"Sure, sure, I'll eat it too."

But he does stop eating right about then anyway.

Dessert arrives after a few more minutes! It is, as predicted, wondrous.

"I love this place," Tintin says upon tasting some kind of pink meringue-like substance.

James is making a pile on his plate. He has lost track of what-all is in the pile but there sure is a lot of it.

Dessert can only last so long. Eventually, they have eaten all they want or all they can stomach, and the firsties are shepherded off to their respective dormitories.

Tintin immediately claims the bed adjacent to James's, James being great and his only current friend.

That sounds fine to James!

"This is more people than I'm used to, I'm excited," he confides in Tintin.

"Yes! So many people, and we will be learning magic and having adventures! It is certainly the most exciting thing that has happened to me."

"Deborah says there aren't that many adventures to be had but I'm sure she just didn't look hard enough."

"The failure to have adventures is often a failure of imagination," Tintin nods. "I managed it in an orphanage, and can most certainly manage here."

Right then there is some commotion at the door and a girl strides past the boys' beds in the boys' dormitory and stops before James's bed.

"I've been told you had been told you were meant to go to the infirmary. And guess what this place is not."

...oh right that.

"The infirmary?" he guesses.

"Mmhm." She places both hands at her hips. "And now because of this I am going to have to go to bed later than usual. I hope you're happy."

"...can't say I care much."

Deborah flicks his nose with a finger.

Tintin hops off of his bed, grumbling slightly. "I will come with you. For moral support."

"Very Gryffindor of you but we don't need three of us to have to go to bed too late because of this one's bad choices."

She's smiling, though. This unreasonably tiny boy will fit right in.

"How exactly do you intend to stop me."

That startles a laugh out of Deborah and she shakes her head. "Come right on, then."

James starts to follow and: faceplants.

"Oh you minuscule idiot," she sighs then reaches for him to help him up.

Tintin supports him as well. "I make an excellent crutch," he reports to Deborah.

"You're just thirteen!" he protests to his sister, though he accepts both of their help.

"Yes, and you're eleven and have the ego of a fourteen-year-old Slytherin so I figure I could take you down a peg or two."

Grumble grumble.

"I think he is welcome to an ego," Tintin says loyally. "He seems to handle it well."

"Where did you find him?" wonders Deborah.