Drachmas and Galleons
Chapter 7
"Bye Perce, try not to get into too much trouble ok? I'd hate to be left out," Natalia hugged her brother tightly.
"I'll try Nat, the same goes for you alright?" Percy chuckled and returned the hug.
"Maybe, I was going to pay a visit to the twins late but I suppose I can reschedule."
Percy just laughed and the siblings hugged once more before bidding farewell. Percy was leaving for the school year to attend Meriwether College Prep. Natalia on the other hand was staying at the camp. The week prior she had received a letter from her good friend and naiad, Azure, asking when she would be returning to her undersea home but Natalia wanted to continue her training. Her father had decided that Natalia would be attending her uncle's school in Scotland, Hogwarts, in two years. Natalia would be fourteen and would transfer in as a fourth year.
Natalia watched as the brother waved to her hanging out the passenger side window and waved back, smiling at his goofy grin. He retracted his head back into the car and Natalia headed back down the hill. A mischievous smirk surfaced on her face as she walked purposefully to cabin eleven. She dramatically slammed open the door and locked eyes with Travis and Connor Stoll who were both wearing smirks identical to hers. To Hades with rescheduling, this could not wait.
"It's finished finally, after months of keeping up the stupid wards, thank the gods. So are you sure you wanna do this? I'm not positive that it'll work right for demi-gods," Natalia fretted, her smirk dropping.
"After all we went through to get the ingredients, not to mention mountains of research," Travis began.
"And the pain of keeping people away," Connor continued.
"Do you really think we'd just quit?" The two finished simultaneously.
Natalia's smirk fell back in place and she turned back around, heading outside towards the forest. Travis and Connor smirked as well and followed when she turned back over her shoulder and said those four words that would change future of their pranking careers.
"Let's rock and roll."
"So what's this purple one on the right?" Travis asked, pointed to one steaming cauldron.
"That, my friends, is the first potion we must take. It's called the Animagus dream potion and, well it gives us a dream about our Animagus form," Natalia answered, reading out of a potions textbook she had received from her father.
"Then what?" Connor asked, eyebrows furrowing.
"Then, we take this one here on my left and actually become Animagi," Natalia replied, eyes drifting back to the book. "We should probably do this one at a time since if you don't have complete concentration then you can get stuck in a weird half state. That might be another problem. You guys are demi-gods so you aren't exactly regular people but I'm not sure if god blood counts as magical blood. If one of us gets stuck in a half-human, half-animal state then we'd have to go to Chiron, thus revealing that we even did this in the first place which is bad."
"I know that we aren't going to anyway, but why would that be bad?" Travis asked.
"Well it says here that if you become an Animagus then you must go to your country's Ministry and register. They do all these weird tests on you or something I guess, I'm not really sure but I don't want to have to go to any officials."
"True point, well let's take this dream potion tonight after dinner and then tomorrow night we sneak back out here and take the other one. We'll go one night at a time okay?" Connor suggested.
"Sounds like a plan," Travis and Natalia agreed.
With that Natalia replaced the repelling wards around the cauldrons and the three hurried back into camp before anyone came looking for the three pranksters.
Natalia found it hard to focus on lessons for the rest of the day, knowing what was coming. Before the week was done she would become and Animagus. On the way to dinner she contemplated what animal she would become. There were so many options, but she knew that she couldn't choose. The animal she would become would depend on her traits and personality. She sat down alone at table three and shared a secretive grin with the twins. Tonight she would find out what animal she would become and she couldn't wait.
"Bottoms up!" The trio knocked together their glasses then downed the slightly lumpy purple substance.
Travis immediately began gagging and Connor's nose wrinkled up as he leaned up against a nearby tree. Natalia's hands covered her mouth as she fought back the bile that rose in her throat. The potion's flavor was absolutely vile and the smell wasn't much better.
"Damn, I hope the second potion isn't as bad as this one! That was just gods awful!" Connor managed to cough out, sending a weak glare Natalia's way.
"I agree, it doesn't say anything about the flavor in the book," Natalia replied, rubbing her temples.
Travis nodded, stretching out his arms. "So now I guess we just go to bed and dream?"
"That's what it says. I guess tomorrow we'll just rendezvous back here and tell each other our dreams. Then we'll take the next potion," Natalia explained.
"Sounds good to us!" the boys replied simultaneously.
Natalia just rolled her eyes and followed the twins as they made their way out of the clearing. Natalia quickly reapplied the wards and the three headed back into camp. They didn't have to worry too much about being caught seeing as most of the campers were gone for the school year. Natalia and the twins parted ways and she headed to her cabin. She was suddenly overcome with extreme drowsiness and fell into bed, her eyelids fluttering shut as she began to dream.
The Dream
Sea green eyes flicked open, observing the area. Rolling hills, the occasional trees and bushes, and a small pond appeared in her line of sight. Natalia carefully stretched out her back and neck, realizing from her perspective that she was very short. Stretching out her arm she noted that her arm, now another leg was covered in black fur and her hand was now a paw. She continued stretching; now standing on all four of her new legs. Her tail whipped around behind her as she struggled to retain balance on her unstable paws.
"What am I?" Natalia wondered aloud, recoiling slightly when a series of barks and whines reached her ears.
Natalia began to inspect herself, trying to figure out what she was. Her entire body was covered in black fur and small claws poked out from her small paws. She ran her tongue over her teeth, finding sharp canines replacing her flat human teeth. She ran a paw over her head, scratching a large triangular ear. Perhaps she was some sort of cat?
Natalia began walking unsteadily towards the pond, hoping to see her reflection. As she neared the small body of water she was greeted by familiar sea green eyes. The rest of the image was foreign however. Natalia's eyes widened as she realized what she was. She was a fox!
End Dream
Natalia headed to breakfast the next morning, mulling over her dream. She was going to become a fox. After she had come to the realization in her dream, she ran around for a bit, getting used to the small sized and being on four legs. She found that when in her fox state she could hear, see, and smell much better than when she was human, though it was to be expected. As she gave her offering and headed back to her table she wondered what the twins dreamed of. She didn't see them but she was up unusually early and she didn't expect them around for another hour or so.
She absentmindedly pushed the food around her plate, picking at bits and pieces of it. Later, when the twins came down, looking slightly disheveled but with an excited gleam in their eyes, Natalia left her plate of mostly uneaten food and sat next to Connor.
"What was your dream?" Natalia asked in an anxious whisper, glancing around to make sure there were no eavesdroppers.
"I'm gonna be a coyote!" Connor answered gleefully.
"Cool! What about you Travis?" Natalia asked, noticing his glum look.
Connor snickered behind his hand, glancing at his twin. "Oh don't mind him, he's just upset because I'm a super cool manly animal and he's gonna be a-"
"A bird, I'm going to turn into a freaking bird!" Travis finished, glaring at the ground.
"Uh, what kind of bird would that be? You know," Natalia suggested, "eagles are manly, so are falcons. I don't see the problem."
"Oh if only I was a falcon. I'm gonna be a damn magpie!" Travis swore, holding his head in his hands.
"Actually," Connor butt in, still laughing, "I think it's quite fitting. Magpies are flashy and Travis will do anything to get Katie to notice him."
"Shut up, no one asked you," Travis grumbled.
Connor continued to chuckle but didn't continue his taunting. Natalia was grinning as well and grabbed both the boys by their arms.
"All right boys, Travis stop moping, let's do this thing called being Animagi!" Natalia cheered, her voice growing softer when she noticed a few people staring.
"Wait," Connor interjected, pulling Natalia to a halt as they neared the woods. "I thought we weren't going to do it until dinner."
"We were but now I just can't wait," Natalia confessed, "We'll still do it one at a time though, just in case there are any malfunctions."
The twins nodded, one more enthusiastic than the other, and let Natalia pull them towards their clearing.
The three stared down at the bubbling green potion then the twins looked at Natalia. Natalia's eyes widened realizing that they wanted her to try first.
"Ok, here going nothing!" Natalia downed her glass, her face scrunching up in disgust.
Natalia's sea green eyes grew brighter and brighter until the twins had to avert their eyes to avoid blinding themselves. The glowing grew dimmer as Natalia scrunched up her eyes in concentration and fell to her knees with her head in her hands.
The twins watched with bated breath as her skin started to ripple. Small bumps formed on her skull and her nose turned up and stretched out. Clenched fists shrank into tiny paws and nails grew sharper and pointed. Leg bones reshaped themselves and feet shrank in on themselves as well. Shoes and clothes fell away as her body grew smaller and smaller. Fur replaced skin and two tiny pointed ear finally poked through the top of her head. Teeth grew smaller but much sharper and a bushy tail bushed out from her tail bone.
The twins had realized when Natalia's transformation had begun that they had forgotten to ask her what animal she would be come but now they didn't have too. Their attention was riveted on a small black fox lying before them. Eyelids slowly opened dazedly to reveal familiar sea green eyes staring back at them. Natalia was now a successful Animagus.
Okay super sorry for the long wait, had a bout of writers block in the middle and was also super-duper busy. Also, this chapter is very short but the next one will hopefully be longer. I just wanted to get something out before my readers hunted me down. On the bright side my birthday was 2 days ago so yay!
Review because reviews are the best late birthday presents you could give me!
