Michael lay on his back reading his latest issue of Rolling Stone. He finished early on a friday lunchtime, and usually chose to spend them out by the lake, lolling in the grass under the shade of the trees. It was relatively quiet there, most students still enduring double potions with Slughorn, or locked up in the library deep in revision. Michael preferred to do his studying outside.

Stacked by his side was his latest Muggle Studies homework, a textbook for Care of Magical Creatures, some seedlings for Herbology that he was meant to be tending to, and some gillyweed (it aided his concentration. It did.) He was having half an hour to himself first though, catching up on his interests before he got stuck into the real hard work. Unfortunately he was having trouble concentrating on even that. His mind was only half on his magazine; the other half was contemplating Roarke.

He seemed to spend an awful lot of time contemplating Roarke.

He hadn't seen her for a few days now, despite sharing a common room and regularly getting together for homework help. In truth, Michael had been keeping a low profile. He wasn't sure what was going on between them, and he was even less sure what his reaction to....whatever it was that was going on, should actually be. They were friends, certainly. And it wasn't as though anything had happened between them, just that things had just been... different lately. Sort of. Maybe? He couldn't really put his finger on it.

Throughout the summer Michael and Roarke had kept in contact, sending letters via owl and opening up to each other in a way that neither of them had expected. They'd always been close, but this was something else entirely; her letters had been the highlight of his summer, and he relished their new found intimacy with every one she sent. She talked of how frustrated she was with those around her, and how narrow-minded they seemed to ways outside of the wizarding world. He finally told her of his problems with the Purebloods, and was immensely grateful when she didn't react with ideas to blow open his secret to Dumbledore . Every letter received had to be read over and over until he could practically recite them by memory; she had become without doubt, his closest friend and confidante over those few months. Michael had developed a crick in his neck from constantly glancing up at the skyline for her owl.

The problem came when they arrived back at Hogwarts; every meeting they had had after that summer seemed tinged with something unfathomably awkward. Roarke was strangely distracted whenever they got together, almost as though she wanted to be somewhere else. Michael himself sometimes felt the urge to turn and run when he saw her.

There was no denying that their relationship seemed changed somehow, but why was beyond him. He certainly couldn't explain Roarke's behavior, but even his own baffled him. He felt... anxious around her. Unsettled.

"Do I like Roarke?" he wondered aloud Camus, who was perched on the tree above him, gave a little hoot of encouragement.

"Nobody asked you," Michael called up at her. Camus shuffled on her branch and turned her back on him, in a huff. She had delivered the letters. She knew exactly what the problem was.

Michael laid the magazine flat over his face and sighed deeply. Supposing he did like her? where did that leave them now?

Michael limped up the staircase and heaved the door open to the Owlery, falling against the wall as it slammed shut behind him. He was out of breath from running and his ribs ached. His eyes began to search the rafters for a familiar bird amongst the dozens nesting there, but Camus had already heard him, and she came sweeping down to land heavily on his arm. He winced at the impact.

Michael was bleeding. His left hand was scraped raw at the knuckles and along his wrist, and there was a large angry gash across his forearm three inches long, from hex or by hand, he couldn't tell. His face ached; his tooth felt loose, and he could feel the familiar dull throbbing of a black eye beginning to form. He poked the area experimentally, whimpering slightly as pain shot to his temples. It was possible that his hand was broken.


Michael had endured the bullying in one form or another since his very first year at Hogwarts. At first it was not much, save the occasional whispered insult in the corridors, and he found he could bear that easily. He was muggle-born, unfamiliar in the ways of the students around him and openly enthusiastic about the life he had left behind. On the whole he was a likable child, friend to many and good with his studies; but some attitudes could not be broken, forged as they were through decades of prejudice. They took a disliking to his muggle way of thinking, and began to treat him accordingly. By fourth year Michael was subjected to daily slurs on his parentage. He felt the rough shoves in the classrooms and hallways, and endured many childish pranks at his expense.

All this he bore with the patience and tolerance that his mother raised him with, but this only served to aggravate his torturers further. His refusal to crumble like the snivelling mudblood that he was enraged them, and their attempts to break him grew more violent and elaborate with each attack. As The Dark Lord began to recruit more followers, Michael's problems grew harder and harder to ignore.

Now in his seventh year, things had grown gravely serious.


Michael stretched out his hand to Camus as though to let her examine the damage, watching as she nipped at the skin around his grazes, fussing over his wounds. All he could do was muse at the Slytherin bullies ethic; All of them fiercely opposed to muggle activities, but when it came to violence they were more than happy to use their fists as well as their wands. Magic could cause considerable damage to a body, but the physical act of laying a hand on another was something altogether quite different, more sinister. Michael often suffered more beatings than he did hexes. It was primeval, a base instinct, and it was born of the most cruelest of desires. They were more muggle than they knew.

He pulled his wand from his pocket and turned it on himself, feeling the warm glow of the wand tip as he healed what he could. He was an old hand at it by now. Running to Madam Pomfrey was an option reserved for only the severest of injuries, and he had spent considerable time in the library looking up basic healing spells for use at times like these. Involving Pomfrey only made the situation worse. Students would go punished, and in turn punish him in only more hideous and imaginative ways. It was safer and more practical to hide the results of his encounters up in the Owlery, where the only witnesses were silent ones.

He just needed an hour to recover. Grazes and black eyes were easily healed, but not so easily explained to onlookers. Many students were blissfully unaware of the problems his kind faced, and he was content to allow it to stay that way.

we're looking for:

- Ravenclaw friendships
- Slytherin rivalries, (vicious ones; feel free to kick him about a bit, he is a mudblood after all)
- some female companions ( but nothing too romantic, unless you think they're a perfect match or something. *cough* OH HAI ROARKE. *cough* :P )
- Muggle enthusiasts

any other ideas, please let us know!