"The library shouldn't be this hard to find" she muttered as she walked down yet another corridor. From what she could tell, the entire castle looked almost exactly the same. Maybe not exactly the same, but since she had spent most of her time roaming around with her face in a book, Emmalyn hadn't learned her way around. "Hello?" she asked though no one could be seen.

Tired of walking, she moved herself against the wall, just under a particularly interesting portrait of Vindictus Viridian. She looked up to see the name on the portrait and made a mental note to research who that was, once she reached the library.

After resting a moment, Emmalyn decided that sitting was good, but becoming completely horizontal was even better. She placed her arm under her head and closed her eyes. Almost instantly she was asleep and dreaming.

Celestia was walking back towards the Transfiguration department, humming softly under her breath. She had nipped down to the grounds to watch a bit of the Quidditch tryouts this afternoon, and was rather excited to see some actual matches. Both of the Houses she'd watched had had some truly talented flyers trying out! The captains certainly had their work cut out for them, and she didn't envy them the difficult choices they'd have to make in forming their teams.

All in all, today had been a pretty good day for the professor, and she was looking forward to doing some reading before the fire in her office. As her eyes performed their usual scan of the corridor, though, her breath caught in her throat. She had been briefed on the events of last term, of course -- not to mention everything that the Daily Prophet had reported about Hogwarts over the last few years. So, the sight of a student crumpled up on the floor down a random corridor had Celestia running over to the student's side in seconds. She skidded to a stop before the student, before dropping to her knees next to the girl and pulling her wand out of her holster.

Celestia's breathing immediately returned to something more even; the girl was breathing. She reached out and attempted to shake the child's shoulder to wake her up. At least, she certainly hoped that the young Hufflepuff was only sleeping...

The dream she was having was glorious. She was over an open field, zooming at breakneck speeds on her broom. The wind whipped her hair out behind her in a silky flow of chocolate and the sun felt warm on her cheeks against the breeze. It was the perfect dream until suddenly her broom began to wobble. She gripped the handle has hard as she could, but the shaking was more than she could overcome. Before Emmalyn could readjust her grip, she was falling. Faster and faster toward the ground she went then suddenly she was awake.

"What? Oh." Her eyes flew open and her body gave a little involuntary jump. She looked up and was greeted with the hopefully kind eyes of a professor. "Wow, that was the best dream ever." her mind was slowly registering that she was not in her room and was in fact awake, on a hard floor, and being nudged by the professor. "Oops. I must have fallen asleep. Sorry about that."

Emmalyn sat upright, and quickly fixed her crazy slept on hair. "So, am I in trouble? I didn't mean to fall asleep. Not exactly I mean. I was walking and got tired, so naturally I stopped to rest and well..." she trailed off and waited to see what was going to happen.

Yes, the young Hufflepuff had only been sleeping. Celestia breathed a sigh of relief as the girl regained consciousness. A lecture about the dangers of the castle was on the tip of Celestia's tongue, but the student beat her to speech. As she listened, the professor felt her lips tugging upwards of their own accord. The best dream ever, huh?

"As much as I hate to interrupt the best dream ever, Miss Watson, it simply isn't safe to wander the corridors on your own. Surely your prefects told you that?", she asked in a gentle tone of voice. She wasn't going to punish a lost first year when no harm had been done (except maybe to her blood pressure). Celestia extended a hand to the girl with another smile in a silent offer to help her up.

The professor brushed off her own robes, though there really wasn't much need to. She simply wanted to act as casual as possible to put Miss Watson's mind at ease. "No, you're not in trouble. It's okay to get lost. I got lost several times myself in my first year," she told the Hufflepuff conspiratorially. Not to mention the many times that she'd gone exploring in places where she shouldn't have, but there was no need to tell students about that. "Where were you headed, Miss Watson?", she asked with yet another friendly smile before something dawned on her. Frowning slightly, she glanced back at the girl and squinted as she tried to recall if Watson really was her name or not. This girl had been Sorted so close to the feast starting; she should really remember her name definitively, but the truth was that Celestia was almost as bad at remembering people's names as she was at mixing potions -- and she had barely avoided a "T" in Potions on her N.E.W.T.s.

Her eyes grew a bit wide in fear a lecture was coming on. She didn't know Professor Grimsbane very well at all and the thought of her being even half as scary as Professor Noble, well that was enough to strike fear into any first year. Soon realizing that the professor wasn't angry, she let her help her up, "Thank you."

She eyed Professor Grimsbane as she took full height and brushed her robes off. Her face did seem kind and there was no hint of anger behind her eyes. "I wasn't exactly trying to wander. Derf, my prefect, did warn us of being out alone. He's doing a great job. Well, not that I have anything to compare it to since I am a first year and have never had a prefect before."'Shush, Emmalyn. Stop rambling and making a fool of yourself'' she ran through her mind, her face blushing a bit. She tended to talk a lot when she was nervous. Not a quality she was fond of.

"I was headed to the Library. I thought it was just down the corridor from where I was, but it appears that I've made a wrong turn. I just can't remember where that happened to get back on track." she offered her explanation as matter of factly as she could. "Oh, and it's Walsh. I'm Emmalyn Walsh, first year Hufflepuff. I guess you knew I was a Hufflepuff."She offered her name with a smile and an extended hand to shake.

"Well, as long as he did warn you, I'm sure he's doing his best," Celestia mused. She didn't know too much about the Hufflepuff prefect, other than the fact that he was young to be selected as a student leader, which was rather impressive in her opinion.

Celestia paused to listen to the rest of what Emmalyn was saying, and felt yet another smile stretch her lips. Emmalyn's rambling was not far short of adorable, and Celestia saw no reason to doubt what she was saying. The girl practically radiated innocence -- not that she would be in trouble for being in the corridor anyway, unless she'd been setting off Dungbombs or something. Not that Celestia had any personal experience with that sort of thing.

Galloping gargoyles, she had gotten another student's name wrong! Celestia winced slightly as Emmalyn corrected her; though she was impressed that the first year didn't seem offended at all by the error. The professor shook the girl's extended hand gratefully, shooting her another warm smile and saying simply: "Sorry about that, Miss Walsh." She thought that Emmalyn was probably still half-expecting to get into trouble. That was certainly how she'd felt whenever a professor came up to her outside of class as a student. The thought was not a pleasant one; it made her feel old and too far removed from her own days as a student here for comfort. "The library is a couple of floors down. Do you want me to show you the way?", she offered. Emmalyn's comment about her House had another grin snaking its way up Celestia's face.

"Your robes are a bit of a giveaway that you're in Hufflepuff," she explained gently with a vague gesture towards the yellow crest attached firmly to Emmalyn's robes -- not to mention all that yellow integrated into the robes and tie as well. She didn't want the first year to feel silly, however, so she glanced down at her own solid, dark green robes and went on, "Mine are a little misleading. I was in Gryffindor back in the day." She gave Emmalyn a not-so-subtle wink to emphasize her point.

Emmalyn smiled every time someone, especially a professor, talked about her prefect. Derf was fantastic and probably the best prefect at Hogwarts. Sure, she may have been a bit biased, but he always seemed to have her back.

"Wait, a couple of FLOORS down? I really did get turned around." She glanced up and down the hall trying to figure out how she had gotten so far off course. It would have been one thing to be in the wrong corridor, but being floors away had her head shaking. "That's so kind of you to offer" she replied to the professors offer to take her to the library. "I think I can get there. Just let me grab some parchment out of my pocket and jot down the directions. I've already taken up enough of your time." She reached into her robe pocket and pulled out a folded piece of parchment and pencil. On one side was a long list of books she was in search of. She refolded the page, exposing a blank space and readied her pencil.

Emmalyn glanced up and down the professors robes, realizing that she wasn't sure what house most of the professors at Hogwarts were in. "Your robes are a bit misleading, but very pretty." She then took in all of the glorious Hufflepuffiness of her robes and smiled. "I bet it was fun being in Gryffindor. Your common room is way up high." Way up high? That sounded silly. She blushed and hoped Professor Grimsbane didn't notice the silliness of her statement.