“You know you can always come home with me. My mum loves seeing you!” Calliope said, trying to convince the black haired girl to accompany her for the holidays. “The snow is so much more fun with a friend.”

“You know I can’t, Cals, but thank you for the offer.” Marilyn frowned, looking to the ground.

Any trace of the once confident girl had vanished due to the unpleasant conversation. Guilt bubbled in Calliope’s chest, not having meant to spoil her friend’s mood.

“You’ll be late to helping Madame Linn, if you don’t hurry up and go change. You know how she is if you are late.” Marilyn shooed the girl off quickly.

Calliope frowned but nodded, knowing the girl was right. She waved goodbye before skipping her way to the Dungeons. Even as a student, Calliope still had a uniform she had to wear when in the Hospital Wing.

She tapped Helga Hufflepuff’s rhythm against the barrels, humming to the beats. She grinned when the door opened, still not used to seeing it open.

Calliope rushed up the stairs to her dorm, pleased to see her uniform neatly laid upon her bed by the house-elves. She quietly thanked them before quickly changing, knowing she was already running late.

The uniform was altered for her, but still looked similar to Madame Linn’s. It was a knee length, long sleeved grey dress. A white apron was over top of the dress, ruffles around the shoulders. She wore white cotton tights and black mary janes. Her hair was pulled back into a bun, wisps escaping around her face.

Without sparing her appearance another thought, Calliope gracefully sprinted out of the Common Room, attempting to not be late. The Hufflepuff dorms were not close to the Hospital Wing which made her trek there more time consuming in itself, but she wouldn’t trade it for the world. She had been given an unbelievable opportunity, one she would never take for granted.

It had started when she was a 1st year. Her mother had always aimed to help people, and was a healer of sorts. She cared for magical creatures rather than witches and wizards. It wasn’t a job that had much business, but Calliope’s mum had always had a big heart for animals. So naturally, Calliope adopted that goodnatured need to help people.

She had scraped her knee quite badly during Flying class and had been sent to the Hospital Wing. It seemed that day had been quite busy as Madame Linn was running around, somewhat frantic, to help all the students.

Calliope, not wanting to be a bother, sat on the bed and pulled out her wand, muttering a quick spell to ease her pain and then grabbing a specific paste like substance and spreading it over her knee before bandaging it. It was impressive work for a eleven-year-old, and even Madame Linn found herself surprised. After learning Calliope planned to pursue being a Healer, Madame Linn offered her a position in the Hospital Wing to learn, since she had such a knack for it.

The young Hufflepuff gratefully accepted, and the rest was history.

“Miss Patterson, you are late. What is to blame for this tardiness?” Madame Linn’s strict voice called to Calliope.

The girl in question smiled sheepishly.

“Sorry, Madame, simply running a little slow after Potions.” Calliope shrugged. “It won’t happen again.” “It best not. Today seems to be rather busy, what with all the first years attempting their more complicated transfiguration spells. Mostly splinches. Anything more complicated I will handle. Understood, Miss Patterson?” Madame Linn raised an eyebrow and stared the young girl down.

“Crystal clear, Madame. I’ll get started right away.”

Calliope typically handled the less serve cases, often bandaging cuts and scraps, as well as the odd splint for a fracture here and there.

While there was a charm to heal such injuries, Madame Linn often preferred to allow the body to naturally repair itself to a certain extent. There were no concrete studies on how the use of magic to aid in the healing of injuries effected the body longterm. With children so young, Madame Linn simply mixed the magic and natural healing.

Most of the students who found themselves in the Hospital Wing would rather be treated by Calliope though, despite Madame Linn’s extensive training. The young Hufflepuff simply had a better bedside manner, one with a more gentle approach. Some wondered if she were a Veela, always noting how quickly she gained the trust of those she treated. Her personality was intoxicating in a way, and those around her always found themselves opening up about what ailed them, regardless if they had previously spoken to her or not.

Alas, Calliope was no Veela, just a very warm presence. It was quite a useful character to possess when one wished to work a job that often had people clamming up about what had really caused the issue.

“Hello, I’m Calliope,” the blonde girl greeted, smiling at the first year who was sitting on the bed before her. The girl had tears streaming down her face, her lip jutted out in a pout. “Can you tell me your name?”

“J–Jasmine,” the girl cried. There was a gash in her arm and Calliope resisted the urge to tut at the injury.

“Jasmine, that’s a lovely name. Now, Jasmine, would you mind telling me what happened?” It was a question that always had to be asked. Every injury had to have a report filed, and every student had their own file. With how young the girl before Calliope was, it was no surprise that there was no previously existing file to her name.

It was only mid-term, so most of the first years still had no file of their own. It was the thing Calliope hated the most, having to fill out the dreadful reports of how various students had gotten hurt. She much preferred to practice her skills than to be forced to simply write using her knowledge of the subject.

Calliope patched up Jasmine easily, moving on to the next student after giving the girl a piece of chocolate. She noticed the candy calmed most students down, young and old. There was something about the sweet that generally just had a comforting effect.

The brunette saw two other first years with similar injuries to the first girl before a different type of case was sat before her.

It took only seconds for Calliope to realize the boy was quite shy. He refused to look up and meet her eye, his arm cradled to his chest.

She gave him a kind smile, approaching him gently, worried if she spoke to loudly or something of the sort, the already shy and frightened boy would shut down even more.

“Hello there, I’m Calliope, I’ll be helping you out today. Can you tell me your name?” Calliope asked, crouching down before the boy, trying to get him to see that she was only trying to help.

He looked to be older than her, but not by much. Perhaps only a year or two.

His lips remained sealed tightly, his eyes looking at everything but her.

“Well, if not your name, can you tell me what happened? Did someone do this to you?” She asked the boy.

Once again, he did not answer her. Calliope frowned slightly. She knew she would have to gain his trust enough for him to tell her what happened.

“I see you are in Hufflepuff,” she said lightly, standing up and sitting on the edge of the bed he was on. “I’m in Hufflepuff too, you know, even if I don’t currently look it. It’s a good house. You must be older than me, you look like you are. I’m a second year. Are you a third year?”

She was saying many words, but her tone of voice was so inviting, so calm and warm, that the boy nodded, agreeing with her question, confirming one thing about him.

“Do you mind if I take a look at your arm? I’m not going to do anything I just am going to look for now.” She told him, once more giving him a gentle smile.

The other Hufflepuff slowly held out his arm to her, his sleeve pushed up to show two deep cuts running vertically up his arm. It took everything for the young brunette not to wince, her lips turning downward at the sight before her.

“Did an animal do this?” She asked, thinking of nothing else that could leave two cuts like that down his arm.

The boy looked up suddenly, startled. He frantically started shaking his head, leading Calliope to believe that was exactly what had left the marks. But why would he be trying to hide it?

“N-no!” It was the first time she had heard the boy say anything, and it startled her slightly with how sudden the outburst was.

“If not a creature then what?” She asked him, sterilizing her hands so that she could hold his arm.

“I-I’m very clumsy. I fell beside the Black Lake, it was a rock.” The boy explained in a rush.

Calliope was very skeptical, but for now she would appease him and go with it.

“Can you tell me your name now, then? It’s very important that you do, to make sure you have no allergies or anything of the sort.”

“N-Newt Scamander.” The boy replied so quietly she almost did not hear him.

“Well then Newt, it looks like a quick spell and some bandages is all you need. Are you okay if I do that or would you prefer Madame Linn take care of it?”

It was a question she had to ask every student. Would they prefer Madame Linn take care of them. While she was quite capable, some of the students were more skeptical about her taking care of them, rather than the fully trained healer.

“You can,” Newt told her, looking down at the ground, his shy demeanor returning.

While Newt was always shy, he found his demeanor wasn’t helped when he found the fellow Hufflepuff to be quite cute. While he never had really had any interest in girls, nor had any friends in general, he still often found himself thinking thoughts such as these, which only ended with him becoming more flustered.

She continued talking to him, making him as confortable as possible, wanting to learn what actually happened to him. However, he never told her more than he fell near the Black Lake, so she was left to put that down in his chart.

The girl did her job quickly, taking care of Newt’s injuries and gingerly wrapping them with cloth soaked in another healing agent, just to insure the cuts did not scar.

“Well then, Newt, that should be all. You’ll need to leave the cloth on for a day, and clean your cuts well when you take it off. Understood?”

“Yes,” he replied, his voice still quiet.

“Good, now off you pop. It was nice talking to you Newt, but maybe if we do it again we have the conversation in the Great Hall, not in the Hospital Wing.” she told him, a joking smile on her face.

The boy flushed slightly at the idea of talking to her again, despite not having done much talking on his part, but he nodded all the same.