Repello Muggletum: a Hogwarts Roleplay discussion

A tower on the East side of the castle, the Owlery has a winding stone staircase leading to the circular room that holds all of the students' and staffs' owls. Here you can visit your owls and use them to write letters to loved ones. But watch your step, as the owls don't care where they lay their food remains or droppings.

RP here.

"It's pretty cold," Clover murmured to her friend as she made it to the top of the staircase, wrapping her arms around herself. She hadn't thought she needed a scarf and gloves, as she'd brought a good coat, but now they didn't seem so bad. The owls, however, seemed content in their nests.

"I told you," Maybelle replied with a giggle. She whistled, then called,"Wes!" A barn owl took off from somewhere above them, gliding down towards the pair. He landed gracefully on Maybelle's outstretched forearm.

"I really need to listen to you," Clover mumbled. Maybelle was smart, and she knew better than her. It was nearly always like that, considering she was Muggle-born and not so comfortable with the wizard world as Maybelle was, but Clover didn't mind that.

She lit up when the owl came gliding down. "Hi Wesley," she cooed to the bird.

"Yep. Next time." Maybelle stroked the owl's feathers with her free hand, Wesley shaking out his feathers as he nuzzled up against her hand. "Come on, then," she said, gesturing for Clover to pet him. "He's really soft."

"Oh, he is," Clover smiled, running her hands over Wesley's soft, sleek feathers. The owl looked at her with that masked-face and liquid eyes. It was too adorable. "I wish I could have an owl. My mum says it's not a normal pet to have, though, in the Muggle World."

"I can send Wesley," Maybelle suggested. "Then you could see him without having to take care of him during break." Wesley cocked his head, then shook out its wings, as if to say that he could do it.

"Really? That would be great. And he could bring our letters back and forth," Clover added. She let out a small laugh at Wesley's response. "I don't think my cats would have a problem with him, too. They get along fine with my parakeets."

"Yeah. I think he'd like that. It'll give him a chance to see a change in scenery," Maybelle replied, smiling. "My mum says I'm not allowed to let him out hunting very often. We live in London. It'd be a bit weird to see an owl about."

Clover nodded. She lived in Worcestershire, which wasn't nearly as populated as London, but that didn't make a pet owl any more common. "Right, yeah. I live near some woods and trails. He'll probably like that," she added.

Maybelle nodded. "It'll let him hunt for a bit. He's usually independent, but he likes to cuddle every now and then," she replied, bringing the owl close to her. "He probably won't nip you or anything."

"That's alright. It's like with cats - sometimes they let you know when they don't want to be petted." Sometimes they simply walked away, but on occasion, Clover's cats would give her a small bite to let her know they were done.

"Exactly." Maybelle stroked the owl. "Wesley's nice most of the time. Isn't that right, Wes?" The owl nuzzled up against her hand. "Here. You hold him." She carefully pried the owl away from her and handed him over to Clover.

She had held birds before, but never really an owl. The talons were intimidating, but Wesley's grip on her arm was firm without being painful. "He's quite light," Clover observed, surprised. Owls were such magnificent animals, it was strange how small he felt on her arm.

Maybelle stroked Wesley fondly. "I know. I was surprised, too, the first time I held him. I mean, we have another owl at home, but he's old, and kind of chubby," she added with a giggle.

Clover laughed. "Some of these guys are huge. Like...that one," she said, pointing her chin towards a large great grey owl, staring at them with big yellow eyes. "If I could, I'd get a smaller owl. But not so tiny it can't bring packages and such, even though they're quite cute."

"Those are adorable," Maybelle laughed. "My cousin's got one. The owls that can barely lift up a package, I mean." It had flown through her bedroom door and collapsed on her bed with the package still tied to its foot.

"It would be so funny if you needed to send a big package, but all you had was all these little owls. So then you'd have this fleet of miniature owls carrying this package," Clover mused, trying not to laugh too hard. She didn't want to startle Wesley.

"That'd be awful," Maybelle replied with another laugh. "But also adorable." She could imagine a flock of little owls struggling to carry one package. "It would just look like a moving box in the sky."

"I would love to have a flock of tiny owls following me around, like a feathery cloud. They could all be white, and then I'd call them a blizzard of owls," Clover said, giggling.

"That's brilliant. It'd be a hassle to take care of all of them, though," she noted. "But whatever. Still a fantastic idea."

"Not really," Clover said, tilting her head as she thought about it. "They'd just be a unit, and do everything at the same time. I could train them to be like little soldiers."

"I guess so." Maybelle shrugged. "I just can't imagine having that many owls at the same time. Well, I guess I can, since we're in the Owlrey, but you know what I mean."

"Yeah," Clover said with a laugh, glancing around at the walls full of owls. Most of them were sleeping, tucked into themselves and keeping warm against the chill. "One owl a person is enough."

"Exactly. And I think they agree," she added, laying a kiss on the top of Wesley's head. "Isn't that right, Wes?"

"I wonder," said Clover, holding her arm out for Maybelle to take Wesley back. She was getting tired, even if the bird was light. "If they like taking the mail. I mean, of course they like flying about and stuff, but maybe sometimes they just want to go off on their own, you know?"

Maybelle scooped Wesley into her arms. "I try to let Wesley out to hunt every month or so. Just so that he can get out of my room, but I don't know. There really isn't much of a way to ask them."

"I guess. I wonder if anyone's ever tried, though," Clover said, the idea springing very suddenly into her head. She wasn't all too familiar with the limitations of magic, but it didn't seem impossible. "Using magic to understand animals, I mean."

"Probably. I'm sure there's someone out there who can understand them. I mean, there are Parseltongues, right? I should ask my dad about it," she added as an afterthought. Her father worked with magical creatures. Surely he'd know of someone who could converse with some form of animal.

"Parseltongues are a bit weird, though. Isn't that a genetic thing?" Clover didn't really follow how those kinds of things worked. It made her dizzy, trying to process the exceptions and limitations. Muggle science things like genetics were much easier to accept and explain. "Either way, it'd still be cool, I think."

"I don't know." Maybelle shrugged. It was then that Wesley decided that he had enough play time, and wiggled free from his owner's grip before flying back up to his nest. Her shoulders slumped. "I can send a letter to my dad about it, if you want."

"If it's not a problem, then sure," Clover agreed with a nod, watching Wesley fly back up to his high perch. "We should get going now, before my fingers freeze off. I can barely feel my nose."

Maybelle chuckled, but modded. "All right. I'll race you back to the castle," she added before speeding down the spiral staircase.

Clover was late in realising it. She raced after Maybelle a few seconds later, shouting a laughing, "No fair!" as she chased her friend across the grounds.

Erin dreaded the weekly coming of the mail now. She didn't have her own owl, having chosen a lovely little frog in third year, but her father always sent either the family owl, Jeremiah (out of all names!) or a variety of owls she was sure wasn't his own but his associates'. She had resigned herself to lie at first, then taken to lie shamelessly after the Christmas incident.

She squinted at the foggy afternoon landscape and to the grey skies, where she could see the large figure of Jeremiah; a large brown and grim owl that flapped his wings energetically towards her. Reluctantly, she stretched out her arm to receive him.

Logan saw another person, standing with an outstretched arm and facing the blurred sky. "Hello," he acknowledged them with a nod. His eyes skipped over the girl and fell upon the owls' nests, looking for a familiar brown and white barred owl. "Lammy," he called softly up to the bird, breaking into a smile when a bright-eyed feathery face popped out.

"Come on, lovely." Lammergeier was down in a matter of seconds, where she settled on Logan's shoulder.

Erin couldn't help but turn her head when the boy--he was a Ravenclaw, she recalled him easily--called out for his own owl to come to him. She immediately smiled at the glance of the lovely fluffy owl, and ignored Jeremiah when he perched on her arm, his claws digging in her sleeve.

"Aww! He looks adorable!" blurted out Erin. She couldn't help it; cute animals always made her feel silly.

"She," he corrected.

Logan regarded his crooning companion, the corner of his mouth quirking into one of his easy smiles. "Do you hear that, Lammy? You've got an admirer." The owl merely stared at him with its wide, unblinking eyes. "Hmm. I suppose that's Owlish for 'thank you,'" he said to Erin, after a fairly long moment of staring back at Lammergeier.

Erin reached out a habd to stroke the adorable little white owl--"May I?"--when Jeremiah hooted indignantly and dug his claws frutger into her skin to get her attention. Erim turned to the owl and stared angrily at it. He needn't make the job any worse! She simply snatched the letter from its beak and extended her arm to motion it to fly away. He wouldn't budge.

Erin sighed. "I'm sorry. Jeremiah never leaves until I read the letter." This had never given her trouble, no one had been as rude as to peek over her shoulder, but Jeremiah was just more determined to make everything a pain.

"Oh, he's just doing his job. Aren't you?" he addressed the grumpy Jeremiah with his unfaltering smile. The bird seemed only to want a little recognition from the girl. "Go on, then," Logan urged her with a nod at the letter. If it was the only way to get the owl to go, then he did not want to get in the way.

Erin gave the owl another disapproving look, which was returned just as sourly, and she opened the envelope. Her eyes reluctantly read over the usual greeting lines and her eyebrows creased with worry as she kept reading. Details for the kitchen and the Astronomy tower, also how to access the house elves--but she glanced up from the paper with a scowl on her face. Jeremiah was pleased by then, and unclinged himself from her to take flight.

Logan had the courtesy not to peek at the letter, although he couldn't help but notice her expression. After the bird had taken to the sky, he asked gently, "Are you alright? Because you seem down." He couldn't imagine what was in the letter, but it didn't really matter the reason, considering she was clearly upset.

Erin bit her lip, a habit she had acquired whilst learning to lie, and shook her head. "It's nothing," she reassured, and after carefully folding it up and placing it back in the folds of her robe she tried to go back to the same hapiness she has assumed before, and was unsuccesful.

Logan did not wish to pry, and so he extended his arm instead, so that Lammergeier could hop down onto his forearm. The owl blinked curiously at the girl. "You're welcome to pet her, although I should warn you, she likes to nibble on clothes." Logan's offer was accompanied by a smile that attempted to be reassuring, but he could not help very much without knowing her predicament.

Erin's smile came back to its previous radiance when Lammy approached her curiously, and per her shyly. "I don't mind. I've always loved pets even if my mother can't take anything larger than my frog," she confessed. The owl's large eyes were on her as she stroked her fluffy head, and began to nibble at her sleeve. Erin just laughed and, pulling her arm away, stroked it with the other hand. "She's lovely. Who is she named after?"

"Well, her full name is Lammergeier," he said in a matter-of-factly tone. "A species of vulture, I believe, also called the Bearded Vulture. Gorgeous wings they have, sort of like Lammy but less like a puffball. It looks as though they shine when they fly, like a chrome finish on the feathers. But I mostly called her Lammergeier because it's fun to say, don't you think?" Logan asked, his smile widening into a grin as the girl's confidence seemed to grow.

"It sounds so majestic when you say it but to her it's just her funny name," admitted Erin with a comprehensive smile. She really mossed seeing this kind of Ravenclaw--who weren't either mostly arrogantly smart or eccentric. The ones that loved knowledge but didn't forget what was going around them.

Lammergier made a sudden nab at her letter and she shrieked in surprise and dropped it, then laughed.

"Perhaps," he said, looking again at the owl. Logan had often wondered what she had going on inside her head. He couldn't know if she liked flying to and fro, carrying something that she, presumably, did not understand. When Lammergeier made a grab at the letter, he decided for himself that perhaps she did like it.

"I've got something for you, Lammy. It's for dad," he said, producing a letter from inside his robes. The owl took it eagerly, feathers ruffling, and took off.

With a carefully wrapped package tucked under his arm, Cecil walked up the steps of the Owlrey. With no owl of his own, he was left to find a school owl that would hopefully not damage the package on its way to his father. As he rounded the corner, he found he was not alone. Kit Silverman, he recalled her name. Same year as himself, Slytherin. He gave her a nod and a smile in greeting before proceeding to find an owl.

((I tried posting this from my phone and it didn't go through.))

"Owl trouble?" His greeting smile turned to one of amusement. Though he preferred to be far from any animal, the owls seemed to get along with him well enough. He let out a little click to call an owl down.