Beauxbatons [Charlie Weasley]

Herbology

She's awoken by a furry tail brushing across her face.

Scrunching up her eyes, but groaning and sitting up all the same, Isabelle allows the fluffy white cat to crawl into her lap, stroking her fur as Célia rolls over and stretches, purring at the French girl's touch.

Isabelle took Célia in only a couple of months ago, taking over from her previous owner, bringing her here to Hogwarts with her as her only friend from France.

Yawning and rubbing her eyes, the French girl slowly lifts Célia off her lap, swinging her legs down off the bed and onto the floor, standing up. She heads into the bathroom that backs off her bedroom, sleepily undressing and stepping into the shower, letting the warm water wash over her and wake her up properly.

Isabelle pulls on some black tights and a short, dark grey skirt, tucking a light beige knitted jumper into it, after she finishes her shower and dries herself off. She then pulls her long, wavy, golden hair back into a half-up, half-down braided style, letting some loose hairs down to frame her face.

Before she heads out the door of her chambers, she grabs her school bag, slinging it over her shoulders, letting Célia run out from between her feet into the castle, her white fluffy tail disappearing around the end of a corridor. Isabelle closes the door to her chambers behind her, heading down through the Hogwarts castle towards the Great Hall.

There's one hundred and forty-two staircases here in total, as she found out from reading Hogwarts: A History, which she finished within two days of borrowing it. There's wide, sweeping ones; narrow, rickety ones; some that lead somewhere different on a Friday; some with a vanishing step halfway up that you have to remember to jump.

Then there's doors that won't open unless you ask politely, or tickle them in exactly the right place, and doors that aren't really doors at all, but solid walls just pretending.

It's also very hard to remember where anything is, because it all seems to move around a lot. The people in the portraits keep going to visit each other and Isabelle's sure the coats of armour can walk.

The ghosts don't help, either. It's always a nasty shock when one of them glides suddenly through a door you're trying to open.

Isabelle made friends with Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington at lunch on the first day, Maisie introducing her to him, and ever since, he's always been happy to point her in the right direction.

Peeves the poltergeist, on the other hand, is worth two locked doors and a trick staircase if you meet him when you're late for class. He drops waste-paper baskets on students' heads, pulls rugs from beneath their feet, pelts them with bits of chalk or sneaks up behind them, invisible, grabbing their noses and screeching, "GOT YOUR CONK!"

Even worse than Peeves, if that's possible, is the Hogwarts caretaker, Argus Filch. He owns a cat called Mrs Norris, a scrawny, dust-coloured creature with bulging, lamp-like eyes, just like Filch's. She patrols the corridors alone. Break a rule in front of her, put just one toe out of line, and she'll whisk off for Filch, who'll appear, two seconds later.

Filch knows the secret passageways of the school better than anyone, and can pop up as suddenly as any of the ghosts. The students all hate him and it's the dearest ambition of many to give Mrs Norris a good kick.

"What have you got on today?" Ollie asks, sitting down next to Isabelle when she arrives in the Great Hall, starting to eat his eggs.

"'Erbology up first and zen a spare before lunch. After zat I 'ave Care of Magical Creatures," the French girl replies.

"Hey, we have a spare before lunch today, too!" Ollie says excitedly. "We can hang out all together!"

"I can teach you how to play Quidditch!" Noah pipes up, leaning across the table towards Isabelle.