Ebony and Ivory

In the back of her closet, in a small gap she had found in the otherwise immaculate floorboards, was where Cordelia kept her 'valuables'. There wasn't much in there, a few trinkets from her old life, the creased letter that her mother had given to her before she disappeared, a couple of doll clothes someone had given her to change Bubba into (Bubba refused them on the grounds they were unmanly), and a necklace. The Necklace wasn't, in fact hers. It had never been hers - one of the adults who had come into the orphanage to look at the children was a particularly wealthy lady. Cordelia hadn't, and still didn't, know the value of the piece, she had merely had the desire to take the pretty thing with her.

So when she noticed that it had fallen off of the woman's neck, and no one else had, she had picked it up - and no one had seemed to notice.

Since then, the small collection of things she had gathered in such a manor had grown, but not rapidly; she had no desire to take, just to take - Cordelia merely did it for the things she wanted, and no one else seemed to be using.

Head snapping towards the door as she heard the sounds of moving feet - she assumed it was probably one of the house elves, Cordelia had grown used to seeing the tiny creatures around - she covered her treasures once more and crawled out of her hiding spot.

Glancing around her room for a moment, the small girl saw nothing of interest, nor concern, so pushing herself up opened the door and stepped out into the hall. Whoever had walked passed had disappeared into one of the other rooms, so Cordelia continued on until a small meow drew her attention downward.

"Hey-lo Ebony," the little girl cooed softly bending down in the middle of the hallway to create the small creature, cuddling her softly, "Do you wanna play?"

“What is this,” Ksenia asked the empty room as she looked down at the black fabric in front of her. The young witch was presently standing in the middle of the dining room, her hands settled on her hips, her head tilted to the side slightly and her lips pursed as she studied what had been delivered to the house via owl only ten minutes ago.

“Are those people colour blind?” she snapped at Cleo who had just entered the room as if the leopard could provide an answer to her quarry. But that was not the case and the young Slushatel was not looking for an answer to the question, but rather venting out some of her annoyance and her familiar just happened to be the one on the receiving end of it.

Cleo growled slightly in reply, only sparing the witch a brief glance before continuing on her way to the fireplace.

“Maybe I should just leave it like that,” Ksenia murmured as she fingered the black linen. She glanced at the leopard once again before deciding she needed some human opinion on the matter and as Dobbs the houseman was currently out that left only person who could provide an opinion on the matter. An opinion that Ksenia was quite interested in.

“Cordelia! Come down here please!” Ksenia called out to her niece from the foyer, her voice strong, but warm at the same time, before going back into the dining room.

Teasing the little kitten with her finger, pulling them close so the small creature would paw at it and then yanking it away with a giggle. This game though surprisingly simple was in fact completely enticing for the young girl. She would have stayed there for quite some time, playing with the budding familiar, without interruption if she hadn't heard her aunt calling.

With a frown she looked down at the cat in her arms and towards where the voice was coming from. Truthfully she thought about not going at all, she was far happier where she was, and there was still slight suspicion on what the older woman could want.

However, she was still in a stage where she trusted her slightly more, but yet to feel comfortable with disobey her. So with a sigh, Cordelia packed up Bubba in one arm, kept Ebony in the crook of the other and paddled towards the voice, glancing around the room with mild curiosity before letting her wide blue eyes fall on her aunt.

"What?"

Ksenia smiled warmly at the girl as she entered the room. "I see you and Ebony have become good friends," she noted as she glanced down at the small cub in the arms of the girl. "It won't be long until she will be the one carrying you," she said with some amusement.

"Come over here," the Slushatel beckoned the small girl towards where she was standing in front of the dining table. She proceeded to spread the black fabric over the table so that it completely covered it, leaving the other sheets underneath. "What would you think of sleeping on something like this?" she asked with amusement.

Ksenia suspected that a young child like Cordelia wouldn't like such a dark colour, but she was very interested in hearing what the girl had to say on the matter.

"Me an' Ebony are friends." With that firm announcement the small curl cuddled the kitten close, and then took a hesitant step forward, again her curiosity causing her to be unable to stay back.

Standing on her toes slightly she looked at the sheets her aunt presented for her. Letting out a mew, Ebony pawed at Cordelia's arm until she moved and let the small creature jump away from her, onto the table where she curled up on the dark material. Delia then used the free hand to paw at the sheets herself.

"They're dark." She announced after a moment. "Why they so dark?"

"Ah, ah," Ksenia shook her head sternly before scooping up the cub from the table. "You do not go on tables," she informed the kitten as she put her down on the ground. The with straightened up and turned to look at the table once again, contaminating as she studied the fabric. At this moment she wasn't even sure why she selected the white sheets to buy in the first place. They were so...mundane.

"You know, I think I will keep these," she murmured almost to herself as she ran her finger over the fabric beside her niece. Her gaze turned back to the small girl and she smiled before flipping over the sheet that was currently covering the table to reveal a smaller one, the one that would fit Cordelia's bed. "Now for your bed...perhaps we should change the colour?" she asked as she took out her wand and looked back at the girl, waiting for a reply.

Cordelia frowned on the kitten's behalf as it was taken off the table, but refrained from saying anything. The way that Ebony began to rub against her leg, wrapping her tiny body around Cordelia's equally tiny feet did much to convince her that she didn't mind so much.

Running a hand against the dark material once more, she frowned at what she was being asked. In her short life she could not remember ever being given such a choice before. The time she spent with her mother, she was at much to young an age to be given such freedoms, and you did not get to chose your bedding colour in an orphanage.

Cordelia had been dealing with 'you get what you get' for a long enough time now, that before this moment she had figured that was just the way all things were.

"I getta choose?" she asked, frowning up at the older woman, all the while her mind racing through all the colours that she knew, trying to settle on one that she actually enjoyed.

"Yesm you get to choose," Ksenia said with a smile as she lifted one of the few smaller sheets all the way off the table. "I have an idea," she said as she walked around the table and to stnad in front of the wall between two of the windows. Waving her wand, the witch adjusted the black bed sheet so that it would hang straight up along the wall.

"Let's start with this," she murmured almost to herself as she flicked her wand over the sheet and in an instant the fabric turned from black to a pale pink.

"Hmm." Her head titled to the side for a second as the thought and than her hand was moving once again, this time in an arc over the bed sheet, leaving behind a single large soft yellow petal.

Her head turned to look at the little girl behind her with a grin. 'What do you think? A good start?"

Cordelia watched solemnly as her aunt moved the sheet, flicking her wand and changing the colours. Something almost like a frown tugged at her lips as she took in the soft pink colour. True the girl liked it better than the harshness of the black, but...

She couldn't say she liked the pink.

The soft yellow made a difference. She liked the yellow, and after a moment's silent said so, ignoring the pink colour all together.

Down at her feet, the kitten purred; bending down she returned to her former occupation of playing with it, mind drifting from the sheet all together.

"Kitty, kitty, kitty," she mumbled to herself as she stroked the soft fur.

Ksenia turned as she heard the girl's voice. Frowning for a second, before returning her expression to one of warmness, the witch walked towards her niece and knelt down next to her, taking both of her little hands into her own. "What colours do you like?" she asked the young girl.

It was clear that she had lost her attention. She never intended to do that. Her minimal experience with children was not making it easier for her to make a connection with her niece.

Letting out a giggle as Ebony licked her hand, the young girl was making nonsense rhymes in her head, every odd word or so slipping out of her mouth being cooed to the kitten. Although she heard her aunt's question, it took Cordelia more than a minute or so to respond to it. She wasn't being purposely ignorant, she simply had her mind preoccupied on the more important rhyme at the moment.

"Yel-ow," she stated softly, "Pu-ple, Buh-lew, only buh-lew like the sky." Thinking this was a decent enough list, Cordelia nodded her head, and went back to teasing her kitten by tapping her on one side, watching the cat respond by turning that way, and then repeating the action on the other side.

Ksenia smiled softly at her niece, waiting as the girl took her time to reply to her question. Interacting with such a young child was not something that the witch had done so much of before and certainly not something that she though she would need to do at her age. The appearance of this little girl has changed her so much, it was hard to believe really. The most notable change was the amount of patience she showed when interacting with Cordelia. The irritation that she sure she would have felt when talking in such a way with a child has been pushed to the very back right at the very beginning when her heart had literally melted at seeing the little girl.

"You know what," she said softly, her voice quiet. "I think we should go shopping one of these days. To pick out things that you will like. Things for you. Would you like that?"

The small girl continued her taping, giggling as Ebony continued to get excited and then confused by the small action. Eventually the creature got fed up with being the butt of her joke, playfully swiping at her hand and then jumping at her - an action in which the four year old actually managed to predict and caught her pet in her arms.

Her wide blue eyes finally deemed it acceptable to glance back at her aunt, cocking her head to the side, she worried her lip shyly, "Can Bubba come?" a soft mew brought her eyes down to the kitten, "and Ebony?"

"Boris can come," Ksenia said as she reached out a hand to gently stroke the kitten's fur. "But it's best to leave Ebony at home. We wouldn't want to lose her on one of those busy streets would we?" she asked softly. “We will go shopping on this weekend. Plenty of time to walk around.” The witch stayed scrunched down with the little girl for a few more moments before lifting herself up.

"Mitzy!" she called out to the house elf, her voice calm but strong so the elf would hear her.

"Yes, Mistress?" it only took a second for the elf to pop into the room.

"Please put away the larger sheets into the linen closet and the small ones should be packed so we can return them to the shop," she instructed the elf evenly.

‘Yes, Mistress,” the creature gave a small smile to the child before disappearing along with the bed sheets.

“Now,” Ksenia said as she returned her gaze briefly back to the four year old girl. "I think there are some cookies that need to be made....." she said, her tone musing as she wandered into the kitchen.

Cordelia frowned as she looked at the kitten letting out a soft 'oh' and thinking about what her aunt had said, "Guess so."

The rest of the interaction were completely lost on the small girl as she sat herself back on the ground, assuming she was done with for the time being. Waving Bubba in the kittens face this time she began to imagine that they were all playing happily together, only looking up at the word cookie.

Eyes dancing with interest, she picked Bubba up again, and moved to crawl after her aunt into the kitchen to see just what this cookie business was about.

Ksenia was completely aware of the little girl that was crawling after her. A smile tugged on the corner of her lips even though she tried very hard to keep her expression nonchalant, not that it mattered at that point as Cordelia could only see her back at the moment. The expression was completely ironed out to a light and composed one when she finally reached the kitchen cupboards.

"Now," she spoke to herself as she opened the pantry and looked at it's contents. "What kind of cookies do we need? Perhaps I should make chocolate ones," she said thoughtfully, a finger lifting to her lips. The with paused there silently before lifting taking out a number of containers and placing on them on the kitchen island. By the end there were chocolate chips, sprinkles of a few different colours, food coloruings, nuts, as well a large collection of cookie cutters. Ksenia arranged them all so they could be easily seen before leaving the island to go to the fridge for ingredients she would need from there.

Sitting on the floor for a moment, sliding under the table so as not to be underfoot, or out in the open, Cordelia watched the movement of her aunt's legs as she got the things that they needed. Listening to the sounds of things being set down and her aunt's words the young girl pieced together a general idea of what might be happening. Though she hadn't much experience with making cookies, she couldn't figure out what was going in them.

It was that curiosity that finally had her crawling out from her hiding spot, and climbing carefully onto a stool by the island Ksenia had put everything on top of. Setting Bubba beside her on the surface, Cordelia, balanced on her knees began to look at everything that had been set out with a quiet curiosity before her gaze settled on the cookie cutters. Picking up one of them, she looked at it closely, before grinning slightly and setting it down firmly on the counter as if she were trying to cut something with them.

"Chocolate." Was all that she said.

The smile returned to Ksenia's features once she heard the little girl moving behind her. It was very hard to get any words out of her, and apart from the time that she had shown her niece the two leopards, the Slushatel hasn't heard her niece say more then two words.

Nevertheless, she understood that the whole process would take some time and apparently making cookies proved to be a very effective task to get the child to participate. "Chocolate it is," she said brightly to her niece as she set some flour and butter on the island, finally turning to face the girl. "Would you like to help measure out the ingredients?" she asked with a smile as the opened the bag of flour.

Her blue gaze took in every item on the island once more. Her little hands were still firmly around the cutters, but that didn't detain her natural curiosity from seeking out all the other things that were before her. Her active brain was trying to figure out how everything that she saw now would bind together to make cookies. To her it seemed to be magic, though Cordelia wasn't sure she really believed in magic in that way. Even as young as she was she had come to find most things had some answer.

She just had to find it.

Slowly she set aside her "toys" and reached a hand out for which ever ingredient her aunt was offering her, "Yes pwease."

Ksenia put a measuring cup in front of the girl and slid the bag of flour towards her. Sure she knew that such a small child could make a big mess with a lot of flour, but then what the point of limiting the girl in such a way?

"See this line?" she said, as she directed Cordelia's attention to one of them. "We have to fill the cup right up to that line. Thats how much we will need to make the cookies," se explained as she leaned over the counter slightly. "We will do that together. Ready?" she asked, as she met the girl's eyes to ecieve her answer, placing her own hand close to the bag.

The slight scrape of the measuring cup sliding across the table was a distinct tone. The girl cocked her head to the side and frowned as she listened to it, filing it away with similar sounds that she had heard. It wasn't so much the measuring cup that made the sound as the sound of whatever the cup was made up, moving against whatever the counter was made of.

Looking up she dragged her gaze away from this cup and nodded in a manner that seemed almost excited. With another child, the action would still have been reserved, but on Cordelia it was more out going than anything that she had done before. A shy little grin appeared on her face as she folded her little hands around the bag.

Cordelia attempted to be careful, she really did. Unlike most children she got no joy out of causing unnecessary trouble. Her life had taught her that care and as much precision as she could get got the most useful results. And what good was anything that wasn't useful. Still, despite her best try, the bag proved too heavy for her small fingers and she felt it slipping from her grasp before she could do anything about it.

"Oops."