Post by Koalingo Academy on Mar 11, 2007 21:13:14 GMT 10
Chapter Four
“I wish I could come with you,” Elouise was whining slightly as she kissed Godric good bye, he was to be returning to Koalingo with some other prefects whom would be travelling with his parents to Koalingo. Elouise was originally going to be one of them, “But Gardiner just told me there’s been a change of plans and they need me to help organise everyone here,” she didn’t look too pleased about it and Godric felt no better; he had the strangest feeling his mother had done a bit of interfering, not that he’d confront her about it.
Lucius showed up shortly after ordering a dozen house elves about, they were carrying several large trunks containing two different crests, one was the Sinister family crest, and the other bore a ‘G’ which could only be for Lucius’ would-be girlfriend Kalika Gardan.
“Godric,” a tall slim girl with long sleek blonde hair tilted her head ever so slightly to Godric by way of greeting him when she passed at Lucius’ side. Walking as if the both of them ruled the world, Godric tolerated it only because he had no real conviction in the thought that he could change them if he tried, “Looking forward into returning to Koalingo for one more year, Godric?” she asked him as sweetly as she could, Godric suspected.
“But of course Miss Gardan, could you think of a reason for me to think otherwise?” Godric replied to her question politely, he knew she was getting at something.
“Nothing comes to mind,” Kalika smiled at him sweetly before turning to see the door goblin holding the carriage door for them, “A pleasure seeing you again, I’m sure it shan’t be the last time”.
“Oh no, I will be at your coronation this weekend,” Godric spoke wondering if Kalika would take the word ‘coronation’ as a joke or an insult.
She however did not falter and continued to smile sweetly, “Splendid,” she turned and almost floated towards the carriage
“Oh, Miss Gardan, Mr Sinister, could I have a word with you please,” Godric’s mother came rushing along the darkened clearing towards the carriage, “We’re one short of helpers for Professor Gardiner, so I told her this morning I’d get one of the School Captain’s on it,”
“I’ll do it,” Godric piped up immediately deciding it might leave a few hours later, but he didn’t mind going with everyone else, he’d never travelled with the rest of the school, not since his first year anyway.
“No Godric, we need you to train the new Emerindyl prefects,” Lady Saphricorn spoke and both Lucius and Kalika sighed very audibly.
“I’ll do it, I suppose,” Lucius spoke looking at his house elves that immediately grabbed all of his bags and moved them away from the prefect carriage.
Godric pulled a very sour face at his mother, though she either chose to ignore it, or genuinely missed it, “Where’s Alex anyway,” he asked her when he caught her glance at last.
“He’s helping out Professor Gardiner as well,” she told him as she walked on kicking a few bags as she went, “These should have been packed ten minutes ago,” she shouted and house elves swept upon them immediately. They were wearing little green uniforms with gold trimming and a Golden ‘K’ in the centre of the front and back.
“Who are the new fifth year prefects?” Godric called after her again as he followed her though her steps seemed to gain speed each time and at last he gave in and fell back.
“Dilemma Pendragon Darkmoon reporting for duty, Sir!” came a very loud and proud voice of Godric’s worse nightmare.
“Oh god, not you” Godric closed his eyes, bracing himself he opened them and turned very slowly, the site he caught was horrific. Dilemma Pendragon, now with a new last name, this boy was like those annoying little flies that hand around our light bulbs and don’t seem to care if you take a swing at them, they just keep coming back. He was about the same height as Godric, a little shorter with dark brown spikes of hair that stuck out at every angle, he also had a very short weak goatee that he seemed to prize but for the moment looked a little immature, ‘Matches his personality’ Godric thought sinisterly. He was wearing a lurid looking brown and tan beaded necklace, which had a dragon’s fang handing from it, it bounced around a lot when he spoke. He was Godric’s age and used to be in his grade but had disappeared the year before last. Godric had heard he’d been killed.
“Well very few people actually call me god, but I encourage it when it happens, and yep, it sure is me,” the boy grinned cheekily, he was always one for jokes and Godric could not understand time and time again how Dilemma had not made Saphricorn when he suited Saphricorn house so well.
“I thought you were gone for good,” Godric narrowed his eyes, “Why are you back now?”
“Gone but not forgotten it seems, saw Elouise just now, she gave me quite a thrashing,” he rubbed his left cheek, Godric noticed now that there was a red hand mark there, “Ah… she still loves me,” he smiled and sighed in ignorant bliss, “Well at least you thought I was just gone, everyone else had some strange thought that I was dead… highly exaggerated of course… it was more… undead” he then mocked a vampire grin and started laughing, “I’ve already got a group of second years stocking up on garlic, the apothecary should be paying me commission, I tell you” he laughed some more, Godric groaned and started rubbing his head again, he could feel his head ache coming back.
“Oh god, not you,” a female voice of an Ameraid girl with shoulder length blonde hair, tipped purple said when she caught eyes of Dilemma, she briskly turned and walked away from him.
“See Godric, it’s already catching!” Dilemma beamed.
The other fifth year prefect went by the name of Lucy Cortez, and she was far more acceptable to Godric then Dilemma, however he knew the decision did not remain with him, cursing that he didn’t make head boy, now. He knew Head boy and girl had the right to strip junior prefects of their powers should they abuse them, and Dilemma had already proved he was incapable of decency before he’d even officially begun as a prefect.
“Ok, all aboard!” Lady Saphricorn called as stopped by the door, the luggage had already been packed and Melinda was raring for take off. Godric walked passed Dilemma, Lucy hot on his heels as he climbed into the carriage which was now ten times as spacious as it had been before with just him, his parents, and Alex in it; and found himself a seat in the furthest corner and belted himself in, they would not be converting to the diamond as they had before, his father had said it was silly to for such a short trip, though when it was time for take off some of the others were beginning to question why the carriage and not the diamond.
When they were in the air, Godric pulled back the curtains for the window beside him and peered out to see endless dried land passing beneath the, though in the early morning light it was all sapphire blue in colour and looked almost as enchanting as anything within the walls of Koalingo Academy. To Godric’s dismay Dilemma had planted himself right next to him, and used up much of the trip relaying jokes he had picked up in his last two years of mysterious wandering for which he would tell no one of in any great detail. The fifth round of laughter and applause broke out before Godric’s head could take no more and a pain grew sharp across his forehead. He pulled out his wand and with a sophisticated little wrist movement and some well-chosen words a small pair of earmuffs popped out of thin air and he placed them carefully on his head, they immediately blocked out all sound. Moments later Godric caught several other people doing the same.
‘Annoying little cretin isn’t he,’ came a voice suddenly out of the silence.
At first Godric checked to see that his earmuffs were secured but soon noted that a girl was looking at him from across the carriage, a girl he knew only too well. Aurora Celeste, in Godric’s grade though in the Ameraid house, she had been a prefect as long as Godric had, she was fairly tall and had shoulder length blonde hair, which, for the moment, was tipped with purple, she was projecting her thoughts at him from across the carriage, it was an Ameraid talent Godric had learned only for pleading with his father, he didn’t like the thought of them invading his mind and hence with his Occlumency training he also learned the power of telepathy whereas all Ameraid’s seemed to develop it naturally in the fourth year, ‘Typical Emerindyl of course,’
‘Is that jealousy I see, Aurora? ‘Cause you know if you want to impress other people you can get that carrot surgically removed from your backside’ Godric shot her a contemptuous look though she showed no emotion in return. She was sitting next to a boy Godric knew by the name of Benjamin Cackle, he’d been a prefect as long as Godric and Aurora though he was so quiet it was easy to not notice him even in a room void of everyone but him.
‘Oh yes, arrogant little daddy’s boy, you have all the answers, don’t you?’ she continued to watch him emotionlessly.
‘Not meaning to interrupt,’ came a third voice that startled both Godric and Aurora, causingAurora to swing her arm up and hit Benjamin Cackle by accident. ‘But Lady Saphricorn is giving instructions on what to do when we land, which should be very soon, and you two are still wearing your earmuffs,’
Godric looked across at Lord Emerindyl, as did Aurora, they both removed their earmuffs hurriedly and Elwyn smiled, though they two had violently red faces.
“As I was saying, once we land Madame Tweed would like a little audience with you all, though I don’t know if she can do it with our School Captain coming with the other students,” Godric couldn’t miss the unmistakable grin at the corners of his mothers mouth, “So in the mean time, fifth and sixth years, pay attention to your seventh year peers, so long as they are paying attention to me…” she cast her eyes at Godric and then to Aurora, whom both nodded in turn, “They know what has to be done, the usual of course, waking up the common room guardians, Shane Moonraker you wait back and I’ll give you the Saphricorn painting – Miss Celeste you’ll not need to worry, Lady Ameraid has been at Koalingo for the entire duration of the holidays so the fountain is ready to accept people, though I do think she requests a word with you and your fellow prefects – Ruberagon’s… ah yes, Miss Gardan you know what to do, I expect, but for god’s sake don’t get burned, you all have dragon-hide gloves, use them, Godric, you know what to do, the rest of you, just follow orders and all should be running smoothly by the time the other students arrive”
With an incredible lurch and the crashing sounds of some students falling from their seats onto the floor, the carriage landed with a thud, they had arrived. Godric was first off behind his parents. He breathed in the soothingly sweet mountain air, which always accumulated around Koalingo manor no matter what the weather. The carriage wheels seemed to have given way with the landing, the carriages bottom was almost scattered across the platform.
“Accio,” Godric chanted and his trunks zoomed out from under many others, the ones that had been above them also zoomed off happily piling themselves up at the edge of the platform, “Dilemma, Lucy,” Godric called carelessly realising that their numbers were half what they should have been.
Dilemma strutted towards Godric holding a sack over his right shoulder; he didn’t appear to have a school trunk like everybody else.
“That’s what you packed for the year?” Godric asked him offhandedly,
“Yup,” he nodded, Godric shrugged and turned towards the castle, “Ok, let’s go, we wont have Elouise and Alex, so we have plenty to do,” he then quickly added as if an afterthought, “Dilemma if you could try and behave yourself,”
They were walking along the stone path that was the entrance to the school from the flying dock, at both sides the lush green grass showed how fertile the area was, where no more then two metres beyond the walls, much of the land was barren save for a few dessert tree’s and shrubs. The Golden gates were opened when they reached them, the three of them walked just inside onto the vast stone entrance courtyard in the centre of which was a large fountain with a mermaid embracing a fish whom was shooting water from it’s mouth. Godric also knew by now that it was through this fish’ mouth that the Ameraid students entered and left their common, which was within the fountain itself. Godric had never been allowed in there, but he’d heard enough to know that; there was a small yet huge underwater palace in which all the Ameraid’s called home. Small by comparison to normal human size, but gargantuan compared to the size you become when entering it.
They dropped their bags just inside the gates and Godric walked to one of the walls, a gargoyle’s head poked out of it, for the moment it’s eyes were closed, but with a tap of Godric’s wand it opened it’s eyes and smiled, “What can I do you for, young master?” it asked in a voice quite out of place for its gruff look.
“House elves for the bags thank you, we have to get going,” Godric told it and within moments several little house elves waddled speedily towards their bags, grabbing them and wandering off back into the castle at high speeds.
“Ok,” Godric told them both, turning and heading up the grand-stand –sized stone steps which led from the courtyard up into the foyer of the manor, “Follow me,”
By wizarding standards Koalingo Manor, as it was called, was most definitely classed as a castle, in fact had there been a description for something far larger and grander then ‘castle’ Koalingo Manor would no doubt have done more then qualified. The sad history of Koalingo Manor was what gave it its name. The castle had in fact been little more the a large manor for the royal family of Australia giants. The Ministry of Magic, finally fed up with giants standing on wizards, decided to wage war against the giants. Which were by no means as thick as giants from the rest of the world are to date. The giants fought back at first, but as is always the case, the magical triumphed over the barely magical and the giants manor became a wizards castle, yet, Elwyn Emerindyl, proud of the Manor’s heritage and traditional owners had from that day called it Koalingo Manor, instead of Koalingo Castle. This of course also led to the peculiarity of things in Koalingo being far larger then they should be, and these steps were a prime example. Three smaller rows of better proportioned stairs ran the outside and centre of the huge stairs to make it easier for students to travel up and down it, the rest remained the same, and made a good place for school assemblies, or school photo’s.
In the foyer they turned left towards the corridor that led to the upper castle. This corridor was one of Koalingo’s two main corridors which led the way around most of the manor and went on for such a long time that it took several days to reach the end, which came out at a balcony at the back of the manor, linking onto the other corridor that took up most of the lower manor.
“These doors need to be secured, Dilemma, make sure you do it properly please, that part of the castle is on lockdown if that door shuts, every door and window is magically and physically inaccessible,” Godric warned him when the dark-brown haired boy sniggered and began to open these huge double doors with the huge golden key Godric had handed him. Godric meanwhile was opening the side doors for the Golden Hall. Built in a gold mine, this dining hall glittered as it’s floor, wall, and ceiling were coated in natural gold, illuminated by the glow-worms employed that lived in it. Once entering the glow-worms illuminated at once and the hall of five grand tables came into clear view. Godric walked briskly towards the left hand side of the room, which, for the moment anyway, seemed to be half made up of heavy green velvet curtains with gold ropes at either end of them.
Godric instructed Lucy to hold one of the ropes while he jogged to the far end and grabbed the second and called for her to pull it. In a blaze of sharp morning light four huge double glass-paned doors flooded the Golden Hall with the light of day. The glow-worms dimmed at this point, feeling no need to give off extra illumination, Godric of course had not noticed, the light from the rising sun was far brighter.
“Alohomora!” Godric chanted at two of the doors, Lucy took his lead and did the same to the other two and a soft end-of-summer breeze carried its way into the hall.
BANG! Click! BANG! Click! BANG! Click!
Sharp noises carried through the smaller doors to the right of the large double entrance door to the dining room that had not yet been opened. Godric left Lucy for the moment and walked briskly through to the foyer where he’d left Dilemma. The Ruberagon’s had already secured the door at the other end, the one that went to the lower castle, and Godric suspected; the Ruberagon common, of which he had absolutely no knowledge. Only that you needed to pass through a massive fireplace to get to its entrance and that any whom attempted entry that were not Ruberagon, would be badly burned.
BANG! Click! BANG! Click! BANG! Click!
“Dilemma, what are you doing?” Godric found himself frustrated with the boy whom was standing there grabbing at one of the door handles opening it and then shutting it again watching it lock and unlock with loud bang’s and sharp clicks, wearing a huge grin the whole time until he saw Godric.
“Um… ah… er… just testing the security, Godric, my bro,” he grinned and opened the doors the entire way where they moulded into the walls they had been swung into and disappeared, “Well would you look at that, no wonder I’d never noticed these doors before,”
“Give me the key,” Godric demanded his tolerance drifting quickly.
Dilemma handed it over still smiling, he didn’t seem to know he’d done something wrong, and if so, he didn’t seem to care too much about it.
“We need to get the house tapestries back up un the Golden Hall – they get taken down every summer for cleaning, and for security reasons of course, though the Golden Hall is the most difficult room to penetrate in a lock down,” Godric told them, as was standard for all new prefects these days, after what had happened at the school during Godric’s first year, all stops had been pulled out regarding security at the manor, “The tapestries are in the swording chamber and that’s… well lets say no one could penetrate it, no one currently living,… or dead for that matter…” it was impenetrable by all means except something Godric had know only as the ‘Riosiewweag’ and Godric had no idea what it was exactly, but he knew his parents had to be there for it to work, and no one but the four founders were permitted to be there when it happened.
“In the meantime we better go wake up the suit of armour, might take the three of us, it accumulates a lot of dust during the summer break,” Godric spoke as he turned to the Golden Hall, taking the key that had been used to open the doors Dilemma had just been playing with, and stuck it into one of two locks, where it moulded over as half a handle.
They walked of up the corridor, which led to the entrance of Emerindyl Lake. They were walking for quite a long time before they arrived at it. The suit of armour was snoozing loudly when they got their, and to Godric’s immediate horror, Dilemma belted it over the head, which flopped off and rolled across the ground clanging as it went.
Godric closed his eyes, thinking quietly to himself, ‘He’s just a trainee, just a trainee… he wont be like this forever… and if he is… you graduate in October anyway…’
“I’ll get it,” Dilemma spoke cheerily taking hold of the rolling armoured head and bringing it back to the suit and replacing it, looking as though he was doing someone else a great favour, “Well come on, you cant tell me after that, your still asleep, you rusted bucket of bolts,”
The suit continued to snore, “It’s not force Dilemma,” Godric told him as he walked closer, drawing out his wand as he went and placing it to the eye of the suit, “The students return, more will come soon, open your eyes, you great metal buffoon,”
“I wish I could come with you,” Elouise was whining slightly as she kissed Godric good bye, he was to be returning to Koalingo with some other prefects whom would be travelling with his parents to Koalingo. Elouise was originally going to be one of them, “But Gardiner just told me there’s been a change of plans and they need me to help organise everyone here,” she didn’t look too pleased about it and Godric felt no better; he had the strangest feeling his mother had done a bit of interfering, not that he’d confront her about it.
Lucius showed up shortly after ordering a dozen house elves about, they were carrying several large trunks containing two different crests, one was the Sinister family crest, and the other bore a ‘G’ which could only be for Lucius’ would-be girlfriend Kalika Gardan.
“Godric,” a tall slim girl with long sleek blonde hair tilted her head ever so slightly to Godric by way of greeting him when she passed at Lucius’ side. Walking as if the both of them ruled the world, Godric tolerated it only because he had no real conviction in the thought that he could change them if he tried, “Looking forward into returning to Koalingo for one more year, Godric?” she asked him as sweetly as she could, Godric suspected.
“But of course Miss Gardan, could you think of a reason for me to think otherwise?” Godric replied to her question politely, he knew she was getting at something.
“Nothing comes to mind,” Kalika smiled at him sweetly before turning to see the door goblin holding the carriage door for them, “A pleasure seeing you again, I’m sure it shan’t be the last time”.
“Oh no, I will be at your coronation this weekend,” Godric spoke wondering if Kalika would take the word ‘coronation’ as a joke or an insult.
She however did not falter and continued to smile sweetly, “Splendid,” she turned and almost floated towards the carriage
“Oh, Miss Gardan, Mr Sinister, could I have a word with you please,” Godric’s mother came rushing along the darkened clearing towards the carriage, “We’re one short of helpers for Professor Gardiner, so I told her this morning I’d get one of the School Captain’s on it,”
“I’ll do it,” Godric piped up immediately deciding it might leave a few hours later, but he didn’t mind going with everyone else, he’d never travelled with the rest of the school, not since his first year anyway.
“No Godric, we need you to train the new Emerindyl prefects,” Lady Saphricorn spoke and both Lucius and Kalika sighed very audibly.
“I’ll do it, I suppose,” Lucius spoke looking at his house elves that immediately grabbed all of his bags and moved them away from the prefect carriage.
Godric pulled a very sour face at his mother, though she either chose to ignore it, or genuinely missed it, “Where’s Alex anyway,” he asked her when he caught her glance at last.
“He’s helping out Professor Gardiner as well,” she told him as she walked on kicking a few bags as she went, “These should have been packed ten minutes ago,” she shouted and house elves swept upon them immediately. They were wearing little green uniforms with gold trimming and a Golden ‘K’ in the centre of the front and back.
“Who are the new fifth year prefects?” Godric called after her again as he followed her though her steps seemed to gain speed each time and at last he gave in and fell back.
“Dilemma Pendragon Darkmoon reporting for duty, Sir!” came a very loud and proud voice of Godric’s worse nightmare.
“Oh god, not you” Godric closed his eyes, bracing himself he opened them and turned very slowly, the site he caught was horrific. Dilemma Pendragon, now with a new last name, this boy was like those annoying little flies that hand around our light bulbs and don’t seem to care if you take a swing at them, they just keep coming back. He was about the same height as Godric, a little shorter with dark brown spikes of hair that stuck out at every angle, he also had a very short weak goatee that he seemed to prize but for the moment looked a little immature, ‘Matches his personality’ Godric thought sinisterly. He was wearing a lurid looking brown and tan beaded necklace, which had a dragon’s fang handing from it, it bounced around a lot when he spoke. He was Godric’s age and used to be in his grade but had disappeared the year before last. Godric had heard he’d been killed.
“Well very few people actually call me god, but I encourage it when it happens, and yep, it sure is me,” the boy grinned cheekily, he was always one for jokes and Godric could not understand time and time again how Dilemma had not made Saphricorn when he suited Saphricorn house so well.
“I thought you were gone for good,” Godric narrowed his eyes, “Why are you back now?”
“Gone but not forgotten it seems, saw Elouise just now, she gave me quite a thrashing,” he rubbed his left cheek, Godric noticed now that there was a red hand mark there, “Ah… she still loves me,” he smiled and sighed in ignorant bliss, “Well at least you thought I was just gone, everyone else had some strange thought that I was dead… highly exaggerated of course… it was more… undead” he then mocked a vampire grin and started laughing, “I’ve already got a group of second years stocking up on garlic, the apothecary should be paying me commission, I tell you” he laughed some more, Godric groaned and started rubbing his head again, he could feel his head ache coming back.
“Oh god, not you,” a female voice of an Ameraid girl with shoulder length blonde hair, tipped purple said when she caught eyes of Dilemma, she briskly turned and walked away from him.
“See Godric, it’s already catching!” Dilemma beamed.
The other fifth year prefect went by the name of Lucy Cortez, and she was far more acceptable to Godric then Dilemma, however he knew the decision did not remain with him, cursing that he didn’t make head boy, now. He knew Head boy and girl had the right to strip junior prefects of their powers should they abuse them, and Dilemma had already proved he was incapable of decency before he’d even officially begun as a prefect.
“Ok, all aboard!” Lady Saphricorn called as stopped by the door, the luggage had already been packed and Melinda was raring for take off. Godric walked passed Dilemma, Lucy hot on his heels as he climbed into the carriage which was now ten times as spacious as it had been before with just him, his parents, and Alex in it; and found himself a seat in the furthest corner and belted himself in, they would not be converting to the diamond as they had before, his father had said it was silly to for such a short trip, though when it was time for take off some of the others were beginning to question why the carriage and not the diamond.
When they were in the air, Godric pulled back the curtains for the window beside him and peered out to see endless dried land passing beneath the, though in the early morning light it was all sapphire blue in colour and looked almost as enchanting as anything within the walls of Koalingo Academy. To Godric’s dismay Dilemma had planted himself right next to him, and used up much of the trip relaying jokes he had picked up in his last two years of mysterious wandering for which he would tell no one of in any great detail. The fifth round of laughter and applause broke out before Godric’s head could take no more and a pain grew sharp across his forehead. He pulled out his wand and with a sophisticated little wrist movement and some well-chosen words a small pair of earmuffs popped out of thin air and he placed them carefully on his head, they immediately blocked out all sound. Moments later Godric caught several other people doing the same.
‘Annoying little cretin isn’t he,’ came a voice suddenly out of the silence.
At first Godric checked to see that his earmuffs were secured but soon noted that a girl was looking at him from across the carriage, a girl he knew only too well. Aurora Celeste, in Godric’s grade though in the Ameraid house, she had been a prefect as long as Godric had, she was fairly tall and had shoulder length blonde hair, which, for the moment, was tipped with purple, she was projecting her thoughts at him from across the carriage, it was an Ameraid talent Godric had learned only for pleading with his father, he didn’t like the thought of them invading his mind and hence with his Occlumency training he also learned the power of telepathy whereas all Ameraid’s seemed to develop it naturally in the fourth year, ‘Typical Emerindyl of course,’
‘Is that jealousy I see, Aurora? ‘Cause you know if you want to impress other people you can get that carrot surgically removed from your backside’ Godric shot her a contemptuous look though she showed no emotion in return. She was sitting next to a boy Godric knew by the name of Benjamin Cackle, he’d been a prefect as long as Godric and Aurora though he was so quiet it was easy to not notice him even in a room void of everyone but him.
‘Oh yes, arrogant little daddy’s boy, you have all the answers, don’t you?’ she continued to watch him emotionlessly.
‘Not meaning to interrupt,’ came a third voice that startled both Godric and Aurora, causingAurora to swing her arm up and hit Benjamin Cackle by accident. ‘But Lady Saphricorn is giving instructions on what to do when we land, which should be very soon, and you two are still wearing your earmuffs,’
Godric looked across at Lord Emerindyl, as did Aurora, they both removed their earmuffs hurriedly and Elwyn smiled, though they two had violently red faces.
“As I was saying, once we land Madame Tweed would like a little audience with you all, though I don’t know if she can do it with our School Captain coming with the other students,” Godric couldn’t miss the unmistakable grin at the corners of his mothers mouth, “So in the mean time, fifth and sixth years, pay attention to your seventh year peers, so long as they are paying attention to me…” she cast her eyes at Godric and then to Aurora, whom both nodded in turn, “They know what has to be done, the usual of course, waking up the common room guardians, Shane Moonraker you wait back and I’ll give you the Saphricorn painting – Miss Celeste you’ll not need to worry, Lady Ameraid has been at Koalingo for the entire duration of the holidays so the fountain is ready to accept people, though I do think she requests a word with you and your fellow prefects – Ruberagon’s… ah yes, Miss Gardan you know what to do, I expect, but for god’s sake don’t get burned, you all have dragon-hide gloves, use them, Godric, you know what to do, the rest of you, just follow orders and all should be running smoothly by the time the other students arrive”
With an incredible lurch and the crashing sounds of some students falling from their seats onto the floor, the carriage landed with a thud, they had arrived. Godric was first off behind his parents. He breathed in the soothingly sweet mountain air, which always accumulated around Koalingo manor no matter what the weather. The carriage wheels seemed to have given way with the landing, the carriages bottom was almost scattered across the platform.
“Accio,” Godric chanted and his trunks zoomed out from under many others, the ones that had been above them also zoomed off happily piling themselves up at the edge of the platform, “Dilemma, Lucy,” Godric called carelessly realising that their numbers were half what they should have been.
Dilemma strutted towards Godric holding a sack over his right shoulder; he didn’t appear to have a school trunk like everybody else.
“That’s what you packed for the year?” Godric asked him offhandedly,
“Yup,” he nodded, Godric shrugged and turned towards the castle, “Ok, let’s go, we wont have Elouise and Alex, so we have plenty to do,” he then quickly added as if an afterthought, “Dilemma if you could try and behave yourself,”
They were walking along the stone path that was the entrance to the school from the flying dock, at both sides the lush green grass showed how fertile the area was, where no more then two metres beyond the walls, much of the land was barren save for a few dessert tree’s and shrubs. The Golden gates were opened when they reached them, the three of them walked just inside onto the vast stone entrance courtyard in the centre of which was a large fountain with a mermaid embracing a fish whom was shooting water from it’s mouth. Godric also knew by now that it was through this fish’ mouth that the Ameraid students entered and left their common, which was within the fountain itself. Godric had never been allowed in there, but he’d heard enough to know that; there was a small yet huge underwater palace in which all the Ameraid’s called home. Small by comparison to normal human size, but gargantuan compared to the size you become when entering it.
They dropped their bags just inside the gates and Godric walked to one of the walls, a gargoyle’s head poked out of it, for the moment it’s eyes were closed, but with a tap of Godric’s wand it opened it’s eyes and smiled, “What can I do you for, young master?” it asked in a voice quite out of place for its gruff look.
“House elves for the bags thank you, we have to get going,” Godric told it and within moments several little house elves waddled speedily towards their bags, grabbing them and wandering off back into the castle at high speeds.
“Ok,” Godric told them both, turning and heading up the grand-stand –sized stone steps which led from the courtyard up into the foyer of the manor, “Follow me,”
By wizarding standards Koalingo Manor, as it was called, was most definitely classed as a castle, in fact had there been a description for something far larger and grander then ‘castle’ Koalingo Manor would no doubt have done more then qualified. The sad history of Koalingo Manor was what gave it its name. The castle had in fact been little more the a large manor for the royal family of Australia giants. The Ministry of Magic, finally fed up with giants standing on wizards, decided to wage war against the giants. Which were by no means as thick as giants from the rest of the world are to date. The giants fought back at first, but as is always the case, the magical triumphed over the barely magical and the giants manor became a wizards castle, yet, Elwyn Emerindyl, proud of the Manor’s heritage and traditional owners had from that day called it Koalingo Manor, instead of Koalingo Castle. This of course also led to the peculiarity of things in Koalingo being far larger then they should be, and these steps were a prime example. Three smaller rows of better proportioned stairs ran the outside and centre of the huge stairs to make it easier for students to travel up and down it, the rest remained the same, and made a good place for school assemblies, or school photo’s.
In the foyer they turned left towards the corridor that led to the upper castle. This corridor was one of Koalingo’s two main corridors which led the way around most of the manor and went on for such a long time that it took several days to reach the end, which came out at a balcony at the back of the manor, linking onto the other corridor that took up most of the lower manor.
“These doors need to be secured, Dilemma, make sure you do it properly please, that part of the castle is on lockdown if that door shuts, every door and window is magically and physically inaccessible,” Godric warned him when the dark-brown haired boy sniggered and began to open these huge double doors with the huge golden key Godric had handed him. Godric meanwhile was opening the side doors for the Golden Hall. Built in a gold mine, this dining hall glittered as it’s floor, wall, and ceiling were coated in natural gold, illuminated by the glow-worms employed that lived in it. Once entering the glow-worms illuminated at once and the hall of five grand tables came into clear view. Godric walked briskly towards the left hand side of the room, which, for the moment anyway, seemed to be half made up of heavy green velvet curtains with gold ropes at either end of them.
Godric instructed Lucy to hold one of the ropes while he jogged to the far end and grabbed the second and called for her to pull it. In a blaze of sharp morning light four huge double glass-paned doors flooded the Golden Hall with the light of day. The glow-worms dimmed at this point, feeling no need to give off extra illumination, Godric of course had not noticed, the light from the rising sun was far brighter.
“Alohomora!” Godric chanted at two of the doors, Lucy took his lead and did the same to the other two and a soft end-of-summer breeze carried its way into the hall.
BANG! Click! BANG! Click! BANG! Click!
Sharp noises carried through the smaller doors to the right of the large double entrance door to the dining room that had not yet been opened. Godric left Lucy for the moment and walked briskly through to the foyer where he’d left Dilemma. The Ruberagon’s had already secured the door at the other end, the one that went to the lower castle, and Godric suspected; the Ruberagon common, of which he had absolutely no knowledge. Only that you needed to pass through a massive fireplace to get to its entrance and that any whom attempted entry that were not Ruberagon, would be badly burned.
BANG! Click! BANG! Click! BANG! Click!
“Dilemma, what are you doing?” Godric found himself frustrated with the boy whom was standing there grabbing at one of the door handles opening it and then shutting it again watching it lock and unlock with loud bang’s and sharp clicks, wearing a huge grin the whole time until he saw Godric.
“Um… ah… er… just testing the security, Godric, my bro,” he grinned and opened the doors the entire way where they moulded into the walls they had been swung into and disappeared, “Well would you look at that, no wonder I’d never noticed these doors before,”
“Give me the key,” Godric demanded his tolerance drifting quickly.
Dilemma handed it over still smiling, he didn’t seem to know he’d done something wrong, and if so, he didn’t seem to care too much about it.
“We need to get the house tapestries back up un the Golden Hall – they get taken down every summer for cleaning, and for security reasons of course, though the Golden Hall is the most difficult room to penetrate in a lock down,” Godric told them, as was standard for all new prefects these days, after what had happened at the school during Godric’s first year, all stops had been pulled out regarding security at the manor, “The tapestries are in the swording chamber and that’s… well lets say no one could penetrate it, no one currently living,… or dead for that matter…” it was impenetrable by all means except something Godric had know only as the ‘Riosiewweag’ and Godric had no idea what it was exactly, but he knew his parents had to be there for it to work, and no one but the four founders were permitted to be there when it happened.
“In the meantime we better go wake up the suit of armour, might take the three of us, it accumulates a lot of dust during the summer break,” Godric spoke as he turned to the Golden Hall, taking the key that had been used to open the doors Dilemma had just been playing with, and stuck it into one of two locks, where it moulded over as half a handle.
They walked of up the corridor, which led to the entrance of Emerindyl Lake. They were walking for quite a long time before they arrived at it. The suit of armour was snoozing loudly when they got their, and to Godric’s immediate horror, Dilemma belted it over the head, which flopped off and rolled across the ground clanging as it went.
Godric closed his eyes, thinking quietly to himself, ‘He’s just a trainee, just a trainee… he wont be like this forever… and if he is… you graduate in October anyway…’
“I’ll get it,” Dilemma spoke cheerily taking hold of the rolling armoured head and bringing it back to the suit and replacing it, looking as though he was doing someone else a great favour, “Well come on, you cant tell me after that, your still asleep, you rusted bucket of bolts,”
The suit continued to snore, “It’s not force Dilemma,” Godric told him as he walked closer, drawing out his wand as he went and placing it to the eye of the suit, “The students return, more will come soon, open your eyes, you great metal buffoon,”