Professor Lilac Crosby
November 18, 2011 5:43 PM
Shield me with your... pipe? [First and second years!] by Professor Lilac Crosby
“…Wrimlet, Morana.” With that final name, Lilac finished the attendance for her beginners’ class. She still didn’t have the names down quite yet (although she knew Miss Wrimlet, a member of her own House). She’d gotten pretty adjusted to seeing the faces of the new first years by this point, but it continually seemed somewhat strange walking into her intermediate class and seeing now-third years like Hope Brockert and Addison Thorton. Even odder still was the fourth-year class; she’d started at Sonora when that particular class was mere first years themselves.Students, just like she herself, grew up ever so quickly. Her very own niece, while still in the beginners’ class, was a second year already. In all honesty, she enjoyed the first and second years a great deal because they were so young still and so rapidly changing. However, she was probably the least free with herself in that class: she tried very, very hard not to be a complete dork and embarrass Sally.
To the considerably newly-christened first and second years she spoke. ‘Now that that’s all in order, I bet you’re wondering why there’s a metal pipe on each of your desks.” The tubes were about two feet long and not as heavy as they looked at all, easy to lift for most students. She’d taken every precaution she could think of for special cases; when Valerie Lennox had come in, for example, the twenty-nine year old had been sure to guide her to a desk where the pipe was smaller and even lighter. Any other students with similar medical concerns were addressed in such fashion as well. She always did her best for such students.
The grey-eyed witch grabbed the pipe off of her own desk, proportionately longer as she was larger than the students and could likely hold more. “Imagine this, if you will: you’re all grown up. You’re an Auror. Someone chases you into a dark alley. Something’s happened that you can’t escape. What do you do then?” Lilac paused briefly to glance across the students. The usual variety of opinionated faces seemed true. “You need a shield, but all the only thing available is a metal pipe from one of the buildings.”
Wand directed decisively at the pipe, she incanted, “Paerdecto!” In the blink of an eye, the pipe was a shield. “Now, note that the composition of the pipe has not changed. Strengthened a little, maybe, but not changed. Most of this is just a shift in form. It is, however, now more resistant to magical damage, as it ought to be.” Otherwise, there really was no point to the spell in itself.
While she had spoken the incantation, it and its pronunciation had appeared on the board behind her. PAIR-deck-toe. “Be sure to realize that this may not do terribly much against stronger spells, but obviously it’s better than nothing.” Just as the pipe and its weight, the spell was not as challenging as it would have appeared. “Any questions? If not, go ahead and begin. Feel free to help each other out. Talking’s fine as long as it’s at a manageable level. I’ll be here if you need me for any reason.” On that note, the class was let loose. The brunette sat at her desk, straightening her ankle-length brown skirt a little as she did so. She absolutely abhorred such a tremendous amount of wrinkles, but she’d overslept a bit that morning.
OOC: Welcome to Transfig, first and second years! Let’s see some nice, creative, detailed posts. That makes me happy, plus you get points, which make you happy too! Everybody wins! Yay! Have fun, but don’t do bad things like writing for other people’s characters. Happy posting!
Subthreads: It would work better to use a shield that used to be a pipe by Theresa Carey, Pecari with Gareth Whitebriar - Crotalus, Theresa
I'll...try? by Mellie Goodwin, Pecari with Katrina (Kitty) McLevy - Aladren
Only if there's room after I shield me. by Alicia Bauer, Aladren with Angel Shield - Teppenpaw
I don't think it will do me any good (Professor) by Valerie Lennox, Crotalus with Prof. C.
All right, if you insist by Alexandra Devereux, Crotalus with Elijah Errant {Pecari}, Alexandra
Not what I'd have in mind. by Evan Brockert, Aladren with Andrina Thornton
Sorry, I'm too busy running the other way by Paul Bennett, Crotalus
Class closed (nm) by Prof. C.
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Professor Lilac Crosby
Shield me with your... pipe? [First and second years!]
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Professor Lilac Crosby
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Alexandra Devereux, Crotalus
November 28, 2011 9:13 PM
All right, if you insist by Alexandra Devereux, Crotalus
Transfiguration was a class Alex had entered with the expectation of doing well. Last year, studying theory and practicing spells with Lissy’s wand, it was one of the subjects which had somehow made the most sense to her, coming together in her head in a way that some of the other things the family was having her study – like German; she didn’t even want to think of that language – didn’t. Also, the professor was engaged to a Brockert – one who dug the garden here, admittedly, and he had more brothers and sisters than Theresa did so he couldn’t hope to rise in his family unless he was secretly cultivating an intensive knowledge of deadly plants out there in preparation for poisoning a good portion of it, but a Brockert – so she was most likely at least somewhat like the people Alex was used to, which had made her think that the professor might be someone she wouldn’t have much trouble getting used to. She’d expected it to be strange to see someone who might be at one of Mother’s parties someday teaching, but that was the least of the oddities of Sonora, so she’d ignored that.So far, she hadn’t been really wrong, she thought. She hadn’t shone as brightly as she’d expected to, Professor Crosby hadn’t been quite everything she was expecting, but she hadn’t been really wrong. As she took her seat and wondered about the item on her desk, she did it in the expectation of another pretty good day in class.
The lesson catching her interest helped with the perception. It wasn’t a very ladylike topic, but she had been the only child, spending a lot of her time with nothing better to do than read on the estate, and she had picked up a number of things. Mother and Father and Grandfather all indulged her until they caught themselves, or each other, doing it, by which time it was too late and she’d already followed some interest, such as a bit of knowledge about magically-reinforced weapons. Was it her fault that Grandfather kept them around the house like some old warlord, and that made her wonder what about the dagger in the drawing room cabinet was different from the knives in the kitchen drawer? No, she didn’t think it was. She had thought that was mostly Charmswork, though.
Some of it, she decided as she frowned slightly over her pipe, probably was, but now that she thought about it, she could see how some of it was Transfiguration as well. If, say, metal were changed into stronger metal, metal imbued with some trait that made it more resistant to magical damage, that would make sense, and she thought it would be a sort of Transfiguration.
She realized what she was thinking and shook her head slightly, the small crease between her eyebrows deepening for a moment before it vanished. Well, obviously some of it was Transfiguration or the professor wouldn’t be teaching it in the Transfiguration class. There had been no need for her to reason through it like that.
She looked at her neighbor, her expression mostly polite, with a touch of curiosity, and found that neighbor already in conversation. Unfazed by this, since she hadn’t been here long enough to find much difference in partners or work with enough people to know which would be average or very good or bad, she looked at the other and found a lack of existing conversation.
“Shall we work together?” she asked. “I suppose we could try a little spell against each other’s shields when we’re done, to see if they work.” It was the only way she could see that they could really work together, and they knew enough magic, she thought, to try something without knowing enough to hurt anyone even if their shield was so ineffective it crumpled like paper and the spell got through to them.
Of course, a lot of partner assignments really seemed more designed to create socialization, which she supposed made sense considering the kinds of people who usually sent their children to Sonora. Maybe this had been meant to be mostly one of that kind. They would see.
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Alexandra Devereux, Crotalus
All right, if you insist
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Alexandra Devereux, Crotalus
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Elijah Errant {Pecari}
November 30, 2011 1:13 PM
I'm wounded - shield me first! by Elijah Errant {Pecari}
Frowning up at Professor Crosby, Elijah allowed himself to be led to a pipe that the woman picked out for him, settling down in his seat and then promptly stood up as she turned away, speeding over toward another desk, refusing to be singled out for his temporarily broken arm. 'I am not weak!' The thought burned briefly in his mind, he could feel the message seared across his forehead, for the world to see. As soon as Professor Croby continued on with the lesson, however, Elijah's rage melted away, departing just as quickly as it had arrived, and he did his best to focus on the lesson. While he enjoyed relaxing, spread out on the grass, the Arizona sun flooding the Canyon, his vision one of orange no matter if his eyes were squinting open or tightly closed against the onslaught of heat, Elijah still had yet to fully master the art of sitting still for class. In the pureblood parties he was sometimes dragged to (not kicking and screaming, but there was pouting going on, and a more than a few dramatic sighs) he was always under the constant watch of his father, or a young man working in the diplomatic office that had naively volunteered to watch Elijah in order to get in good with Ambassador Errantez. But here he was out of his father's power, and Sonora, while filled with apparently rigid characters (a certain over-dramatic, tightly wound female came to mind) it still had a looseness to it that Elijah was unused to most of the time. A freedom whose boundaries he couldn't see, and so he had to push and push and push harder until he found them.Shifting a little in his seat, rocking his chair back a little, a quick grin flashing across his face as the front legs of his chair rose so that he was balanced only on the hind legs, Elijah restrained a laugh, tipping forward again to land with a slight thump back onto the floor. It was the simple things in life that pleased him most. He looked up to see that the professor was done talking, and relaxed in his seat, pulling out his wand from his robes pocket, sliding it out carefully with his non-wand arm, doing his best not to disturb Suzuki, his pet fancy rat. "Pair - day - doe!" With a hard rap of his rosewood wand against the pipe, Elijah waited for magic to occur. 'Aw, come on. Transfigurate for me!' Beside him, on his left, Alexandra, a fellow first year, turned and asked to work together. Elijah looked up, smiling at her, before turning back to the pipe and rapping it again with his wand. “Per - deck - low!” Nothing again. Elijah glared at his right hand before returning his attention to Alexandra.
“Sure, let’s work together.” He shifted a little, careful not to brush his arm against the seat, turning to face her a little better. “I’m just trying to get my wand to obey my stupid hand. I’m a lefty,” He stated this with exuberant pride, but his beaming face fell as his words continued. “But I think I’m gonna have to be... what do you call ‘em? When you use both hands? I’m trying to be both-handed because I seriously think I’m gonna be half-broken forever.” His dark brown eyes glared down at his hand once more before he smiled once again at Alexandra. “So, how’s the spell going for you? I like the idea. Although I doubt,” He grinned, gazing around the room at the stiff students occupying the space. “many people here will ever dare get into a situation where they would have to use this.” As for himself, Elijah couldn’t wait.
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Elijah Errant {Pecari}
I'm wounded - shield me first!
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Elijah Errant {Pecari}
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Alexandra
November 30, 2011 10:30 PM
And have you in my debt? by Alexandra
Alexandra was an only child, and indulged, but she had always known exactly what her place in the family was. They had made sure she knew, from the very day she was old enough to know anything at all, that she might be Alexander’s only grandchild, but she was only that from a girl, and a girl married to a near-nobody to ensure he didn’t become a grand somebody and push the Careys out of the place they had clawed and scratched to earn in Louisiana over the past century and a bit at that, and she was by no means his heir. The moment Uncle Jack had a child, even if it was another girl, she would have to curtsy to it, and even her cousin Lissy – the child of the patriarch’s half-brother – would be preferred to her for inheritance because, quite bluntly, she wasn’t even really a Carey. If Uncle Jack didn’t have a son, it would most likely go to one of Great-Uncle Stephen’s sons.Because of this, Alex was used to being spoken over, and closing her mouth when someone did speak over her, of pretending not to notice when they didn’t apologize or even acknowledge she had been saying something. She didn’t like it, but she did it. She was a half-Carey, she was a girl, and she was a child, that was as good a reason as any to learn to hold her tongue. Elijah Errant was not even Lissy, another girl, but sheer force of habit kept her from saying anything except the spell word herself, producing what looked a bit like a misshapen, over-long platter, when Elijah took his own time in answering her except for a sarcastic thought about how if he was sure he didn’t mind too much when he agreed to the proposition.
“You want to be dextrasinistrous,” she proclaimed when he said he wanted to learn to use both hands because he didn’t think his wand arm would ever heal, making the word up from ‘dexter’ and ‘sinister’ meaning, she thought, ‘right’ and ‘left’ in Latin. She thought being able to speak English and read French and maybe a little Spanish ought to be enough for anyone, she did not like languages very much, but Grandfather insisted she study at least some Latin. She might not be his heir, really, but she was his namesake, and she thought sometimes, as more years went by without Aunt Priscilla presenting his heir with an heir, that he just forgot. Or wanted to forget. She looked at his arm curiously. “What did you do to that, anyway? Could you not get to a Healer quickly enough?” She had heard that could cause complications with an injury, was the reason, along with it happening in the eighteen-hundreds when things weren’t very civilized, Thomas had his limp.
She wasn’t sure what he meant by speaking about how ‘most’ of the class would never get into a situation where they might need to use a shield, as though the two of them were the same and might well be that kind of person. Alex could almost see the appeal of a wild life of adventure, like in the stories, but she was a girl and not an idiot anyway. If she attempted that, she’d probably die horribly, and if she didn’t, then there wouldn’t be a warm welcome for her at the end of it, she’d be unceremoniously disowned and become another example whispered between girls of what not to do with your life, just like the last Carey girl to reside in Crotalus House.
“None of us knows where we’re going to end up,” she said, thinking of that. Gwenhwyfar had been – still was, if she wasn’t dead yet – very beautiful, a patriarch’s daughter, at one time his heir, she should have had everything fall into her lap, and instead she had been in complete disgrace since she was their age, she was probably dead, and if she wasn’t then she was stuck living in some unnatural relationship with some Muggleborn she was not married to, and who she’d heard some people say had kidnapped her and brainwashed her into liking him at all, in order to have any protection at all, not to mention food to eat and a dress to put on her back. “But I think the spell’s going well for me. We should both try it again, though.”
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Alexandra
And have you in my debt?
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Alexandra
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Elijah
December 08, 2011 2:18 AM
Nah, it's your duty to save me. So no debts necessary. by Elijah
“Dextra... dextrasinistrous.” He tasted the word, letting his tongue play around with it, enjoying the sound. “Yes, right. That.” He had a list of words in his head that he liked to unravel and go through. New words felt the same way for him as singing did. As flying did. There was a rush, a thrill. A little bit dizzying, but he couldn’t stop pushing forward or soaring higher. It was too exciting to turn away from. Before she asked the question, Elijah sensed Alexandra’s attention settle onto his arm. A new story popped into his head, spilling from between his lips before he was fully aware of the plot. “It was a Healer who did it to me, actually. One of the Tamers on the ranch is studying to be a Magical Creatures Healer so my grandfather can hire him for that instead of just flying the thestrals out and back around the mountains every day. Well, neither of us like the idea of him practicing on one of the animals because that’s cruel, you know? So naturally I didn’t mind letting him break my arm and practicing fixing it up.” He shrugged his left shoulder, raising the arm slightly as if it independently wanted to greet Alexandra. “So it’s healing, but slowly. I promised Ambrose I wouldn’t let another Healer touch it and ruin his work by speeding it up.” More than a little pleased with how easily the words came to him, how the story, simple as it was, was weaved by him, Elijah smiled brightly at Alexandra before making another attempt at his pipe.His right hand adjusted its hold several times around the rosewood wand, his tongue wetting his lips, and when he spoke his command was every bit as simple and clear as his story had been. “Pear - decktoe!” There was a slight tremor that ran through the metal, and with delight Elijah watched his pipe change. “This class is great.” It didn’t come out looking like a shield, but the pipe had melted, a nice curved platter of tarnished silver. He looked at Alexandra at her comment, surprised that she had responded in that way. Dark brown eyes blinked, gazing directly at her face. “Yes we do.” He was slightly confused by her words. “That’s what our parents are for. To tell us what we’re going to be. Haven’t they told you?” He was to follow in his father’s footsteps and Julio’s father’s footsteps, and Salvador’s father’s footsteps and go into foreign diplomacy. It wasn’t anything Elijah was particularly interested in but it was a comfort to know that his future was assured. Everybody’s was. There was nothing Elijah or anyone else could do to ruin his future, or their own.
“Yeah, let’s give it another try. I think I am becoming a little more dextra... dextrasinistrous.” It was still a word he had to ease into. “I think I just had to know what it was called before I got it.” All words were magic, in that way. ‘Maybe I couldn’t have been happy, until I knew the word.’ He tapped the pipe with his wand again. “Paerdecto! Oh, that’s great!” His grin widened at the defined edges around his bent looking object that, perhaps if explained to an audience that it was dropped from a very high height and trampled for a day under an elephant stampede, could pass for a shield. He gazed proudly at it for awhile, before he turned again to Alexandra. “Oh, wait, I apologize. I don’t think I fully understood you before.” His thoughts began to readjust themselves and he cleared his throat, silently asking for her shared gaze once more. “I think we’re all given paths and deep down, if we think about it, we can realize what those paths are and I think even realize other peoples'. Partly because our families tell us. And, you know, I can just tell that I’m gonna have to use this spell one day. But most people here just won’t.” He shrugged, then turned back to the shield. “Just felt like - ah, what’s that word? Clearifying? I wanted to clearify that.” He looked from his own shield to Alexandra’s and then back again. “Test it out now, or do you wanna continue trying to make them stronger?”
ooc: Sorry I took long in replying.
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Elijah
Nah, it's your duty to save me. So no debts necessary.
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Elijah
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Alex
December 08, 2011 6:40 PM
...Hm, I think I prefer the version where you owe me by Alex
Alex raised an eyebrow at the story she heard about a Healer being the one who put his arm in its unusual device. “My grandfather would expect me to tell him if any of the hired help was that incompetent,” she remarked. Of course, any hired help who mangled her arm might not live to tell the tale, since another thing she’d always known about her place in the family was that just not being his heir didn’t mean Grandfather didn’t love her, but that was not something you talked about in public, and it wouldn’t happen, anyway. They had two family Healers, and besides, it was not that complicated to fix a bone. She’d seen Grandfather fix a broken wrist and a broken ankle both in moments, and Grandfather definitely wasn’t a Healer. “After he finished breaking my other arm if I let someone do that to me,” she added.Her family loved her, but it wasn’t soft. She didn’t doubt for one second that she would be punished for being so foolish as to just give someone permission to break her arm. If anyone ever tried to assault her, she was to scream for help, and at the same time she was to kick, hit, bite, stab, and do whatever else she could think of for all she was worth. If anyone ever offered to assault her, she was to report it if she could, so they could be dealt with. Everyone had told her that sort of thing at least once. Had his family not?
She looked back at him without blinking when he spoke about how they knew exactly where they were going to end up. “Of course,” she said. “I’m going to get married and run a household. But my husband might be from Illinois or Boston, or he might die and I might end up marrying twice, or I might have a son who gets disowned or killed somehow, or…anything.” And that was all assuming she was good. She usually did assume this only a little uneasily, but since her Sorting, she thought about it more.
When he claimed that knowing the word ‘dextrasinistrous’ was why he could now work better with his left hand, Alexandra had to bite her bottom lip and turn her head slightly for just a second to hide a smile, since she was completely sure she had just made that word up the moment she said it to him. “I’m sure,” she said, composed again, mostly. She nodded agreement that his shield was coming along well. It was not very good, but it was shield-like, anyway. She tried the spell again, too, and her shield-pipe widened a bit further.
She was surprised when he came back to the issue of what they were to do with their lives. Alex kept her expression somber, her brown eyes meeting his even though she was feeling a little uneasy with the direction of what he was saying. For one thing, that sounded almost like Seer talk, like Great-Aunt Delphine, and for another…there was just something about it that made her uneasy. “That makes a little more sense,” she said when he was done ‘clearifying.’ Somehow, it didn’t surprise her that he and Theresa were in the same House; she could see the other girl brazening it out with a word like ‘clearifying,’ too, or even ‘dextrasinistrous.’
“Maybe we should try it a few more times,” she said, she hoped tactfully, when he proposed testing. Neither shield was very good yet. “Paerdecto,” she tried again, and this time the bottom of it came to a point. “A little more and we’ll have it right.”
OOC: No problem!
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Alex
...Hm, I think I prefer the version where you owe me
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Alex
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