[img align=left]https://harry-potter-sounds.ambient-mixer.com/images_template/4/9/2/492e9aa1d0aa23457b3f6f14af6af17b_full.jpg[/img] It was a gorgeous Saturday. The unseasonably warm breeze fluttered around the lake, Students were excited about the picnic the school had arranged. There were blankets all around each with a picnic basket sitting on them. But these were no ordinary picnic baskets. These you simply had to read from the menu options and speak into. The house elves delivered the selections with a light jingle to the basket when orders were completed.

Some students where happy to bring their pets and let them wander around and enjoy the weather. Others were reading under the shade and even a few were taking a nap.

[img align=left]https://i.imgur.com/X5C1fhD.png[/img] Zoe meandered slowly up to one of the blankets and set her rather full book bag down. Her grey long haired cat, Tales, climbed the nearby tree, content on bird watching for the moment. Zoe was planning on people watching. Picking up her newest book she sat down on the blanket and preceded to glance over the top of the pages as students milled around.

[img align=left]https://sapi.subeta.net/shared/325911.png[/img] Lenore walked down the the lake and stopped to take in the view. Of all the natural elements, it was water that always called to her. A part of her wanted to walk straight into the lake and feel the water surround her, blocking all noise from the world above. Perhaps another time.

Looking about, she saw several students gathered together. She didn't see anyone she knew yet. Hoping that Elizabeth () or Callista () would arrive soon, she chose a blanket near the water that no one was using yet. As she looked around, she caught the eye of a Ravenclaw girl () with bright blue hair who was, as Ravenclaws always seem to be, reading a book. She gave the girl a subtle nod of acknowledgement and then turned back to her own activities.

"Steak and kidney pie with coffee please." she addressed the basket. "and a tumbler of scotch whiskey?" she added hopefully. A moment later the basket jingled and she opened it. The pie and coffee were there but not the whiskey. Shrugging, she pulled them out and set them on the blanket.

Conjuring a pillow nearly as large as herself with her wand, she leaned back and began to eat her pie.

[img align=left]https://sapi.subeta.net/shared/368592.png[/img]Marcia loomed above the rest of the students near the lake; she had perched herself within one of the shorter trees near the shore. It was nice being off the ground. The view from up high was so unlike the one available from one's normal height. She, of course, had her sketch book with her, tucked inside her trusty book bag, which she had draped from one of the protruding twigs on her branch of choice.

It was nice to just people watch, rather than participate in any conversation for now. However, she soon noticed Lenore, () a girl she recognized from the Slytherin common room, settle down on a blanket near her tree. She wasn't too friendly with her yet, and she seemed rather engrossed in her own world at the moment, so she decided not to call out to her. However, the tree had different ideas, apparently. The twig holding her bookbag snapped suddenly, and before Marcia could scramble to cast a spell to stop it, the bag landed with a heavy thud a few feet from Lenore. Soon after, Marcia landed gracefully on her feet in the same spot, careful not to ruffle her outfit on the way down.

"Ahem, sorry for disturbing you," She said sheepishly as she plucked her bag from the grass.

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Lily was so excited to be outside, she turned and admired the view of Hogwarts. "Wow". She says out loud. She turns and sees a free rock to sit on, and waits for the rest of the students to arrive. She notices a blue haired girl sitting and reading a book, but she's too shy to say hi. She keeps an eye on Burr who's noticed another cat in a tree, he slowly stalks up the tree to play. She then notices another student jump from another tree, amazed by her agility.

[img align=left]https://sapi.subeta.net/shared/368603.png[/img] It was a beautiful day and all way quiet, that is, until Jona arrived. "Zoe!" Jona came running up behind her () like a puppy, chanting her name. "Zoe! Zoe! Zoe!" He circled in front of her and asked, "Wutcha doooooin'?" Then he realized how stupid that was, because she was obviously reading and probably didn't appreciate the distraction. "Er, sorry," he smiled sheepishly and scratched the back of his head while he circled to see who else was there. Without moving from his spot by Zoe, Jona yelled at the next person he recognized to come over. "LIIIIILYYYYY!!!" He jumped up and down and waved his arms real wide, as if she () couldn't already hear him, his frantic figure definitely told her where he was. "Hey, come here!" He shouted to Lily then perched on a rock and played the drums on knees while he waited for her.

Chrysariel walked down to the lake and saw the amazing array of blankets on the ground with picnic baskets. She thought how nice it was for Hogwarts to do this for them. She was new here and wasn't sure where to sit. Her tuxedo Maine Coon Sputnik decided for her. The big fluffy cat went right to a purple blanket and meowed at the basket. Chrys laughed and hurried to join him. On the way, she saw Zoe from her house Ravenclaw and waved. As she passed another girl laying on a huge pillow, she smiled at her and called out, "What a brilliant idea!"

She reached the chosen blanket just as the basket jingled. Sputnik looked up at her impatiently and swished his tail. She reached into the basket and gave him his plate of minced tuna he'd apparently ordered. Conjuring her own huge pillow, she spoke to the basket for her own meal.

"Roast beef, mashed potatoes and gravy, carrots, and a hot buttered roll please, with tea." She was really hungry and hadn't eaten much in the last couple of days while she had been concentrating on studying. When the basket jingled her stomach growled. She grinned but was glad no one had heard it and pulled out her plate.

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Lily takes in the pretty day before noticing Jona (] running around the blue haired girl. She waves to him when he calls her over. "Hey Jona!" She says when she joins them, she looks at Zoe () "Hey, my name is Lily...if you couldn't guess from Jona yelling my name..." she pokes Jona's arm in a teasing manner.

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Callista waves as she joins the gathering, heading for Lenore. "Hi Lenore!" Sabrina jumps down from her shoulders onto the blanket and begins to sniff around.

Callista sits down. "Fish and chips please," she says to the basket, "and a Diet Pepsi, and a separate bowl of raw chicken livers for Sabrina." When the basket jingles she's amused. An ice-cold bottle of soda, a china bowl of serval kitten treats, and her lunch is wrapped in the traditional newspaper.

When the bookbag lands -- and Sabrina jumps, to go see what there is to catch -- Callista looks up. "Oh, hi Marcia. We're not disturbed. Have some lunch!"

Zoe gave Lenore ( ) a nod. She continued to watch the girl with her guise of reading. Then another girl appeared, by way of coming out of a tree. ‘Mmm,’ Zoe thought, ‘I should’ve done that.’ She continued to watch as a girl and her cat arrive . The girl had not been paying attention so when Jona arrived she was startled enough to drop her book. “It’s fine,” The teen said with a smile. Someone was actually happy to see her. “Have a sit. Eaten yet? I haven’t.” Then he beckoned Lily over before she knew what was happening. As the boy played drums on the rocks, she asked in a slightly droll voice, “had a lot of sweets this morning?” Zoe gave a nod to and watched as Lily arrived at their blanket. “Hi,” she replied to Lily. “Name’s Zoe.” She noticed another slytherin arrive but she didn't know this girls name.

"Bada pow! Bada bum! Badum psh - oh, what?" Jona looked up from his pretend drum set when Zoe asked her question. "Sweets? Nah!" Jona laughed as if her comment was the funniest thing he'd heard yet. "Unless you count this sweet day!" He raised his hands to the sky and gave her the goofiest grin, obviously enjoying the sun and the breeze. Then Lily finally made it over to them - jeez, she was slow as molasses! She poked him and made fun for being loud and his only response was to shout that much louder than before saying, "MAYBE YOU GUYS ARE TOO QUIET!!" He laughed, knowing that time he was being ridiculous and probably annoying some of the other students around them. "Aaaaanyway," He looked to Zoe, figuring of the two she would probably know the answer to his question. "Might we go swimming in that lake over yonder, milady?" With the old-time speak came a botched British accent as Jona stood stiff straight and demonstrated what he thought "proper" gestures might be.

Zoe gave him a quizzical look. The boy was obviously happy to be out of the castle. "It is rather lovely. I brought my pets with me. Lloyd will come eventually. He was grazing somewhere nearby." To the fake accent and ridiculous phrasing Zoe snorted. "Sure you can. Only do be careful of the giant boy eating squid." She gave a playful smile to let him know she was kidding. "Well, it's never ate a student yet, but I keep hoping one day it'll do something interesting."

Jona stared wide-eyed at Zoe's squid comment. He looked at the lake, back to her, back to the lake again, and sighed. "Nevermind then. After what you just said, I kinda don't wanna tempt fate, ya know?" He threw his backpack on the wrong which held a towel a book in it. "I can see you brought your pets with you," Jona said as he poked the tummy of the shape-shifting rabbit. "That's nice. I thought about bringing T-Kay, but wasn't sure how he'd do out here. I've never had a toad before and I need to figure out how to take care of him. He's - well, at least I think he;s a he. How can you tell with frogs?" The question was only half-rhetorical with Jona looking up and asking the sky, rather than either of the girls next to him. "Anyway, he's pretty chill, which I guess is okay. I just wanna play with something a little more, ya know." Jona waved his hands back and forth, then suddenly jumped up and ran a few feet then came back and tumble to the ground, laying where he dropped. "Does that make sense?"

[img align=left]https://sapi.subeta.net/shared/368811.png[/img] Sauvage came out to the lakeside and sat down. She waved to a few students she recognized, but mostly kept to herself and picked a space further isolated from everyone else. Her grandmother had just began teaching her how to knit over the summer and Sauvage was hoping to have a pair of mittens finished before Christmas so she could give them to her. She quickly braided her hair to get it out of the way and got to work.

"I was joking," Zoe said. "There's is a giant squid and sometimes you can pet its tentacles. He's really never harmed anyone. We can go for a swim if ye'd like. But if not we can do something more...active." When Jona asked how to tell with frogs, Zoe said, "Females are larger than males in frogs, if it croaks a lot it's likely a male. But if ye are still confused we can take him when we go to the petshop." She understood, he wanted something to play with. "Maybe ye need a dog?"

"Yeah, a dog!" Jona was starry-eyed and daydreamed for a few minutes about having a dog. He shook his head back and forth, dispelling the cloud of the dream. "Can I have a dog here? Are they allowed?" His face was all scrunched up in a question, but his eyes still glimmered with hope.

"Several people do," Zoe said with a smile. "We can go to the petshop and get you one. I'll get ye a puppy and we can save the rabbit for yer birthday, which is...when?"

When Jona yells, Lily blushes at the other students staring over. She sits on the blanket with Zoe. "I love to swim!" She says when Jona. When Zoe tells them about the squid her eyes widen, "A squid that lets you pet its tentacles?!" She's looks over the lake "I wonder what it feels like..." When Jona changes his mind Lily is a little disappointed. "Yeah let's just stay here. What a cute rabbit." She smiles when she sees Harold. "I think a puppy would fit you well. It'll help you get some of that energy out of your system." Her stomach growls. She begins examining the menu near the basket.

Marcia smiles at Callista and Sabrina, amused by the cat's inquisitive nature. With little hesitation, she sits down on the blanket with the pair of girls and tucks her legs underneath her in a demure pose.

"Your outfit today is lovely," Marcia complemented Callista with a grin before turning to Lenore (). "As is yours. You both look so high class and enchanting."

The Slytherin girl then turned to the picnic basket, speaking into it confidently, "May I get some shepherd's pie with a custard tart for dessert, please? And a cup of green tea to go along with that as well?"

Shortly, the basket jingled in a charming fashion and Marcia was able to pull her meal out of the interior.

"I hope everyone enjoys their meals," She mused before digging in.