Chapter One: A Blonde Slytherin Walks into a Scoring Room…
Disclaimer: Okay, so again- none of this is mine.
Well, I obviously wrote it, but you know- it's not under a copyright I own or… You know what, nevermind. I don't even care. It's way too early in the morning to care.
The long hall, through which Lylia was dragged, ended with a simple pair of oak doors, through which Lylia was also dragged. She, along with Kayla and their proctor, entered a spacious and comfortable chamber filled with sitting chairs and maroon carpeting. An oblong bench sat close to the back wall, and at that bench sat numerous 'stiffs' Kayla immediately surmised to be their test scorers. The brunette promptly snatched Lylia's test packet from their proctor's hands and delivered it along with her own to the nearest scorer.
Adjusting miniscule glasses and licking a fingertip, the receiving man ripped individual pages of scoring sections out of both test books and passed along each score sheet to their respective checking points.
"This'll be a minute," the green-eyed, lanky man informed the pair of girls as he released Lylia. "Make yourselves at home… But not too at home, if you don't mind."
Lylia plopped down into a waiting chair next to their escort, crossing her arms in imitation of his stern pose. He simply stared at the very-interesting wall ahead of him, not making eye contact.
"Hey, Lyl- can I let Shadow out?" asked Kayla as she heard a familiar yowl from within the crate. At the blonde's affirmative, she unlatched the bolt restraining the cat and set the feline free. Hissing at the world, the black blur darted under Lylia's chair.
"So… Tall, Thin, and Awkward." Lylia looked sideways at the proctor. He glared over. "Got a name?"
"… Aidon," he answered tersely.
Lylia snickered. "Eye-duhn?"
"Aidon Haynes," growled the proctor.
"Like the underwear, then?" asked Lylia rhetorically.
A few of the strangers scoring their tests gave a stifled snort of laughter, Aidon's face going a beet red in infuriation. "N-no! Not 'Hanes!'"
"Finished," one of the scorers stated for the group. "Scores are listed highest to lowest. Kayla Hartland, you qualified for examination in three subjects: Quidditch, Transfiguration, and Charms. Lylia Letum; Potions, Defense Against the Dark Arts, and Care of Magical Creatures."
Aidon's jaw dropped in contrast to the girls' uncomprehending glances at each other. "Three subjects each?! But Muggles normally only qualify for one, if at all!"
"Maaaybe we're just special?" piped up Lylia.
"A second escort will arrive, taking one of you to the examination site," explained a scorer. "Mr. Haynes here will escort the other of your pair to the same location."
Small amounts of desperate light sparkled behind Aidon's emerald eyes: no longer having to deal with Lylia! The idea danced around his mind like a promise of eternal bliss.
A herald to his hopes, the doors behind them opened again, and in walked the blonde known as Draco Malfoy. Matured, robed in green and black, and less of an arse than he was in the books, nineteen-year-old Draco glanced around the room to spot his new charge for escort. The girls just kinda gaped.
"Oh, good, Malfoy," sighed Aidon in relief as he gestured to Lylia. "You'll be taking Letum and-"
"Drop dead, Haynes," Draco immediately bit back, instead nodding at Kayla. "You- come with me." Turning, he strode immediately from the room. Kayla glanced at Lylia almost fearfully before, still in shock, following her escort.
"What's your name?" Malfoy asked from her.
"Kayla Hartland," answered his charge as she fell into step beside him, confidence replenished from her natural spring of pride.
If he seemed surprised by her sudden and immediate casualty in his presence, Draco didn't show a modicum of it as the pair made their way out of the now-empty testing hall and to a back room of the bookstore. Opening a cupboard, he examined a sole pair of lightbulbs sitting on a shelf. "See that bulb on the right?"
"Yes."
"When I say three, grab it."
"Sure. Wait, what?"
"Three!"
Kayla jerked out her hand just in time to grab the bulb simultaneously with Draco, not altogether certain it was the best of choices as a famous jerk behind her navel sent her spinning away through the fabric of space, the portkey taking them far away.
Meanwhile, Lylia still sat leisurely in the waiting chair, quite content in using Aidon's back as a footrest. The proctor yelped a few times as he tried on hands and knees to grab Shadow out from under Lylia's chair, met with fierce and senile resistance from the black cat.
"Maybe I should do it. Lemme try," offered Letum as she made no move to aid, instead watching the ceiling.
Shadow hissed.
Kayla Hartland did not like being dropped by portkeys onto grass. No, it was decidedly one of her least favourite things to do. She disliked being dropped onto wet grass especially.
However, this was the situation in which she found herself as the portkey deposited her somewhere conveniently on another continent.
"Welcome to England," commented Draco as he helped her up, having landed quite smoothly himself. Through the onslaught of English water from the skies, Kayla could make out a line of rain-beaten tents that seemed to be all marking the training site, aside from a lake not far away and, beside it, a promising sports field with three elevated hoops on sticks. Her escort nudged her in the direction of the nearest tent. "Go on- Transfiguration's in there."
Apprehension and tension wracked Kayla's nerves as she headed for the tent. At that same blip in time, Lylia was dropped on her face into wet grass. Aidon jerked her up.
"Next time I count to three, don't pretend to be numerically dyslexic. It doesn't work that way."
"But it was so amusing to see you freak out."
"Go to the third tent down. Defense Against the Dark Arts awaits." Aidon gave his charge a light shove in aforementioned destination's direction. She just grinned and waved to him fondly before jogging to the tent through the downpour.
Inside both tents, a table sat. A pile of wands laid in a corner of each tent. In the Transfiguration tent Professor McGonagall herself greeted Kayla with a small smile and nod. Within the Defense Against the Dark Arts tent a stranger hooded in black stood silently, nodding minimally to Lylia. And so the exams began.
"You'll choose a wand," said Professor McGonagall, "and proceed to select an incantation with which you will attempt to turn this mouse into a bracelet."
The hooded man just stared Lylia down.
Kayla smiled and went to the corner, kneeling and starting to sort through the wands.
The hooded man vanished in the air with the loud pop of Disapparation.
Lylia blinked. "… Uh, yeah… Does this mean I pass?"
Three wand boxes later, Kayla pulled a long, thin rod of polished brown wood that sent pleasing warmth budding along up her arm, filling her chest with the heat of the sun's rays as it reached her heart. "… I think I like this one," she said a bit perplexedly before sitting at the table, across from McGonagall. Examining the small cage on the table surface, she noticed a list of spells carved neatly into its side. The mouse inside seemed to hold its breath in anxious waiting.
Lylia was about to leave the tent, when something caught her eye. A black line was forming under the sealed tent entrance flap. "… What?" The line widened and started to protrude towards the tent interior, as if someone was pushing a black sheet under the flap. "… Um…" A sickening sensation started to churn inside her stomach as her eyes remained glued on the silent, gliding black sheet.
"Lethifold," she mumbled in utter fear.
Finally deciding on the spell she believed to appear the correct one, Kayla aimed her new-found wand at the mouse inside its cage. As she neatly finished the chant, the tiny mammal squeaked once, twisted in on itself, and melded into a silver bracelet with a small charm on it in the shape of a mouse's paw. McGonagall's eyes momentarily bugged. After some time spent composing herself, she managed a surprised, delighted smile and stood.
"Why… Congratulations, Ms. Hartland!" breathed the professor as she shook Kayla's hand, sliding the bracelet onto her wrist. "I must admit, I'm in a dreadful shock… I've never before had someone succeed so tremendously at my exam!"
Lylia dove for the pile of wands, tossing box after box at the slow, leisurely-sliding agent of her demise. Considering the fact that Lethifolds are carnivorous beasts that live in the tropics and attack only when the victim is asleep, her next comment was not completely random:
"Why the hell are you trying to eat me?!"
Realizing that pelting the enemy with one's own weapons is not a prodigious tactical maneuver, Letum stopped throwing the wand boxes and started yanking each in turn open, examining the wand within each. A yellowish one was tossed aside, as was a brown one. She stopped as she was about to throw a white one, however. The strip of fair wood cooled her hand at the touch, sending a chill of rigor and release up her limb. Barely taking in the white flower engravings along its held end, Lylia stood up and scrambled back, aiming the stick at the Lethifold. Her mind raced to conjure up familiar Latin vocabulary.
"I-Incendio!" Flames leaped from the wandtip, signaling Letum's extreme luck at selecting a Latin word that actually was a spell. It also signaled the end of her luck, however, as the flames clung to a wall of the tent and started to snake upwards. The Lethifold, not seeming daunted in the slightest, continued creeping along its ungodly path for its next meal. As rain-burdened smoke started to cloud Lylia's vision, she jumped on the table and aimed again. "Retexo!"
Not waiting to see if the extemporized attempt at an unweaving spell worked, Lylia leaped clear over the Lethifold and fled from the burning tent, taking off across the rain-drenched grass her best friend had come to loathe. Nearby viewers looked on in amazement and horror as the tent collapsed, harbinger of end to the Defense Against the Dark Arts examinations.
A few minutes later, Lylia met up with Kayla, both watching the flaming remains of a tent get extinguished by the last bits of rain the clouds had to offer.
"How'd your exam go?"
"Nicely enough- made a charm bracelet. Yours?"
"Alright. Destroyed a lethal monster intent on devouring me completely."
"Right. See you after the next exam, then!"
They parted ways, Lylia for the labeled Potions tent and Kayla to the marked Charms tent. The inside of the Charms tent was large but cramped, stuffed with numerous shelves on which hundreds of manhandled books made their homes. A portly but sweet lady with a round face greeted Kayla, while no one greeted Lylia in the austere, dark Potions tent but the silence of surrounding darkness.
Feeling her way to the back of the tent, the blonde girl found the knob of a door and, ignoring the oddity of its existence, passed through the door to the stone chamber beyond. Meanwhile, Kayla was introduced to the pleasant Wingardium Leviosa floating spell.
"You'll be levitating this feather through an obstacle course," stammered the brunette's examiner as she pointed to the series of hoops and blocks suspended overhead.
"You'll be getting rid of this box without leaving any pieces," stated a cool voice a few yards ahead of Lylia. The blonde jolted in alarm at its sudden appearance, then again as her own examiner, a lean and sour-faced lady, flicked on the enchanted candles dotting the room.
"R-right," Lylia answered noncommittally as she approached the stone table before her, upon which rested a styrofoam cube and numerous bizarre pieces of ingredients: a buttery, yellow substance; a greenish powder; some whitish cream; a match; a pomegranate; and some water.
As Kayla directed the feather through the obstacle course as carefully as humanly possible, Lylia started ripping up the block. The blonde's proctor sighed, apparently used to this behaviour from those taking the exam.
At they finished, Kayla's proctor commended her for the success and went to get some First Aid for her tongue- Kayla had bitten a good cut into it with all her concentration.
"I'm sorry, but you fail," said Letum's proctor.
Lylia stopped and repeated her words. "I fail?"
"You still left pieces behind, stupid."
Letum's cheeks flared a bright red at the insult. "If you weren't so discriminatory, you'd know that I was simply shredding the block to increase surface area!" Now irritated, she grabbed the powder, dumped it on the block, and proceeded to scrape a bit of the buttery substance onto the box. With a singular glare at her proctor Lylia upended the water over the cube. It gave a furious fizz and burst into foam before being eroded completely away.
"I'm sorry, but it's too late. I can't say you pass-"
A deeper, much graver voice interrupted. "I am no longer in need of your services. Leave."
Light from outside the dark interior of the tent momentarily blinded Lylia, but she could barely see a figure silhouetted against its light. "H-hello?"
A black arc of fabric blotted out the light before the door closed, footsteps echoing before a sallow, pale man with sharp features shoved Lylia against the wall by the table. Severus Snape analyzed the girl's face, then the mess the same girl made on the table.
"Ever heard of a beaker?" he asked coldly.
"W-well, I didn't know how strong a mixture it would be," stammered the pinned subject. "So I, well, figured the thick stone would be more reliable than a piece of glass."
Without another word, Snape released the girl, stared at her again, and left.
"… So does this mean I pass?" Lylia asked the silence of the tent.
Emerging a few minutes later, both of the girls went to their third exams: Lylia to the lake and Kayla to the makeshift Quidditch field.
"What position are you?" Lylia's initial examiner from Potions asked Kayla.
"Beater," came the immediate reply.
A blonde boy awaited Letum at the water's edge for Care of Magical Creatures, giving her a brilliant smile as she arrived. His beauty seemed to make the lake pale: a sharp gaze contrasted with the soft wave in his golden hair, his chiseled face gentled in its angles to seem almost angelic. "Hey."
"Hi!" smiled Lylia, much more interested in the lake than in the man beside it.
"I heard you're one of the two girls that qualified in three classes," he conversed while drawing up a net from a nearby bush's hold. Purplish-blue eyes sized up Lylia. "I'm Elden Lesperance."
"Lylia Letum. What's the exam, then?"
"Oh, you need to snag or catch one of three animals," the beautiful twenty-three-year-old explained. "This lake's filled with saltwater for this exam, so mind your eyes in it. There's a kelpie, a kappa, and a kneazle."
"I choose kelpie."
The boy laughed. "Good one. You know what a kelpie is, right? It drowns and devours people. The kneazle is practically harmless, and you just can't let the kappa get its hands around your ne-"
"Net, please." Lylia was not smiling.
His radiant grin failing, the examiner handed her the dark green web.
"Here, kitty kitty kitty," goaded Letum as she walked along the water's edge, giving a whistle afterwards. Hearing the summons, a lean, white horse with a permanently-dripping mane made its way into the shallows of the lake, eyeing Lylia.
Kayla's examiner tossed her a broom. "Get on."
The young brunette's eyes shot wide as kicking off from the ground sent her a foot into the air astride the beam of wood. "Whoa!"
"Catch, you idiot," chided the woman as she tossed a Beater's bat to Kayla and unleashed a Bludger into the air.
Kayla waited about ten seconds to give the woman a good, false sense of security before swiping at the Bludger and sending it straight into the back of the examiner's head. The woman wasted no time in falling unconscious as she hit the ground, relatively harmlessly.
"Hey!" waved the familiar voice of Aidon Haynes from the edge of the field. "We're late! Get a move on, Hartland!"
Groaning inwardly at being summoned by the awkward proctor, Kayla descended and dismounted the broom.
"Where the bloody hell is Letum?" demanded Haynes.
"Well, it's Care of Magical Creatures- she's probably by the lake," said Kayla as she pointed to where Lylia stood with Elden.
Inching forward, Lylia gave a noble attempt at looping the net over the horse's head. However, the horse's neck brushed against her hand in its retaliation, and so Letum found herself dragged bodily into the water, her hand's side firmly stuck by some magic to the creature's neck.
Aidon's jaw dropped as his charge vanished underwater with a demon-horse. "JESUS CHRIST!"
Kayla's jaw dropped as well. "Lylia!"
The pair sprinted toward Elden's amazed form on the lakeshore, Aidon grabbing his peer by the shirt collar. "What the bloody hell did you just let her do?!"
"She chose the kelpie," answered the flawless face a split-second before Haynes let it go, dropping it unceremoniously into the mud left from the rain.
At that same point in time, Lylia's hand broke the surface of the water and waved a bit frantically for aid. Flailing out to the drop-off point, Kayla grabbed the hand and pulled her best friend up from the water that sought to claim her life. While she gasped and coughed up saltwater, Lylia held her free hand to her stomach and managed a smile. "T-thanks…"
"Are you alright?!" fretted Haynes as he ran in circles around the pair. "Did Lesperance let you get hurt?! Are you still breathing?!"
"I did nothing to her!" growled the muddied examiner, rising and cleaning off his visage.
"We're late!" screeched Aidon in complete disregard for Elden's words, instead grabbing Kayla and taking off across the grass. Kayla took hold of Lylia's wrist and pulled her along as well. Lesperance flung mud from his hands as he glared after Lylia, all traces of his favor gone from his face.
He would never forget that girl.
Author's Note: Okay, people! Please talk to me! XD I'm uploading the first chapter now! I'm almost done with my rough drafts for all the other chapters too, so I'll upload more of them once I finish the edits and stuff. Unless, that is, no one's reading this- in which case I'll probably... post them anyway.