Braelynn trudged to the owlery, clutching the letter she had written to her family. Sadness filled her heart and she heaved out a quiet sigh. She made it a point to write to them weekly, telling them of everything going on in her life. She'd told them about Travis, Mac and the gigs she'd gotten at some pubs. She'd been downright frustrated and disappointed to learn that classes had been cancelled. If she'd known earlier, she knew she would have made plans to visit her family. She didn't know when she would next see them. Now, all she had left to occupy her time were those gigs, which she enjoyed, and her waitressing job at Eureka, which she didn't quite enjoy.

Sighing again, she entered the owlery and picked an owl out, giving him the letter and address. She wished Harmony was with her but she'd wisely left her back at the dorm, unsure of how she would react to the other birds. She stood at the window and watched as the owl took off with her letter and hoped that it would reach her family safely. Although she had regular weekly replies from them, she couldn't wait for the next letter she received from them. Any news from home comforted her and motivated her to study harder and get better grades for them. She knew they expected quite a lot from her, being the only Muggleborn in the family, and she worked hard to try and please them. She knew though, that they wouldn't ever condemn her or make her feel guilty if she did fall short of their expectations.

Unconsciously, she began quietly humming one of the songs she'd sung with Travis at their first gig. She'd always resorted to music to console her and sort out her thoughts. It was the one thing that was constant in her life and never let her down, except of course when it proved elusive during some of her songwriting times. It was her escape though and she never let it go.

A brown barn owl had found her while she was relaxing on the Academy grounds. She took a letter off of the owl's foot. Her name was written in Lorcan's messy handwriting, the twins may have been identical but their handwriting wasn't.

She read over the letter which detailed his adventures thus far. Unlike her Lorcan and Lysander had taken traveling instead of a Academy. They were learning plenty though, through their hunts of various magical creatures.

She read the letter and once she was done, stuffed it into her pocket. Melody took the owl which was content with perching on her arm, to the owlery.

"Hello," Melody said when she noticed someone else there.

"Sorry for interrupting. I'm Melody." She had recognized the song although she did occasionally fall behind on muggle artists, it was hard to keep track while not living in the muggle world and she knew that once she graduated she might end up forgoing that world completely so she could focus on her career.

"A gig? Interesting. What is your band called?" She made her way around and carefully set the owl down and made sure that it wouldn't fly off yet. "I got a surprise letter from my brother." Lysander's letter probably wouldn't be far off and she didn't know if they were sharing an owl. She found a place to sit and then got out some parchment, ink and a quill out of her bag.

"Nice to meet you two," Melody said. So they weren't a band but it still sounded like they had fun. Melody had used to run around singing with the birds when she was little but the thought of mentioning it embarrassed her. She didn't think that she could perform in front of a stage anyway.

Melody considered the question, there was her parents, grandfather, two brothers and some relatives on her father's side. Still it wasn't exactly a huge family, nothing like the size of the Weasleys.

She shook her head. "Not very big at all. I have two brothers though." She dipped the quill and started writing out her letter. The ink pot was enchanted so it didn't spill out into her bag. When she was done she folded up the letter, wrote Lorcan's name on it and tied it to the owl's leg.

"What about you?"

"I might do that," Melody said. She didn't usually bother with concerts, too crowded and noisy. Listening to something on the wizards wire or taking her old muggle radio out and switching though the stations was much less bother. But there had been some ones she'd enjoyed and she appreciated the inviation.

"There are my parents and other relatives as well," she said. "But we don't all live and my brothers went off travelling a while ago." There had been the fair share of noise. She remembered one time when the Potters had visisted and James had helped the twins blow a hole through the roof. Nothing like all being crowded together on a farm though. She assumed that it must be a muggle farm. Did wizards have farms? They certainly wouldn't use tractors. "I hear the country is a nice place to live."

Certain that she wasn't going to add anything more to its leg, the owl flew away. "What major are you?"

"I'll look it up," Melody said. It sounded like it would be in the muggle world, it had been a while since she had been there but she could handle it. "Because I'm curious about it," she hastily added. "Its not that I don't believe you."

"They are in the English mountains now. They haven't been to Thailand to my knowledge." She considered telling Braelynn about the time some guy hired both of them to check out a magical creature related rumour about his property in Canada but decided not to. She couldn't really tell it the way they did.

"I guess there are pros or cons for living anywhere. It still sounds nice. Ah, Potioneering was always my first choice. I considered double majoring with curse breaking but that's been dropped from the curriculum so its just as well that I didn't."

Melody was glad that Braelynn had dropped the subject. She would show up or she wouldn't but she hated to promise anything. She would just end up feeling bad if she couldn't make it.

"The difference in cultures around the world is amazing. I used to read all about it when I was a kid." She wasn't sure if she'd enjoy travelling. There were various ways of travel that she didn't like, her first time using the Floo network had been scary and she was never comfortable on a broom. Apparating often left her dizzy but some of the muggle ways of travel didn't sound too bad. Maybe flying wouldn't be so scary in the safety of a plane where there were things to hold onto.

Melody nodded. "I've always loved it! I've never been really been able to explain why I like it so much."

"Uh..." Her mind had gone blank after hearing the question. Really she had never planned out what the best place to travel would be. Lot's of places were interesting but nothing could come to mind. Melody listened to Braelynn's ramblings. "That sounds nice. I don't know. Maybe Ireland, the marshes sound like an interesting place to draw. I could take my family along to search for Nessy."

"Yeah. I like to learn about new things though, I suppose that's why I was a Ravenclaw."

"Reading books. I on and off take up drawing. Its surprisingly easy to just lose track off. Sometimes I don't draw anything in months. What about you?"

"Its great to meet a fellow Ravenclaw." For some reason Melody found herself thinking back to the blue gown she had worn to the school's ball.

"Wow. I wish I had that much of a passion for something. Sure, there's potions and reading but I couldn't talk about it the way people do about music. Although I've never been the best of explaining why I'm interested in something. I can sing somewhat but I don't have the nerve to do it in front of anyone. Never really danced either." Well she had actually when she was little if twirling around the garden could count. She missed the care free days of youth even though many would tell her that she's that old yet.

"Have you been performing for a long time?"

"I don't know why but I'm recalling the Masquerade the academy once had," Melody said. "I think that was the last time I was somewhere that had people dancing and not a lot of people did. It might have been just two of them." Perhaps I should have worn Ravenclaw colours to it, Melody thought. It could have looked nice.

Melody smiled. "Maybe. I know but some people can talk really beautifully about it. Its nice. Umm... nice wasn't how I meant to put it. But you know some people just have their faces light up when they talk about something and its great seeing that." Well that wasn't exactly poetic, Melody thought.

"Well I think two months is still a pretty big achievement. Congrats."

"I think it was to celebrate the opening of the Academy." Melody said. "I still have my outfit." She gave a small smile. "I don't know if I'll ever reuse it. It might not be proper equitte to. But I haven't been to enough balls to know. The mask I could have worked into a Halloween outfit or something."

"Maybe." She wasn't sure how much of the school population had gone. It felt like there was a bunch of people at the time. Certainly there would have been enough partners for everyone.

Melody just nodded. She had spent some time in various muggle schools and hadn't met a lot of people that loved math. Most people seemed to hate it in fact. "Does he like school?" Would he be out of school already? Melody couldn't recall Braelynn mentioning his age.

"You are very welcome." Maybe she would come to Eureka. It would be nice to see how Braelynn sang. Watch her pour her soul into a song.