We'll Say a Little Prayer (Dastan)

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By the time that she and Dastan reached the portrait into the school kitchens, Gwen was glad to feel that she was thawing out. “Here we are,” she announced to Dastan, turning to smile at him before tickling the pear to grant them entry.

She stepped inside and then stepped aside so that Dastan could get in, loosening her scarf as she greeted the house-elves. Dinner had already begun, so Gwen hoped that they wouldn't be too busy now. “Hi, everyone,” she smiled, giving the elves a small wave. “This is Dastan, and he's visiting us from Beauxbatons.” She doubted that they had seen him around before, so she felt that it was only right to introduce them.

Looking to Dastan and then to the elves, Gwen paused. “We were wondering if we could get some dinner, please?” For Dastan's sake, she didn't want to have to bring up why they had decided to come down to the kitchens instead of eating in the Great Hall with everyone else. Fortunately, though, the elves weren't ever ones to pry.

@dastan

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He smiled back at Gwen, when she told him that they'd arrived. He had no idea where they were, but he didn't care. Gwen loved him and she was with him and for the first moment in the last few days, he wasn't entirely focused on Jesper's death and how he could get revenge.

He followed her inside and nodded when she introduced him to the house elves. Of course, he knew what they were, but he was a little puzzled at the way she was treating them. They were servants and she was talking to them like they were old friends. No matter. He wasn't here for the elves, he was here to spend time with Gwen, away from prying eyes.

She glanced at him before asking the elves to bring them dinner. In the next ten seconds, Dastan felt himself pulled to a table, which was suddenly laden with food. He looked for Gwen, wanting to be as close to her as possible. He reached out a hand to her, inviting her to sit next to him at the table. "Thank you for doing this, Gwen," he told her simply as he waited for her to join him. He was so relieved by how she was treating him just the same as she did before. At least she wasn't looking at him differently. 

@gwendolen

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As the elves got to work on their dinner, Gwen kept her fingers crossed that something that they made would be vegetarian. She had forgotten to specify that she would need to be accommodated in that regard. If she only had a side dish of vegetables available to her, she wasn't going to complain; it had happened before, and it wouldn't be the last time.

Then she and Dastan were pulled over to a table with the food that had been prepared for them. Instantly, she saw that there were potatoes and peas, and she knew that she could make a meal off of those.

“Thank you for doing this, Gwen.”

Gwen took Dastan's hand again and took the place beside him with a smile. “For doing what?” she said while putting her napkin on her lap, as if completely oblivious to her gesture. “I don't mind having dinner alone with you.” She didn't think it was weird. It might not have followed what was expected of her, but there was nothing wrong with breaking protocol—especially not for Dastan.

@dastan

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It all seemed to come so naturally to Gwen, talking to him, trying to comfort him. Dastan was sure that if things were on the other foot, he would not be as much of a help to her. Still, he was trying. He wanted to make her happy, wanted to spend time with her and he wanted to let her help him. Then again, that was easier said than done. 

He smiled, ready to answer her question when she continued on. "Well, I still appreciate that you're willing to have dinner alone with me, away from everyone else." Had he been in a different mood, that same comment would have meant something completely different, but at the moment all Dastan was thinking of was that he didn't want to be in the public eye right now. 

"So what do you want to talk about?" he asked her, after dishing up some food onto his plate.

@gwendolen

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“Well, I still appreciate that you're willing to have dinner alone with me, away from everyone else.”

It wasn't the meaning that might have been implied, and Gwendolen knew that. She knew that people their age had a tendency to act or speak before they actually thought about the consequences of what they were doing or saying. They didn't always intend to be insensitive, but it was better than having to try to deflect people from bothering Dastan at a table with at least a few of his classmates.

She nodded. It was quicker than ending up in a continuous loop of each of them saying the same things over and over again. “Any time.” Gwen meant it. She would drop everything to be there for him.

Dastan began to put food on his plate, and so did she, carefully avoiding anything that looked as though it contained meat. “So what do you want to talk about?” he asked her.

What wasn't there to talk about? “Anything,” Gwen answered back, thinking. Dastan would be finishing school at the end of this year. “Have you heard from any Quidditch teams yet?” She hoped that he hadn't given up on those aspirations because of his brother's death, and especially not when it meant that there was a chance that he could stay nearer to her.

@dastan

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Gwen said she was willing to talk about anything and Dastan almost grimaced. That was not what he wanted to hear right now! He wanted her to tell him something specific that they could talk about, that way his mind wouldn't wander and he could focus on his conversation with her, which he was sure would be stimulating once it began. Then she asked about Quidditch and Dastan smiled. He could talk about Quidditch all day. He shook his head, "No, I haven't heard from them yet, but they did say that they wouldn't be able to get back to me until spring. So I still have a bit of time before I really should start worrying about that. Do you like Quidditch?" He asked curiously. How did he forget to ask her this before?

@gwendolen

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Dastan explained to her that he wouldn't be hearing back from the Quidditch teams until the spring. He only had a few more months to wait, if that, and Gwendolen wasn't worried at all about his prospects. There were so many teams out there; to be honest, she couldn't keep them all straight. It wasn't too unlike football in the Muggle world, although she didn't pay very much attention to that sport, either.

“Do you like Quidditch?”

Gwen's answer was quick. “Just watching it,” she said. One year of mandatory Flying class had been enough to confirm that she was not a natural on a broomstick. “I don't like heights, though.” She cringed a little at the thought of the sensation of being on a broomstick, far above the ground. Being Muggle-born, it wasn't natural to her. Some of the tricks that her fellow students used while playing were absolutely terrifying, and it was always difficult to watch when someone had ended up hanging from their broom with one hand.

“But I'll watch you play every chance I get,” Gwen assured him. She couldn't promise Dastan that she wouldn't have to cover her eyes at times, but she would do everything in her power to be there.

@dastan

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Dastan smiled at the girl who was spending her free time with him instead of with her friends. She didn't have to do this, but he really appreciated it. He appreciated that she wanted to make sure he was alright and would try to conceal from her the part that wasn't because surely if she saw the burning rage within him ... she wouldn't think she was in love with him. And after losing Jesper, Dastan wasn't ready to let Gwen go, even if that was the better thing for her. 

Her immediate response to his question about Quidditch told him more than her actual response did. She liked to watch, with either meant that she wasn't athletic, or that she didn't like heights, which was alright with Dastan. He was all for someone watching and cheering him on. "That's alright, watching is perfect," he told her with a smile. He focused a little more on his food once more.

@gwendolen

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Even as Dastan assured her that simply watching was “perfect”, Gwendolen couldn't help but feel slightly guilty for not having much of an interest in the sport that clearly meant so much to him. She took a few bites of food, eating what she knew she could without having even more of a guilty conscience. When she wasn't chewing, she kept her mouth in about a half smile, determined to make things better. That short silence between them felt so long.

“Maybe I just need a better teacher?” she suggested. She knew that Hogwarts had brooms besides the ones that belonged to individual students. They might not have been the newest models around, but, if eleven-year-olds could learn to fly on them and not chicken out from being barely off the ground, so could she.

Gwen knew that Dastan would be patient with her; she knew that without a doubt. And he was almost a professional Quidditch player, so he knew what he was doing. She could trust him, if he agreed to do it. “Not catching Snitches or anything,” she added. “Just the broom.”

@dastan

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A short way into the silence, Gwen spoke and Dastan turned to show he was listening. Even so, he didn't expect her to suggest needing a better teacher. A sly smile slid onto his face, "Maybe a foreign one would be able to help you look at things a different way," he suggested back at her. Being with Gwen was the best distraction he could hope for. At least, until Margaux came back with more information about Jesper's murderer. Still, he cared for Gwen and she obviously cared for him too, so this was helping. 

He laughed when she said no catching Snitches. "I don't do that. I work with the Quaffle." And the bludgers. OK, sometimes the Snitch too, but that wasn't his preference. Of course, he wasn't going to make her do any of that, though he might try to show off with it. "When do you want to?" Dastan asked simply.

@gwendolen

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“Maybe a foreign one would be able to help you look at things a different way.”

Gwen grinned. He had understood, although he had to correct her mention of the Golden Snitch. She blushed at her mistake.

“When do you want to?”

Rushing Dastan into anything seemed horribly rude of her, especially when she didn't even know if he was going to have to return to France for Jesper's funeral, assuming that there would be one. Although Gwen didn't want to bring it up again unless Dastan did first, she wanted to make sure that he also understood that she could wait.

“Maybe not today,” she laughed, considering how cold it was outside and the fact that it was already late. The next day would be too cold, too. “But whenever you want. Once the weather is warmer, like.” Although, as soon as she said that, she knew that they would be waiting a while. Since there was no telling how much schoolwork either of them would have in the coming months, she decided to compromise. “Okay… I'd like to be able to feel my fingers on the broom handle.” Gwen hoped that that wasn't too much to ask.

@dastan

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Dastan laughed, surprised by the sound. Sure, he didn't expect to be upset forever, but he didn't think he'd be laughing today either. "No, not today. That's not what I meant," he told her with a wide smile. "Whenever you want to learn, just come and tell me and we'll do it." He paused for a moment, "But if you forget I'll probably come to you and ask you if you still want to. Just as a warning." Hopefully she wouldn't mind if he did that because ... there was a definite possibility that he would. 

@gwendolen

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Gwendolen's smile became warmer when she heard the sound of Dastan's laughter. She hadn't expected it, but it didn't sound the way that forced laughter did. “No,” he told her, “not today. That's not what I meant. Whenever you want to learn, just come and tell me and we'll do it.”

If they were going by that, thought Gwen, there was a good chance that she would talk herself out of it. She liked knowing that Dastan didn't want to put any pressure on her, either, though. If he was going to teach her how to fly, that was important.

“But,” Dastan continued, “if you forget I'll probably come to you and ask you if you still want to. Just as a warning.”

That was a warning she could handle. Swallowing the bite of food that she had taken in the meanwhile, she smiled again. “Okay,” she agreed. “We've got passwords for all of our common rooms here,” she explained to him, “so you might not be able to reach me there.” The riddles changed every so often, but maybe it was a good thing that Dastan wouldn't be able to drag her out of bed.

Still, Gwen realized that this was potentially problematic. What if, she thought, he urgently needed her? “We could make a code,” she proposed. “Hmmm… If you need me but can't find me,” the unfortunate part of having a castle as large as Hogwarts, “send me an owl and just write an ‘X’. I'll know what it means, and I'll go straight to the Beauxbatons Carriage.” It seemed effective and uncomplicated, and, while she had never had the need for a system like that one before, Gwen figured that it was the closest thing to instantaneous communication, short of charming something to do it.

“For anything,” she added. “Not just flying lessons.”

@dastan

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Dastan smiled, "I doubt I will have a hard time finding you. If I cannot get one of your friends to get you for me, I will just wait until a mealtime or send you an owl." Either way, he'd been seeing her almost daily now, so he didn't see this as being a problem.

Then she suggested the idea of a code. Dastan nodded, liking how thorough she was with her idea. "I will do that then. And if you need me, do the same and I can meet you ... in the Entrance Hall?" Would that be an easy enough place to reach her? He wasn't sure. 

By this time Dastan was done eating, so when she told him to use thing for anything and not just flying lessons, he reached over and took one of her hands. He didn't understand why she was being so understanding, but he appreciated it greatly.

@gwendolen

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Dastan said that he didn't think that he would have any difficulty in finding her, and he was probably right. He said that, if he couldn't find one of her friends to find her for him, he would wait until it was a mealtime or send her an owl.

“…Or you could just follow the sound of show tunes,” Gwen joked, though it wasn't inaccurate. Most singing at random times would likely lead him back to her, whether she was on her own or in choir practice.

He seemed to like her idea of a coded message, not that her plan was anything intricate. If it was urgent, she figured that neither of them would want to bother with complex cryptography. “And if you need me,” he told her, “do the same and I can meet you… in the Entrance Hall?”

“The Entrance Hall,” she nodded, affirming that the choice of location was fine with her. It meant that Dastan wouldn't get lost somewhere within the castle, and they could go from there to wherever was best for them to talk.

Gwendolen didn't mind that she hadn't quite finished her dinner when Dastan took her hand in his. She looked down and then into his eyes and squeezed it back. “Are your family having a funeral for Jesper?” she asked cautiously. She didn't know the circumstances enough to know if that was even a possibility, but it was still something that she felt that she needed to ask. If she were a twin, she thought, seeing someone who looked exactly like herself in a casket would have been too much to handle. Just the thought of either of her brothers' deaths, when she knew that they were alive and well, was an uncomfortable one.

@dastan