Chapter 59: Feminine Gaze
[POV SWITCH: Caroline Davis – Second-Year Ravenclaw]
When I got my Hogwarts letter, I thought it was a mistake.
Magic? Me? My family thought it was a prank, something dreamed up by a bored neighbour. Even when the second letter came, sealed in the same strange wax, they still didn't believe it. By the time I stepped onto the Hogwarts Express, I felt like an intruder in someone else's world. Everyone else seemed to know the names, the spells, the history. I just tried to keep my head down and survive.
My first year felt like I was between two worlds. We didn't have enough money for Gringotts' exchange, so my family didn't have enough galleons and couldn't buy an owl. Meaning I was basically alone for the whole first year at Hogwarts.
I did make friends, of course, but they were more acquaintances than anything. I think it was my meek personality that made it really tough to find true friends.
I always found magic to be relatively easy. I can do all the spells in practice; I learn them really quickly. But when I try to complete them, with anyone watching? I just can't do it.
I'd get made fun of by my classmates, who'd tell me that's just how Muggle-borns are. Bad at magic, how I was just not made to be a witch.
Then I met him.
My second year was already living up to the first. The night those older Slytherins cornered me is burned into my memory. They had me trapped, my books scattered, my wand trembling in my hand. I could barely remember a single spell. They laughed like I was beneath them. I tried to fight back, to not roll over and take it. And then Richard Magus appeared. He didn't storm in with grand gestures; he just walked forward, calm as ever, and spoke. His voice wasn't loud, but it cut through the air like a blade. They backed down, not because they feared his wand, but because they feared him.
After that, I kept expecting him to forget about me, to move on like it had been nothing. But he didn't. He found me later, in the library, sitting alone with a fortress of books around me. He sat across from me, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, and talked. Not about what happened, not with pity, he talked to me like I was someone who mattered. He told me that I wasn't any different from any other wizard or witch. That stuck with me.
It brought me confidence like no other.
From then on, everything changed. I stopped hiding in the back of classrooms. I practised more. My spells stopped faltering. Under his quiet encouragement, I started to believe I belonged at Hogwarts. I began to believe in myself. Richard has this way of giving you just enough, never doing the work for you, never holding your hand, just handing you the tools and expecting you to use them. And you do because you want to prove him right.
The thing about him is… he's Slytherin, through and through. You can feel the sharpness under everything he does. But when he helps you, it's not charity. It's not pity. It feels like he's lifting you up because he knows you can rise to the challenge.
On the train home, when he sat beside me by the window, it felt like the rest of the train faded away. We talked about the summer, about my plans to practice spells where no one would see me. I admitted I still felt like I was catching up. He looked at me with that calm certainty and told me I wasn't afraid anymore, that I was moving faster than most. That I'd be better than most of them soon.
I told him it was only because of him.
He didn't deny it. He didn't accept the credit either. He just said, "You already had it in you."
That's who he is. He sees what you can be before you see it yourself.
Next year, I won't just be the girl he saved in a hallway. I'll be someone who deserves to stand beside him.
And I'll make sure he knows it.
[POV SWITCH: Poppy Pomfrey – Second-Year Ravenclaw]
I've always noticed people. Maybe it's because I want to be a Healer one day, you learn to watch, to see the small signs others overlook. Most students at Hogwarts rush around, caught up in their own dramas, their own little worlds. Richard Magus is different. He doesn't rush. He moves like the world itself bends to his pace, like every step is already accounted for.
The first time I saw him during the sorting ceremony, he stood out as the tallest among the first years, and his eyes were a unique purple. He looked the spitting image of a pure-blood, I thought of him as a Slytherin straight away. But when his name was called, Magus, I had no clue who that family was. And it would seem, after some asking around, that no one else, not even the other Slytherins, knew either.
The second time I saw him was during my visit to the library; he spoke smoothly, as if the conversation were just a play.
After that, I couldn't help but watch him. He wasn't like the other Slytherins, who either sneered at the rest of us or kept to themselves. He helped people, quietly, with no fanfare, then slipped back into the shadows. I saw him in the library more times than I could count, head bent over books far too advanced for a first-year, eyes sharp with focus. He'd ask questions that made professors smile before answering, questions that made you think about things differently.
I got curious. Too curious. I asked around. Everyone had a story about how he brewed a flawless potion on his first try, how he'd stood up to older Slytherins when they cornered a Ravenclaw girl. How he seemed to know things no first-year should know. The more I learned, the more intrigued I became.
Richard has this… pull. Not the kind that demands attention, but the kind that draws you in whether you want to or not. I've caught myself watching him when I should've been focusing on my own work. It's the way he looks at people, with those eyes that seem to peel away layers, seeing more than what you show the world. It's unsettling, but it also makes you want to be better, to prove yourself worthy of being seen like that.
When we talked, it was never just small talk. He remembered things, details I barely remembered mentioning. When I told him I wanted to become a Healer someday, I half-expected him to laugh or to dismiss it like others had. Instead, he simply said, "You'll make an excellent Healer someday." Just like that. No hesitation, no empty flattery. It felt like a prophecy more than a compliment. Those words have stayed with me ever since.
On the train ride home, I saw him move between carriages, speaking to people with the same calm focus he'd had all year. He stopped to talk to me, just for a few minutes, but it was enough. He asked about my summer plans, reminded me to keep practising, and then moved on like a shadow. Yet even after he left, I felt… seen.
There's something about Richard Magus that no one can quite put into words.
I don't know what that something is.
But I do know this: I want to be there to see it.
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The last Bonus Chapter of this week will be released later.