"And I complain Occlumency's hard to practice! Once I'm of age, maybe - it does sound really nice -"

"Legilimency does?"

"You could talk with a friend while you're sitting in class or a boring meeting, or have an important conversation with no chance at all of being overheard, or discreetly ask one person for verification of something that someone else just said aloud in a negotiation..."

"It didn't sound quite that - controlled - or rather it didn't sound like there was a way to sort out thoughts you mean somebody to see from thoughts you don't, so all that sounds very nice but you'd still need a very high bar of comfort with it - or maybe I'm just weird, Minor didn't think he'd mind if people read his mind -"

"A lot of my family members are very direct people. There's nothing they think that they wouldn't happily say aloud, and so on. But yeah, I'm imagining learning it with my brother or maybe a very close friend, where the ability to communicate privately would be worth it..."

"I'll probably just have my mum Confund me about something little and silly when I go home for the summer hols as a test."

"Best of luck!"

"Thanks."

And at some point he'll mention to Minor not to go around suggesting he has sketchy powerful magic, not very helpful, that.

Miranda continues not to see what's so hard about Occlumency. She's probably missing something but she has no way to tell what (she tries a couple professors; none of them know anything about it) so she just steadily works her way through the book and then practices a little every day and presumably if her mum can Confund her she's not doing it right but until she can check that she doesn't know what else to do.

And he tries to learn Mermish, and writes detailed letters home on the progress of this endeavor. Sometimes his not-cousins come down to the lake to watch him. He suspects they are making fun of him for sticking his head underwater but he's hardly going to wait to learn the language until he can do advanced charms to let him breathe in the lake. 

Gaunt needles Miranda about her father again, this time in their dormitory instead of the common room. Miranda aims a hair-braiding charm at her head and Gaunt winds up with such ridiculously entangled hair all braided together in front of her face that she can't see or talk for hours until she's unpicked it all.

And apparently tells someone about it, because he asks her, "what is the story with your father?"

"My parents are divorced and I don't talk about him," Miranda says.

"I'm terribly sorry," he says gravely. "That must be very painful."

"They've been divorced since I was a baby, it doesn't trouble me very much except when people won't leave it alone."

"You have my sympathy." Beat. "But he was a pureblood, right?"

"I didn't insult you," Miranda says pointedly.

"I'm not trying to insult you! I wouldn't hold it against you if you got abandoned by a Mudblood father!"

"I did not get abandoned by a Mudblood father and you'll leave it at that if you don't want your own set of plaits like Gamp's!"

"There's no need to get all defensive," he says, and storms off.

Harrumph.

"His mother's French," someone comments scornfully.

"I didn't know that," Miranda says neutrally.

"Yup. Good family, but still."