WHO: Rachel Corner and Danielle Rookwood
WHAT: Tea time turns into a literal disaster!
WHERE: Rookwood home!
WHEN: This afternoon!
RATING: DM for DARK MAGIC
Of all Gabriel's friends’ wives, Rachel liked Danielle best. Kobe Ackerly was a rather dense child, and while Erin Kirke was by no means unpleasant, the two women had little in common aside from their husbands' friendship and the same House in school. She'd known both her and Danielle in passing during their school years, given that they were only a year senior to her, but it was Danielle she'd felt any kinship toward. For all her lack of a so-called proper upbringing, she still had a certain amount of poise and the unmistakable demeanor of a Ravenclaw. Danielle was quiet, which Rachel appreciated, and an accomplished Healer, which she esteemed, and the Rookwoods were likely her preferred couple to attend a social engagement with being that their temperaments were so close to Gabriel's and her own.
Which was why she had taken it upon herself to do what most people accused her of being too good for, and reach out to the older witch. Rachel may not have been the kindest or most approachable of people, and a warm bedside manner had certainly never been her most remarkable trait during her time at St. Mungo's, but she thought she knew on what level to approach Danielle, and believed at least a tenuous friendship had formed between the two. And while she may have loathed the experiences from the bottom of her soul, had in fact gone through not one but two pregnancies of varying difficulty, so she thought her experience in that area might be of some value now that they too were expecting, although she was reasonably certain Danielle had read every piece of literature, both Wizarding and Muggle, on prenatal care, pregnancy, and child rearing. Still, everybody loved testimonials.
Today, she had come to bequeath a thin stack of painstakingly selected nursery catalogues which then led to a discussion on what child-proofing the rest of their house might involve (over tea), and slowly, like any gathering of one or more high society witches and afternoon tea, to any other number of baby- and not-so-baby related topics. Rachel found that the more time she spent with Danielle, the more personality traits and quirks she found enjoyable; the most recent being how (sometimes unintentionally) humourous Danielle could be.
"I might have looked like a whale at seven months," Rachel was saying, stroking the rim of her cup with her finger, her brow sardonically raised at the memory of one of the Parkinson girls' discovering her delicate condition the first time, the mistake time, "but even with swollen ankles and newly discovered stretch marks, I assured her I was both better-looking and more intelligent, and had I mentioned how I turned down her fiancé's marriage proposal not six months earlier? But I did hope they were happy together."
She shrugged with a little smile. "My motto has always been not to fight fire with fire, but obliterate it." Rachel leaned forward to place the empty cup back on its saucer. "I'm sure you can understand, what with the inevitable hormonal surge."
Rachel was so very intriguing. Danielle listened to the other woman’s stories, trying not to gape, but--they were the kind of gossip she never got and never knew she needed. Danielle had been on many adventures in her life, and was still continuing to go on, but it was remarkable how much like a vicious jungle the pureblood upper class was. She was glad that one of its leading lionesses was one of her friends, even though Danielle was quite sure that she would never receive an invitation to one of these events in her lifetime.
She couldn’t imagine Donovan enjoying his time at these things, which relieved her in some ways. He would not have been happy having to constantly go to these events and socialize with people he believed to be---it would have been dreadful if he had been married to that girl. Danielle couldn’t bear to imagine if she had just shown up a few months later, would she have been able to reunite with Donovan and stop him from walking down the aisle to someone he’d admitted that he didn’t love?
“That girl Donovan was engaged to was disowned,” Danielle blurted, feeling the need to add to the talk, and not go on about some healing appointment she found interesting. Rachel seemed to appreciate those stories, but this didn’t seem like the time. Her eyes widened, unused to spreading stories, especially when she hadn’t even told Donovan that she’d heard the news.
“These two women were going on about it in the cafeteria,” Danielle left out the part that they had only started to talk about Cecilia because they had seen her walk in and began to gab about ‘the halfblood that ruined the poor Rookwood boy’s life,’ “Apparently she met a boy who wasn’t a pureblood and broke off her most recent engagement, but no one knows where she is and it’s simply---I almost feel bad for her.”
Danielle knew she did, but there was the part of her that illogically could not get over the fact that the younger girl, whom she’d never met, could have kept her apart from Donovan forever, who had almost did because he was honorable and did not go back on his word at first. Danielle took in a deep breath, sitting back and placing a hand on her stomach. She only looked as if she had an extra piece of dessert, but it was a strangely comforting position.
Her eyes widened in interest, recalling the few times Gabriel had mentioned the situation to her, and how it had been all puzzling and dramatic, and had piqued her curiosity more than once, since she was familiar with the other family members.
"I simply cannot imagine," Rachel shuddered daintily. If her parents hadn't disowned her for Amissa, nor for Hippocrates Smethwyck, she wasn't entirely sure where the line lay. A Muggle, perhaps. Or, she believed, there was no line at all, for the more mistakes she made, the tighter they'd simply rein her in. As if they would let her run off into the wild of the Wizarding world to do as she pleased. Her glance fell to her ring finger and the band on it, which she worried for just a few seconds before looking back up. At least there had been one right thing they'd pushed her into. It could have turned out much more like Donovan and the other Hooke girl, and that… well, would have been exactly what she had expected, wouldn't it?
"Happily that's all in the past now," she said, re-crossing her ankles and settling back into her chair, taking in the all too familiar hand-on-stomach position. "And you're expecting. I have to say, I was awfully put out that Benjamin was not in fact a girl," or, one might say, put out in general, "but I have to admit he was easier with the morning sickness. Has it lessened for you at all, yet?" Rachel remembered all too well having to run out of the room on more than one occasion for much longer than one trimester, foolish mid-wife.
Very happily in the past, Danielle silently agreed. While hearing the women gossip about her had upset her (an hour in the on-call room tearily writing journal messages to Donovan, upset), Danielle knew that she and Donovan’s futures were set and she need not worry about being broken up any longer.
“I’m not very good at dealing with girls,” Danielle admitted with a slight shrug, “I was very happy with a boy, but a girl would have been just as lovely.” Her cheeks reddened at Rachel’s question about morning sickness, and while she normally would give a short response of ‘yes,’ she felt like this bonding time with someone who could be considered an ‘in-law’ of sorts deserved a bit more. “Oh, yes...we’ve managed to curb the nausea quite some bit with, erm,” her face was pink, so very pink, “with some exercise.”
Her eyebrows lifted, sending Rachel a ‘look’ that she hoped put the point across that she and Donovan had discovered that morning, afternoon, and evening shags were quite productive in alleviating the nausea morning sickness gave her. Whether it was just a very good distraction, she couldn’t tell you, but Danielle was very keen on keeping this practice up for as long as they could. Maybe she’d even write a book about it one day, and cure all pregnant women of the ailment.
“It’s done wonders, and, oh this might be a bit much but during our lunch breaks we---” Danielle was cut off by a crashing sound somewhere in the house. The kitchen, perhaps? She jumped, but she let out a short laugh. “I think the cat’s having a bit too much fun.”
She'd been about to suggest the house-elf favoured remedy of meadowsweet for any lingering sickness a good romp couldn't fix (and was she eager to hear the outwardly-prim Danielle reveal any details about such things) when the disturbance sounded. Nodding at Danielle's explanation, she had yet another reason to turn down her daughter's begging for a kitten of late. Rachel was quite content with the near-mummified Priscilla, who had, she noted with tongue-in-cheek amusement, taken a jealous disliking to princess Amissa, much to the latter's chagrin. But if it meant her house, furniture, and other belongings remained intact, she greatly preferred Amissa's sulking.
A moment passed as she glanced down at the tea service that had been summoned, and in the general direction of the crash which the kitchen was in. "Allow me to take these back and I'll have a look, shall I?" meaning no imperiousness, but being quite unable to stop her natural bent for hostessing, particularly when her own was pregnant. Standing and waving away and protestations Danielle could make, though thinking the Rookwoods could benefit from the services of a house-elf, she deftly levitated the tray and made her way to the kitchen.
The scene caught her off-guard, as shards of broken glass glittered dimly from the nearly every surface within a five-foot radius of the large windows, the center one having been shattered. Furrowing her brow, Rachel stepped gingerly forward and spotted the culprit rolling between the legs of a chair — not a cat, but a dark ball. She pressed her lips together, and shaking her head, Rachel peered out of the windows to look for the offenders. "Are there children on this lane?" she called, carefully walking forward. "Someone's thrown a — "
Just as she'd stepped closer to it, raising her wand to clean up the glass, a peculiar rattling caught her attention. Glancing to the side, the tray floating alongside her was vibrating with such a frenzy that one of the cups tipped onto its side before the whole thing stilled and smashed loudly to the floor. "What in the —"
Danielle couldn’t possibly stay behind while Rachel took the tray and tea. She was very new at playing hostess, but it was her cat, a cat she had insisted upon when Donovan not-so-subtly suggested she spend more time at home and less at the hospital. The woman hurried after her guest, but then slowed her pace when she spotted Dilys, her kitten, on top of the book case, hissing and looking quite petrified. It would have taken a lot for the tiny cat to get up that high, and Danielle entered the kitchen with her wand out and ready. Maybe a bird had gotten into the house? But no, Rachel was saying something about children, or something being thrown--
She jumped at the crashing of the tea tray, one hand going to her stomach as her wand struck out. There was glass everywhere which confused her greatly, and she shared a worried glance with Rachel before the object of their concern. The little black ball rolled out from under the table and for a split second Danielle wondered how hard someone could have thrown or hit it that the ball was still moving, but then wisps that cracked the air with each movement started fuming out and it became obvious that it was hexed.
“Get out, get out!” Danielle shouted at Rachel, trying to banish the ball but feeling as if her wand was just a heavy stick. Nothing was coming out of it, no sparks, it was as if the dark magic seeping from the orb was stopping her magic. It felt unnatural, but she put her wand in her pocket and reached for a broomstick to try and swat the offending ball away. The moment the bristles touched the ball the black fumes crackled and wrapped itself quickly up the staff of the broom and before she could react they twisted around her hand and wrist. Danielle cried out as a searing pain burnt her skin with each lash and she dropped the broomstick, managing to cut it off before it went too far up her arm.
She backed away quickly, looking at Rachel for help as the black, dark magic began to go along the cracks of the tiled floor.
The moment the tray had fallen, Rachel knew there was something very wrong in the kitchen. What it was, she could not have said, but there was no reason for her flawless to the point of second-nature charm casting to fail, or why, after glancing at Danielle a moment later, when she tried to clean up the glass, nothing happened. That's when Danielle's cry snapped her attention to the blonde, then to the floor where her wand was pointing and the curls of something dark and hazy that rose from the ball — an orb, and her stomach dropped.
"Danielle —" she started, staring at the object with a struck look, her hand blindly reaching out in the other witch's general direction, "We need —" but then Rachel saw her grabbing the broom, reaching towards it. "Danielle, don't!" but the subsequent shouts showed her warning went unheard or unheeded.
Pure instinct took over as the orb was now smoking and showering them with far-reaching sparks, like a volatile cracker about to explode. That was likely exactly what was going to happen, and Rachel did not want to be anywhere near this room — this house — when it did. Scooping the tray up, heedless of the glass and china fragments, she hurled it like a weak shield over the orb with one hand and not so gently shoved Danielle in the direction of the door with the other. "RUN!" she shouted, backing away with her eyes locked on it before turning to sprint. It was three strides to the kitchen door and she felt a pulse of relief before a thunderous explosion caught her attention. The last thing Rachel remembered as her steps faltered and she looked over her shoulder was the slamming cloud of blackness.
