MC4A; Hogwarts
Stacked With: Hogwarts; Snicket Fence; FPC
Individual Challenges: In a Flash; Click Bait It; Yellow Ribbon; Yellow Ribbon Redux
Representations: Helga Hufflepuff; Salazar Slytherin; Deception
Bonus Challenges: Peddling Pots; Second Verse (Pear-Shaped); Chorus (Not a Lamp; Persistence Still)
Prompts: Helga Hufflepuff (auction); Reckless (365 words); Deception (Insane Prompts); Write about someone as a mage, warrior, or rogue (Games Development; Task 3)
Word count: 899
Helga watched the wizard from her hiding place on the small rock shelf above his head. The man was circling the trees below and inspecting each pile of roots and turned up earth he came across. From that behaviour, Helga knew that he was there for the same reason she was. She glanced to the place she had covered only moments before the wizard had arrived; it wouldn't stay hidden for long with the way he was methodically checking all possible places.
A plan arrived in her brain, fully formed and ready for action. With a smirk, she stood up and called out to the wizard.
"Hey! This is my patch, go find your own mushrooms."
The wizard startled and even though he had been caught completely off guard, his staff was unerringly pointed towards her. She cocked an eyebrow with her hands on her hips, not daring to show that she was actually wary of the magic the mage could wield.
"I was not aware that this part of the forest belonged to any one person," the wizard said.
With quick movements and sure hands, Helga climbed down from her perch and stood in front of the man. He blinked when she suddenly appeared in front of him—in his eyes, she had been up above and then had vanished from there only to reappear before him. She poked him in the chest.
"Well it does, so shoo."
A gleam appeared in the wizard's eyes and Helga wanted to take a few steps back; she refrained and merely kept up her glare. The wizard lowered his staff from the threatening position it had been in and stood it on the ground next to him, smiling slightly. Helga watched the staff's movements from the corner of her eye but never moved her focus from the mage.
"Perhaps we can come to an agreement," the wizard stated.
Helga crossed her arms across her chest. "What sort of agreement?"
"I'll leave here and you can have your mushrooms all to yourself." So far, Helga liked this agreement. The mage's next words both filled her with elation and dread. "However, you will come to my school tomorrow and teach. We have been searching for an expert in quickening magic."
Her plan had worked! Sort of. The mage thought that she had her own magic, even though all she had was a lifetime of practice in moving swiftly and silently. "And what makes you think I am the expert in quickening magic you seek?" she asked.
He looks incredulous for a moment before smoothing the expression away. "You clearly have skill in quickening your movements and I am aware that performing the spells upon oneself is the most difficult of all quickening magic."
She hummed. "I'll think about it."
"It's a one time offer. Turn me down now, and I will take all of the mushrooms from this patch before making it unable to grow more."
Helga repressed a gulp. This had gone beyond what she had thought it would. This mage wanted her—a woman who lived only by her wits and possessed no magic of her own—to teach magic at his magic school and was ready to threaten her mushrooms to get her to do just that. Yes, she could make it seem as though she had magic with her various skills, but that didn't mean she could teach it!
The mage would probably return to this area and remove all traces of mushrooms once he realised Helga had no magic in retaliation for the deception. Deception was what she did. Did he want her to teach his students how to control their bodies for maximum movement, how to flex their fingers just so in order to pick a pocket, how to clamber up a sheer surface using only the small cracks available?
She wouldn't survive long in a magic school.
She glared, "Like I said, I'll think about it."
The man considered her and then nodded. "Very well. If you decide to teach, go to Hogwarts School of Magic and ask for Salazar Slytherin. I'll see you there."
He turned on his heels and started walking away. Helga watched him for a few seconds before bending down and uncovering the prize that had been sitting hidden at their feet. She picked one of the mushrooms up and threw it at the mage's head. It flew true and struck him right in the middle of his head.
His hand flew up to the spot and he turned to face her, staff raising instinctively in reaction to the threat. She grinned and pointed to the fungus at his feet. When he looked at it in confusion, she explained.
"That's for you."
Making a noise of understanding, he bent down and picked it up, examining it. "I thank you."
He turned away again and once more started walking. He twitched a few times when he heard Helga moving about and she held in a laugh when she saw his hand keep trying to jerk up and protect his head from more flying fungi. When he had been gone for several minutes, Helga let out a great sigh of relief and collapsed against the nearest tree.
Never again would she pretend to have magic to scare off another mage. It was far too reckless, and the odds would never be in her favour.