Try telling guys that on Defense Against the Dark Arts

Tabitha Brooding-Hawthorne

January 04, 2020 3:22 AM

Advanced Class, you can look but can't touch. by Tabitha Brooding-Hawthorne

The first few weeks of the school term had flown by for Tabitha, seemingly in the blink of an eye. It was starting to unsettle her how quickly time seemed to be passing by. Mary had recently turned thirty which had got Tabitha to thinking of her own age (thirty-one) and she found that she didn’t feel particularly comfortable with such a fact and a recent letter from her parents had demanded (they didn’t request) information such as when were Mary and Tabitha going to look into options for having children and the Defence professor had not yet sent back a reply. Having children would mean less travelling, it would mean slowing down. While she wanted them, Tabitha also felt there was a lot more she wanted to see and do first, and she especially liked having Mary to herself at the moment.

Feeling rather uncomfortable with these thoughts, Tabitha abruptly banished them from her mind and turned her attention back to her lesson for the Advanced class. On her desk sat two rows of differently shaped black boxes, their lids currently closed and held shut with a clasp. They were a big part of her lesson today and she just hoped her students liked what was inside.

The door to her classroom opened bang on time and her students started to trickle in, one by one and take their seats. Her lessons with the Advanced Class had been somewhat theory heavy as of late and Tabitha figured that it would be a good idea to give them something practical and exercise their magic and wand work.

“Good morning, class!” she called out, smiling when she received a few hellos back. “Today’s lesson is going to be looking at cursed objects and how to lift or break their curses.”

A flick of her wand at the chalk made it obediently rise up and start scribbling notes on the board as Tabitha talked.

“So, if you recall, a curse is a type of dark charm and they are designed to cause some kind of suffering to the victim. There are, of course, different levels of curses that cause more harm than others and who can remember which three are the worst and are classified as illegal?”

When Tabitha received the right answer, she nodded and carried on as the chalk obediently wrote the answer down on the board. “That’s right, the Cruciatus Curse or the Torture Curse, the Imperius Curse, the mind controlling curse and, of course, the Killing Curse… rather self-explanatory. The Unforgivables.”

She let a moment of silent pass after such a heavy word before clearing her throat and carrying on. “Now, most curses will have a counter-curse that removes their effect or even a potion that the victim can take to be cured. You must make sure that you know your counter-curses as it is possible that without the correct cure, the victim will remain cursed. The longer a curse lasts, the harder it can be to reverse its effects. Of course, some of the more minor curses, or as I prefer to call them, hexes or jinxes can just wear off with time.”

Tabitha flicked her wand at her desk and a stack of papers hovered up and dished themselves out, one to each student. “On these pages are a list of curses and their counter-curses along with the appropriate wand movement for each one. Learn them, memorise them and store them. A word of warning, however. If I catch anyone using these curses outside of this classroom, they will at the very least serve detention with me.”

She let that hang in the air a moment before turning to her desk and, with a swish of her wand in the direction of the boxes, unlocked them and let their lids open. In each box was a different piece of simple jewellery. Brooches, rings, bracelets, necklaces... Nothing expensive that had cost a fortune but Tabitha had thought them pretty or interesting and decided they might be a nice reward for her students. Of course, they had to work for them first.

“With the ball planned for the end of the year, I thought at least some of you might like some little trinkets to wear to it. If not, you can keep these anyway as a reminder of today’s lesson.”

She gestured with her hand at the boxes. “Each of these items has been cursed by me. I’ve only used minor hexes and jinxes, ones that you’ve used and been taught in class but I have layered them so they do have more than one. Your job is to work out which hexes I’ve used and then remove them, leaving them harmless and of course, wearable. Do not touch them directly unless you wish to be hexed, which is why I have also provided the boxes they are sitting in. You can come up one by one to pick whichever one you like and you may also chat with your neighbour for ideas. You will need to remember the charm that reveals which hexes I’ve used and then used the appropriate counter-curses. If you get truly stuck, I am of course here to help. If any of you accidentally get jinxed, I will use the counter-curse to remove the jinx. Do not attempt to remove it yourself or get someone else to. Once you have your chosen box, you may begin.”

OOC - the revealing charm is ‘Revelio’.
These are the list of hexes and jinxes Tabitha will have used on the items. She will have used more than one but no more than four. Feel free to pick which ones you like.

Full Body-Bind Curse
Jelly-Legs Curse
Leg-locker Curse
Pimple Jinx
Stickfast Hex
Tickling Hex
Tongue-tying Curse
Hair Loss Curse
Bat-Bogey Hex

If an exact counter-curse cannot be found, “Finite Incantatem” should work.

Subthreads:

Cursed items make for interesting adventuring [Tag: Jasmine] by Gary Harper with Jasmine Delachene

Try telling guys that by Cleo James

20 Tabitha Brooding-Hawthorne Advanced Class, you can look but can't touch. 1417 1 5

Gary Harper

January 04, 2020 12:49 PM

Cursed items make for interesting adventuring [Tag: Jasmine] by Gary Harper

He was going to do it. Gary was going to ask Jasmine to the ball. That was all there was to it. It was going to happen, it was going to happen today, and apparently it was going to happen in Defense against the Dark Arts class. Well, assuming they were doing some sort of partner thing where it wasn't forbidden to talk to the other students during class. Otherwise it may have to wait until lunch. Gary would much rather prefer a class setting to lunch though. During lunch she usually ate with her friends and he's not sure he could go up to her and ask with all of those other people around. In class there was always other things to talk about that could lead around to the question, and people were doing their own things and may not be paying much attention to them. Well, he could hope.

He tried one of his old tricks of hanging out in the hall, waiting for her to arrive, then going in the door soon after her. Not to soon mind you, but soon enough that if she had sat down next to an empty seat, it should still be empty when he entered. Luckily fate had smiled upon him and everything was going according to plan. He took the seat next to her, smiled and said hi, very casually, nothing going on here but an ordinary class. Nope nothing strange at all. He pulled out his books and notes and such and got ready, just like always, nothing unusual. Just getting ready for class.

The professor began talking and he began taking notes. This was going to be an interesting class. Cursed items were always a fun way to spice things up. There's nothing quite like discovering those +5 bracers you'd found all sudden have become -5 bracers, and can't be removed. Or the terrible robe of vermin, or even the classic girdle of gender swapping. Heh, fun stuff.

He'd almost forgotten about his plan, then the professor showed them the items and brought up the ball. Right, plan. This could work in his favor though, if he got a nice enough looking item, and fixed it for her, it should count as a circumstantial bonus for asking her. It may even give him advantage on the check. When it was his turn to pick an item however, he ran into a minor problem. He wasn't sure what Jasmine had picked. There was a nice looking necklace, but he couldn't give her one of those if she already had picked one. After looking things over, he decided on a bracelet. Multiple bracelets wouldn't be a problem, right?

He returned to his seat, looked over the bracelet, checked his notes and sighed. He was going to have to talk for this plan to work. Now was as good of time as any. "So..." he started off slowly, not having any idea what he was going to say next. "Which curses do you think you got?" Then mentally kicked himself, that was a terrible way to start this off.

2 Gary Harper Cursed items make for interesting adventuring [Tag: Jasmine] 1404 0 5

Jasmine Delachene

January 07, 2020 9:33 AM

I’m here for the horses. And the shinies. But mostly the horses. by Jasmine Delachene

Jasmine had not intended to continue with DADA. The subject material was just going to get scarier as they got further into RATS level stuff. She didn’t like the monsters and she didn’t like the harsh spells they learned.

Unfortunately, her Transfiguration CATS had come back with a grade too low to continue in that class at Advanced levels. In fact, the only three with grades high enough to keep taking had been Charms, where she’d barely scraped an E, Care of Magical Creatures, in which she’d actually somehow pulled an O, and Defense Against the Dark Arts, which had bafflingly come back with an E as well. Everything else was either As or Ps, and most teachers advised Es or extra work to continue working towards RATS.

Jasmine suspected the DADA material stuck because it was too scary to forget. Or maybe Uncle Daniel’s annoying fact filled letters leading into the exams had been a close enough cousin to actually studying that it boosted her grade just enough to qualify for an E. Maybe it was that she just got lucky with the easy proctor for DADA.

Whatever the case was, now she was signed up to keep going in DADA and she was absolutely certain it was going to be a huge mistake and she really should have just begged her Head of House’s mercy to let her keep trying to understand Transfiguration.

She’d give it the first month. If there were too many nightmares, it might still come to that. Or maybe she’d just take two RATS classes. That’s all you needed to graduate, right? And while she didn’t need an advanced degree to work at her mother’s ranch, it would look better to mom’s clients if she did, especially if she planned to take it over someday, which she did, and degree programs liked seeing at least three RATS, and DADA was probably slightly more relevant than Transfiguration anyway, because that could help you defend your stock from magical predators.

But it had been a few weeks and it had been blessedly mostly book work so far. In most classes, that would be a bad thing for her, since she did better with practical work than theory work, but she would make an exception for DADA. Unfortunately, it looked like that streak was coming to an end today.

So, for the good of her horses, she would do this. She was willing to muck her way through piles of horse poop for their well being and she could pick a cursed item out of a box for the chance to do right by them in the long run. Though cursed objects were unlikely to be something winged horsed had to be rescued from too often.

Bribery with shiny jewelry helped, too.

She took an inordinately long time deciding, not least because she didn’t yet know which dress she would be wearing to the ball, but eventually the call of a nice looking necklace with a pretty blue stone (she did not know if it was an actual sapphire or just a glass imitation, but if it was a fake, it was a nice one) spoke louder than the others and she accepted that as her assignment for the day. She picked it up carefully by its box so as to avoid touching the cursed jewelry directly.

Returning to her seat, she picked up her wand and stared at her new necklace and wondered where they were supposed to start. She had the paper with the counter curses, but did you just start at the top and try all of them?

Fortunately, Gary was sitting next to her and Gary was an Aladren.

And Gary sometimes asked dumb questions.

“I was just trying to remember how we are supposed to find that out,” she told him. “I suppose I hope for the Tickling Hex because that one seems the least awful of the ones on the sheet, in case I don’t clear it right and then get cursed.”

“Did you catch what we’re supposed to do to find out what curses are on here?”

She looked over at his item and smiled. “Oh, you picked the matching bracelet! I was thinking about that one but decided to go with the necklace instead.”

1 Jasmine Delachene I’m here for the horses. And the shinies. But mostly the horses. 1397 0 5

Gary Harper

January 07, 2020 4:56 PM

The horses do need you. by Gary Harper

"Well..." Gary started quietly as she looked over and noticed the bracelet he had picked out. He stopped as she commented on his selection. Really? It matched? He looked over at her necklace, and sure enough there were definitely some similar motifs between the two of them. He decided to take that as a sign from above that his plan had met with the approval of the higher powers that oversee these sorts of things. Or.. he had just rolled a natural 20, and now the universe needed to balance those scales with a critical failure. Perhaps some more testing and observations needed to be taken before jumping to any conclusions.

"Well, " he started again, "if we can get these cursed cleaned off of it, it's all yours if you want it." He paused a moment, the was probably the best opportunity to bring up the discussion of the ball. But, to do that without arousing her suspicion that he was desperate, scared and had no idea what he was doing, would be difficult. Maybe a joke of some sort? He put on a grin that he hoped didn't betray to much of his nervousness, "It'll look a lot better on you at the ball than on me."

"As for figuring out what curses we've got to work with," he started flipping through his notes from the past few days, "The easiest way is just to touch it, but I'm pretty sure that's not the best way. Aha!" He grinned properly as his eyes scanned down the page and found what he had been looking for. "Here it is, 'Revelio'". he turned his notebook to face her so she could see his terrible handwriting describing the incantation and wand movements. "Shall we give it a try?"

2 Gary Harper The horses do need you. 1404 0 5

Cleo James

January 13, 2020 2:43 AM

Try telling guys that by Cleo James

CW - mild allusions to sexual assault, and subsequent mental health issues

Cleo had kept Defence Against the Dark Arts because she was in it. Admittedly, Veela had been covered at Intermediate level - a fact that she was unlikely to forget in a hurry. Being the subject of a class lecture was bound to stick with you, even though she’d been excused from the class itself. Still, given that she was a dark object, she figured a thorough grounding in how they worked might be kind of handy.

Though essential, it was rarely cheerful, and today’s lecture was no exception. Cursed objects. People were just so vile. Why would anyone do this? Admittedly, the horrors of human nature were not a new subject to her either, and she almost couldn’t muster the energy to be disgusted. She had used up quite a lot of her reserves on that front the previous year. She also couldn’t say she wasn’t tempted… There were, she thought, justifiable reasons for hurting someone. Like, if they had hurt you. If they had hurt you, and justice wasn’t on your side, maybe you had to do something about it yourself. The main thing stopping her sending Blake Brize-Norton jinxes by mail was not that it was morally wrong but that she had no idea how to do it without getting caught.

She tried not to think that this class might help her with that. She was vaguely aware that it was wrong to think such things, but she couldn’t decide how wrong. The one thing she had wanted was not to give into her veela powers and be some dark, creepy monster that played with men like toys, or made them do crazy things. They had done anyway. And, though few people believed her, her veela side had had nothing to do with it. It had just been him behaving like trash. Whilst it was not a very nice thought to hope he died horribly, or to want to have a hand in it, she wasn’t sure it was the veela part of her that thought that. And she wasn’t sure it was unjustified.

This lesson also made her want to hit her head against the desk because it was a reminder of the existence of the ball. She had really hoped they would get past Midterm before the teachers started ramming that down their throats and everyone started going kind of crazy about it. The prefects had to lead the dance. She was a prefect. Parker was a prefect. They had gone before and he was still her best friend. It should have been very very easy and it was just a dance… She just wasn’t sure how she felt about it, any of it. And Professor Skies had pointed out that if anyone was really stuck for a date or had any concerns they should see her, or another adult, and talk it through. She wasn’t going to force anyone to be humiliated or uncomfortable. But- It was months away. Cleo just pushed it out of her mind. Or at least, did so as best she could when their lesson was a concrete reminder of the subject.

She selected a piece almost at random. She had never been a super fussy, into appearances kind of girl anyway, and the second half of the last year she’d done as much as possible to not even be looked at. It was a little enamel ring with flowers on it. She guessed that wasn’t much of a coincidence. It was for girls. Girls liked flowers. Still, she felt slightly more motivated to make it hex free and claim it as her own.

“Revelio,” she cast, once she had placed it down on her desk, watching as various swirls appeared in the air, suggesting the spells that had been placed on it. They seemed familiar but it was sort of hard to interpret. She cast a glance at her neighbour’s work to see if they were getting any further than she was.

13 Cleo James Try telling guys that 389 0 5

Jasmine Delachene

January 23, 2020 1:53 PM

Naturally by Jasmine Delachene

It was as Jasmine suspected. Gary had no idea how to ask a girl out. Professor Hawthorne literally provided ball asking props and what does he do with them? A throwaway comment that could be taken any number of ways and them a quick change of subject to the lesson at hand.

Still, she didn’t want to alienate this best chance for getting a date, so she didn’t sigh out loud or roll her eyes. She even tried to be attentive to his help with the DADA assignment, though honestly that wasn’t really on the top of her list of things she wanted to discuss with Gary right now.

“Yes, let’s avoid touching the object with multiple unpleasant curses on it,” she agreed dryly to his rejection of that terrible idea.

She peered over at his notebook as he showed her the part that had the spell they were supposed to be using. His handwriting was barely legible, but she had practice reading Anya’s so she figured it out. Great. Well, they could start working un de-cursing the pretty jewelry anyway. She practiced the wand motionas he had written it, then nodded. “Yes, let’s try it.”

“Revelio!” she cast at her necklace.

The answering magic was faint, and she could only make out one of the curses layered onto her item. Maybe it was the most recently cast one and it blocked out what was under it? Or maybe she hadn’t cast the spell entirely correctly. Either way, she did know one of them.

“Ugh. Pimple hex. I do not want that.” Maybe a nudge would help, a reintroduction of the subject? “Not now, and definitely not at the ball.”

1 Jasmine Delachene Naturally 1397 0 5

Gary Harper

January 23, 2020 7:02 PM

Together we will triumph! by Gary Harper

Ugh.... this wasn't going well. Gary wasn't sure how, but he could feel the situation degrading. Jasmine's response to his farcical solution for revealing the curses hadn't evoked any level of amused response, nor did his self-deprecating attempt at humor seem to soften her attitude towards him. Instead it seemed to have possibly raised some of her defenses? This encounter was going poorly, and he couldn't afford to fail. That was one of the reasons he had refocused on the classwork. He was well aware that his intelligence stat was way better than his charisma.

Unfortunately, his terrible charisma was failing him, so he had switched tactics. If he could instead use his INT to help her solve the classwork problem, perhaps that would leave her more receptive to the idea of thinking about possibly being his date to the ball. Maybe. However, he was also aware that this was also a tricky line to walk. She wasn't great at this class, but she had made it. While he was helping her, he had to impress her while not showing off and putting her down and at the same time not pandering to her. that sounded like it was going to rely heavily on is wisdom stat. At least he had a shot with that one... unlike his stupid charisma score.

He watched as he she cast the Reveilo and get a response! Awesome! It looked like her wand movement was a little off, but it had still worked! He could work with that. He grimaced at her comment about pimples. He had to agree getting them at the ball would be terrible.

Wait. Perception senses tingling... Had she brought up the ball? Well, these things were for wearing at the ball, right? It made sense, plus he had mentioned it as well. But... when he had mentioned it, he was looking to gauge a reaction from her... was it possible that she might be doing the same thing? He should probably give her a reaction then, something positive. Something that might help continue the conversation in that direction... something not sitting here staring at her blankly.

Gary snapped himself out of his reverie. "Awesome! You got one!" No plan yet, need to think some more, need a distraction. He picked up the sheet that the professor had given them and handed it to her. "Next step then, once identified, find the counter curse." He smiled encouragingly as his mind raced.

Objective: ask Jasmine to be his date for the ball without making a complete and utter fool of himself.
Obstacles: terrible charisma, no information on plans she already has, insufficient information on her feelings towards him.
Assets: Temporary captive audience, decent intelligence stat, Jasmine's fondness for Disney princesses..?

Plan step one: Obstacle 1 insurmountable, focus on obstacle 2.
Plan step two: Inquire as to current ball plans.
Plan step three: to be determined in accordance with the results of step two.

"So...." Gary began slowly. No! Confidence, asset 3 indicates a propensity for fancy ball type things. He just needs to be the prince that she wants to accompany her to such an occasion. Ugh.. reference plan step 1. Still... he gathered what high charisma characters he'd played to channel and hoped the fate was with him. "I'd hate to see you covered in pimples at the ball. It would mar your lovely visage." That had definitely sounded better in his head. Charisma failure again, return to intelligence based tasks for positive modifiers!

He turned to his own bracelet and cast the revelio charm with a minor imperfection so that one of it's curses was revealed. "Hmm, looks like I've got a tongue-tying curse." Maybe he should have touched this one. Oh well, no point in delaying the inevitable any longer. He looked back over at Jasmine, "Speaking of, have you made plans for the ball yet?"

2 Gary Harper Together we will triumph! 1404 0 5

Jasmine Delachene

February 20, 2020 7:06 PM

Triumph sounds a very high bar to reach for by Jasmine Delachene

Jasmine felt a quick rush of pleased satisfaction as Gary praised her for identifying the first curse, but it was swiftly swallowed by irritation as he gave her the handout to determine the counter curse instead of picking up on her attempt to steer the conversation back to the ball. The next time she figured out a boy had a crush on her, she was going to have to ensure the boy wasn't an Aladren. Aladrens were altogether too focused on schoolwork when the last thing she wanted to deal with was pimple hexes.

Suppressing a groan, she looked at the handout. She may as well get a passing grade from this disaster even if she didn't get a date. Gah, who in their right mind goes through the effort of creating magic to make pimples? Weren't pimples enough of a problem naturally without creating more? Who wanted to look at pimples, even on their enemies? Pimples were just nasty. Why did this hex even exist?

According the handout, the pimple hex could be cleared by boil-cure potion, but she didn't see a counter-curse incantation for it. Professor Hawthorne hadn't said anything about potions, and she wasn't sure that would do anything for a curse object rather than the actual effects of the hex after it went off. So she'd probably need to use the Finite then. Good. She knew Finite.

She cast it as Gary revealed one of the curses on his bracelet. Okay, good. So she'd done it right then, and it was just supposed to reveal one at a time. Surprising. But good.

And then, just as she was about to cast the revealing charm again to see if her finite had worked and/or to find out the next curse she had to deal with, she was surprised by Gary bringing the conversation back around to the ball for the third time. Perhaps he wasn't as clueless as she'd thought? This was promising.

"No plans yet," she told him, smiling expectantly at him and waiting.

1 Jasmine Delachene Triumph sounds a very high bar to reach for 1397 0 5

Gary Harper

February 21, 2020 8:03 PM

Have faith in your dreams by Gary Harper

"Excellent!" he praised Jasmine as she cleared the pimple hex from her necklace. He whisked away his tongue-tying curse with the finite spell just as she had done. He probably should have consulted the list to see if there was an actual counter for the curse, but part of his brain argued that there wasn't a point in memorizing a lot of different specific spells if one general one will function just as well. Sure, you could counter a fireball by casting your own fireball, but if you have dispell that will work on any spell thrown at you, why not prepare and it instead?

Practice and flexibility another section of his mind argued back. Learning the root causes and effects of the specific magics will get you a better understanding of how those forces work and possible other uses for those counter spells. Any more self-inflicted arguments were quickly stifled as Jasmine responded to his question... with a smile! She had said she didn't have any plans!

He couldn't help but grin, and his mouth started moving before he could stop it. "No plans? Someone as lovely as you? Unthinkable. If you would allow it, I would consider it an honor to escort you to the ball this year." He was in deep now, should he say more? Should he just let it go at that? Wait... he would wait and see how she responded.

2 Gary Harper Have faith in your dreams 1404 0 5

Jasmine Delachene

February 25, 2020 6:02 PM

It's not my dreams I lack faith in by Jasmine Delachene

She was not one hundred percent sure whether she should be flattered that he called her lovely, or irritated that he was reminding her that she didn't already have a date. But there it was. Finally. An offer. Not quite a question, but definitely an offer. In light of that, she decided to be flattered.

"I would be glad for the escort," she returned formally, her partly dimmed smile shining back up to full brilliance, feeling very pleased with life now that (a) she had successfully secured a date to the ball, and (b) knew what 'escort' meant and how to use it in a sentence.

So. That was step one. Step two could now begin. Jasmine liked step two. It was much less nerve wracking than hoping a boy would ask her out. "So this necklace and bracelet set are a good start," she opened the discussion on wardrobe. "I like the blue stone in them. Do we want to both wear blue?" She had some nice gowns with various shades of blue, but not specifically this shade, though the one was close. "Or something more neutral that would make the blue stand out more? Maybe with blue accents for both of us?"

1 Jasmine Delachene It's not my dreams I lack faith in 1397 0 5