The girls sat in silence as Professor Snape drawled about the glory of potions before he gave them their first assignment. It looked simple enough but the girls had no intentions of making it simple. Reaching into their bags, they pulled out lab coats, safety goggles, and heavy gloves (all enchanted to be fireproof).
"Just what," their teacher slunk over to the now oddly dressed girls, "do you think you you are doing?"
Mia blinked innocently up at their teacher,
"Lab safety?"
The muggleborns snickered, recognizing the phrase and just how far those girls were willing to go to antagonize one teacher. The potion was done and the two girls worked amicably as Snape scowled at their attire. Though their point was arguable…
"I'll let it slide, this time."
Surprisingly to the others, the girls weren't scared at all. Rather, they just blinked.
"Did we do something we weren't supposed to?" Mia asked and Snape sighed in clear irritation.
The girls paid him no mind as they headed to Charms. Allie and Mia sat at desks and took a look at the large white quills almost everyone else was holding.
"That's a little archaic," Allie commented and Mia nodded.
"I don't think people used quills since the nineteen hundreds."
All eyes were on the quietly conversing girls.
"Are feathers easier to enchant or something?" Mia asked and Allie shrugged.
"Maybe wizards don't use plastic?" Mia shook her head.
"Wood can be enchanted, they fly on brooms, after all."
"I think it's just that wizards have no common sense," Allie sighed.
"It's like they've never even heard of the word 'safety'," Mia sniggered.
"Painful deaths?"
"Duh," Mia hummed.
"And I'm like 'the heck kinda school is this'?" The two laughed.
"I know! And where are the lightbulbs?" Mia complained, gesturing to a sconce on the wall.
"Like… does the school not pay bills? There's running water." Allie questioned derisively.
"And what kinda psycho uses parchment, as in dead animal, when they have books made of paper?" Mia jabbed a thumb at a writing student, who shot her a glare. Allie slumped in her seat and the two pulled out notebooks and mechanical pencils, though Allie also took out her metallic rainbow pens.
"I heard wizards kept slaves."
"Are they trying to give Muggles a reason to hate them? Seriously, this society is asking to collapse." The two began to copy the board.
"No cultural development except a odd bit here or there from muggles," Allie continued as they worked diligently. The pureblood elitists in the room scowled. Mia nodded.
"How many people travel by steam train these days?"
"I'm sorry, what's a steam train?" Allie blinked as several students snickered.
"Never mind..." Mia groaned and Allie sighed.
"What is wrong with this school?"
"What's not wrong?" Mia shot back.
"Excellent point! And we will be discussing the importance of the way a wand is waved," their teacher interrupted. The amused look on his face took all the animosity out of his interruption.
Allie and Mia blinked innocently, pasting an interested look on their faces. At least in Allie's case, Mia's mind was on a certain Asian country under dictatorship and how they'd react to find him irreversibly stuck to a flagpole.
(OvO)
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"You know," Allie said thoughtfully, "I wonder if there's some weird magic way of learning languages."
"You can check the library," Mia shrugged, tossing a ball up in the air and catching it.
"And what will you be doing?" Allie asked.
"Flossing. Writing with a quill. Trying to find the ugly thing I saw in the hallway last night," Mia said casually.
"Why don't you go see if anyone wants to play soccer?"
"I'll just join you," Mia huffed, getting up.
Allie strode across the halls to the library, Mia in tow, where Hermione Granger had taken residence.
"Where can I find the language books?" she asked Madam Pince sweetly.
The librarian narrowed her eyes. "Sixth bookcase," she said, pointing.
Mia quickly abandoned Allie in favor of a leather book with a strange gem on it.
After glaring at Mia, Allie walked towards the language books.
"French Dictionary; Hola!;
Mia looked up at her, and blinked slowly.
"Anneyongsayo, Carter Mia ibnida," she said flatly.
"Buenos Dias, Mia. Cómo está hoy?" Allie replied.
"Daijobu, arigato," Mia said, switching languages again.
The two laughed as Allie delved into Spanish. But Mia was leafing through the book. It was all over the place. Potions, spells, enchantments. Suddenly, as though they were always there, threads floated through the air. They changed colors and shapes, temperatures and textures. Some were wrapped around walls, or even on objects. They wove together and drifted apart. Yet they were definitely connected. How Mia knew, she wasn't sure. She reached out towards a bright green string that had tangled a thin and faded black string to soft, bright, red one. As soon as her fingers made contact with the green string, the strings disappeared with a flash of pain.
The world was back to normal, the strings were gone.
Her eyes traced over the words "Animagus Spell" before it clicked. This book was special, and didn't belong in this library. She'd be holding onto it for a little while.
"Mia, why'd you steal that book?" Allie asked in a hushed voice. Mia wordlessly grabbed her hand and brought her to the empty common room. She showed the other girl the spell.
"Any interest in being an animagus?"
"Yes." Allie's eyes were sparkling and Mia couldn't help but smile. She perused the page with eager eyes.
"Come with me. We have some work to do."
"What about our potions essay?" Allie asked, trailing behind her. Mia shrugged, uncaring.
"We have three days. You'll come up with something."
"Alright. Let's do this." Allie's hands were shaking but she moved quickly, excitedly.
Mia managed to obtain the things she needed for the spell in a few minutes. Each step was easy to follow and soon enough, Allie had created a potion out of seemingly random ingredients. And then the world flickered.
Mia stared at the strings. She figured that only she could see them, not that she'd asked. But the Ravenclaw couldn't help but want to see them. To study them. The book had nothing about the strings as of yet, but every time she read it, even cast some of the spells she found in it for privacy, the strings appeared. They had to be magical, no doubt. She was with Allie, who was watching the potion. Nobody would see her. She carefully raised a hand to touch the string in front of her. A long, golden, rod. It was smooth and cool. It didn't move as she pushed or pulled it. To test something, she grasped a blue silky string, and it moved with her tug. The silky string thrummed with energy. Why were they there? She let out a gasp as the string was pulled from her by some invisible tug. She pulled on the string and gasped at the sudden feeling of conviction and a sudden feeling of warmth.
"A fire charm…"
A sudden wicked thought crossed her mind. Make it backfire. She grabbed the strand and held it firm. A wash of embarrassment and the string went cold. How could magic use these strings? With a small tug, she let a burst of fire come to life. Was this…? She pulled out her wand and blinked. It had a hook with a thin golden connected to her wrist. And the it made sense. The strings were tunnels, with magic. And anyone who could use a channel, could tap into it. And the different strings were the enchantments in the air. That had to be it. That or she was going insane. Her eyes trailed back to the golden string,
"What are you?"
The dirty blonde eagerly drank the potion, before freezing in place.
A horrible scream ripped from the girl's throat, catching Mia's attention.
"Just take a deep breath or something!" Mia called anxiously, strings flickering out of view. Allie let out another scream and her voice was labored.
"Take a deep breath?! It feels like my insides are being ripped out!"
"If you can't do the transformation, don't force yourself!" Mia ran over to her friend, to tell her to stop it before she killed herself-
Allie gave a howl of pain when something fell into place. All of a sudden, a brilliant blue bird stood before her. It looked almost like a phoenix… if it was blue. Her feathers were silky smooth to the touch as she stared into inky eyes. The creature before her was ethereal.
"You did it," she said softly. Slowly, staggeringly, the bird morphed into her best friend.
"Yeah," her voice was raspy. "I did."