But she had a cat, and she had expressed some respect for Gunther and, most important, she was his friend’s cousin, so she was beyond questioning. He couldn’t say that he exactly liked her from his first impression, but there was enough background that he wouldn’t stoop so low as to think badly of her just because she came off as slightly inimical. Maybe he simply wasn’t a great judge of character. Or it was the fault of the light. Or she was tired. Or… there were a hundred legitimate reasons why she wouldn’t appear as friendly as the average person he talked to. And slowly, slowly, there seemed to come understandable things out of her mouth. She gave him a detailed answer when he asked after the valleys, which was honestly more than he had dared to hope when he had asked in the first place. “It sounds beautiful,” he said quietly once she had stopped speaking. She enjoyed nature, that was one positive personality trait he could add to what he already knew of her.

He would never have anticipated this, but after this initial rather cold exchange with his older housemate, there was something reassuring to talk of Dominic even if it meant recounting all the oddities he had been told by him. Whatever he said about the Gryffindor, it was listened to with solemnity, which was more than could be expected from the most patient of souls. He certainly had been far more freaked out hearing about these things. But she knew her cousin he supposed. And she did give him a serious answer. No, there were no animals that could be mistaken for oranges as far as she knew. And if she didn’t know, then why should Dominic? It couldn’t be that the Gryffindor had some sixth sense where detecting animals was concerned… or could there? That was a possibility he had never even considered before. Maybe Dominic had not too much, but he too little imagination. This was a scary idea, and he was very glad to hear the girl also chalking it all up to her cousin’s fantasy. She was related to him, she could judge him better than he could. “He does,” he agreed. “I just wished it contained less fruit-shaped animals. I now sometimes want to bite in an apple and then I look at it and suddenly I ask myself, you know, how would I know whether it isn’t alive. That can get creepy.” He shuddered.

He nodded relatively collectedly when she too assured him Herbology wouldn’t be cancelled. He had by now accepted that all too big changes wouldn’t happen in all probability, but it was good to hear it repeated. “Yes, Muggles are very important,” Henry obediently echoed her. “Donald said so too. And that it’s better not to ask questions because the administration doesn’t like them… something like that…” he concluded lamely. It was very unsettling that maybe he couldn’t trust those whose profession it was to support students. He didn’t like to think of it. At all.

At first he was a bit disconcerted at how she talked about her brother. It was somewhat dismissive, and it almost made him worry that she didn’t care about Donald’s opinion. It wouldn’t be nice to look down on others, but then he found himself nodding again. It was a really wise thing to say he thought. Everything had its value. Even being interested in something gave it value. Actually, that was a beautiful thought. Thinking over the matter, he smiled to himself. “It’s sort… we give value to things, do you think that’s true? Because existence in itself isn’t rated in any way, it’s how we view it. That’s right?” He had tried to reword what she had said, and he really hoped he had got it correctly.

“Thank you,” he said when their conversation turned back to Dominic. “Yes, I can’t imagine anyone who’d like being called stupids. It wouldn’t be nice to do that in the first place. And it’s not like I did. I said what he was saying wasn’t thought through. That’s not the same as calling someone stupid, is it?” The latter would be insulting, and naturally he didn’t want to insult his friend. He had only wanted to make arguments against an opinion that he thought, and Amy apparently agreed, unwise. That wasn’t a bad thing to do. He really hoped it wasn’t. And even if it had been rude of him to talk about this with Dominic’s cousin, she had promised to look out for him, so that was a good thing. He couldn’t have done anything too bad when the consequences were good. “I suppose there’s always danger when you’re not taking enough care,” he ventured. “Like you can make a potion blow up if you’re not paying attention to what you’re doing. And when there’s no professor to supervise, it’s all the more important to be careful.”

It almost slipped out of Henry’s mouth that it’d be stupid not to accept help when it was offered, but he stopped himself in time. That would be too near to an insult, especially as he was talking about someone who wasn’t there. It would be very, very bad to speak ill behind someone’s back, even more so when the someone had been as nice to him as Donald. And it wasn’t like he had Donald’s version of the story, so maybe Amy was misinterpreting things. “Yes, I suppose,” he reduced himself to say in agreement. He didn’t understand why someone would refuse the help of a family member — or anybody’s help to be honest. Maybe pride? Wishing to prove that he was independent? Something like that. It didn’t really make sense to Henry, but he assumed that it might to other people.

“I don’t know much about flying,” he admitted. “And I haven’t seen any Ravenclaw match yet… I think.” He wasn’t entirely sure about that one. He certainly couldn’t remember paying attention to their Seeker. But when Amy said all these things, he certainly wouldn’t doubt them. As his sister, she had to know after all. “It depends on what you later on do I suppose?” he suggested. “I guess there are branches of magic where Transfiguration isn’t used that much. Donald said your parents work at an apothecary…” Or had that only been the dad? He should have payed more attention. “There, it’s not really needed, is it?” He actually had never thought much about how which subject would later on help for work. Not that he had thought much about what he would do after school anyway. Go on adventures maybe… but that was a little unspecific. And maybe it would be hard to make a living out of it too. He shook his head. He had time, many, many years in fact, to think about this.

“Yes, I was thinking that too,” he said, caressing Lancelot while Gunther had somehow managed to turn around in his arms so that he was facing the other cat. He was glad for the additional company, now that their conversation turned to Dominic’s problems. It was sad to know that his friend was struggling and nothing he had suggested seemed to be working. He wasn’t all too sure admittedly how zealously Dominic had tried to follow his suggestions, but that was beside the point. He didn’t understand why the other boys were not more patient. Maybe it was because they were Gryffindors. Dominic himself tended to be irascible. Most likely, he wouldn’t get along with himself. Or if he would, they’d make so much noise together that nobody else could stand being near them. But he was thinking up an idiotic scenario. His yearmate couldn’t muliply, and Henry was rather grateful for that. “He does,” he said to Amy. “We’ve already talked about a lot of interesting stuff. Like how to practice Magizoology. Or how to live properly. More like a tiger or a bug. Stuff like that. It’s great talking to him.” Though not necessarily talking for more than two hours. As much as he didn’t want to criticize his friend, after two hours he did usually start to feel exhausted.

“Yes, you’ve got a point there,” he said thoughtfully. Maybe it was sometimes better to be rude than to lie. But... no. This couldn't be, could it? Both options sounded wrong, but they were talking about a case where the two persons involved were close. Rudeness seemed easier to forgive than falseness. It would be more hurtful to be lied to, he guessed, than to be told once in a while that one was annoying — not that Henry hoped he would ever have to experience anything like that. Maybe he should be grateful that he didn’t have much family.

Henry felt his face getting red. “No, Lancelot,” he said, standing up again but keeping his distance in case the cat would take him for a threat. “I’d never harm you. Not even stroke you the wrong way. I’m not eating meat at all now, you don’t even have to share your mice with me.” To be honest, he didn’t think he’d eat mice even if he consumed other forms of meat, but he decided that Lancelot didn’t need to know that detail.

He supposed that she was right and collecting eggs couldn’t physically hurt chicken. But there was the question whether the hens wouldn’t be depressed that their babies were taken from them. And killed… he had never thought about this before. Eating eggs… was that eating babies? That’d be monstrous. He half opened his mouth but then decided against asking his fellow Hufflepuff. He felt like there were more suitable persons for this question. But at least there was nothing wrong with wool. On the opposite, it was helping the sheep. That was good to learn. He wanted to be just as relieved about the cows, but then he paused. “Couldn’t the calves drink the milk?” he asked, confused. “I… I thought that’s what milk is for. For the babies…” Wasn’t it like that? Or couldn’t the calves drink enough? This was strange.

“That’s good,” he answered. “It’d be horrible if you wanted to help the animals and ended up ruining the farmers. Then the farmers would have to get rid of their animals too and…” What would they do with them? Just release into wilderness? Or… worse? He decided not to think about it, as no farmer was obviously going to be ruined because of him. He sighed deeply with relief.

He nodded along her speech about arguing. “Yes, you’re right. I’m glad I’m in Hufflepuff. Here people don’t get loud that often, don’t you think?” Or had he said something wrong now? Was he being mean to anybody who was not in Hufflepuff? He hoped that wasn’t the case. But… he was glad to be a Hufflepuff.