Sprout makes a thoughtful humming noise. "Hmm, I think Minerva - ah, Professor McGonagall - might argue that, technically speaking, it stops being separately alive in the way that it previously was and goes on instead being alive in the way that the castle itself is? But broadly yes, I would say so!"

"Huh," says, Neville from next to Bruce, in the quiet wondering tone of someone who has just learned that anything in the universe can ever be cool and not terrifying. "That's so cool?"

This is the first time he's said anything out loud all day, and Sprout beams at him like the sun rising.

Smile for Neville. "It really is. What does it mean that the castle is sort of alive?"

"Hmm. Well, there is a way that people and animals are alive, and there is a way that plants are alive which is a little bit different from that, and then there is the way that enchanted things like broomsticks and mirrors and photographs are a little bit alive, and Hogwarts is more like the third thing than like the first two but more so?"

"Does it have--goals? Emotions? Memories? Does it decide things?" Does it have opinions about the students, because that's a terrifying prospect made only slightly less terrifying by the ineffable sense of love and welcoming they all felt when they arrived.

"I think it probably has feelings? But we are venturing, alas, a bit out of my area of expertise. Filius - ah, Professor Flitwick - might be able to tell you more."

He nods and says "Thank you for answering my questions!" as if he hadn't thought this was a behavior teachers came with, and goes back to watering skyvines.

The rest of Herbology class will pass uneventfully, leaving them free for the evening. Next week, according to the schedule, the fourth block on Tuesdays will be flying class, but in week 1 this is omitted for reasons unspecified. Wednesday is much the same in the daytime, with plenty of time for reading as they haven't yet been assigned any homework, but Wednesday night they have their first Astronomy class at midnight.

A gaggle of Ravenclaws exiting their own tower will join them on the way across the seventh floor, already enthusiastically embroiled in an argument about whether England or Wales is likely to field a better national team this year based on the performance of various potential players in their club matches over the summer. Even the ones that don't actually care very much about Quidditch are having fun arguing, except for Kevin Entwhistle who has declared himself the moderator (on grounds that he heard of Quidditch for the first time two days ago) and is gleefully awarding his classmates imaginary points for quality of rhetoric with absolutely no sense of whether anything they are saying is true.

This conversation cannot hold Bruce's attention because ASTRONOMY. He's gonna get to use his TELESCOPE.

It's obviously going to be England, guys, England has Martin Bellwether and he's worth two of any other chaser, did you not listen to his match against Puddlemere in August, he is completely impossible to get an interception on and he had Sandra Wallis bamboozled*, Wales doesn't stand a chance.

*This is a technical term referring to the state in which a keeper repeatedly falls for feints and blocks one hoop while the bamboozling chaser scores in another hoop.

The night sky over Hogwarts is even grander than its image in the great hall ceiling, stretching from horizon to horizon over the tallest tower in the castle. When they looked out of the windows on the way up the tower, they could see lights in the windows of other towers and wings around and below them; from this platform all earthly lights are muted. There's a sliver of waning moon overhead and a carpet of stars shining almost bright enough to read by.

When the trapdoor shuts behind the last student and the light of the stairwell is cut off, Professor Sinistra glides across the open space to meet them; she's tall and willowy and snow-pale and looks like she could turn out to have been a trick of the light and disappear at any moment. She addresses the class in a whisper that makes you want to stop talking and lean in closer.

"Welcome to astronomy. This class has practical uses, but we will not discuss them tonight. Tonight is for joy. If you wish to view the Moon, Jupiter, or Saturn, I will help you adjust your telescope. If you wish to contemplate the stars, I will not trouble you. If you wish to leave and return next week, I will not speak of it."

Bruce wants to set up his telescope and look at the planets, but--not just yet. He has never seen this many stars, never had a minute to lean silently against the crenellated wall and let his head fall back so everything he can see is sky and just exist.

Okay now he wants to set up his telescope and look at planets!!!

Seamus wants to confirm real quick that we are arguing specifically about England vs Wales because we all already know that Ireland's team is the best in the Isles? (There's a series of nods.) Excellent! So Ron's totally right about Bellwether but Wales has --

When the trapdoor shuts, Seamus stops talking (and so does everybody else). It's impossible not to, it's too dramatic. Sinistra gets the quietest listening class to her introductory since McGonagall, and for quite different reasons.

Hermione is not really a Contemplate The Stars type of guy, constitutionally, but she'll respectfully try to set up her telescope quietly while near everyone else is doing that.

Sinistra is quietly efficient at helping everyone who wants to set up their telescope, adjust it for their height, get it pointed at the celestial body of their choice, look through it at the right angle, and set the focus. A couple of the ravenclaws want to see what random stars look like and she whisperingly explains why they still just look like points.

Saturn really does have rings just like in the pictures!

Parvati and Lavender are soon whispering excitedly to each other about astrology, periodically pointing at various parts of the sky. (Evidently they've been taught wildly different things on this topic, owing to the fact that Parvati's parents are pureblood wizards and Lavender's mom was unaware until eleven months ago that her mysteriously disappeared boyfriend from 1979 had been magic.) 

Dean and Seamus mostly ignore their telescopes and just stare at the sky for a while in companionable silence. 

Neville is very carefully not touching his telescope, which Professor Sinistra has pointed for him and which he will absolutely knock askew if he interacts with it in any way, but looking through it and admiring Jupiter. 

Ron would definitely not have gotten out of bed to come here if it had been known to him in advance that the first class wasn't required, but now that he's here, it's really cool how the moon has a shape and texture and isn't just some fraction of a flat splotchy white coin in the sky.

Neville will get to find out that the four little sparks hanging out in a line around Jupiter are its moons. Some of the Ravenclaws point their telescopes at their own tower to see what closer-by things look like through them.

Eventually Professor Sinistra says that class is officially over, but anyone who isn't done can stay until they are, and people finish looking at whatever they're currently looking at and trickle back to bed by ones and twos.

But... but there was not an assigned task...

Hermione dithers for a little while and then raises her hand and asks, not quite a whisper because she's a little agitated but making a creditable attempt, "Sorry, how do I tell when I am done, please?" 

"You are done when you desire to leave more than you desire to stay. You have done all that is required of you, and the sky will still be here next week."

Okay but what she wants is to do the thing that will make the teacher most impressed with her. Which one is that. 

...

No, wait, the Sorting Hat warned her about this.

Hermione will dither for another several minutes and then decide that she would like to go to bed so as to not be too tired for Transfiguration tomorrow even though that's after lunch, they have the whole morning off after the midnight class. 

And when everyone has gone back downstairs, Professor Sinistra will return to wherever she goes when she isn't teaching.

They get to sleep in, the next day, with no classes until after lunch, and then they have their second weekly block of Transfiguration followed by theoretical Astronomy, which (being as it is a class for eleven-year-olds with no guaranteed prior education other than presumed literacy) consists of a very basic overview of the solar system and the names of the planets. 

(Older students point at Bruce in the hallways as they pass, which is increasingly obviously not a coincidence as the week wears on. They whisper to each other, strident and fascinated: Boy-Who-Lived! - so little! - thought he was a myth! - )

At Friday morning breakfast, Bruce has a visitor! 

Mail owl has brought mail! Mail owl is so pleased with herself. 

Dear Bruce, 

I know you get Friday afternoons off, so would you like to come and have a cup of tea with me around three? I want to hear all about your first week! Send us an answer back with Curie. 

Hagrid