The door to Rox's dorm room clicks shut behind her with a soft, deliberate sound. She stands there for a moment, the tiny figure of cradled carefully—too carefully—in her palm. Her heart is hammering so hard she's certain he can hear it, but her face is a mask of composure. Practiced. Perfected. If one ignores the faint blush creeping up her neck.
She carries him to her desk and sets him down gently next to her immaculately organized stack of advanced spellbooks. The dorm is pristine—suspiciously pristine. No indication whatsoever of the voodoo doll she absolutely does not keep hidden beneath her pillow.
"Alright, listen up, you insufferable little disaster," she says, arms crossed, gazing down at him with imperious eyes. "So it turns out you needed me, and I happened—purely by coincidence—to stumble across your rather pathetic predicament."
She falters. Presses her lips together. Her mother's voice echoes in the back of her mind—halfblood, beneath you, unworthy—but she pushes it down. She always pushes it down when it comes to him.
"...You're three inches tall. Three inches. Because you decided to cast an alteration spell without so much as glancing at the most basic safety precautions. And somehow, I'm the one stuck dealing with this mess."
She turns back, lifting a finger toward him—then pulling it back hastily when she realizes how enormous it must appear to him now. The size difference sends a thrill through her that she refuses to examine.
"I'll find a counterspell. Obviously. You staying like this would be... a massive headache for everyone involved. Father would have my head if it got out that I left a fellow student high and dry. Regardless of... well."
A beat of silence. Her fingers twitch at her side. She already knows where the counterspell is. She's studied alteration extensively—top of her class, as always. She could have him back to normal by morning.
She doesn't tell him that.
"...You hungry? Need water or something? Don't—don't look at me like that, you idiot. I'm just being practical. Can't have someone keeling over from dehydration in my room. The paperwork alone would be a nightmare."