Arianna Valenti
September 17, 2016 6:33 PM
Getting it together by Arianna Valenti
After an interesting wagon ride across the country, Arianna was finally at Sonora. It was kind of pathetic how much she had missed this place. It’s not even like she had many friends here, just the Aladren Quidditch team because they couldn’t afford to lose her, her cousin because he was family, and kind of Natalie, because she and Gabriel were practically married. Arianna had no regrets for calling them out as a couple in the yearbook surveys last year.The newly minted second year dropped her things off in her Aladren dormitory and promptly left before there was time to run into any of her roommates. She didn’t actively dislike her roommates, but they definitely were not best friends. Farrah was weird, and as for their Class Lady, Madeleine, Arianna assumed that she looked down on Arianna’s background.
They had named her Most Ambitious, and Most Likely to Cause Trouble. Her parents hadn’t been particularly pleased with that last one. They assumed she had fallen back into her bad habits from before school, back when she couldn’t control the magic she didn’t even know she had, which had led to a bout of semi-intentional kleptomania. But Arianna bet she knew the truth. She was one of the only girls in her year without a magical pedigree, but she didn’t let it stop her from doing as best as she could. Sometimes that meant outdoing kids from more prominent backgrounds than her, an act she was not particularly shy about. So they called her a troublemaker. She was less than.
Last semester, Arianna had spent way more time than she ever would have liked to admit in the Library in an attempt to prove that wrong. But there were no Valentis - she assumed she got her magic from her Papa’s side, given that Gabriel was magic too - in any of the magical history books. And her ancestors, she was sure, would have done something memorable.
It hadn’t really been the people, or the activities, and definitely not the ugly school uniforms that had made her dream of Sonora all summer. Today, the first day back at school, she openly flouted the school dress code, wearing a white off the shoulder top and jean shorts and white Chucks. She’d change into something nicer for the opening feast, but wanted an outfit she could move in for now. Squeezing her walnut wand in her hand, she felt a rush of energy up her arm.
She had magic again. The whole summer, she’d been forced to go back to her regular, mediocre life, forced to pretend that she too was regular and mediocre. Arianna had not been prepared for what that would do to her, how frustrating it would be to have to go turn the light on, instead of just waving her wand. It was miserable.
Now, clutching her walnut wand as she entered MARS, she felt right. She felt whole.
Tossing her dark side braid over her shoulder, she studied what the room had set up before her. She was in the sports room, and before her stood large wooden blocks, the sort you could put together for a puzzle. They were just big enough that it would be difficult for her to lift on pure strength. But she didn’t need to do manual labor. She smiled.
Examining the puzzle pieces for a few moments, she thought she had a game plan in mind. Stepping back she pointed her wand at a block, swished and flicked, and commanded, “Wingardium Leviosa!”
The size of the block and the level of precision it was going to take to complete this challenge meant that she was entirely focused on the task at hand. Dark eyes narrowed, lips pursed, all of her was going into this levitation charm. Therefore, she was completely oblivious when someone else entered the room.
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Arianna Valenti
Getting it together
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Arianna Valenti
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Kellen Mormont
September 19, 2016 5:45 AM
Keeping it together is rough too. by Kellen Mormont
Kellen’s summer hadn’t gone as planned. Everything had been fine, almost even good, until that stupid jerk had to go and make him Hulk out. After “the incident”, he’d been grounded for the rest of his time at his father’s. He could hardly leave his room, which meant no library. He felt like a bird with clipped wings, but he guessed it was a fitting punishment since he broke his half brother’s nose.When his mom finally came to get him, they all sat down for a super awkward conversation about Kellen’s “anger issues”. It was weird trying to be parented by two people with radically different views, but that was his life, unfortunately. His stepmother had threatened to press charges, and his dad thought that maybe anger management was a good idea. His mom had been the only who actually believed that Adam wasn’t an angel, and that was what made him the most upset--he was being bullied in his own house and everyone else was oblivious to it.
The last few weeks of summer were spent in Portland with his mom, where he actually could relax--well kind of. His father thought some kind of athletic activity might help Kellen blow off some steam, so mom decided that it would be fun for the two of them to do tai chi as a method of anxiety and stress reduction. That’s what brought him to the MARS, he definitely needed to de-stress after the wagon ride to the castle.
Kellen entered the room and immediately turned around and walked back out when he saw someone else was already in there. He considered just going back to his room and waiting until the feast started, but practice made perfect, and he didn’t want to lose any of his newly acquired skills. The Aladren quietly walked back inside and watched as the girl attempted to move giant blocks with her magic. He’d recognized her from class, the common room, and the yearbook as one of the Arianna’s, he just couldn’t remember which.
He figured it would be polite to ask if she minded him sharing the room with her, so he cleared his throat in order to get her attention, hopefully without startling her too much.
“Hey, um, do you mind if I share the room with you for a bit? I’ll stay out of the way…”
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Kellen Mormont
Keeping it together is rough too.
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Kellen Mormont
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Arianna
September 21, 2016 9:15 PM
Challenge Accepted by Arianna
The sound of another voice in the room startled Arianna, and the block wobbled in the air before unceremoniously coming to a crash. Touching at the sweat on the back of her neck she turned around to see the housemate-yearmate she knew least, Kellen. He’d appeared halfway through their first year, and as far as Arianna could tell, had quickly paired off with her roommate, Farrah. Beyond both happening to be first year Aladren girl members of the Science Club on the Northeast wagon, Arianna didn’t really have much to do with the other girl, which meant that she didn’t have much to do with Kellen either. Probably a dull nerd, though.“What would you do if I said that I did?” she tilted her head inquisitively, mostly just to test her theory and see how he would react. The second year liked playing with people, she sometimes even did it without meaning to do so. She liked to understand why people did the things they did. It gave her a sense of control.
Like managing her appearance, for instance. For all the after school specials she had been forced to sit through as a kid, so far as she had seen in real life, people judged you by your appearance. If you appeared like someone that cared about yourself, like somebody who mattered, then that was how people would treat you. And if you dressed sloppily, or wore wrinkly clothes, or nerdy t-shirts, then that signaled to people how you should be treated, too. So that is why she took care of her clothes, paid attention to fashion, and taught herself new braiding styles when she was feeling anxious. It sent a message. It wasn’t anything that Arianna had come up with herself, it was a fact a life. You figured out the rules, and then you figured out how you could work them in your favor.
Or you found out that everything you thought you knew about the world was a lie with a simple letter on your eleventh birthday.
But then you figured out that the new world also had rules, and so you learned them, too. Currently, she was testing her theory that even if she couldn’t find herself a family pedigree, if she was a good enough witch, she could not be ignored.
“Any interest in puzzles?” Arianna asked as she adjusted her wand in her hand, curiosity getting the best of her. Power could come in unusual forms, after all.
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Arianna
Challenge Accepted
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Arianna
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Kellen
September 23, 2016 2:27 PM
I fold. by Kellen
Kellen’s blue grey eyes narrowed under a furrowed brow when Arianna responded the way that she had. Granted, he’d spent most of his time at Sonora thus far in the library, but he was under the impression that people were nice and accepting here. He supposed she could just be joking, but he didn’t know her well enough to know the difference. He didn’t know her at all, actually, and based on initial impressions, he wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to. He should have just walked away, he should have just turned around and left well enough alone. However, he was tired of being picked on, talked down to, and just simply disrespected. He had to put up with it the bulk of the summer, and was not about to tolerate starting out a new year this way.Maybe dad was right and he did need anger management.
Kellen sighed and reached into his pocket, idly fingering his wand. After being attacked by his brother earlier in the summer, he was a little twitchy, and he felt a little better having his wand in his hand, not that he intended to actually use it. It was possible that the young Aladren was overreacting, his anxiety seemed to make that happen occasionally, but he felt as though she was being unnecessarily cold and unwelcoming. That was fine, two could play that game if that’s how she chose to be.
“Then I’d ask what happened to you to make you so...unpleasant. Look, I’ve had a bad few weeks, not that it matters to you, all I wanted was a bit of space to practice my martial arts. I didn’t realize the room was so full of your ego. But please, don’t let me interrupt you, clearly you have more important things to do than be a decent human being.”
He felt bad the instant the words left his mouth. Not entirely sure where that venom came from, and very sure that Arianna didn’t deserve that, he decided it was best that he leave. Obviously he’d need to sort out this awful mood he was in before he was forced to sit through an entire feast. Turning heel, he ignored whatever it was that Arianna had said afterward, and hurried towards the common room.
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Kellen
I fold.
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Kellen
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