Chittering lodestones on Cat's windowsill woke him up. The sun hadn't risen, although the sky was paling. He was still in his robes, fist curled around the flint under his pillow.
As had become his habit at waking ever since his first letter from Hecuba Hall, Cat re-arranged himself on the bed so he lay on his back and took a deep breath. He let it fill his belly, slowly slowly, and listened to the pause before he released the air from his lungs. He repeated this for a while, watching clouds scud across the lightening sky framed by the skylight above his head.
His body became very loud, his stomach gurgling and purring, his heart knocking inside his chest, his hair follicles moving, his joints settling.
He rolled up to a sitting position and rubbed his face. He felt the grape buds of his nipples brush against the inside of his shirt and closed his eyes again, not sure if he felt sick or hungry or still too full from yesterday's feast.
I'm terrified, Cat realised. He reached for the flint under his pillow and turned it over in his hands.
What do you do? He asked it. What have I been doing?
When he eventually found his way to the dining hall, the sun had risen. The long tables were dotted with shining brackets full of steaming toast, piles of waffles and pancakes, trays of bacon rashers and sausages and ramekins of glistening butter and jams. It was early still – birdsong filtered through the vaulted open doorway at the end of the hall and the odd older student sat at the benches surrounded by parchment and smoking mugs.
Cat sat at what he was pretty sure was the Ravenclaw table and a plate of fried eggs and an enormous mug of coffee appeared before him. He cradled the mug in his hands and felt moved to prayer.
He fished a crumpled notebook out of pocket and searched all his pockets for a pen.
2nd September, 2019, he began.
I woke up in this new world. I half expected to find myself in my bed at home. Everything feels awake. This wooden table, my room, the hallways. Everything was whispering to me on my walk down. It's louder if I'm touching something. I'm almost scared to brush the walls here.
He stirred cream into his coffee, watching it curl, pale and thick, into the dark liquid.
Almost scared… Honestly, I'm properly afraid. I don't understand how this magic business works. Nothing I've read has really made sense of it. I know it's real – I'm certain of that by now. I have proof. It's like HH said – it doesn't really surprise me that the world is stranger than I was taught to expect. But as for why I can feel it (and change it? That remains to be seen) and why my parents can't – I have no idea. What is it that I can do (and have been doing? Suppressing puberty?) and why is it different from what others can do? I'm not getting the sense that anyone finds this easy to explain, otherwise I suspect it would've been all laid out nice and simple in the first magical theory book I found at F&B.
Cat ate his eggs and drank some coffee.
I'm so afraid of cocking this all up. That someone will find I've been doing whatever the nurse said I've been doing and punish me for it (it can't be normal, can it?). That I won't be able to deal with all this Energy, all this whispering power, that I won't be able to do anything with it.
"Cat Wither?" said a voice to his left. Cat started, his elbow jolting his mug off the table. He watched it tip, frozen by its graceful parabola towards the stone floor.
The mug hung in mid-air and then reversed its course, quietly clunking back down on the wooden table-top. Cat looked up and saw the Cher-looking magician of the pithy pre- and post-banquet speeches.
"Professor Hall?" he guessed.
She hiked up the skirts of her robes, revealing dark emerald corduroy trousers, and clambered over the bench to sit next to him.
"Indeed," she said, proffering a hand. "It's a pleasure to meet you in the, ah, corporeal realm finally. I enjoyed our correspondence enormously."
"Same here," said Cat, grinning despite himself. "Thanks for sparing me the time."
Professor Hall cradled her chin in her hands, scanning Cat's face intently. The gesture caused her sleeves to fall around her elbows, revealing her twining tattoos again. Cat saw dragons and manticores and griffins chasing each other's tails around her forearms.
"How did you sleep?"
"Like a log, honestly. I'm right at the top of Ravenclaw tower. It's perfect."
She smiled. "And you saw Madame Sorrell?"
Cat started again. "Y-yes."
"She's rather perfect, too. We're very lucky to have her. I had to do some very literal head-hunting with that one – found her in a middle of a month-long fast out in the Mongolian desert after six weeks of tracking her across the Urals...," she trailed off, looking wistful. "I sensed her talisman on you – it's why I asked."
Cat brought the flint out of his pocket. "This, you mean?"
"Mmm," she pursed her lips and squinted slightly. "Barely thirteen hours with it and it's more yours than hers. Such a lovely stone."
"I-," Cat paused. He wished he knew the right question. "I really have no clue what's going on, Professor. I don't understand any of this."
"Wise beyond your years, young Cat. Give it time – it only gets worse."
Cat tried a dry chuckle that came out more like a croak.
"You'll get a cursory orientation today, which should help you figure out where to start exploring. Follow your instincts – they'll lead you right."
Professor Hall looked up sharply, setting her acres of hair a-swinging. Her forehead knit.
"Ah… What an unexpected development."
Cat followed her gaze to a small figure framed in the arch of the doorway.
"It's Malcolm Nessier, of course. Cat -," she turned to him, a warm smile blooming across her face, "I must be off. I have no doubt I'll see you again soon."
Cat had half expected Nessier to make a bee-line for him from the dining hall entrance, but Professor Hall had swept him up and away almost immediately. If Cat wasn't mistaken, Nessier had cast a laconic glance over his shoulder towards Cat as he followed her up the stairway into the castle.
Why is he here? Why is he here? Cat scrawled in his notebook, gulping down a second cup of coffee that had appeared before him.
The hall slowly filled with bleary eyed students. After everyone had scarfed enough breakfast, Grace the Prefect gathered the first-years and led them into the castle grounds. There, she'd distributed class schedules.
"There's the forest, the groundskeeper's residence, the greenhouses, and the Quidditch pitch. You shouldn't be going into any of those without a proper invitation, and never after dark. That's a good general rule when it comes to your magical education. Hmm – except for Astronomy," she corrected herself, "that's really only good after dark. The grounds are yours to roam during the day," she continued, "although keep your wits about you all the same. There's some antagonistic flora, most notably the Whomping Willow over there (it's in the name).
"And we had a 16th century groundskeeper who thought charmed hahas were the cutting edge of modern magical landscaping." She grinned at their bemused faces. "There's a lot of magical ditches that'll take you by surprise," she clarified. "I wouldn't trust any knot gardens you come across, either."
"Now, if you'll all turn to the castle itself… You can see the four towers from here," she pointed. "There's the South tower – that's us. Below us, in the South wing, you've got the Infirmary, and below that, the dining hall. There's the East tower, the squat one with those weird chimneys – it's mostly Divination classrooms. The Library is below it and takes up most of the upper East wing. There's the North – telescopes for Astronomy and the owls roost just below. Then the West tower with the dragon weathervane – top of that's Professor Hall's office and lots of staff rooms around the base of the tower.
"On the far side of the castle you've got the lake. The whole thing is built into the natural rock formation on the lakeside, which basically means the founders had to enchant the shit out of the dungeons to deal with the damp. No wonder Slytherins are the way they are. Anyway, every generation of professors have left their mark on the place – lots of secret rooms, hidden stairways, strange tapestries, and the like. All the sort of thing you're going to have to figure out for yourself."
The gaggle of first-years stared at her.
"Now," she looked down at their schedules, "it looks like you've got Potions with the Hufflepuffs at 10 o'clock. I'll lead you there and answer any questions on the way – but after that, getting to classes on time is your responsibility! Professors tend to be understanding for the first week…"
And she started off towards the castle, leading them out of the sun and into the cool dankness of the dungeons.
No one asked any questions, but Cat was sure he heard some of his fellows muttering directions to themselves.
The Potions professor was shockingly young. He had auburn hair in long plait that hung down to his waist and sharp nails lacquered indigo. He ushered them into the classroom, which was lined with specimen jars and lit by flickering candlelight. On each desk sat a cauldron on a squat brazier.
"Good morning." His voice was soft, with a slight country burr. "Find yourself a seat wherever. My name is Professor O'Grady and I have the pleasure of introducing you to potion-making.
"Today, we will begin with my favourite elixir. First, I'd like you all to come up here," he waved a graceful hand towards the table at the front of the room, which was cluttered with strange objects, "and find yourself a suitable teapot. Just pick one you like."
The first-years nervously shuffled out from behind their desks towards the collection of items on the table. Some were recognisably teapots – black kettles and ceramic pots with spouts and handles – while others looked like chickens or had multiple segments or seemed to be made out of mother-of-pearl. Cat found himself a fat green pot with a wicker lid that was far heavier than it looked. It hummed low and happy under his fingers as he carried it back to his desk.
The boy sitting next to him had picked a big-bellied porcelain dragon-shaped teapot and was sucking his finger, which he seemed to have cut on one of the dragon's spines.
"Course I picked the lethal one," the boy muttered. "Suitable my ass."
"Now," said Professor Moran, "Wands out. I have three pieces of magic to teach you."
There was a rustling as students brought out their wands. Everyone looked up, expectant.
"First, tap the brazier under your cauldron with the tips of your wand." He tapped an iridescent nail against the brazier on his desk and it spat out a blue flame.
A light rat-a-tat rang across the room. Braziers sparked alight across the desk tops.
"Excellent. Now, point your wands into your cauldrons and say Augamenti. Be careful – it may splash."
Augamenti, Augamenti, muttered all the students, followed by sounds of awe and delight as wands began to spout water.
"Perfect! Hold your wands and concentration steady until your cauldron is about half full."
The sound of water filled the room. Professor Moran circled the room, depositing enamelled boxes full of pungent leaves.
"The final and most important magic: turn to the person next to you and introduce yourself. We'll spend the rest of the lesson experimenting with the ideal steeping time, trying different teas and getting to know each other."
The boy next to him was called Jeremy Trout and was the child of mid-country magical plant breeders, Cat found. Over smoky black tea and fragrant green, they talked. Cat was surprised to find himself talking about his cousins, their bike rides along the canal, and how his growing discomfort and uncertainty around them as his departure to Hogwarts and their shared approach towards adolescence neared had made behaving 'normally' a thousand times more difficult.
Trout had nodded sagely, "I know exactly what you mean. Everyone's caught up in growing themselves with no time for each other beyond how they want to see themselves reflected back. No matter what I do, my sister and parents are always noticing how I'm clumsy and tired and insensitive. Even though I'm always making them dandelion coffee and weeding the garden and walking the animals and listening to them talk about their friend troubles and arguments with my granddad. It's like they expect me to turn out a certain way and have no time for how it's actually turning for me."
Cat blinked. "You're a wise one, Jeremy."
"Call me Trout – everyone does."
They left the dungeons sparkling with caffeine, boxes of tea stuffed in their bags, chattering with new-found friends. Cat introduced Trout to Amy, and felt like he was floating as they wended their way through the resonating hallways towards the dining hall and lunch.
Nessier was waiting for him.
"Ah… Catherine," he appeared at Cat's side as he walked through the vaulted doors. Cat froze, and Amy and Trout stopped too, flanking him. He felt a swell of gratitude.
Nessier continued. "Just who I was hoping to see. How has your first day at Hogwarts been, young lady?"
Cat's face burned. He kept his eyes down. He suddenly wished Amy and Trout were far away. Then a curious sensation swept over him – gentle laps of something, washing over his feet, his knees, his belly, his shoulders. It whispered to him, too fast to fully comprehend or question, Catherine, you're a good girl… such a sweet face, when your hair grows out... respect your betters… how lucky you are… how grateful you must be…
Amy and Trout abruptly walked off, each to different tables.
"It's been lovely, Mr. Nessier. A bit overwhelming, but I'm sure I'll find my way eventually."
"Splendid, splendid," replied Nessier. "Catherine, I'm so pleased to find you much more, ah, tractable than last we met. Such a treat."
Something in Cat's pocket seemed irksomely heavy. She tried to ignore it. "Uh, can I help you with anything? Not sure I'd make the best tour-guide yet, but if you need directions I'll do my best."
Nessier made a dry, hoarse sound – an approximation of a chuckle. "I know my way well. No, I was just hoping for a quick word. You seemed so… out-of-control when we met, I worried…"
The monotone surged, tugging at his—her navel. How could you be so rude… so disrespectful… to an important guest… all that you have… a debt, a debt… forget yourself… manners…
Cat blushed dark red. "I'm sorry, sir. I was angry at my parents for wanting to send me to… No, no excuses. I was ungrateful and disrespectful. All I have are my apologies."
Nessier smiled, baring all his teeth. "I'm a forgiving man. It's in the past. Forgiven, but not forgotten. Just be mindful – not everyone is so… considerate," he hissed.
"I'll be sure to remember," she replied.
"Just promise to be a good girl, and we'll let bygones be..."
Cat's hands had found their way to her pockets and something flared up against her finger. It felt like a warning, and she worried about it giving her away so wrapped her hand around it. The flint shifted in her grip and then pushed. Repulsively soft bands of something slithered off her.
Cat gulped. "Some promises I just can't keep."
He scarpered off, flint pulsing, towards the Hufflepuff table. "Trout," he flopped down on the bench next to him. "Trout!" He pushed at the boy, and felt the same soft magical trace fall away from him. Trout turned a look of shock on Cat.
"What was that? Where did you go?"
"Honestly, not sure. That man, over there—No, don't look," he muttered urgently. "The one who came up to us when we were walking in? Grey suit?"
Trout nodded.
"I think he has, like, a special power. To persuade you or make you do things."
"Yuck," Trout shuddered. "That was on me?"
"Yes! To make you leave, or ignore him, I think. I don't know why he's here – or talking to me. Shit, shit, shit."
"Hey, hey, Cat," said Trout, putting a hand on Cat's shoulder. It rested there warmly. "It's ok, man. You're ok." He risked a glance behind him, towards the entrance. "He's gone, it's good."
"Come help me explain to Amy?"
"Right behind you."
Trout spent lunch at the Ravenclaw table with them. They split up at the sweeping stairs, Trout to the greenhouses for his first Herbology lesson and Cat and Amy to Defence Against the Dark Arts with the Gryffindors.
There, they were taught regulations and conventions for spellcasting – duelling protocol, what legally constituted a defensive spell, restrictions for underage magicians, Hogwarts' own rules – by an earnest man with a weary, heavily lined face and welted scars over his close-cropped scalp, neck and forearms, called Professor Mosse.
A scowling Gryffindor girl kept challenging Mosse's mildly-made comments, questioning "the wisdom of prohibiting underage magicians from using defensive magicks." Her insistence provoked a highly technical argument among most of the class about recent wizarding history and politics that Cat had trouble following and ate up most of their lesson.
"What was that all about?" Cat asked Amy once they were comfortably ensconced in Ravenclaw common room's sofas and cradling mugs of tea. The afternoon was breezy, the light still high in the sky, and the hearths empty. Students meandered through the room on their ways elsewhere and their murmured conversations trailed away.
"That whole debate with Mosse?" Amy sipped her tea and squinted at Cat over the rim of her cup. "Hmm."
She set the cup down and settled back into the chair. "It's a long story. I can't say I've ever been in this situation before." Cat looked bemused. "How to begin… You've heard the name Voldemort before, right?"
Cat shrugged. "I don't think so? I've been hearing a lot of strange new names recently, I've got to say."
"Well, Voldemort's an important one. Throughout the end of last century, wizards across Europe were afraid to say his name. Vol-de-mort." She relished the syllables. "He was referred to as You-Know-Who by the press and He Who Shall Not Be Named by his admirers."
"And My Lord by his wife," Cat offered.
"Close enough – Dark Lord by his Death Eater devotees. He was a cruel wizard who wanted power – not a very original concept, sure, but he had flair with the killing and the, uh…"
"Maiming?"
"Brain-washing, in particular. And his followers were straight out of nightmares – rabid werewolves and psycho killers and billionaires. He infiltrated our government and played puppet master to all our politicians."
"Let me guess – nobody noticed the difference?"
"Not for a couple years… Eventually, Voldemort was unmasked and defeated by a handful of eighteen year olds who had devoted their entire tenure at Hogwarts to fighting him."
"Phew," Cat exhaled. "Heck of a story."
"Isn't it?" Amy said with glee.
"But the thing is, a lot of folk died in those decades of conflict. Brilliant wizards and witches, very beloved and famous professors here, whole families, most of the remaining European giants, too many children, lots of Muggle innocents... It was bleak and brutal for a while there."
"But then everyone partied like it was 1999?"
"Pretty much. Traumatised and focussed on repopulation. So we were born. Our heroes growing up were The Boy Who Lived and his band of intrepid Gryffindor buddies. Growing up, everyone wanted to be sorted into Gryffindor until you hit maybe seven, eight and then it got uncool."
"Guess we dodged a bullet."
"Brainy, not brawny. So it goes. But, yeah, our role models! We grew up hearing these stories about these kids who flouted every school rule ever – and somehow still did well in their exams – before finally taking down the Dark Lord! Evil was vanquished forever, with some pluck and simple wand work!"
"So the magic world's all set? Safe from apocalypse? Catastrophe averted?"
"That would be one way to read it – maybe if all your living relatives hadn't been wiped out in the space of a couple years. But the prevailing feeling runs the opposite way."
"As in, the end of the world is nigh?"
"Exactly. In the words of my mother when I was born and when she taught me my first warding charm at five and before she put me on the Hogwarts Express just two days ago: 'It is never too early to defend yourself against the Dark Arts!'"
"That's some pressure."
"Especially if you're in Gryffindor, I think. Let's go find dinner?"
Trout joined them at their table.
"I just had to explain, like, all of Harry Potter to him," Amy explained to Trout in between mouthfuls of pie.
Trout snorted into his drink. "All of it?"
"More like the highlights," Amy conceded.
"The major themes," Cat suggested.
"I hadn't even thought that you didn't know. Wow," Trout stared at his plate, the enchanted ceiling, and then at Cat. "Wow," he whistled. "Wait – did she get to the Triwizard Tournament yet? I can't believe they haven't restarted that. It's been twenty-five years, dammit, it's time to try again! Fatalities be damned!"
Cat clambered into bed heavy with food and reeling with legend. The air felt viscous with ghosts. He was gripped by sudden fear, as he rode off into dreams, that he wouldn't know light arts from dark arts any more than lord from mort or salt from pepper or charm from harm… or ham…
The next morning found Cat bleary eyed and late for breakfast. Amy ushered him from the frantic energy of their common room and produced a stack of toast from her cloak pocket for him to eat on the way.
"How do you know where to go?" Cat mumbled around crumbs.
"Asked Grace at breakfast. You have bad dreams too?"
"Yeah. Lots of hedge mazes."
"For me, seagulls. Terrifying birds."
Amy guided them down a corridor hung with faded teal- and rust-coloured tapestries. Cat couldn't make their scenes out – there was something that looked like a gigantic purple pinecone and, further along, something that might have been a white two-head horse or perhaps, he considered, an octopus. Maybe they were aquatic adventures, he mused.
"I think this is it," said Amy as they approached an arched doorway engraved with sigils and topped with a forlorn carved head in a stocking cap. "Left pass the Conclave tapestries, door at the end."
Cat rooted around in his cloak pockets and found only his wand. "I was looking for the time," he explained. "Unsuccessfully. Ask me about smartphones later, yeah? So – do we knock?"
"The professor isn't here yet," spoke the stocking capped head in a gravelly voice. The door swung open. "You might as well wait inside."
Small birds flitted across a crazed lattice work of beams spanning the classroom's many vaulted ceiling. A white cat sitting on a chair balanced on one of the desks paused in its contemplation of the architecture to stare at the two children in the doorway appraisingly.
Holding their gaze, the cat lifted its paw and three brown mice leaped down to the floor and scurried under the floorboards, past a tangled heap of snoozing rabbits, ears and noses twitching.
"Am I hallucinating?" whispered Cat.
"Stop gawping and find yourselves seats. You'll let the tits out," snapped the stone head.
"Our bad," said Amy as they stepped inside cautiously. The door groaned as it closed. "I was not expecting this."
"This is mental, right? Not just to me?"
"Completely mad – s-s-shit, Cat, look in that corner," she pointed to a huge mound of brown furs piled haphazardly by a long stained glass window depicting a shoe becoming a ship.
"Maybe it gets cold in here?"
"N-no, Cat, it's breathing. I think it's a bear."
Cat watched the tinted shadows cast by the window slide up and down the pile of furs. "It would be tragic for us to die on our second day of classes."
The white cat slunk over and butted its head on Amy's shin. Neither child reacted, unable to take their eyes off the sleeping bear.
"Maybe it's hibernating," whispered Amy.
The bird chatter from the beams started to increase in volume, and Cat's heart began to gallop. A rooster jumped onto the teacher's desk with a flurry of noisy wingbeats, wobbled its red comb and proceeded to crow at ear-splitting volume.
"Not anymore," said Cat, as the furred form began to twitch and then to lengthen. Enormous paws pushed down at the stone floor and lifted up as the bear extended to its full height. Cat stopped breathing. Amy slid her hand around his elbow and pulled him closer to her side.
The bear met their eyes. Its nostrils flared twice, its ears flickered, its eyes widened, and its forehead creased. It tilted its head to the side, seeming to consider the pair, and then nodded its head at them. It was an unmistakable gesture of recognition. Amy and Cat stood frozen.
The bear dropped its forepaws back to the ground and lumbered off through a door set in the back of the classroom.
"Mornin-," began a voice from behind them. Cat shrieked and Amy yelled a choice expletive.
They turned to find a laughing young woman with bright red hair, dressed in denim overalls covered in floral embroidery and wearing socks the colour of pumpkins. Mushrooms dangled from her ears.
"Sorry for startling you. I'm Professor Fairchild, your Transfiguration teacher. I'm guessing you already met Winsome."
"W-Winsome is the bear?" Amy asked.
"Indeed. He insists on napping in here, no matter how many times I scold him for scaring students. And you two are?"
"I'm Amy Thyme, and this is Cat."
"P-pleased to meet you, Professor," Cat managed to mumble.
"Ravenclaw first-years?" she asked. They nodded. "But of course – Slytherins are rarely early. Find yourself seats and I'm sure the rest of the class will be here soon enough."
Cat and Amy took seats at the side of the classroom, near the windows, while Professor Fairchild bustled around the front of the classroom, humming to herself, picking up fallen objects from the floor and placing them on her desk around the rooster, who was busily arranging his emerald tail feathers.
"Now seems like a good time to ask," whispered Cat. "What the hell is Transfiguration, and why does it involve rabbits and mice?"
"Umm, basically just magicking things into other things. Rabbits into slippers, desks into pigs. It'll probably take us a while to get to mice though – you need pretty good aim."
The rest of the Ravenclaws slowly trickled into the room with delighted exclamations at the birds and bunnies. The mice seemed to be staying out of sight behind the skirting boards for the time being, and the door through which the bear had left remained blessedly closed. Cat and Amy's heart rates began to settle.
The Slytherins arrived altogether, entering the classroom as a pack. A few of them were very tall and they all seemed to have perfect hair. Cat felt miserably young and scrappy until Amy whispered, "I just love it when Slytherins prove the stereotypes about them completely true. What oily, smug bastards. Pure bloods are all inbred, you know."
"Welcome, sweet Slytherins!" the Professor was saying. "Do come in and find yourself a seat between Ravenclaws. I want everyone sitting next to someone from a different house." She turned to Cat and Amy, "That means you early arrivals need to split up, I'm afraid."
Amy scooted down a chair, casting a dark glance at Cat. The Slytherins began finding seats. An enormous boy with dark curls piled on his head covered in freckles made his way to the space Amy had vacated, knocking over the chair in the process.
"I'm Tanner," he said to Cat, offering his huge hand. His voice was mellow, patient with syllables.
"Cat Wither," said Cat as they shook hands. "That's Amy."
"A pleasure," said Tanner with a slow, wide smile. Cat grinned back, catching Amy's rueful expression over the Slytherin's shoulder.
"There was an actual bear in the classroom when we got here," offered Cat.
Tanner raised an eyebrow. "I would've shit myself."
"It was a near thing," said Amy.
"Now you're nice and settled, I'd like you all to stand."
Tanner knocked over his chair on his way up.
"If you turn your attention to your desks, you should each find in front of you some beads. Please, pick them up, have a look at them, pick your favourite. I want you to investigate one bead thoroughly. Get a sense of its size, its weight, its colour, its shape. Focus all your attention on this bead. I want you to form full impressions. Keep looking past the point where you'd usually stop, past the point of boredom. Trust me that there's plenty to be noticed."
Cat found a fat turquoise bead. It felt smooth but the longer he looked the more he could see striations of dark colour across its surface. He ran his thumb over the bead again and again, trying to feel if they were actual hairline fissures or just colour variation, but couldn't make up his mind.
"Transfiguration is the art of magically shaping change. It harnesses the fact that nothing is fixed or permanent. I want you to imagine these beads thousands of years from now, lost from a bracelet down a storm drain, washed up on a beach, buried in the earth. How might they look then? How might they change colour, or be worn down, or break? How might they remain the same?
"Now, drop the bead you've got and pick up another."
Cat looked up, surprised. He slipped the turquoise bead into his pocket and noticed Tanner do the same with his. Cat selected a small black sphere of a bead off the desk and wondered why they were all standing.
"I don't want you to bother looking at this bead. Pay it no attention at all, please. Instead, I want you to think of a seed. Hold the idea of a seed very clearly in your mind's eye. Imagine it in detail – what colour is it, what size, what shape? You don't know what this seed grows into. But you can see what it looks like now. Have you got it?"
The class variously mumbled acquiescence or nodded. The only seed Cat could think of was a sunflower seed, and he worried he was imagining the roasted and salted kind. He cursed himself for missing breakfast.
"Put your bead down on the centre of your desk and draw your wands, please."
Cat's wand gave him a faint shock as he pulled it out from his pocket. He held it awkwardly in front of him and snuck a glance at his classmates. Many looked similarly uncomfortable.
"Alright – keep the image and notion of your seed in the forefront of your mind. Now, superimpose the seed onto the bead on your desk. Look directly at the bead but don't notice it. See the seed. See how it rests on your desk. See how the light catches it.
"Now, take a slow breath in through your nose. As your belly fills, I want you to focus your desire to see the seed on your desk. You want the bead to be the seed."
Seed, not bead, repeated Cat to himself as he tried to calm his breathing. He could see how the sunflower seed would rest just so on one of its flattened sides, a single dark grey stripe running off-centre and lengthwise up to its blunt tip. It was sort of creamy off-white beige, he thought, but by the window it would look more yellow. Not because it's roasted, he tried to reassure himself.
"Raise your wands and touch their end to the bead that you wish were a seed."
There was a clatter and someone gasped. Cat resisted the urge to rubberneck.
"Don't worry, child," said Professor Fairchild. "Just use a different bead. Focus, everyone. Fully visualize the seed, see your wand touching the surface of the seed, feel the energetic connection from your centre, down your arm, through your wand, and to the seed. Feel the heat and power of this energy and let it rush into the seed, which you are imagining, very clearly, resting on your desk. Let the seed grow charged with magic until it starts to vibrate a little. Maybe it's starting to spin or roll, but keep it connected."
Cat cursed under his breath and tried to imagine the sunflower seed filling with magic flowing from him, through his wand, and into the bead-seed. Magic energy, not heat energy, because this is not a roasted sunflower seed.
"Now, the incantation. It is metakairna. Meta – like metamorphosis – and kair-na – like seed kernel, but not. You want the k to be clear and hard and your emphasis to bounce off air. When you speak the word, keep your focus locked on the bead that you wish were a seed. Make sure it hears you.
"Ready? Keep your elbows loose and the energy flowing through your wand and into the seed. Focus on the seed, how it sits on the desk, how it catches the light. Now, with me, speak the incantation:
"Metakairna," pronounced the class in ragged chorus.
The word felt clunky on Cat's tongue, and he suspected he'd closed his eyes right as he said it. He felt a sharp jolt through his arm, like a trapped nerve, and something rushed through and around his hand. The classroom suddenly filled with noise – exclamations, murmurs, a singular hoot – as everyone looked at what they'd wrought.
An iron grey seed with a single yellow stripe lay on Cat's desk. It was the shape of a sunflower seed, he thought, but the colours reversed from how he'd imagined.
"Quiet down, quiet down," said their Professor, smiling broadly. "Very nicely done, everyone. You may be seated now. For the rest of class, I'd like you to make thorough notes about the spell you just attempted while I walk around and see what you've made."
Tanner followed Cat and Avery out of the class.
"Well, that was strange," he remarked. Amy looked up at him, surprise playing across her face.
"Yeah," she agreed after a pause.
"I've got Defence Against the Dark Arts next. What's Mosse like?"
"Umm, kind of stern," said Cat. "Lots of scars, nice voice."
"Sounds alright," said Tanner. "I'm gonna go and find somewhere to plant my seed-bead. Want to come?"
"Sure," said Cat.
"Professor Ash is pretty nice – she might let us stick 'em in a greenhouse. You had Herbology yet?"
"Not 'til Monday," said Amy.
"Solid," said Tanner and led them on a quiet amble out the castle and to the first of the greenhouses.
Professor Ash's hair was wrapped away and her shoulders speckled with bits of moss and leaf dander. She grumbled about her shoes being full of dragon dung – "not pleasant between the toes, let me tell you" – and cooed, curious, at their transfigured seeds. They found a sunny bench and potted the seeds under her watchful eye.
"I'll make sure they get watered regularly, but you'd best come and check on them every so often," she said as she saw them off to lunch. "Seeds don't like to be forgotten."