I'll try not to. on Transfiguration

Professor Skies

June 20, 2015 1:55 AM

Intermediate transfiguration - don't touch by Professor Skies

“Good morning class,” Professor Skies greeted the Intermediate students. They were a few weeks into the term, and so she had just about got over the shock of who was a third year already, and had come to accept their presence in this class as normal.

“Today will be our last lesson on plants. Next lesson, we will be moving on to creatures.” She had been setting theory readings and homework on animate transfiguration over the first few weeks of the term. She felt that the more that the students understood about what they were doing, the less likely they were to become squeamish and sentimental. Selina taught from the school of theory that posited that vanishment space - that is, wherever objects that were vanished went - was the space used in all Transfigurations. Things were not being changed into other things, so much as swapped, piece by piece. Things could get stuck halfway, there could be frightening looking results, but things could be undone, sent back, rejoined with themselves.

Still, it was good to practise on plants to get a few basic skills with living things, and let the theory sink in.

“You will be making Mimosa Pudica today - also known as a sensitive plant or touch-me-not. The leaves of this plant close in when touched. There are photographs demonstrating this in the nature books at the back,” being wizarding books, the pictures showed the leaves of the plant in motion, folding up as a finger stroked them. “The level a task will be to start with a wooden stick, level b with a plastic one.” By now the students were familiar with the split level classes - although anyone was welcome to attempt either task, at this stage in Intermediates, the guidelines were that third years attempted the level a, and fifth years the level b. Fourth years were welcome to choose, although Professor Skies had been pushing them to attempt the more challenging tasks with the plants, and would become less lenient on them as the year went on.

“The spell is the plant’s latin name, along with several short sharp flicking motions,” she demonstrated, turning the pot of pencils on her desk into the small plant with its many segmented leaves. She stroked one gently, showing the movement it made when she did so.

“You may discuss your work quietly with your neighbour, though you should all turn in an individual project,” she advised, “And if I overhear too much social chit chat or gossiping, I shall not be pleased.” The rumour that had appeared on the Cascade Hall doors earlier in the week was bound to have garnered some attention. The students had been given a strict talking to about the ills of gossiping and vandalising school property, but although the message had been charmed out of the woodwork they couldn’t remove it so easily from the students’ minds. She wasn’t going to set a specific punishment - they were bound to talk and there was a limited amount she could do to stop it - but she wanted them to know she found it unacceptable, and would be keeping a close eye that enough work was being done, and that no one was being particularly vile about anyone else.

OOC - posts are 200 words minimum and will be marked on length, creativity, relevance and realism. If you need Selina, please tag her in the subject line.

Subthreads:

Don't tell me what to do by Shinohara Uzume with Isaac Douglas, Crotalus

Why would I want to? [tag: Lena] by Olivier Westley with Lena Westley, Aladren

Trying to remain optimistic. by Liliana Bannister, Pecari with Serena Brockert, Teppenpaw

Transfiguring a robot plant by Clark Dill, Aladren with Leonidas Bennett, Aladren, Leonidas

..... *touches* by Makenzie Newell [Crotalus] with Tobi Reinhardt, Teppenpaw

I'll try not to. by Duncan Brockert, Teppenpaw with Araceli Arbon, Crotalus

Looking is allowed, though by Diana Carey, Pecari

13 Professor Skies Intermediate transfiguration - don't touch 26 Professor Skies 1 5

Shinohara Uzume

June 20, 2015 5:36 PM

Don't tell me what to do by Shinohara Uzume

Although the incident in Cascade Hall was a hot topic earlier in the week, things in Uzume's world had settled down for the most part. Despite the fact that she didn't enjoy the way feminine way of gossiping, if it made life at the acadamy more interesting then she couldn't very well complain. Uzume waltzed into class a little earlier than usual, as she much preffered the coolness of the classroom to the dry air of the desert in fall. Sitting down in the back near the window, she stared out the window until the class began, not even turning her head to greet whomever had decided to sit next to her.

As Skies-sensei began the lecture Uzume forced herself to pay attention. Alhtough many of the spells in transfiguration would be useless, some of the more stylish spells may come in hand soon. She would be turning 14 soon, and with that came the woes of womanhood, although she had yet to experience anything yet it was a constant worry in Uzume's mind.

Looking at the plant in the text book, it seemed interesting enough, although she wasn't sure it would be used in traditional dance, it may have come in handy if she wanted to perform something more contemporary. Uzume sighed, she was already begining to think like a dancer- and as a result more like a woman, a female, a...

Trying to focus on her work the best she could, she picked up a wooden stick, pacing it flat down on her table. As Uzume prepared to do the spell however, something occured to her. How would the plant grow if the stick was sideways, and in addition to that if she just grew the plant wouldn't it fall over due to a lack of dirt for the roots to take hold in. She scowled, realizing that perhpas Skies-sensei was giving the class a task with mutiple probelems that they had to solve. "What an underhanded trick for a teacher to pull," Uzume thought to herself, as she tapped her wand to her chin, pondering what spell she ought to use to make a pot of dirt.

Realizing that she was not alone at her table, she turned to her partner- hoping to milk the fool for all they were worth. "Do you understand what Skies-sensei is looking for?" she asked not caring if she was interupting her partner's work. "Are we suppoused to make the whole plant- roots and all, or cut it off at the stem? Or is it just suppoused to be a leaf?" she asked twirling her stick in her left hand. She hated sounding like a brown-nosing Aladren, but if she wanted to show up all the other dancing tarts she would have to be the best. No exceptions.

0 Shinohara Uzume Don't tell me what to do 0 Shinohara Uzume 0 5

Olivier Westley
June 20, 2015 6:06 PM

Olivier Westley
Alumnus
House: Crotalus
Written by: Mathilde Reinhardt

Age in Post: 14

Why would I want to? [tag: Lena] by Olivier Westley
The summer with Lena had been lovely. There had been no foolish classmates to bother them as they traipsed across the Welsh countryside. They had spent as much time outside and away from others as they could. Their distant parents meant that life at home could get incredibly boring and as a result they had resorted to exploring the surrounding areas from a young age. He liked the idea of getting away from civilization and spending time with just Lena, someone who understood him better than anyone else. When they weren't having twin time, he had followed her into trees and fields as she daydreamed in order to ensure she stayed safe. However, the good times were short lived as fall approached and they were forced to come back to school.

Coming back to Sonora was always a hassle for Olivier. The only good thing about Sonora itself was that he had a room to himself. There was, of course, Lena, but since he could have her at home too he didn't really think she was an attribute for the school. To consider her so would be insulting, he thought, since she was so virtuous and those at the school had their minds likely so deep in the gutter and filth of mankind that they would never truly appreciate Lena for who she was. That being said, he was glad he was around to be able to keep those who dared to overstep their boundaries, like that awful Tobias Reinhardt, in check.

Olivier snuck a glance at the biggest offender of his siter's honor as they sat in Transfiguration waiting for Professor Skies to begin the class. The past year without the Reinhadts in their class had been...refreshing. Tobi had been the only person at Sonora to whom he had revealed his true inner self to and though he was glad he had intimidated the younger boy into leaving his sister alone, he was somewhat regretful he had lost control of his temper like that. In order to be successful, he needed to maintain his composure, show that he was the kind, friendly sort of person who actually liked people.

Professor Skies' lecture was short and sweet, just the way he liked classes to be. The less time she spent talking, the more time he could spend chatting away with Lena as they completed their assignments. The warning about gossiping and chit-chatting though only reminded him that even the teachers were as dim-witted as his peers. So he could only take her lecture so seriously. In the end, it didn't really matter what the teachers cautioned them to do, he was certain that his less academically-minded classmates would likely fall to the base temptation of spreading rumors.

Grabbing two wooden sticks, one for himself and one for Lena, Olivier turned to his sister to begin work on the assignment. "I wish we had plants like these in Wales," he said nodding towards the pictures which showed closing leaflets. "It would have made our hikes more interesting if we'd had these to play with." He smiled, a genuine smile. Though Lena likely knew him to be cheerful person, it was probably only because he feared her finding out how cynical he truly could be.

OOC: Any mention of Olivier & Lena's home life taken from previously agreed upon things by the authors.

10 Olivier Westley Why would I want to? [tag: Lena] 282 Olivier Westley 0 5

Liliana Bannister, Pecari
June 20, 2015 7:42 PM

Liliana Bannister, Pecari
Alumnus
House: Pecari
Written by: Mathilde Reinhardt

Age in Post: 15

Trying to remain optimistic. by Liliana Bannister, Pecari
For as long as Liliana could remember, Transfiguration had been the bane of her existence. However, after sitting with Atlas for the past three years, having her best friend help her go over everything that she did wrong in the class and then spending part of the summer with Isaac (who was probably the best out of all the cousins at her worst class) she felt that she had improved significantly. The past few weeks had been her putting her new skills to the test. So far, she had been able to get the spells right in under five tries and yesterday she was sure that she had completed the assignment almost perfectly which was a huge step up for her. So she had been feeling pretty confident going into her second class of the day. She was still contemplating on dropping Transfiguration the next year as sometimes she wondered if the class was really worth all the stress that it gave her. But other times she almost wanted to take it anyway, sort of as a way to prove to herself that no class could get the best of her.

However, that morning, she arrived rather distracted. She had woken up with a particular bounce in her step. She'd had a lovely time since starting back and Sonora and every day felt brighter than the last. She knew it was a stupid cliche, but she couldn't help but feel it perfectly applied to her life at that moment. The day had started off as usual, she had gone for her pre-breakfast run and showered quickly before leaving to go down for breakfast. However, today when she got out of the shower there had been two letters sitting neatly on her bed.

Since she never got letters that early in the morning, she had walked forward tentatively and picked them up. Flipping through the names she saw they were from her grandmother and mother. Two people who never normally wrote her at school. Despite the bad feeling in the pit of her stomach, she opened the letter from her grandmother first, deciding that it was likely better to get that one out of the way and then cheer herself up with whatever it was that her mother had written her about.

The letter had been full of harsh sentences that accused Liliana of intentionally hiding the fact that she played Quidditch from her grandmother and also of sneaking around behind her back to play a man's sport. Liliana really wasn't sure how Grandmère had ever got to that opinion, since Grandpère had always seemed to be okay with witches playing Quidditch and her aunt had played Quidditch back in her school days. But then again, Liliana supposed, she was the only granddaughter, and when her aunt had been playing Quidditch, Grandmère'd had Liliana's mother to dress in nice dresses and have tea with. "You are a lady, Liliana not a Quidditch player," the words made Liliana's cheeks burn. She had been angry with herself for actually feeling as though she had done something wrong and she'd set the letter aside, sinking down against her bed, utterly exhausted.

The other letter had held no better news. The letter, which she had been half afraid to open, read It's a boy! in large blue letters. Liliana had blinked. What? It's a boy? What did that mean? Her eyes had hungrily devoured the rest of what appeared to be a baby announcement, eyes growing wider and forehead crinkling more and more as she did so. It appeared, that she was going to have a baby brother. "B-but..." she had said to herself. "I didn't even know Mother was pregnant!"

So it was that the normally talkative Liliana was in kind of a funk that morning. She had skipped breakfast entirely and now was regretting that, so she was grateful that Skies had asked them not to talk too much that morning--she wasn't really in the right kind of mood to be pleasant. She collected her plastic stick silently and placed it on her desk, letting her head fall forward until if the stick had eyes she would have been engaged in a stare down. "So," she said softly to the stick. "Let the battle commence."

10 Liliana Bannister, Pecari Trying to remain optimistic. 274 Liliana Bannister, Pecari 0 5

Serena Brockert, Teppenpaw
June 26, 2015 3:13 PM

Serena Brockert, Teppenpaw
Alumnus
House: Teppenpaw
Written by: Allegra Brockert

Age in Post: 15

I know the feeling, by Serena Brockert, Teppenpaw
Serena had had the most amazing perfect summer in the history of the world. Nothing could get her down now, not even Transfiguration, the class that had been the bane of her existence since she was a first year and realized that she wasn't as good at it as all her relatives-and being self-conscious about her inadequacies didn't really help her do any better.

At the moment though, it didn't matter. She had met the most wonderful man over the summer...and he was a real live prince to top it off. Prince Oscar. It wasn't everything, his title, it was what kind of man he was. Gentle and kind, a true gentleman. The ideal Prince Charming like in a storybook. Oscar-he'd wanted her to call him as such right off, which meant she was special -was so well mannered and not the least bit snobby. He'd made Serena feel like the only woman-yes, woman, not little girl-in the whole palace. That was more than she could say for Amity's sleazy brother-in-law.

Her family had been on their annual vacation on St. Berylla's, an island where many important pureblood families summered. Nearby was Livilia, an island kingdom of only magical folk. Oscar's family had ruled there for nearly a thousand years. It had been named for their very first queen, a distant ancestor of the current family that had been very much beloved by all as was the current royal family. They were a royal family that much cared for it's subjects. Not that there weren't rough patches in their leadership when a less than stellar king came in to power but for the most part they'd been pretty good rulers.

Anyway, every year a royal ball was held and all the important vacationing families were invited. This year's had been special, with girls around Serena's age specifically requested to attend. It didn't take an Aladren to figure out the reason why. Oscar was of marrying age and they were trying to find him a wife and while she didn't want to get her hopes up, he hadn't exactly spent much time with anyone else. Serena felt like she was a probably a likely candidate, which would be amazing . He'd even wanted to see her after the ball and had taken her out sometimes. At the end of the vacation, she hadn't even wanted to leave, but they had to go to Amity's wedding and support her. Oscar promised to write.

Unfortunately now, she was in Transfiguration class, listening to Professor Skies, trying hard not to go back to daydreams of summer. She sighed when she recieved a plastic stick. Serena wasn't sure she was too happy about being a fifth year, and have to do the harder lesson, not really feeling she'd perfected the easier ones. Plus Charlotte and Gemma were both in Advanced classes so it wasn't as if she had anyone but family members to work with. Granted, there were people she should probably try to be on good terms with, such as Leonidas Bennett given he was Paul's sibling too.

The plastic stick was green and approximately the same shape as a wooden one. Serena was certain that she could probably have turned this one into one. But then, wasn't that place to start? Surely, Professor Skies didn't want a plastic plant. But would the Teppenpaw be able to succeed? She did the correct motions and words. Only to find her results to be a wooden stick with a few already curled up and rather sick looking leaves.

Serena sighed. She was supposed to be good at this like everyone else in her family. Well, except Sophie, but she was a Brockert-or rather O'Malley-by marriage not blood so it was different.

That's when she heard Liliana Bannister speak next to her. "Are you having a hard time too?" The Pecari didn't seem her usual chipper self but she'd never seemed too good in Transfig. Serena tended to at least get things, just not as quickly as her relatives. She was certain Fabian and Kira were already impressing Professor Skies with their Transfiguration prowess.

The fifth year looked back at her project, wishing once more to escape into her daydreams.

11 Serena Brockert, Teppenpaw I know the feeling, 272 Serena Brockert, Teppenpaw 0 5

Lena Westley, Aladren
June 26, 2015 7:28 PM

Lena Westley, Aladren
Alumnus
House: Aladren
Written by: Natalie Varth

Age in Post: 14

More Pressing Topics at Mind by Lena Westley, Aladren
“You may discuss your work quietly with your neighbor, though you should all turn in an individual project,” Professor Skies said and Lena cringed slightly. Individual projects were preferable when Olivier wasn’t available but recently she was falling behind in classes. “And if I overhear too much social chit chat or gossiping,” Professor Skies continued, “I shall not be pleased.”

That at least she didn’t worry about. Lena never really paid much attention to the doings of others or their secrets. She preferred people to be happy or at least content with the goings on in their lives but it didn’t affect her. She cared about Olivier and his well being, both emotional and physical, but she didn’t have to come by information about him second hand through the grape vine. In fact, information about her brother through that would almost undoubtedly be far from the truth. After all, Olivier was not as he appeared to others.

Relieved and feeling slightly guilty that Olivier had had to bring two wooden sticks over, she turned her attention to the outside world again. She had no doubt Olivier could have done the level b version but was glad to have him matching her pace. He probably hadn’t even thought about doing it differently from her. Olivier was looking at the textbook and by the look of him seemed calm but she sensed something about him was unsettled. He thought he hid his agitation well, and he did, but Lena was his other half. It made sense that she could tell from even the slightest thing that something wasn’t as it seemed with him.

"It would have made our hikes more interesting if we'd had these to play with." His smile didn’t reach even close to his eyes, it barely made it midway up his cheeks. This was always a problem. Lena could tell something was wrong but she didn’t know what. She knew how his mind worked theoretically but it was so different from her own and couldn’t imagine the turns his mind might take. Instead of making assumptions or continuing to wonder she looked down at the point where his finger seemingly caused the plant to furl.

“Mmm, they are interesting. They would’ve fit perfectly into flower crowns.” Lena still remembered having made those when she was but it hadn't stopped from when they were little, Lena still made flower bracelets. She didn’t like big flowers but ferns and the little yellow buds that grew in her neighborhood suited her, a wallflower. She waited to begin the enchantment. This wasn’t unusual, she usually watched Olivier instead of going at the same time but he hadn’t yet started.

In truth Olivier wasn’t the only one upset. Back home, Olivier was Olivier and Lena was herself, but coming back here after. . . Olivier may have forgotten the end of last year or at least wasn’t upset over it but Lena felt something significant about those events and the bond between her and her brother now. It wasn’t broken, nothing could sever it, but it was taught on her end. Not with distance, she was just as close to him. She didn’t know what the cause of it was but she couldn’t help feeling they should talk.

'We should have talked at home' a frowning Lena thought, but the summer had been so wonderful that she had completely forgotten. Sonora wasn't on her mind at all, it was just her, Olivier, their parents occasionally, and lots of room and time to think and feel and just enjoy being. She didn't feel this back then; as soon as she and Olivier were on their last plane home she was relaxed. If she had felt miserable there she might have ventured bringing it up to relieve herself of the tension but then again maybe not.

"You should go first. I'll watch"she finally said. She wanted to clear her head first, but she also wanted to follow her brother's example. Despite having the accent he managed spells with far more accuracy than she. She still wanted to be a witch, and what's more a witch her brother would be proud of, but to do that she'd have to really follow by example. Leading was for Olivier.

7 Lena Westley, Aladren More Pressing Topics at Mind 279 Lena Westley, Aladren 0 5

Lena Westley
June 26, 2015 7:33 PM

Lena Westley
Alumnus
House: Aladren
Written by: Natalie Varth

Age in Post: 14

Re: More Pressing Topics at Mind by Lena Westley
OOC: Forgot to comment on original post. Lena is very troubled at this point so she's reading too much into Olivier's smile. In his post it's genuine, but Lena (not being able to read between the lines as well as she should) is maybe reflecting her emotions onto him or maybe just thinking in terms of what she observed earlier. In any case, the author INTENTIONALLY made Lena misunderstand how Olivier is feeling.

7 Lena Westley Re: More Pressing Topics at Mind 279 Lena Westley 0 5

Clark Dill, Aladren
July 01, 2015 11:59 AM

Clark Dill, Aladren
Alumnus
House: Aladren
Written by: Nathan

Age in Post: 14
Birthday: Who knows? But he celebrates it in November

Transfiguring a robot plant by Clark Dill, Aladren
The staff's admonishment against gossiping defacing school property, along with their total failure to announce a contest to figure out who would be the band playing at the midsummer concert, effectively dashed Clark's theory about the message carved on the Cascade Hall doors. It also dropped his opinion of his schoolmates' decency by a few dozen points, but he tried to remember one bad egg should not reflect on the nature of the whole student body.

Still, just in case there was a staff concert conspiracy afoot, he had spent the last few days researching lyrics and songs from the wizarding world. Few of them had gone very high on the magical equivalent of 'the charts', when they'd made it onto them at all, but he had found eight songs that utilized the phrase "Guess who likes girls?" in their lyrics.

The first was a super liberal feminist-lesbian singer who used the question defiantly to declare her own right to be who she was and like who she wanted. In a similar vein, another singer was trying to work through her confusion about whether her best female friend was flirting with her and her own greater confusion about whether or not she was okay with it if she was.

Another was almost a modern ballad about the Quidditch player, Rosaline Penn, and her historic coming out story and the whole Girls In Quidditch outcry and controversy that followed.

A fourth was closer to Uzume's interpretation of the words. The song was sung by a male lead who was basically saying his ex-girlfriend broke up with him because she was actually a lesbian who hated men and wanted to use them. Clark was of the opinion the guy was an idiot with far too high an opinion of himself and the girl had shown a great deal of common sense by breaking up with him.

The next two weren't quite as self-serving or motivated by personal insult as that one, but were no less demeaning and cruel to women who may or may not have been lesbians.

The last couple he'd found were also sung by men, but they were celebrating heterosexuality. The phrase was used rhetorically, with the obvious answer of 'Me!' In at least one of the songs, Clark thought the question "guess who loves female body parts and getting laid?" would have been more applicable to the ideas being expressed, but it just didn't fit into the rhyme scheme nearly as well. The only reason he wasn't sure whether the second one deserved similar rewording was because Clark also wasn't sure if the guy singing it was trying to convince his listeners he was straight or himself.

All in all, it was probably for the best that the school likely wasn't hiring any of those groups for the concert. That was the only saving grace Clark could find as he took in the subtle reprimand against gossiping that Professor Skies issued as she released them to begin the day's transfiguration.

As a fourth year, Clark had the choice of starting with a wooden stick or a plastic one, but as an Aladren vying for one of highest grades in the class, his 'choice' of the plastic stick would have surprised nobody. He set the plastic stick at the top edge of his desk initially, so it wouldn't be in the way, then went to look up up the plant in one of the nature books. After reading the brief article fully, he copied the except into his notes with a quick replication charm.

Returning to his desk, Clark began writing out his transfiguration table for the day's exercise. He probably could have done it in his head by now, but he liked the almost scientific preparation of having it spelled out clearly in tabular form exactly what changes needed to be made. He'd found the tables also came in useful for remembering what the spells did and how they worked when it came time to study for the end of year exams.

So he continued to write them out, using mathematical formulas in some places as appropriate to describe the physics of how much mass needed to be created or sent away or moved around. (Dad had taught him the revised theories that accounted for magic in the muggles' physical laws for conservation of mass and energy.)

When he was done with his descriptions and calculations, Clark swapped his parchment to the back of the desk and brought the plastic stick forward to the center of it, lying it vertically on the surface. He drew his wand, reread the relevant passage on the plant in question, focussed on the illustration for a moment, then concentrated and cast the spell.

It wasn't perfect. Oh, it looked good. A fine small branch the length of the original stick with several offshoots forking off to either side. He was quite good at making things look right, at least in size and proportions - he attributed that to his taking the time to do the math - but the subjective things could still throw him off a bit. The leaves were just a little too yellow and not enough green. The texture was a bit too smooth and the small veins just a bit too prominent. And of course, the new bit, autonomous movement, wasn't quite right either, since it had been months since he had last worked on that in his third year. He'd oversimplified the formulas for that and when he touched the leaves, the plant moved more like a robot than anything normally found in nature books. There were even quiet clicking sounds, which he was pretty sure the real plants did not make. More texture problems, he guessed, combined with too much force in the motion. Or possibly the molecular composition was still a bit too plastic yet and not fully organic. Was that why it wasn't as green as it should be?

Not a bad first try, though, if he did say so himself.

He looked over to his neighbor to see how they were doing. "Did you get all the plastic out? Mine's clicking when it folds up." He touched another of the small twigs forking out of the main branch. The yellowish leaves mechanically clicked closed in demonstration that there was still work to be done.

1 Clark Dill, Aladren Transfiguring a robot plant 277 Clark Dill, Aladren 0 5

Isaac Douglas, Crotalus
July 01, 2015 4:20 PM

Isaac Douglas, Crotalus
Alumnus
House: Crotalus
Written by: Grayson Wright

Age in Post: 15

I will if I want to. I've got a badge. by Isaac Douglas, Crotalus
That he was squeamish was something Isaac had long since accepted about himself. He did not have a strong constitution. His father making snide remarks about how any of Isaac’s half-blood half-sisters could take him any day of the week was not something he had even realized still bothered him until the summer day when he’d found himself wildly recounting his success at staying on a broom after being hit (really more like ‘grazed,’ but his father would have been ashamed of him, and rightly so, if he had ever told the truth about such a thing when there was no-one to contradict his claim) by a Bludger. For most of his life, he had taken the view that whatever it was that made his sisters view pain and blood as non-concerns was something they must have inherited from their father, which meant it was something a proper pureblood shouldn’t even want anyway. Even now, he was still mostly okay with only having the faintest imaginable trace of it when he was in a group situation and scrambling to save a little dignity. Too much of that sort of thing didn't seem healthy.

Accordingly, he was less than happy when Professor Skies mentioned that next lesson they were going back to animals, though not because of the potential damage to the animals. He was not sentimental and the theory embraced by their textbook indicated there was no reason to be. He just didn’t like working with animals because he just didn’t like the possibility of being bitten or stung and was not much fonder of having to chase his target around the table half the time. The only reason he could think of for transfiguring something that moved in the real world was if it was an immediate threat to his life, and since he lived many stories above the ground in a city, far from wild animals that could threaten him, he did not see that as a skill he really needed to put enormous amounts of effort into cultivating.

Except, of course, to prove that he could. He hated his one scrap of pride sometimes. It just refused to let him cement his status as the Least Accomplished Child. If he could get Head Boy, he could rest assured that the title belonged to either Kate or Alicia, but since there was no guarantee of that, the qualifications for the title nobody wanted were currently...murky, especially considering Alicia’s luck, and that meant he had to control every variable he possibly could.

Mimosa pudica. Sounded like a Spanish variant on a drink order, though he knew he should know what he words actually meant. He’d had Latin lessons until he left for school, but had not continued them after. Now, though, he saw the potential to impress that could go with knowing what the words meant and made a mental note to write home for a dictionary. ‘Pudica’ sounded familiar…something to do with feet? No, that was ‘ped.’ He tried not to think about bubbly drinks that tasted like feet as he looked at the third year beside him.

He had been trying to be nice to them in this class particularly to impress Skies, but they weren’t making it easy for him. In fact, he was beginning to think they were the vilest, worst brought up little beasts the school had to offer. Last week, he’d sat beside Umland and by the end of class had known that he hated that kid. First the brat had hit him with a Bludger last year and then when Isaac, assuming the Aladrens were probably Skies’ favorites, had decided to forgive that and ask him how his work was going, he had spent ten minutes of Isaac’s life, ten minutes Isaac would never get back, chattering on about it as they worked, all in an attitude that had put Isaac strongly in mind of Alicia plus about five cheering charms and a blow to the head. This week, he’d settled on Shinohara, hoping at least that the famed camaraderie between Quidditch players and the similarities between Housemates would keep her from doing anything that would make him want to kill her, but her resolute window-staring had done nothing to encourage his optimism. It was just rude and that, along with her now not speaking a civil word to preface her questions, made him wonder how she had even gotten into Crotalus.

He forced a smile. “The best way is usually the way that’s easiest for you to visualize,” he said in his best imitation-teacher tone, gentle to the point of mild condescension. “Since we don’t see the roots on Professor Skies’, though, it might be easier for you to picture it just ending at the stem – or to make a little pot out of parchment for it to rest in so it’s more like hers,” he added in a fit of inspiration which he instantly regretted, as that meant he couldn’t do it himself. He needed to do a better job than she did, after all. “Roots are hard to do,” he added, remembering hearing Alicia complain about that once. She had been talking about conjuring, but he decided he could safely borrow from his vague memories of a rant he’d heard three years ago and supplement it with a little common sense in order to sound smarter. “You can run into trouble with mixing and matching from the vanishment space, though I doubt that would count against you too much now,” he made up mostly from air. “Professor Skies probably won’t expect your plant to live long enough to need watering.”

OOC: I also write the brat Umland, so references to specific-but-unwritten incidents involving him are author-approved.

16 Isaac Douglas, Crotalus I will if I want to. I've got a badge. 273 Isaac Douglas, Crotalus 0 5

Makenzie Newell [Crotalus]
July 01, 2015 8:15 PM

Makenzie Newell [Crotalus]
Alumnus
House: Crotalus
Written by: Casey

Age in Post: 13

..... *touches* by Makenzie Newell [Crotalus]
Things felt weird this year. Makenzie was glad Dustin had not been Sorted into her House because it provided her with a sort of sanctuary in which she could hide from him. Likewise, she was eternally grateful to her mother and aunt for giving birth far enough apart for Makenzie to have moved into Intermediate the year Dustin arrived for the Beginner classes. But there were times between class and curfew during which she wanted to be out and about, but often times, she noticed her cousin from a distance, and maybe it was just the timing of when she happened to look over, but he always seemed to be… staring at her or something.

She knew that despite the fact that she was older, Dustin had some weird complex where he considered it his duty to look after her and ensure her proper behavior and reputation were maintained. But it wasn’t. She assumed part of it was some kind of Heir Thing where he had decided the moment he learned he would be in charge of things as an adult that he was not allowed to have fun or be an actual child in the meantime, but part of it was that it felt like he thought she couldn’t handle things on her own, like she was stupid or something. But contrary to whatever he had told himself, Makenzie knew things. A lot of things. Some of the things that Dustin didn’t.

But she wasn’t going to let him ruin things for her, especially when he wasn’t even physically around right now. It was class time, so he was off in a class (she wasn’t sure what his schedule looked like, if it was the same as last year’s Beginner had been) and she was in Transfigurations, a class she rather liked despite its challenges. Today’s lesson, the last with plants, make her a bit nervous, mostly because she hadn’t completely mastered them yet and now they were going to start doing things with animals. She definitely needed to get this right.

The redhead took a deep breath and did her best, being careful to enunciate the Latin words and to keep her wand flicks from turning into flails. The wooden stick changed immediately and clearly, taking on a much more plant-like structure. Makenzie cautiously ran her fingers across a leaf, which retracted automatically. This success boosted her confidence until further inspection showed a problem with her performance, as the stem still looked way too much like a stick and way too little like a stem. “Well, I was close,” she sighed aloud.

12 Makenzie Newell [Crotalus] ..... *touches* 291 Makenzie Newell [Crotalus] 0 5

Leonidas Bennett, Aladren
July 05, 2015 9:40 PM

Leonidas Bennett, Aladren
Alumnus
House: Aladren
Written by:

Age in Post: 15

At least you'll never have to water it by Leonidas Bennett, Aladren
The first few weeks back at school were always, Leonidas thought, a little dull for the older Intermediates. They had studied magic long enough now that it usually didn’t take much as much effort to start casting spells after the summer as it sometimes did for second and third years and they had already been through the broad outlines, if not the specific spells, of their classes at least once, but the classes had to introduce material slowly so the third years could keep up. The truly driven in the class were probably already ready to pull all their hair out in impatience.

He, though, had decided to be moderate in his ambitions and looked at it differently. Yes, the weeks they spent on simple plant Transfigurations to steady up the third years’ nerves were not very interesting, but at least they kept that material fresh in their minds. CATS were meant to be difficult, but remembering material you hadn’t even looked at for several years was difficult. His sister Eliza had complained about getting some small, virtually useless spell she had learned in her second year on one of her practical exams and missing it because it had just never occurred to her to look back over that material because it had only been a skill drill, something to teach them a concept. His brother Paul had not had a similar complaint, so Eliza’s test could have been a fluke, but Leo had still planned to look over a copy of one of the Beginner textbooks over midterm or something just to be safe and to pay attention through the first few easy weeks of his classes even before he’d returned to Sonora for his fifth year.

Events had put only one small crimp in that plan, which Professor Skies unhelpfully called everyone’s attention to before she set them to work. Gossip was all over the school because of the vandal in the Cascade Hall, and while Leo didn’t think his year was the worst for gossips, he still would have rather everyone been too worked to the bone to have the energy to gossip after class. His own morality was not in question, and he didn’t think anyone was looking speculatively at the sister he had here, but the specifics of the graffiti still struck kind of close to home. He didn’t approve of it anymore than anyone else did, and his parents would both sooner die than talk about it, but…well, if Gemma had been...so inclined, he was nearly sure at this point that she wouldn't have been the first in their family. He suspected everyone had relatives who were like that or something else society would disapprove of just as much - it just happened; there was no way everyone in a family was going to perfectly conform to social norms and have nothing to hide - but he knew his family did, however discreetly. He was sure the door had nothing to do with his family if there was even anything improper in his family for anyone to comment on, but he wasn’t comfortable and was really hoping all the gossip would attach itself so firmly to Francesca that no one would even notice that Gemma existed this year.

He took one of the strange ‘plastic’ sticks and immediately realized it was going to need a lot of work to become a living, moving plant. This was definitely more challenging than the third year assignment. That was good; they'd have plenty to talk about other than gossip.

Picturing the plant Professor Skies had produced and trying to remember what leaves and stems felt like in as much detail as possible – he had discovered last year that working with as much sensory input as he could keep in mind at one time could help with detailing on these assignments and had spent more time in the Gardens than he really wanted to learning how things felt before he touched the wrong thing and had to go to the hospital wing – Leonidas tried the spell for the first time. The stick flowed into a plant shape, but touching the result revealed it was moving slowly, felt more slick than seemed natural, and though the leaves came closer than the flower to feeling right, they were still not quite flexible enough.

That was why he said, “I don’t think so, no, not yet,” when Clark Dill asked him if he had gotten all the plastic out.” He listened closely and heard the clicking sounds the fourth year’s creation was making. “Interesting. It’s almost like a toy with an animation charm on it,” he said, remembering toys he and his siblings had played with when they were younger. “Or at least I always assumed it was a charm. Maybe it’s more like chessmen.” It didn’t occur to him that Clark, who clearly hadn’t grown up in an all-magic family and probably not with a bunch of older siblings complaining about their homework, might not know about the old argument over whether or not chessmen were charmed or transfigured. It did occur to him that saying more than the bare minimum to Clark when they weren’t on the Quidditch pitch wasn’t totally proper, but he didn’t think it was totally improper either. Part of the assistant captain’s role was being friendly with all the players, gaining their loyalty against the day when he became captain. "Anyway, it's a good start," he said.

0 Leonidas Bennett, Aladren At least you'll never have to water it 269 Leonidas Bennett, Aladren 0 5

Liliana
July 07, 2015 2:40 AM

Liliana
Alumnus
House: Pecari
Written by: Mathilde Reinhardt

Age in Post: 15

How do you do it? by Liliana
Liliana’s thought process was interrupted by the only other girl in her year, Duncan’s cousin. She shook her head—did everyone in the school think she was an absolute idiot? “Not yet at least,” she replied. “I haven’t attempted the spell yet, though I have been making vast improvements since last year!” All she could think about, however, were the letters she had received that morning. First off, she couldn't believe that her assistant captaining had gotten back to her French speaking grandmother in England! She supposed that Levi or Isaac could have told one of the other cousins (she knew it couldn't have been Joseph as he was trying to stay on her good side) and somehow it got around until Benji's idiot of a wife thought it would be a good idea to actually congratulate the Rosenthal matriarch on Liliana's achievement. She wanted to close her eyes and pinch her nerves. She didn't really know if that helped, but she'd seen her mother do that in times of stress more than once and it had always seemed like a good plan of action.

Liliana remembered back to a particular instance at the Christmas Ball one year when she and her cousins had gotten into a huge snowball fight right before dinner. Her grandmother had been furious and Liliana had felt sorry for ruining her grandmother’s ball unlike the rest of her cousins who had all laughed it off. Being the youngest and the only girl she had been left off rather easy considering the fact that she was supposed to be the clean one. Not that Liliana minded, as much as she did what she was told, her cousins had corrupted her enough to learn how to bend the rules enough so that she would still be following them while having fun. This time, however, she had no clue how to back track and fix whatever it was that had made Grandmère upset other than quit Quidditch which Liliana was not about to do.

Secondly, her mother was pregnant? Since when was that a thing? she wondered. Growing up, her mother had always told her how pleased she was that she was only expected to have one child, and when that child turned out to be a girl she was over the moon because it meant she could buy pretty dresses and teach her good manners. So this “it’s a boy!” announcement was really coming out of nowhere. What Liliana wanted to do was to stamp her foot on the ground and fall down and cry. She knew it was an extremely immature thing to do and something that Joseph likely wouldn’t approve of and something that could possibly make the professors reconsider the prefect and assistant captain position that Liliana had received.

However, because Liliana didn’t want to lose either of her badges, she just gave Serena a sort of odd shrug and turned back to her stick. Somehow she had ended up with a red one which totally sucked because it meant one more thing she had to think about while she transfigured the stick into a plant, especially hard because red and green were on the opposite end of the color spectrum. “Mimosa pudica,” she said, preforming the wand movements very carefully and thinking about the changes she wanted to see as the stick transformed into the plant. And slowly, but surely a rather normal looking specimen of the plant formed. She reached a finger out to touch it, however instead of shrinking back at her touch, the plant surged forward. Merlin’s beard, she thought angrily. She had thought about the wrong movement because she’d been so angry and thinking about the different ways she could confront her idiotic sister-in-law.

So, Liliana prepared herself to try the spell again, sending a quick peek in the direction of Serena’s plant to see how her neighbor was coming along.

10 Liliana How do you do it? 274 Liliana 0 5

Duncan Brockert, Teppenpaw
July 07, 2015 3:09 PM

Duncan Brockert, Teppenpaw
Alumnus
House: Teppenpaw
Written by: Allegra Brockert

Age in Post: 15
Birthday: February 10

I'll try not to. by Duncan Brockert, Teppenpaw
Duncan had been a bit in a daze since the Opening Feast. He touched the badge on his robes, in awe. He'd never really expected to get it, he'd always somehow thought it would be Serena. He knew she wasn't upset at all, they'd promised long ago they wouldn't be mad at each other about it and what happened would happen. Besides, quite honestly, Serena seemed to have something else on her mind. Something good apparently, since she seemed utterly blissful.

Still, he couldn't quite figure out why he'd gotten it. The Teppenpaw knew it had nothing to with his last name being the same as the Headmaster's-Serena had the same last name too, of course. And his cousin always seemed so sweet and compassionate, caring about others and intelligent and organized enough. She wasn't the bravest person, but Duncan never thought that was really quality that was essential to being a prefect.

Then there was him. Socially awkward and weird. Preferring the company of the dead-who it still bothered him that he had not run across yet at Sonora, why didn't they like him, he was good with them-to the living for the most part because it was what he was used to. Duncan was a nice person, of course, that was why he was in Teppenpaw, and he supposed he was smart enough, though he didn't think he really stuck out that way.

Could it be just because he was male? That wouldn't be right. It also didn't make sense because there were plenty of girls who became prefect. The other two Teppenpaw prefects were girls. Liliana had gotten prefect over two boys.

Of course, a lot of the Teppenpaw prefects had been female, so maybe "because he was a boy" would be a step towards it being less sexist.

Either way, his parents were proud of him and he was honestly thrilled. Mother never seemed to say much other than he needed to be more social with his classmates and less "socially maladjusted" though seemed happy enough with Duncan's grades. Father, on the other hand, had been ecstatic, more so possibly than the fifth year had been himself. Father had been a Teppenpaw prefect too at school, so he was excedingly excited to have his son follow in his footsteps.

He blinked, trying to bring his attention back to Professor Skies. It wasn't very prefectly to not pay attention in class. Duncan wanted to do a good job, like his father had, and set a good example. Unfortunately, the Teppenpaw was not all that familiar with plants, being that Sonora didn't offer Herbology and that they had house elves doing all the landscaping at home.

"Accio book" He summoned a book to himself. Always good to keep a spell in practice, especially with CATS this year. Besides, what was the point of being a wizard otherwise?

Duncan flipped threw the book until he found the appropriate page. He watch the leaves on the picture do their thing and looked at the plastic stick and then looked back at the book, trying to get a handle on the exact shape of the leaves. The stick shouldn't be too hard since it was the same shape as the plastic one. " Mimosa pudica "

He looked at the plant, the stick was...wooden looking, but still plastic. However, his leaves were pretty near perfect. Duncan grinned and turned to the person next to him. "Do you want to look at the book too?"

11 Duncan Brockert, Teppenpaw I'll try not to. 271 Duncan Brockert, Teppenpaw 0 5

Tobi Reinhardt, Teppenpaw
July 08, 2015 9:41 PM

Tobi Reinhardt, Teppenpaw
Alumnus
House: Teppenpaw
Written by: Mathilde Reinhardt

Age in Post: 13

.... *actually speaks* by Tobi Reinhardt, Teppenpaw
Over the summer, Tobi had turned thirteen. In his mother’s family, thirteen was an important year—it was a year that had been built up his whole life. Growing up, Tobi had thought thirteen would mean an end to constant metal charming workshops, to finally being able to have more control over his life. However, just because thirteen was an important year for his mother, thirteen didn’t mean he was an adult, and for his father and pretty much everyone in the wizarding world, he wouldn’t be considered Of Age until he turned seventeen. It was a sobering thought for the third year who had somehow seen freedom in his future when he thought about that thirteenth birthday, however even his mother had set him straight, explaining that thirteen didn’t mean he was an adult, even for her family he would have to be at least seventeen before being able to make those kinds of decisions for himself.

A good thing had come out of his thirteenth year, however, he had undergone an extreme growth spurt over the course of the summer, jumping in height so that he was now nearly as tall as his five foot six mother and had needed to buy a whole new set of pants because the ones he had worn at the end of the last school year now reached above his ankle. He rolled his neck, enjoying the popping noise it made as he waited for Professor Skies to start class. Despite normally enjoying Liac’s company, Tobi had opted to take a seat next to a different classmate so that he wouldn’t really have to talk, kind of wanting to stew in his own thoughts as he thought about the rather cold rebuffing Arne had given him earlier that morning when Tobi asked him if he wanted to get together to write their mother a letter home. He sent Liac a smile to let his cousin know that he wasn’t upset with him, and hoped that Liac would take the move as a show of Tobi trying to branch out past his small group of Liac and sometimes Aiden (Tobi didn’t think he could count Arne as his group just at the moment though he really wanted to, things hadn’t been right between them in awhile).

“I’ll take the bags up to the room after Charms,” Tobi said softly to Liac as he passed by him on his way to his seat after getting up to grab himself a stick for the day’s project. Eating lunch together was just one of those constants in Tobi’s life that he really enjoyed. Every day the two would take turns taking the bags up to their dorm room while the other found a good place to eat in Cascade Hall. Since Arne had joined them at Sonora, Tobi’s younger brother had occasionally eaten dinner with them, sometimes dragging along the Muggleborn girl from their town. However, Arne rarely ate lunch with them—he usually just grabbed a quick bite before going off to participate in whatever illicit activity he got up to during the lunch period (Tobi would later find out that Arne generally spent this time pestering Laila in the library).

When he got back to his seat, he thought back to all the different plants he came across while walking in the forest back home. He had seen many plants which looked similar to the Mimosa, pudica, none of which collapsed at a finger touch, however, and so Tobi made sure carefully observe the moving pictures in the nature books Professor Skies had provided before attempting the spell himself. Though metal charming was not something that particularly wanted to do, and though transfiguration rarely played a part in the job (it wasn’t called metal charming for nothing), he could already envision a beautiful piece decorated with a folding plant not too different from the task at hand. He cleared his mind of any all encompassing thoughts, allowing himself to think of and only think of the retractable plant, however Things were overtaking his mind as quickly as he could empty it. As he waved his wand and said the spell, he watched as the plastic stick warmed to the right shade of green, the graininess of the stick gave way to something more shiny yet still natural, and little leaflets sprung forth and lengthened into perfect little leaves.

However, his finished product was entirely too miniature-fern like for him and besides that, when he touched it, instead of smoothly shying away the leaves had a more jerky response. He turned and saw his desk partner had a nearly perfect result and though he knew it wasn’t her fault, he blamed her slightly for his distracted mind. The red hair in combination with the girly smell… He briefly scowled before realizing he was doing a very good Arne impression and let the displeased look melt away. He would just have to try harder in his next attempt. However, instead of saying the spell next, Tobi’s brain seemed to defy his heart’s wishes and decided to actually speak to the girl. He felt as though he were outside his body, trying to tell himself to leave it alone and finish the class in peace and quiet. Nevertheless, his voice came out in it’s usually scratchy, low pitch, rough from rarely being used. “Yours is coming along nicely,” he said with a smile that showed off his white teeth and right cheek dimple.

OOC: Mentions of the Reinhardts lunch plans previously discussed by both authors at an earlier time.

10 Tobi Reinhardt, Teppenpaw .... *actually speaks* 289 Tobi Reinhardt, Teppenpaw 0 5

Clark
July 09, 2015 12:13 PM

Clark
Alumnus
House: Aladren
Written by: Nathan

Age in Post: 14
Birthday: Who knows? But he celebrates it in November

There is that by Clark
Clark looked over Leonidas' plant. His looked good, too, better even than Clark's really, but he was a fifth year and also an Aladren, so that was almost to be expected. The nuances of the remark about enchanted toys went over his head, but he'd had his fair share of charm-animated toys (they were cheaper than battery-animated toys and usually they hadn't begun life as toys anyway; Clark already knew Dad was a ... unique ... example of parenthood) so he figured he understood what Leonidas meant well enough.

Leonidas' plant wasn't perfect either, still retaining a few plastic properties, so that made Clark feel better about his own work as well. It was a good start, as the older boy pointed out. Clark wasn't so much a perfectionist that he expected to get it exactly right on the very first try.

He was enough of a perfectionist that he couldn't leave his plant as it was now, so he began making adjustments to his transfiguration table (using a color changing charm on his ink so he'd know later what had been original and what had been a revision). "Thanks," he said absently, not wanting to entirely ignore Leonidas' support since that would be (a) rude, (b) unsociable and Clark wasn't that kind of Aladren, and (c) ungrateful to the effort Leonidas was making to not exclude Clark. Clark was quite aware most of the Quidditch team wouldn't give him the time of day if he wasn't their Seeker (and so far an undefeated one at that), but they were all doing a decent job of pretending like they could tolerate his company, and after dealing daily with Oliver and his refusal to even try to pretend any such thing, Clark really did appreciate the attempt even if it was a little transparent at times.

Right now, though there was a transfiguration to get right and Leonidas would surely understand and appreciate the quiet as he tried to figure out what had gone wrong with his own assignment. Clark sat back and again lifted his wand once he was satisfied with the changes he'd made to his movement calculations and composition descriptions. He'd also added a small diagram of plant cells to remind himself how different they were from the relatively simple chemical bonds of plastic.

Moving his wand and repeating the incantation, Clark cast his second attempt. The yellowish cast darkened to a more appropriately chlorophyl influenced green, and when he touched it, the clicking sound was no longer audible and the motion was much more fluid. He still wasn't sure it would pass a botanist's inspection, but it looked pretty good to him.

Satisfied with his improvements, he glanced over to see how Leonidas was doing with his. "How's it going?" he asked curiously when it seemed the older boy wasn't in the middle of anything important.

1 Clark There is that 277 Clark 0 5

Makenzie
July 12, 2015 2:58 AM

Makenzie
Alumnus
House: Crotalus
Written by: Casey

Age in Post: 13

*prefers asterisks* by Makenzie
Dimples were a very positive attribute for a young Pureblood gentleman. Makenzie was, in fact, quite fond of them. Tobi Reinhardt, Teppenpaw third year, also known as the person next to her, happened to sport a rather nice one on his right cheek that was currently being highlighted by his kind-looking smile. She tried to not let it distract her from her work, because honestly, she was already concerned enough about getting it right, or from his statement, but as a thirteen-year-old girl, she found this task rather difficult.

She was pretty sure what Tobi said to her was a compliment, so with her own bright, delicate smile shining as a counterpart to that which he provided, Makenzie replied, “Oh, thank you. It’s a bit less…. stem-like, than I wanted, but it’s a good start, I think. I want to get this stuff down really well before we move on to animals.” Magic could be very fickle and sometimes horrible, and she hated to deliver any sort of horrifying fate to the poor, unsuspecting animals they would be using as samples. Doing any less than her best would simply be cruel. And as an animal lover, she was not about to stand for that type of thing, especially when it was her own magic hypothetically committing this heinous crimes against animals.

“What about you?” she asked in polite return. Her large eyes glanced curiously down to scope out Tobi’s results in comparison to hers. Makenzie wasn’t necessarily top of her class, but she wasn’t the bottom either, or at least, she didn’t think so. Classes were hard, but she always managed in the end. She hoped Tobi had similar results, if not better. “How is you fern coming?”

12 Makenzie *prefers asterisks* 291 Makenzie 0 5

Tobi
July 16, 2015 11:43 PM

Tobi
Alumnus
House: Teppenpaw
Written by: Mathilde Reinhardt

Age in Post: 13

*thinks asterisks are nice too* by Tobi
Mackenzie was a rather cute girl, Tobi decided when she responded in kind with a rather bright smile. But he tried to put any inappropriate thoughts out of his mind. Lately he had been plagued with all sorts of horrible things about his female classmates. They had started the previous year with Shino and, it seemed, were continuing that year. Anytime a girl spoke to him he colored—granted his tanned skin made it difficult for anyone to detect said blush but he could feel the heat in his cheeks and even though he wasn’t necessarily embarrassed about the unwilling action he still preferred his cheeks to stay at a normal temperature, thank you very much.

“Well, if you can tell it’s a fern then it’s not,” he replied in his kind tone. Perhaps if he were more harsh like Arne then what he had said would have come across as insulting, but in Tobi’s slow, gentle manner of being it simply came across as being a word conversationalist. Which was something Tobi was very proud of being. People talked too much, he thought. If they were just quieter and took the time to observe things then they would have a lot less issues. “I think it will get better after another try though,” he elaborated, not wanting to make the Crotalus uncomfortable with his lack of words. It was an odd thought for him. Though Tobi was always very considerate of others, he generally didn’t modify his manner of speaking for them—he was able to please them while keeping to his short exchanges and this was something that had previously worked.

He turned silently back to his project and attempted the spell again. Thankfully he had not created spores so he hadn’t needed to get rid of that in his next transformation, he had just needed to smooth out the plant’s movement and soften it so that it looked more like what it was supposed to be. He looked at a picture of it again and this time the pretty little leaves unfurled properly, the elegant, delicate shape of the plant finally taking it’s proper form and he ran a tender finger across it watching in fascination as they tucked themselves away in a much more pleasing movement than they previously had.

Generally his transfigurations took more work, but anytime he had to work with turning something into a plant or animal he was pretty quick at it as he was always eager to see the result. Transfiguring plants or animals into other things, however, always took more time as though he was not squeamish and believed that the circle of life allowed them all to live in a wonderfully symbiotic world where they could eat one another no problem, he still took issue with ill-using other living beings.

“That’s better,” he said with another smile and he turned to Mackenzie. “I find it’s easier to transfigure non-living objects into animate ones rather than living objects into inanimate ones,” he said with ease. “Don’t you?” He really wasn’t sure if Mackenzie was the sort of person who would agree with him, but she looked nice enough and in Tobi’s book, after family, there were two sorts of people: those who enjoyed and cared for nature and those who didn’t. And quite frankly, he didn’t have anytime for the sort of person who didn’t care about the world in which they lived.

10 Tobi *thinks asterisks are nice too* 289 Tobi 0 5

Araceli Arbon, Crotalus
July 17, 2015 3:11 AM

Araceli Arbon, Crotalus
Alumnus
House: Crotalus
Written by: Rhy

Age in Post: 13

*pokes* by Araceli Arbon, Crotalus

Transfiguration seemed like a good time to further her acquaintance with Duncan Bockert. She was a little wary of being around upper years in any classes, but in Transfiguration she stood a better chance of controlling her magic, and not drawing so much unwanted attention Duncan had helped her out last year, when she’d been dealing with the dilemma of having utterly inadequate height to reach the library books she needed. He seemed relaxed and kind, a temperament which would probably be well suited to Araceli, although he had chosen to hang out with Liliana at the fair last year, which had given her a slightly sinking sort of feeling.

She took notes as Professor Skies talked. She referred a little to the transfiguration table, having decided that she would pretend to wean herself off it when about half of the society Purebloods had. She didn’t want to look presumptuous but nor did she want to be considered slow. She was just finishing her notes up, when Duncan spoke, offering to share his book.

“Thank you,” she smiled. She had been vaguely aware of him using the accio Charm beside her, frustrated by the little shortcuts he could take that she could not. She studied the picture for a moment.

“Does yours do that?” she queried, reaching a tentative hand out to brush the leaves of his plant. He’d got impressively far already.

“Oh, and congratulations on getting prefect,” she smiled, “I would have voted for you if… y’know, that was a thing that we did,” she blushed, not quite sure that her attempt at a compliment hadn’t come out as complete idiocy instead.

13 Araceli Arbon, Crotalus *pokes* 290 Araceli Arbon, Crotalus 0 5

Diana Carey, Pecari
July 18, 2015 12:05 PM

Diana Carey, Pecari
Peripheral
Written by:

Looking is allowed, though by Diana Carey, Pecari
She had refused to admit it to anyone, both because it was silly and because she was Carey enough not to want to look weak even in front of those closest to her, but Diana was a little apprehensive about entering Intermediate classes. Brandon’s complaints had to be taken with a grain of salt, but Diana knew that while she had always been better at school than her brother, it was because Bran didn’t read well, not because Diana was exactly on par with Jay or Arthur in academics. She was on level with Arnold at best, only without the sense of duty which drove her cousin to try to excel at everything he did whether he had any natural aptitude for it or not.

What she did have, though, was the ability to observe, and what she had observed worried her. Her circle – or rather, her nearest older relatives’ circle – included two married girls, one a Carey by birth and the other by marriage. Both Lucille and Fae were of a certain type – fair-haired, meek, demure little things – which Diana was not. If Diana resembled anyone, it was her older sister Theresa, who entertained all Arnold’s friends but never married any of them. Since getting into screaming arguments about friends who overstayed their welcomes with Jay at least twice a month was not a career path Diana thought sounded appealing, she had looked around for some other model of female success, one that she could imitate more easily than she could Fae or Lucille, and had spotted the brainy types. Francesca Wolseithcrafte and Effie Arbon weren’t as surely good models as Fae and Lucy were, but Jay and Anthony were publicly polite to them, which was a good sign when she knew there were was a kind of girl whose boyfriend wouldn’t even admit he’d ever met her in public, and they did have two things in common: stupid fair hair again, but also being the brainy types. Since there was nothing Diana could do about her hair being brown, she had decided to assume it was the ‘brainy’ part which Jay and Anthony seemed to like rather than just the ‘blonde’ part. Diana thought she could work with brainy, or at least do a better approximation than she could of meek. One was just inconvenient; the other was against her nature. Mother blamed it on running too much with her brothers and hoped her sister Cecilia would do better in life.

Diana didn’t know how Ceci would turn out, but she did know that she had been right to worry about how intermediate classes were going to challenge her commitment to being one of the brainy ones when it came time to attract an appropriate husband. She had been working hard since she got back to school, or as hard as she could bring herself to, anyway, so much so that she’d barely taken the time to notice if anyone was noticing her diligence. She didn’t think she had slacked off that badly during her first two years, either, which was kind of worrisome in its own way since of her siblings, only Jay was really bright and even he wasn’t brilliant. If the others were all better at magic than most of the people in her family were, then where did that leave her family, when they had always been able to do what they wanted because other people were a little afraid of them? It was best to study hard and pray that it wasn’t just blonde hair that the right sort of boy in her generation found attractive, and that the move from moving plants to non-plants wasn’t going to be as hard as it sounded.

Maybe it wouldn’t be, if this was supposed to prepare them for it. Sticks to plants wasn’t all that bad since sticks were parts of plants. On one level it was a little confusing – one of the basic rules of magic was that something dead couldn’t be brought back to life, so where did that leave turning dead branches into living plants? Would it not work if the stick had come from the mimosa pudica plant? – but it seemed to work out in practice, which was all that really mattered, at least to her. If she could just get the stick to be a moving plant, she would be well on her way to conquering the rest of the year, and she could get the plant to move if everyone else could. She did not share Henry’s trouble performing any more than she shared Bran’s trouble reading.

How it worked…since non-magical plants didn’t really move much on their own, she thought about charms and how they could make things move. The spell animated them, and when the power behind it ran out, they stopped. She guessed that made sense for this, too. Mimosa pudica didn’t look obviously magical, but maybe it was the distant descendant of a hybrid or something; she didn’t know enough about herbology to know for sure, but did know that could happen every now and then. But then, was she charming and Transfiguring this at the same time, or Transfiguring something into something that was already magical or charmed, or….? But Professor Skies would have told them if there had been any extra factors like that. The short flicking motions must take care of the movements, she decided; the rest was just in pulling out the plant.

“Mimosa pudica,” she said, making the short flicking motions. The stick shivered, then sprouted branches, which were quivering but did not look much like the plant Professor Skies had made. She frowned slightly, but then remembered that nobody liked a frowning girl and turned to her neighbor with a smile.

“Well, I’ve got the moving part down, anyway,” she said cheerily, holding what she had made up to show it off. “How are you doing so far?”

0 Diana Carey, Pecari Looking is allowed, though 0 Diana Carey, Pecari 0 5

Leonidas
July 18, 2015 7:04 PM

Leonidas
Peripheral
Written by:

Always look on the bright side by Leonidas
Flexibility, Leo thought to himself as he began work on his plant-thing again. Unfortunately, he began to think of fabric flowers, which didn’t seem immediately helpful. It would no doubt be much easier to turn this…substance…into a fabric leaf than a real one, but that wasn’t the assignment, and getting the appearance right but the substance wrong was a mistake that could cost you major points on an exam. He didn’t have access to enough details about the CATS, at least, to know what would be graded most harshly, but if he were grading it, at least, he thought he would use that system. If it was at least made of plant, then it was closer to the thing they wanted. Details were not the same as substance. Gemma’s hair was darker than his and Eliza’s was darker than Gemma’s – he alone in the family had come truly close to sharing his mother’s blonde hair, though his was still recognizably brown – but they were all Bennetts despite those details.

Clark, he noticed from the corner of his eye, seemed to be a writer. Leo could see the advantages of the approach – it could be a lot easier to organize thoughts on paper, where everything could be put down and lines drawn between it if he wanted to – but he tried not to use it too much while he was casting spells. He really doubted that his examiners would let him write out a lot of notes before performing the necessary spells during his CATS, after all.

Or in life. There was that. Sometimes, especially in the highly academically competitive atmosphere of Aladren, remembering that they were learning all this for something besides the CATS took a few seconds. He didn’t think it would be a real problem until it was time for RATS, though. If he was still focused more on academic performance than anything else then, it might be a problem, but right now, CATS were a comfortable priority to have.

He recast his own spell and then bent one of the resulting leaves between his fingers, moving it around to test for texture and firmness. It felt better this time, but still somehow not…quite right. Not quite real. He’d have to keep working on it.

“It’s progressing,” he said when Clark asked. “I imagine it would pass, now, but it’s…just a touch off. I can’t put my finger on it, but I’m going to give it another try.” There were many fields where anything he said to Clark Dill would most likely be incomprehensible, but he thought they were speaking the same language now. Perfectionism knew no blood, he guessed. He looked at Clark’s to compare. “Yours is looking better, though,” he added politely. “How did you correct the clicking problem?”

0 Leonidas Always look on the bright side 0 Leonidas 0 5

Serena
July 19, 2015 9:43 PM

Serena
Alumnus
House: Teppenpaw
Written by: Allegra Brockert

Age in Post: 15

Who says that I do? by Serena
"Oh" Serena wondered what such a cheery girl like Liliana would seem so down about if she hadn't even tried the spell yet. As far as she could tell, the Pecari had nothing to really feel down about. She was prefect and Assistant Quidditch Captain and would likely be Head Girl too, so surely it wasn't any of that. (Serena might not care that Duncan got prefect but part of that was because of Oscar and her and her cousin's promise long ago not to get mad at each other about the badge, and she knew that others cared a lot about it like Chaslyn did.) Besides, the other girl was popular and confident so what could she possibly have to be upset about? As far as Serena was concerned, Liliana seemed to have it all.

Not that she wanted the other fifth year to feel bad, she just couldn't think of any reason that she would. It could be some deep personal family problem that Serena didn't know about that was none of her business. She and Liliana weren't the least bit close, having nothing much in common other than being pureblood and female. Serena was shy, on the squeamish side and was rather girly whereas Liliana was outgoing, bold and played Quidditch. The Pecari had honestly always rather intimidated Serena and she often felt inferior-and perhaps a tad jealous at how seemingly easy Liliana had it with others. Though, of course, Oscar's seeming interest in Serena did help her feel better.

She considered Liliana's comment about getting better at Transfig and wondered if she herself had. Her plant was far from perfect and a quick glance over at Duncan suggested he was doing better than she was, as usual . His had all it's leaves and they all looked to be alive . Serena's looked sick, if she managed to make a plant at all, it usually didn't look too healthy. She dared not look at any of her other relatives, even though the twins were most likely doing the easier assignment. Scarlett had to be, she wasn't one to push herself, but Serena still didn't want to see that her younger cousins were even doing better than her on that.

Seeing Liliana's plant didn't make her feel much better. Apparently, the other fifth year really had been improving. Serena tried hard not to frown. It wasn't that she wanted others to do badly, it was just that she was ashamed enough as it was not being as good at Transfig as everyone else in her family without someone else, who'd been historically not very good at this class and already had it easier than Serena in so many ways, doing better than she did on her first try kind of bothered her.

She realized she should probably try the spell again, but she didn't really want to now. It didn't help when Liliana looked back at her. It made the Teppenpaw very self-conscious. She couldn't have felt more inadequate if Sophie suddenly became an animagus. Think about Oscar, think about how good he made you feel, how more than just adequate, you could be a princess someday. thought Serena, trying desperately to make herself feel better.

11 Serena Who says that I do? 272 Serena 0 5

Duncan
July 20, 2015 8:24 PM

Duncan
Alumnus
House: Teppenpaw
Written by: Allegra Brockert

Age in Post: 15
Birthday: February 10

Me or the plant? by Duncan
Duncan gave Araceli a pleasant smile. He'd enjoyed talking to her last year, finding her to be a sweet, polite girl-and given the lack of appropriate girls in either his year or the one below, he probably should be looking at the third years a bit more carefully, even though they still seemed a little young to him at the moment. All he knew was that the twins were out obviously.

Still, Araceli seemed as good a place to start as any. She seemed to rather like him, not necessarily like that but like him somewhat. That was...something he supposed, given how awkward he could be. His parents would be delighted with the friendship, in fact his mother would be thrilled that he made another living friend who happened to come from a good family. It showed, in her eyes, that Duncan was capable of functioning socially. Of course, as far as he was concerned he'd always been able to carry on a conversation, it just that the ones he'd carried on were with ghosts. He considered them no different than others beyond that they were dead and could float around and go through solid things. It was his sister who strongly preferred horses to any people at all.

Anyway, Araceli would still be a good friend to have. Their respective ages kind of made Duncan feel a little like looking out for her. Not that he wanted to stifle the third year in any way or that he believed girls couldn't be tough and take care of themselves-Liliana for example-but he kind of felt more drawn to ones like Araceli. Some desire to feel at least somewhat needed on some level, he guessed, even if it was just to get a book down. Which was something she'd be able to do on her own someday anyway even if she never grew an inch. Still Duncan enjoyed the third year's company very much.

"Well, let's see." The Teppenpaw had been about to test them out when he noticed her reaching out toward his plant. "Did you want to try?"

He blushed. " Well, thank you." Duncan still had no idea why he was chosen but having someone's support made him happy. Even though he was certain Serena would have done just as good a job, it wasn't like Araceli knew her. He chuckled and gave her another grin to let her know he wasn't laughing at her. "It's just too bad you won't be able to vote for me for Head Boy." Yeah he doubted he was getting that . If he had to place a bet on it, he'd probably bet on Theodore Wolseithcrafte or even Leonidas Bennett. How many Head Boys really ever came out of Teppenpaw? The only ones he could think of were his father and in more recent years, Derry Pierce. There were a few more that were Head Girls but Teppenpaw didn't have quite the track record Aladren did.

11 Duncan Me or the plant? 271 Duncan 0 5

Liliana
July 23, 2015 11:08 PM

Liliana
Alumnus
House: Pecari
Written by: Mathilde Reinhardt

Age in Post: 15

You always seem to have a handle on things... by Liliana
It was rare that through Liliana’s stinks, she could tell someone else was feeling down. Being an only child as well as the youngest and the only girl in her brood of cousins had made it so that Liliana could be rather selfish and unaware on the emotional front. When she was upset, she was used to being able to put up a fuss and not have to worry about how others were feeling at the time about similar or completely unrelated problems. Today, however, through the rose-colored lenses of at least getting the spell nearly right on her first try even though so many other things in her life were having issues, Liliana noticed something she perhaps normally wouldn’t have had she found herself in a similarly bad mood without the aid of accomplishing something she previously had been really, really bad at.

Liliana took a look at Serena’s unhappy looking plant and then at the girl who had so succinctly just said “oh,” followed by a brief period of quiet where Liliana had tried the spell. She stopped and paused her family melodrama for a minute and considered something else for a change. Perhaps, she realized, it was possible that more than one person was allowed to be unhappy at once and she tilted her head slightly, still trying to wrap her mind around that idea. Had she ever experienced anything like this before? She wasn’t sure. Certainly Atlas had tried to be unhappy whilst she was unhappy however all those incidents had ended in his giving in and admitting that she was right—which was exactly what Liliana liked to hear.

“How are you coming along?” she asked her classmate. It was sad, Liliana was realizing, that she only knew Serena as her classmate. They were fifth years now and had never really had a proper interaction. As the only witches in their year one would think that they might gravitate towards each other to deal with the unending stupidity that a group of wizards could sometimes create. However, Liliana had so very quickly become friends with Atlas and then Duncan and had her rivalry with Theodore that she had never really stopped to consider befriending Serena as well. It would have made sense, she thought, for them to eventually become friends as Serena and Duncan were cousins and wasn’t that how the some of the sixth years had worked? Made friends and then because of a set of siblings became a larger group of friends? It was as if Liliana was half expecting that to be the same case for the fifth years.

In all reality, Liliana was missing female companionship which was why she had turned to the second-year Ginger Pierce to talk to when they did their clandestine Keeper practices, but now she was realizing, perhaps really realizing for the first time, that there had also been a suitable candidate in her own year, someone who Grandmère would likely be infinitely more pleased with as she was Liliana’s age, of a good background, and didn’t play ce sport terrible (“That Awful Sport,” as it had been come to be known jokingly amongst the cousins). That Serena and herself didn’t have much in common went completely unnoticed as Liliana attempted her first bid at pleasing Grandmère without having to give up Quidditch. Besides, making a new friend would undoubtedly help with pushing aside any horrible things that were happening on the Quidditch and new sibling front.

“Have you found it very difficult being outnumbered by the boys?” Liliana asked conversationally, her accent coming out slightly more pronounced than usual as she tried to force conversation. Though Liliana was generally a very skilled conversationalist, her lack of previous conversation with Serena as well as the lack of knowledge of what sorts of topics the other girl liked to discuss made it a little more difficult for her and also so that she was grasping at straws and as a result sounded undoubtedly more British than usual (which was, really, quite a feat). “Ours is one of the only grades where that is and I simply cannot imagine what it would be like to have more witches around though I do think it would be quite lovely, don’t you?”

She looked hopefully at Serena, masking her feelings about her new brother and her Grandmère so that the other girl didn’t think the unhappy sentiments were directed at her and respond in a similarly cheery manner.

10 Liliana You always seem to have a handle on things... 274 Liliana 0 5

Araceli Arbon
July 26, 2015 5:28 AM

Araceli Arbon
Alumnus
House: Crotalus
Written by: Rhy

Age in Post: 13

Would you object to either? by Araceli Arbon
She stroked the leaf, watching as the majority of the segments folded in, shrinking shyly away from her touch. Only a few stayed in place, the others bunching around them. She suspected the flicking motions he’d made with his wand hadn’t quite been equal.

“That’s very good,” she smiled.

“Yes, it is,” she nodded, when he lamented that it was a shame she wouldn’t be able to vote for him for head boy. “I guess there’s quite a lot of competition in your year too. There’s a lot of boys, and quite a few society people, which must splinter the vote. I suppose it’s good for things like keeping proper company but something of an obstacle when it comes to things like Head Boy. Or finding a date,” she added. “It’s really just your cousin and Lililana Bannister. No wonder you took her to the bonfire - not that I’m saying she’s not a nice person too,” she added, realising how that might have sounded.

“I should try the spell,” she added, taking care to let the agitation stay with her as she turned to the plastic stick. “Mimosa Pudica,” she cast, taking inspiration from Duncan and giving her wand slightly uneven flicks, though trying to do so without making it too obvious.

“Oh dear,” she sighed, “Looks like it’s a bit too sensitive,” she nodded to the plant in front of her, which was twitching its leaves erratically without even being touched. “I guess I got nervous…”

OOC - Duncan's author let me know how his plant would have reacted.

13 Araceli Arbon Would you object to either? 290 Araceli Arbon 0 5

Duncan
July 31, 2015 3:16 PM

Duncan
Alumnus
House: Teppenpaw
Written by: Allegra Brockert

Age in Post: 15
Birthday: February 10

Is there a safe way to answer that? by Duncan
"Why, thank you." Duncan's cheeks burned slightly. Transfiguration had always been his best class so he was rather used to doing well but that didn't mean that a compliment in it was meaningless. Besides, what guy wouldn't like one from a pretty girl in anything? And even though she was young, he had to admit, Araceli was quite attractive. He just hoped that nobody could hear what he was thinking and found him creepy for it. Personally, Duncan didn't think two years was too bad-especially given lack of available females in his own year or the one below-men often married women much younger than themselves.

"Yeah, I honestly don't see myself getting it." Duncan replied. "I mean, guys like me usually don't. It's usually the smartest and most ambitious of people and Teppenpaw doesn't get Head Students very often anyway. I think the two Aladrens in my class have been on track for it since before they even entered Sonora." That was the impression he'd gotten of Theodore and Leonidas. And if it wasn't an Aladren, it was often a Crotalus. Duncan had to admit he really didn't want to see this happen, Isaac Douglas was not a nice person. Yes, he'd gotten prefect, he was the only one, and even remembering back when there were others, Duncan found the other boy to be least of all evils, but that still didn't mean he wanted to see Isaac get it if there were better options-and honestly he wanted to believe he was, despite that he was a darkhorse at best.

"It's possible though that the two of them are similar enough to people, that that will splinter votes like you said. I mean, we're all society, but Theodore and Leonidas are much more similar to each other than they are to me." He still didn't feel he had a great deal in common with either Aladren. Perhaps that would work in his favor, but he still wouldn't want to get his hopes up. Or those of his father either.

"I suppose that's true too and there are only two girls in the fourth year class as well-one of whom is also my cousin." Duncan chuckled slightly. "And I didn't exactly take her." He added for clarification. "It was just hanging out with a friend and her friend." He'd had a good time, yes, but he was pretty sure that if anyone had been on a date, it was Liliana and Atlas and he was just along for the ride. Atlas was much closer to Liliana than Duncan was.

"It's all right." Duncan reassured Araceli. "Barely anyone gets everything right the first time. I'm sure there are plenty of people who've done worse than you. I don't think you've even done too badly, maybe it was just your wand movement. Do you want me to help you?" His tone was helpful, and not the least bit condescending. It would make him happy to help Araceli. Feel like he was doing something good for someone.

11 Duncan Is there a safe way to answer that? 271 Duncan 0 5

Professor Skies

Intermediate transfiguration - don't touch by Professor Skies

Shinohara Uzume

Don't tell me what to do by Shinohara Uzume

Olivier Westley

Why would I want to? [tag: Lena] by Olivier Westley

Liliana Bannister, Pecari

Trying to remain optimistic. by Liliana Bannister, Pecari

Serena Brockert, Teppenpaw

I know the feeling, by Serena Brockert, Teppenpaw

Lena Westley, Aladren

More Pressing Topics at Mind by Lena Westley, Aladren

Lena Westley

Re: More Pressing Topics at Mind by Lena Westley

Clark Dill, Aladren

Transfiguring a robot plant by Clark Dill, Aladren

Isaac Douglas, Crotalus

I will if I want to. I've got a <i>badge</i>. by Isaac Douglas, Crotalus

Makenzie Newell [Crotalus]

..... *touches* by Makenzie Newell [Crotalus]

Leonidas Bennett, Aladren

At least you'll never have to water it by Leonidas Bennett, Aladren

Liliana

How do you do it? by Liliana

Duncan Brockert, Teppenpaw

I'll try not to. by Duncan Brockert, Teppenpaw

Tobi Reinhardt, Teppenpaw

.... *actually speaks* by Tobi Reinhardt, Teppenpaw

Clark

There is that by Clark

Makenzie

*prefers asterisks* by Makenzie

Tobi

*thinks asterisks are nice too* by Tobi

Araceli Arbon, Crotalus

*pokes* by Araceli Arbon, Crotalus

Diana Carey, Pecari

Looking is allowed, though by Diana Carey, Pecari

Leonidas

Always look on the bright side by Leonidas

Serena

Who says that I do? by Serena

Duncan

Me or the plant? by Duncan

Liliana

You always <i>seem</i> to have a handle on things... by Liliana

Araceli Arbon

Would you object to either? by Araceli Arbon

Duncan

Is there a safe way to answer that? by Duncan

..... touches by Makenzie Newell [Crotalus]

.... actually speaks by Tobi Reinhardt, Teppenpaw

prefers asterisks by Makenzie

thinks asterisks are nice too by Tobi

pokes by Araceli Arbon, Crotalus