text: [Themes: Fan fiction, magic, fan fiction, Harry Potter]
  
  > Look around
  The space is dominated by a huge trophy case, which butts directly up against a pedestal holding an enormous brass cup. It's immaculate--no dust anywhere. To the east, suits of armor keep watch in their gallery.
  
  Wandering the castle alone is eerie, and you find yourself remembering things that you'd rather not--whisked away to a time that doesn't really seem happier, in retrospect...
  
  Grandma Gigi's snug kitchen, with its Aga and its aura of coziness, long before it was destroyed. Grandma herself is sitting and knitting. You've just finished quietly celebrating your twelfth birthday, and you're doing your part with the dishes, scrubbing them up in the sink.
  
  "Happy birthday, Alice," Grandma says, but she doesn't really sound so happy.
  
  > talk to Grandma
  At the sound of your voice, Grandma looks up.
  
  > 1
  "Grandma--when you were twelve, what did you do for your birthday?" you ask.
  
  "When I was twelve--well, I suppose that when I was twelve I was at school in Scotland."
  
  > 1
  "So you didn't have a party then?" you ask.
  
  "Well, I suppose I did have a party. My friends brought me sweets, of course, and presents--I'll always remember the beautiful ribbons dear Al gave me, in our House colors, red and gold. But it wasn't with family, like yours is." It was nice of her to put it like that.
  
  > 1
  "Was Al your best friend? Is he still alive?" As soon as you ask it, you realise that it's probably rude to put it quite like that. Fortunately, Grandma chuckles.
  
  "Back then one didn't have a best friend of the opposite gender," she says, "but yes, he was my best friend, for awhile. We still keep in contact; he teaches at the school where we went, in fact."
  
  > 2
  "Really, you couldn't be friends with boys?"
  
  "This was in Queen Victoria's reign," she says. "We couldn't even say the word "leg" in mixed company. But Al was almost like a girl, and things were a little different at school." Even at twelve, you know that she couldn't possibly be that old--but Grandma is a great joker.
  
  The memory falls away, and you wish you could put your finger on precisely what seemed so important about it. The boarding school thing? Too late. It's gone.
  
  The space is dominated by a huge trophy case, which butts directly up against a pedestal holding an enormous brass cup. It's immaculate--no dust anywhere. To the east, suits of armor keep watch in their gallery.
  
  > go to the east
  A long, narrow room, lined with suits of armour on either side. Staircases lead down and up. Westward you can see the gallery open out into a trophy room.
  
  > Go upwards
  As you step on it, the staircase wiggles as if considering something, then subsides. You climb it without incident.
  
  A short corridor, the walls and floor made entirely of granite. Centuries of use have worn a smooth path down the middle. Staircases lead down and up. A plain door leads south, and the hall ends in what looks like a library to the west.
  
  > take the BALL
  You're way too short to reach it.
  
  > check your inventory
  You are carrying:
  a prefect's badge (being worn)
  a copper cauldron
  a golden toad
  a broom
  a piece of type
  a silver hoof
  a vial of mercury
  a cloth book
  a blue book
  a long-handled scrub-brush
  a tin cup
  a book of herbs
  a book of alchemy
  a scribbled note
  a ciphered book
  a piece of purple parchment
  an iron bell
  a handful of yellow Jelly Babies
  a Hogwarts brochure
  a contract
  a medallion
  an identity card
  
  > ride the broom
  You're a Muggle. You can't fly. Remember?
  
  > talk to Doll
  "Are you ready to help me now?" you ask. No immediate reply.
  
  > stand on the chair
  For a moment it feels like the chair is going to eject you, it's so hard--but that's ridiculous, even for a wizarding school. Isn't it? ...You decide not to risk it. Molesting the armchair in any way is out.
  
  > examine the Babies
  Jelly Babies just like any you'd buy in a shop, except they're all yellow.
  
  > stand on the pouf
  The pouf feels rather like a marshmallow. Just as you thought, it's too uncomfortably soft to sit in, and too squashy to give you any kind of a height boost when you stand on it. So much for that.
  
  > examine the BALL
  A perfectly round ball of schorl tourmaline. It is blue-black, and you can imagine a wizard scrying in it, drawing images up from its depths.
  
  > give the Babies to Doll
  The china doll is too high to reach.
  
  > stand under Doll
  Most IF separates space into a series of locations, each containing a set of objects. If you can see an object, you can usually interact with it without worrying about positioning. Try a command like EXAMINE TOURMALINE BALL for a closer look, LOOK to get a new description of this location, or a compass direction like (for example) DOWN or D to move to a different location.
  
  > talk to gargoyle
  "Hello, gargoyle, may I come in?" you ask. "Certainly," he says, and lets you pass.
  
  A circular room with a high, vaulted ceiling. It is filled with various magical instruments, an enormous claw-footed desk, and innumerable oddities--all of which have been pushed, higgledy-piggledy, to the walls, and some of which look much the worse for it. An elaborate perch stands forlornly next to the desk, with no bird seated on it. The walls themselves are covered in portraits of important-looking people. A spiral staircase appears to continually spin downwards--almost like an escalator--at the far end of the room.
  
  > look at the perch
  An elaborate perch for a rather large bird. Presumably it's normally inhabited, but whatever usually sits there is nowhere to be seen.
  
  > talk to Newt
  "Um, Headmaster Scamander?" you ask.
  
  "Yes?"
  
  > 1
  "Never mind," you say. Newt nods curtly and goes back to his book.