"That was good!" Lucy exclaimed while walking to Transfiguration. They had just had lunch, and were heading to the next class. They had left early, well, Harry, Hermione, and Lucy had left early, they had to drag Ron with them, because one was not late to McGonnagall's class, lest the wrath of the Gryffindor Head of House fall upon him/her.
"Here it is," Ron called from the front of the group. "Classroom 1B, right on the other side of the court yard and above DADA." When he saw Lucy's face, which basically said 'how on Middle-earth am I supposed to remember everything' he continued reassuringly, "don't worry, you'll get it within the first week. Harry and I did."
The foursome entered the classroom and found their desks. Hermione and Lucy together, and Ron and Harry, both of whom looked a little lost not to be sitting by Hermione. While they were waiting, Lucy turned to Hermione.
"Could you show me how to do that spell that shows the time please? I saw one of the boys in Ancient Runes do it."
"Alright. You flick your wand in an upward movement, like so," she flicked her wand. "While you say tempus. You try. It is extremely easy."
"Tempus!" the blue ribbons formed the time 12:53.
"Huh, that's odd." Hermione remarked. "Mine's -" but what ever Hermione's was remained unknown for the time, as they were interrupted by the flood of students coming into the room, followed shortly by the Professor.
"Good Morning. Today we will continue with the Second Year review, turning rabbits into slippers. I don't want to see any ears on your slippers," here she glared at Pavarti, "Or tails." Now she was looking at Harry, who looked sheepish. "You may begin."
"Hermione, I wasn't taught this!" Lucy hissed over the commotion of hopping slippers, half transfigured rabbits, and general noise.
"Here, you twirl your wand over your rabbit, and say lepus soleas. You have to focus in your mind what you want the slippers to look like, and you have to feel the magic flowing through you, and push it out to get the best transfiguration." Hermione turned back to her rabbit, and with a twirl of her wand and a whispered incantation, she had a perfect pair of slippers on her desk.
Lucy sighed, and turned to her white animal. She had never felt the magic before, she had just been thrown into a completely different world without so much as a by-your-leave, and was capable of things that she had only dreamed of, of course she hadn't taken the time to feel the magic that was newly discovered in her. Remembering from the books what McGonnagall had said about quick, precise wand movements, she twirled her wand in a quick circle, than said the incantation. It worked, sort of. She now had slipper-shaped bunnies on her desk, hopping around. Still, she couldn't help but feel the wonderment that her magic worked, and that it wasn't just a thing of storybooks, even if she was probably insane in the hospital.
Trying the wand movement again only removed the hind legs, which left a rather comical rabbit on the desk, slipper-shaped and missing it's hind legs. She was about to try the spell again, when a loud explosion from the back of the room interrupted her, and everyone else. Turning around with the rest of the class, she saw Seamus Finnagin with no rabbit and a lot of scorch marks.
Hermione sighed, rolled her eyes, and turned back to trying to shrink her slippers so that they would fit her. Because she wasn't supposed to know things like Seamus's proclivity for pyrotechnics, and becakuse she didn't want a repeat the Boggart mess-up, Lucy felt constrained to ask-
"Does this happen often?"
"Unfortunately, yes," Hermione replied "Our first practical charms lesson he blew up his feather and the feathers of those beside him."
Lucy winced. "Bet F- your charms teacher wasn't too pleased."
Hermione opened her mouth to answer, but was cut off by McGonnagall finding her voice and shouting "Detention! And ten points from Gryffindor!" after a minute, when the stern professor was calmer, she continued. "Now that most of you have successfully, or almost successfully transferred your rabbits, I would like you to put your wands in your lap." When everyone had done so, some more reluctantly than others (Lucy was one of these), she called "Accio!" All the slipper/rabbits zoomed over to her desk and into a cage. McGonnagall pursed her lips as she looked at the rabbits. The only one that looked like a pair of slippers were Hermione's. "I can see that you all are very rusty. Ten points to Gryffindor for Miss Granger's perfect slippers, she is exempt from the essay. For the rest of you, one foot on the proper way to transfigure a rabbit into a slipper. I expect to see it on my desk on Thursday.
Class dismissed."
After the usual scuffle of putting papers in bags and wands in pockets, the four all headed out the door, through the court yard, over two bridges, and down the staircase to the potions class room, the boys complaining about the homework the whole way.
Lucy started to get a head ace as soon as she entered the Potions dungeon. The left over fumes, combined with the dark, were too much on her already over burdened brain.
They had only just taken their places when Snape entered.
"Settle down, settle down." His voice was barely above a whisper, but everyone could hear him as if he had shouted. "Today you will be making the first half of the swelling solution from memory. I hope you dunderheads wont blunder it. The ingredients are in the cabinet. Begin." With that, he sat down at his desk and looked out over the class.
Yes! Lucy knew this one, thank goodness. Susan had made her learn it only yesterday on Pottermore.
"I'll get the ingredients." Her attention was drawn away by her desk mate, Pavarti.
"Alright, I'll attempt to set up the cauldron," she replied. While Pavarti was in line at the ingredients cabinet, she took out the cauldron, the measuring scoop, the mortar and pestle, and the spoon. Pavarti slid into the seat beside her.
"Do you know what's first?" Pavarti whispered to her.
"Two scoops of the dried nettles, and three, or is it four? puffer-fish eyes into the mortar." Lucy whispered back.
"I'm pretty sure it four." Pavarti added the nettles, and Lucy tossed in the eyes while making a face. Since the mortar and pestle was on her side, Pavarti started grinding the ingredients to a fine powder.
"To measures into the cauldron." Lucy said in a low voice, handing her the scoop. When the powder was in the cauldron, Lucy continued. "I don't know how these flames work, can you bring it up to heat? I can count the seconds.
About a minute later, Pavarti signaled that it was to temperature.
"One hippogriffs, two hippogriffs, three hippogriffs, four hippogriffs," fourteen seconds later... "Nineteen hippogriffs, twenty hippogriffs. Take it off the heat." Lucy pulled the cauldron off the flame, while Pavarti turned said flame off. She looked at Lucy.
"You wave."
Lucy waved her wand over the solution, feeling rather foolish. 'Guess I know what Snape was talking about when he said 'foolish wand waving,'' she thought. Her attention was pulled away by the color of the potion. "Um, Pavarti, I don't think that its supposed to be red, I seem to remember it being gold."
Pavarti wordlessly nodded her agreement, then nudged Lucy to be quiet, nodding her head at Snape, who was inspecting Ron and Harry's cauldron. It was well she did, as Snape came to them with in seconds to inspect their potion.
"Red," he sneered. "Red. It should be gold you dimwits. Twenty points from Gryffindor and two feet on the proper way to make the Swelling Solution, with emphasis on preparing the ingredients." he swept on.
"I bet it was three puffer-fish eyes," Lucy whispered to Pavarti.
So here you are, the quickest update I have done in my life. I feel quite proud of myself.
The next chapter is the last chapter that describes school subjects, the story will move quicker very soon.
Here's a challenge for you, look up transfiguration on Harry Potter Wikia, and try and rap you mind around it. It is hard. So is Ancient Runes, for that matter.
As with the previous chapters, the tenth reviewer will be put into my story. Please review. Pretty please with a cherry on top. *puppy dog eyes*
~Ginny
