early morning [aura]

[auraquinn collins]

Aura rolled his eyes at both of her comments. He didn't want to be involved with the general populous, considering he had gone to school with most the staff. His eyes locked onto hers and he tapped a finger to his chin. "I have to go to breakfast, huh? Fine, but you have to agree to one condition." He grinned and began to pace. His eyes were clearly focusing on his thoughts as he was going to make this a lopsided barter as best he could.

Finally, he lowered his hand into his pockets and began to walk around her slowly. He was making it clear that he was sizing her up as he moved behind her. "In order for you to get me to go to breakfast, you have to not only return my cloak now, but also decide between option a or option b." He smirked and came to a stop before her, the tips of his boots mere millimeters from her feet.

"You must not only agree but pick your option and return the cloak before I tell you what the options are." His eyes locked onto hers, a liquid chocolate that seemed to be constantly moving. His breath was close enough to her for the first time, causing him to be able to smell it. The grin on his face never even wavered as he stood there taking in the mezmorizing scent of the girl before him, but also the one he produced of jasmine and rain.

[zara celeste o'riley]

”We’re going to barter over this?” Zara asked him. All she wanted him to do was go to breakfast but she was interested in what his condition was. ”Alright what’s the condition.” Sometimes it was a wonder she had not been placed in Gryffindor. Her decisions were sometimes impulsive and foolhardy.

Aura began to walk around her and Zara stood still, turning only her head to look at him. ”What are you doing?” she asked him. His mind was obviously working over time on whatever he was planning and she just wanted to get moving. He was in front of her and she could smell the rain around them even though it had not rained. Aura this close to her made her heart pick up its pace and her cheeks flush with colour.

Zara took the cloak off from around her shoulders and held it out to him. Once again her purple jumper was the only thing keeping her safe against the chill of the morning. ”Option A.” Zara said still looking at him. It really was hard to focus and straighten out her thoughts around him like this. She should have told him she wouldn’t bend and comply to his conditions.

[auraquinn collins]

Aura grinned and held an arm out as if offering for her to head inside. He would follow behind her at a distance, a grin plastered to his face as they walked. There wasn't much that could kill his mood anytime soon. The vampiric male seemed at ease with all that had happened and he was going to explain why soon enough.

He walked around Zara and pulled the door open. The grin on his face was ever present as he held open the large wooden object. He waited for her to near before pointing at his cloak still in her hand. "I'll get that back eventually. I got you to hold it close enough to realize which one it was. There's only couple knives and some bottled alchemist fire. Nothing that Albus wouldn't overlook as soon as he saw any of it." He grinned and nodded slightly, there was clearly more to what was running through his head.

He would wait for her to pass before following silently for a few moments. "Option A. Heh. So, you agreed to allow me to take you to dinner at a moment of my choosing without prior warning." He smirked as he followed, his hands falling into his pockets as the walls echoed her footsteps. He had gotten too used to not hearing himself that he would probably collide with Zara if she stopped to see if he were still there.

[zara celeste o'riley]

It took her a few seconds to unglue herself from the spot in front of him. Aura had already opened the door for her and she began to walk through, ”Thanks.” She folded the cloak over on of her arms and moved past him trying to clear her head a little. ”Surely you don’t have a need for all that stuff whilst your in the castle.” Zara said to him as he listed off all the things that were in the cloak, making her a bit more weary to put it on.

She listened to his condition and for a split second felt her head get all foggy again. Then again not much could take her by surprise not if she kept an eye out for it. Whilst thinking about that she then had another though. Zara stopped and turned to him. ”You don’t eat,” she stated simply. ”Wouldn’t it be weird to go to dinner?”

[auraquinn collins]

Aura shrugged and laughed. "I carry what I need on my person. The stuff hidden in the cloak is just fun to play with. A fire that needs to die out on it's own is a bit of a blast, and that's without the pun." He laughed and watched her turn around. He stopped just short of colliding with her, but less than a breath between them and they would have been touching.

Aura grinned and locked onto her eyes. His smirk curved up on the right as he completely forgot where they were standing. He could care less as long as she was there. "Probably would, but I have a terrible tendency to try to eat normal food. It's not that I can't, it's just that I don't need to, so I don't think about it." He knew full well he should be doing something, possibly something that involved moving, but he couldn't figure out what it was for the life of him. Since he hadn't stopped to be a pain in her ass, he had no idea why he would have to go anywhere.

[zara celeste o'riley]

Zara shook her head. ”You entertain yourself in weird ways.” Why would you want to carry bottles of fire on your person? Then again if muggles knew about them, carry around a wand for fun was probably weird and high up on their list of why would you do that questions.

She flinched thinking he might walk straight into her but had stopped just short. Zara looked up at him and nodded slowly. Finding her breath she said, ”I …I don’t want you to be uncomfortable or feel weird or anything.” He made no effort to move and once again, Zara wasn’t entirely sure she could. ”We could do something else?” Zara suggested to him quietly.

Once again the smell of jasmine and rain enveloped her and she now realised properly that the smell was from him. It felt comforting and pleasant to smell. "I'm not trying to back out of the condition. I'm just saying rethink it. What was option B?" Zara asked him curiously.

[auraquinn collins]

Aura snapped back when she mentioned option b. He shrugged and took a step back, his head gradually beginning to clear from the fog that had set in. "No idea. I threw that out there as soon as I came up with something. I honestly expected you to argue." He shrugged and waited to see what would happen next.

Truth be told, he was seeing her before him and discussing things, but his mind was going through conversations of a time long passed. She had asked him not to speak of it, so he was learning to keep his memories to himself. However, he watched and smirked as the two lined up here and there. The way she spoke, the looks he got, all of it. He knew she was in there somewhere, he just had to be patient.

[zara celeste o'riley]

Aura took a step back and Zara watched him before looking at the floor. ”I see.” She really hadn’t wanted to argue with him. Not when her brain had been as tangled as it had. She would probably have made a mess of any valid point anyone. Zara didn’t look at him again but turned and began to walk. ”You should think about what I said. Find something else to do.”

She moved into the great hall to see that the majority of the castle seemed to be awake now. People were sat at their house tables and the clattering of cutlery and chatter hit her and she smiled. This was normal for her, spending time with Aura was not. But the latter felt familiar and she stepped into it with only slight hesitation.

The smell of food made her stomach growl and she realised just how hungry she was. Walking down Ravenclaw table she smiled at one or two of her housemates before sitting down at the table. Now, she looked up to Aura and said, ”So how many people have you met?”

[auraquinn collins]

"Not a chance in hell." He wasn't going to change his mind on this one. He wanted to tell her that she should know better by now, but as he opened his mouth, his mind came back to reality. He closed his lips and followed in silence, contemplating just how mad she would have been if he had let his thoughts flow out in sound.

As the doors to the great hall opened, Aura looked about. It had been so long since he had been here, and yet it also felt like he had never left. His eyes scanned the room and one by one dropped onto each of those that the other students called the Marauders. His foot actually made noise as he lept to Zara's side and pointed at the Gryffindor in the glasses. "Who's the self righteous twit?"

He smirked and stood up straight. It was clear that the only two people he knew here were her and Rory. He didn't much care for the presence of others, as many noticed. Some of the people that Aura would never remember their names gasped as soon as they recognized him. He stood still and looked at Zara. "Is there something wrong with how I'm dressed?" Auraquinn Collins was oblivious to the fact that the only time anyone else saw him was in class. Truthfully, he'd avoid that, too, if he could.

[zara celeste o'riley]

”Fine.” Zara said. He obviously wans’t going to budge and considering that he was at breakfast with her it was only right to keep her side of the deal. ”I eagerly await dinner with you.” She hoped he wouldn’t try to take her when she was hanging out with Tyson. That boy had some issues going on and Zara knew she needed to get to the bottom of it before he exploded. She did a quick scan to see that he wasn’t at breakfast and frowned.

Aura then pointed towards Gryffindor table. Zara followed to see who he was talking about. She gave a short laugh, ”That’s James Potter.” Undeclared leader of the Maraudrers. ”You’ll fit in well with the Slytherins if you keep on like that. Most people love him.” Zara was rather indifferent when it came to the four boys. She admired the thinking that went behind some of their pranks but other than that they were disruptive and that didn’t bode well with her. ”Have you always been a Ravenclaw?” Zara had just broke her own rule. She knew it wouldn’t last. Talking about him and his life and not as if they had just met.

As she put some toast onto her plate she noticed some of the looks he got and when he asked her she took it as an excuse to look him up and down. ”I don’t think it’s the way you’re dressed. Maybe just the face area in general.” Zara shot him a smile and bit into her toast. ”There’s no way this is going to be normal, is there?” Zara said to him quietly with a small nod.

[auraquinn collins]

Aura nodded and smirked. He wouldn't have given in on that one. He never had before and he wasn't about to start now. He followed her through the room as she explained who the loud one was and sized him up. "He was the one tormenting the Slytherin kid the other day, no?" Aura grabbed a roll as he sat on the edge of the table facing Gryffindor. One good shot was all he needed, and yet he made no notion of hiding his intentions from his face.

He heard her question and smirked. She had failed at her own terms. He decided it was best to pass it off lightly as he watched the jackass from Gryffindor make a fool out of himself. "Ravenclaw is and always shall be home." He nodded slightly, twirling the roll in his hand.

He broke his gaze to look down at Zara. "Are you insinuating that there is something wrong with my face?" He pushed her jokingly with the side of his leg and looked back up at the group of students from the red and gold leaving. Aura stood on the bench next to Zara and let the roll fly. He knew his aim well enough to know it would connect with the back of his target's head, so once he released, he spun and dropped into a seated position next to Zara and grinned.

His eyes met hers and he didn't realize how close he had landed. He looked almost human with the large, childish grin he wore. He then heard her question and his face twisted slightly. "What do you mean? First you knock my face and then you go off about me being abnormal. What gives?" He pressed his forehead to hers and sighed. "Is what ever going to be normal?"

[zara celeste o'riley]

Zara nodded. ”Probably.” She didn’t keep a tab on James and his friends but their targets always tended to be Slytherins. She wasn’t entirely surprised when you took into account that Sirius was his best friend, and if any of the rumours were to be listened to, had moved in with him over the summer. Everyone knew the Blacks were proud of being pureblood and Slytherin so in their eyes Sirius must have drawn the short straw to end up in Gryffindor.

When he said that Ravenclaw would always be his home she smiled and said, ”That makes me like you a bit more.” She didn’t think there was anyone immune to house pride. Zara had always loved the fact she was a Ravenclaw.

”Maybe. I think I’m just getting used to it.” Zara told him with a laugh. Then he was standing on the bench and Zara could see where his line of thought was going. ”Aura!” she hissed at him. ”Get down.” But as she said it the roll went sailing through the air and Zara had turned away before she could see if it had hit its target which it probably had. She felt the weight drop down on the bench next to her as he sat with her again.

Zara turned to face him, her cheeks burning red. She punched him in the arm, hard. ”Because that was mature for like a sixty year old.” She was not impressed. And then his forehead was against her and her breath caught in her throat. ”Any of this. I’m never going to be able to treat this like a normal friendship because it isn’t. If I want to know you, I guess, you can’t be censored.” She was talking herself through the realisation.

[auraquinn collins]

"Closer to ninety, actually." Aura mumbled these words under his breath as he heard the Gryffindor household yelling for the roll culprit to come forward. He smirked and listened to her words, contemplating whether or not to pick a fight. When it came down to it, he had over half a century of experience on them and it would probably not end well.

Her comments caused the vampire to start thinking. She honestly wanted to know about him without all the strangeness that was Auraquinn. He started to think about if such a thing were possible and nodded slowly. "Just take your time. It's not like I'm going anywhere." He wore a huge childlike grin that, to him, felt like a lifetime since it had been there.

[zara celeste o'riley]

When he mentioned he was closer to ninety there was a slight uncomfortable twinge in her. She had been joking but of course he had been around for a while. He had been around longer than her grandparents had been. "You are…old." Zara said back to him quietly. "But you definitely look after your skin." She had to make light of the situation or she would start to freak out. "Also you'll have to tell me when you 100th birthday is and we'll throw a party."

She could hear James calling for whoever had thrown the roll at him and prayed that no one would drop Aura in it, mainly Aura himself. She gripped his hand to try stop him if he did decide to have a showdown in the hall.

"I'm glad about that." Zara said matching his grin with her own. She then remembered they were in the great hall and put some distance between them to continue eating her toast. Her blue eyes flicked up and down the table to see if anyone had seen their cosiness and there were one or two stares that dropped when she caught them. "Is there anything you want to tell me because I'm not even entirely sure where to start with questions."

[auraquinn collins]

The old comment made Aura glare at her in a slight disbelief. He wasn't going to argue it, though. It wasn't often that he mentioned that to anyone, let alone people near to him. His eyes wandered around as he tried to avoid the mention of a birthday party. He hated parties and only went to them when one of three people made him go. However, one of them was the one asking about it, so he had to at least consider it at some point.

His eyes followed the angered Gryffindor and he smirked. He wanted to pick this fight, but something stopped him. He looked down to see Zara's hand holding his and grinned. If there was one way to stop him from proving he should have been in either Gryffindor or Slytherin, she had found it. The male leaned back against the table and just watched as the boy became more and more irritated with the silence.

Aura caught a few looks if his own and jus grinned like a dork. He figured it was best to let them think what the will, seeing as how none of them were involved. His smirk started to fade as Zara began to request that he tell her anything about him. "Oh no. No. Last time I did that, you got upset. We leave that alone until you ask." He smirked snd waited for the Gryffindor household to calm down and start leaving again before throwing whatever was closest. This time it happened to be an orange. When it hit, Auraquinn quickly became focused on skinning an apple with a knife he slipped from his belt.