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Aug. 31st, 2011 09:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alt_aliceI haven't had the time to catch my breath until now, let alone write anything down, but I've carved out a spare handful of minutes to give everyone an update. There were nine Muggleborn witches and wizards all told, courtesy of Kingsley, Remus, Sirius, and Poppy's quick thinking at the match. Some were in fairly rough shape. We lost an older man that Kingsley brought through, but everyone else is stable and recovering -- some slower than others. Kingsley and the Players have been invaluable in helping Victor in the kitchens, Stephen in the potions laboratory, and the rest of us with the other countless things that we need to do day to day on top of everything. Sirius, love, you were quite the help yesterday too, and I'm so glad we could see you before you took off for Remus and Tonks' again. Our newest additions hardly knew what to make of you, I think. I'm sorry you had to leave so soon, and that you weren't able to properly come into Moddey Dhoo while you were here, but I understand your reasons.
They are all so young.
I know, I know, our Hermione and Terry Boot are in the same basket, but to see so many of them in one place... it makes my heart hurt. The oldest among them was a first year at Hogwarts when the Protectorate came and took away his childhood, and they all hardly know what to do with themselves. I keep telling them to relax, to lie down, to heal, but the next moment they'll be up and out of bed trying to help me pour water or fold a sheet.
Only one of them has ever held a wand, the one that had just started Hogwarts -- and the rest are either thrilled or terrified (or both) about the idea that they might learn to use their own magic without being punished for it.
The exterior wounds are easy enough to see and treat, but I fear the interior ones will be much more long lasting. One dear little girl told me that her name was Porca, like a pig, which can't be her true name. We'll get the real one out of her, but that will take time. She doesn't dare look me in the eye, and all of them flinch whenever I pull out my wand to fix something.
They'll stay here, with us, where they belong. We'll get them out in the garden, and swimming in the ocean, and playing with the babies, and not doing any chores they don't feel like doing for a very very long time. I simply wouldn't feel right passing them along to Sherwood like so much cannon fodder. Right now, they need a home, they need to learn how to use a wand, and they need their share of happiness. Our first-year class has expanded from two to ten in the blink of an eye -- and they range in age from ten (our own Katherine McGivern) to twenty-one (Richard Weyman).
We are in desperate need of wands. As it is, we've been carefully doling them out and keeping all we could on reserve, but there aren't enough to go around. We aren't passing them out just yet, mind, but when they are ready for them, we will need more. Along those same lines, Mellisandra is also requesting wand core materials, as well as any books we can get her about wandlore -- she requested some specific titles from the Restricted Section at Hogwarts, Minerva, if you can see fit to loan them out to us without attracting too much notice. The sooner she is able to get some real work done the better.
I anticipate that this winter will be especially difficult with eight growing young people -- Molly knows all too well how teenagers can eat -- not to mention the Lees and Mellisandra as well. We've already started a late summer expansion of our gardens, but it won't be enough without additional outside supplies.
On an entirely different note, I received an owl from Neville yesterday that was certainly unexpected. It's about a classmate of his, Seamus Finnegan, who recently confided in him that the Protectorate has been holding him as a hostage of sorts ever since he came to Hogwarts so that his family will work harder to control the muggles in Ireland, and that were the Irish to be linked with this recent attack, he fully expects to be killed.
Neville has never quite seen eye to eye with Seamus Finnegan, from what I'd heard of him from Neville in the past, indeed, I have been led to believe that he's quite loyal, and that he's not the sort that Neville would trust -- but he's quite concerned about this, believes it to be quite genuine, and has asked us specifically what we could do to help. Frank and me, that is.
Minerva, what do you know of this? What sort of boy is Seamus Finnegan? Is he in real danger? Is there anything we should do? I fear that he's not the sort that would be grateful for a rescue from the likes of us, from what Neville has said, but I can't just simply sit on my hands.
They are all so young.
I know, I know, our Hermione and Terry Boot are in the same basket, but to see so many of them in one place... it makes my heart hurt. The oldest among them was a first year at Hogwarts when the Protectorate came and took away his childhood, and they all hardly know what to do with themselves. I keep telling them to relax, to lie down, to heal, but the next moment they'll be up and out of bed trying to help me pour water or fold a sheet.
Only one of them has ever held a wand, the one that had just started Hogwarts -- and the rest are either thrilled or terrified (or both) about the idea that they might learn to use their own magic without being punished for it.
The exterior wounds are easy enough to see and treat, but I fear the interior ones will be much more long lasting. One dear little girl told me that her name was Porca, like a pig, which can't be her true name. We'll get the real one out of her, but that will take time. She doesn't dare look me in the eye, and all of them flinch whenever I pull out my wand to fix something.
They'll stay here, with us, where they belong. We'll get them out in the garden, and swimming in the ocean, and playing with the babies, and not doing any chores they don't feel like doing for a very very long time. I simply wouldn't feel right passing them along to Sherwood like so much cannon fodder. Right now, they need a home, they need to learn how to use a wand, and they need their share of happiness. Our first-year class has expanded from two to ten in the blink of an eye -- and they range in age from ten (our own Katherine McGivern) to twenty-one (Richard Weyman).
We are in desperate need of wands. As it is, we've been carefully doling them out and keeping all we could on reserve, but there aren't enough to go around. We aren't passing them out just yet, mind, but when they are ready for them, we will need more. Along those same lines, Mellisandra is also requesting wand core materials, as well as any books we can get her about wandlore -- she requested some specific titles from the Restricted Section at Hogwarts, Minerva, if you can see fit to loan them out to us without attracting too much notice. The sooner she is able to get some real work done the better.
I anticipate that this winter will be especially difficult with eight growing young people -- Molly knows all too well how teenagers can eat -- not to mention the Lees and Mellisandra as well. We've already started a late summer expansion of our gardens, but it won't be enough without additional outside supplies.
On an entirely different note, I received an owl from Neville yesterday that was certainly unexpected. It's about a classmate of his, Seamus Finnegan, who recently confided in him that the Protectorate has been holding him as a hostage of sorts ever since he came to Hogwarts so that his family will work harder to control the muggles in Ireland, and that were the Irish to be linked with this recent attack, he fully expects to be killed.
Neville has never quite seen eye to eye with Seamus Finnegan, from what I'd heard of him from Neville in the past, indeed, I have been led to believe that he's quite loyal, and that he's not the sort that Neville would trust -- but he's quite concerned about this, believes it to be quite genuine, and has asked us specifically what we could do to help. Frank and me, that is.
Minerva, what do you know of this? What sort of boy is Seamus Finnegan? Is he in real danger? Is there anything we should do? I fear that he's not the sort that would be grateful for a rescue from the likes of us, from what Neville has said, but I can't just simply sit on my hands.
no subject
Date: 2011-09-01 03:31 pm (UTC)Do send me their sizes, Alice. They're too old for soft knitted toys and the like, I know, but I have just received quite a bit of recycled yarn, and I can knit them some jumpers and slippers, or perhaps knitted shawls for the girls. Individualized clothing, you know, handmade, something to make them feel pampered. They need to learn again that they have the right to be comforted, to have their tastes consulted. Let me know if any of them admit to favourite colours. And also let me know if there is anything else that they might need that I could find on the barter network. Would any of them like any books, perhaps, for example? Or anything to help them individualize their quarters, knick knacks and the like?
That's quite a horrifying bit of news about Seamus Finnegan! Ron hasn't talked about him very much, but it's clear that there has been rather a split that's developed in his dormitory, with Ron and Neville on one side and Seamus and Dean on the other (Arthur has been rather bitterly disappointed about Dean). Ron has said one or two things that have given us the distinct impression that Seamus has rather bought into the Protectorate rhetoric--but if this is true, that sheds a whole new light, doesn't it? The poor boy! He must have lived with his heart in his mouth any time in the past three years.
no subject
Date: 2011-09-01 06:37 pm (UTC)I don't know how many times I wish we had our own version of the library at Hogwarts. We've culled quite a bit from the local muggle libraries, of course, which helps, and our last shipment from Lazlo (which seems like ages ago) had some rather nice reference books and the like, but it's something we're always looking for more of!
no subject
Date: 2011-09-01 03:40 pm (UTC)We could ask Mundungus Fletcher, but frankly, I wouldn't be inclined to trust him if he pops up presenting something as a dragon heartstring or a phoenix feather. It'd be more likely to have come from a lizard or a parrot.
Emmeline reminds me that old time wandmakers sometimes used other cores, like kneazle whiskers. I'm not sure they would be as powerful or predictable, of course. Do we know anyone who has a kneazle?
no subject
Date: 2011-09-01 06:39 pm (UTC)And that's a notion about Hermione helping with the unicorns. If she's willing and able, she'd certainly be ideal.
Charlie Weasley might have some connections to a supply of dragon heartstring, but I'm not sure how tightly regulated it is, if he'd be able to squirrel any away for us.
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Date: 2011-09-02 02:22 pm (UTC)I'll write to him at once and ask.
no subject
Date: 2011-09-02 02:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-02 02:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-02 04:13 am (UTC)