Sylvia Mordue
August 12, 2020 7:46 AM
A helping hand (tag Heinrich) by Sylvia Mordue
(OOC permission to god-mod accepting the situation obtained from both authors)Sylvia made her way to the potions room at the appointed time. Her grades had not slipped to the point of disgrace, as she wouldn’t lower herself to anything below an ‘A,’ but it had been enough of a decline that asking for some further help, perhaps from a peer who had the right ideas, had been a reasonable move. She had been able to pinpoint her problem as ingredient preparation, and had suggested to Professor Brooding-Hawthorne that the extended time available for that activity during the potions assistantship sessions might help her to catch up. She had rather expected Professor Brooding-Hawthorne to jump at that, after all she was usually so sickenly chipper about wanting to help them all. However, the professor had wanted to check it was alright with Heinrich first, seeing as it was his assistantship. Sylvia thought that if Heinrich was unkind and ill-mannered enough not to want to help his fellow students, that would be a pretty damning character flaw.
Happily though, he had accepted. That pointed toward Heinrich at least being easier going than Evelyn was. He’d been harder to get on his own, but - as her planning proved - not impossible. Admittedly, her life might have been easier if he simply didn’t exist at all, but well… here he was, and Sylvia was aware that resorting to murder over this would be rather an extreme reaction. It also wouldn’t really be helpful as murder was famously difficult to get away with. Heinrich wasn’t even that big of a problem really. Nate had respectability credentials which Heinrich did not, and thus anyone remotely logical would choose him. It was she who was going to struggle. It was she who had to resort to the illogical to make progress.
She politely knocked on the potions room door. She had decided it would be sensible to wear her school robes so that she was clearly practically dressed and ready for the task at hand. He was an Aladren, and they valued seriousness after all. Her long dark hair was tied back in the same elaborate mermaid braid she’d had it in for class, although she’d been sure to make it neat and tidy before coming. First impressions counted. She made sure to smile nicely at Heinrich.
“Thank you for having me,” she said politely. “I just needed a chance to spend some extra time on ingredient preparation and I’ve noticed how neatly yours is always done,” she stated, assuming Professor Brooding-Hawthorne would have explained the reason for her coming but figuring it didn’t hurt to reiterate, especially as she wasn’t really sure what else they might say to each other. “I’ll try not to be a bother, I know you’re busy. I just thought it would be helpful to get some extra practise without the time pressure of a class deadline.”
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Sylvia Mordue
A helping hand (tag Heinrich)
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Heinrich Hexenmeister
August 12, 2020 5:38 PM
I am getting too popular by Heinrich Hexenmeister
Heinrich had been in Sylvia's class for six years, and their yeargroup was the smallest one in the school, so he knew who Sylvia was. She was also the person in their yeargroup that he had encountered the least. Nathaniel he knew the best, as they were both doing Quidditch and prefecting. Caitlin and Michael were likewise co-prefects. Beau had been one of the people he ended up tenting with during the last bonfire.So he was surprised when Professor Brooding-Hawthorne asked if it would be alright if she were to join him for his potions assistant time this week to work on her ingredient preparation skills. Having no good reason to refuse, he had agreed, though he would not say he was looking forward to having another person about during his quiet time of working in the potions room.
She arrived with a smile and he nodded back equally polite, though he wasn't one to distribute a lot of smiles, so she back got more of a bland expression than she'd offered. "Hello," he said, careful of his pronunciation so he said the greeting the English way and not the German way. "It is no trouble," he promised, hoping this would be true. He had only one thread of uncertainty about his role in her presence here today, so he asked it up front, "Do you seek advice, or just to have practice opportunity?"
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Heinrich Hexenmeister
I am getting too popular
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Sylvia Mordue
August 13, 2020 7:03 AM
You should look happier about it by Sylvia Mordue
Sylvia was a little surprised when she didn’t get a smile in return, although she didn’t let it show on her face. She had observed Heinrich in class enough to know that he was a generally serious sort of person, although she would have thought she was worth smiling at. He’d also be more attractive if he smiled. Still, he was being friendly enough. More so already than Evelyn had been – though he had managed that before she’d even got through the door.“Maybe a little of both?” she suggested, regarding whether she needed specific instruction or just to make use of the time. “I think it will be good for me to just to have the extra practice, but maybe I can keep an eye on what you do, and you can keep an eye on what I do? If I see anything where I see you have better technique, I can ask. If you can see any specific things I need to practise, or where you have pointers, you can let me know,” she suggested.
“I don’t think I’m bad at anything, exactly,” she stated, well aware that Aladrens would value competency to a certain extent, and also well aware that this was true in her case, “Just some of the ingredients we have to handle this year are very complex. Or, if a brew says simmer for thirty minutes then… well, that’s fine. Thirty minutes is thirty minutes. But the recipes never say how long to spend finely slicing your acacia root or whatever else, so it’s easy to start feeling like you’re spending too long, or not long enough – it’s the easiest bit to get wrong, really, especially when you start putting yourself under pressure. Do you find that at all?” she asked.
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Sylvia Mordue
You should look happier about it
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Heinrich Hexenmeister
September 07, 2020 11:30 AM
Why? by Heinrich Hexenmeister
"This is agreeable," Heinrich agreed to Sylvia's suggestion to do their own things but watch each other's preparations. He would not have to explain what he was doing, which he was glad about, both because he was not sure he could provide verbal commentary that would do any more than draw attention to what his hands were doing anyway, and because he was not sure it could be done without sounding slightly patronizing when Sylvia was in his own year group.He shook his head slightly when she asked if he experienced the same difficulty she did in knowing when an ingredient was done being prepared. Again, he was uncertain he could provide words that were not patronizing, but now they were required of him, so he tried to explain as best he could. "They do not say how long to slice your roots because how long it takes depends on how efficient your cuts are. The recipe maker is seeking a specific amount of cutting that may take longer for some people than others. Simmering always takes the same amount of time. You cannot simmer more efficiently than anyone else. That is just how long it takes the heat and water to have its effect on the ingredients. Slicing is more variable. If you cut like this," he selected a root from the ingredients arrayed in front of himself, and carefully sliced through it a few times, being very deliberate and precise in how thin each sliced bit was, "it will take longer than if you cut like this," he began taking much quicker, obviously well practiced, but much less deliberate slices off the root.
After his pile of slices had more than doubled in a fraction of the time it took to make the original pile, he picked up one of the thicker slices from the second round of cutting. "This is a bit larger than ideal, so I would cut this slice again," he carefully did so, being about as careful about it as he had been for the first slices because now there was a risk of cutting his fingers if he went too quickly, "but if you had thrown that into your potion, it would still work. It just might not be as potent, and there could be a lump. For slices, you're looking for cuts that are about this wide." He held out a slice of root that was the right thickness. "A little variation is acceptable, but you probably do not want to have slices thinner than this, or thicker than this," he sliced two more cuts off the root to show her the extremes of what still counted as good slices. "You can hold onto those to compare to yours until you get a good eye for it from practice," he offered, pushing the three slices - lower limit, upper limit, and ideal - closer to her spot at the table.
"Is that helpful?" he asked hopefully.
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Heinrich Hexenmeister
Why?
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Sylvia Mordue
September 08, 2020 9:56 PM
Being popular is important by Sylvia Mordue
"Yes, that's my point exactly," Sylvia nodded. Heinrich seemed slightly like he had misunderstood from the way he was phrasing things, but they were talking about the same thing now, and she wanted to keep it friendly."Simmer for thirty minutes is clear. You have to be very careless to get it wrong. But slicing and preparing... It takes as long as it takes. You want to do it carefully and properly, but you have to leave yourself enough time to brew. When I have spare time after making a potion, I'm always wondering whether that means I rushed my preparation," she tried to explain, hoping she could make the point clear without making it sound like she was bad at anything. It was a fine balancing act between having a reason to be here and making herself sound incompetent.
She watched him slice up the root, paying careful attention. She was pretty sure she could identify which were the right slices, even without his help, not that that made it easier to achieve.
"Yes," she smiled, when he asked if he was helping, "Thank you." She took the offered root slices and began working on her own, going slower than Heinrich had. That part was not an act - his extra hours in the potion lab were clearly paying off, and Sylvia had always been far too fond of her own fingers to risk wielding a knife quickly. She sliced at a rhythm which was definitely within the margins of acceptable, one which would see her preparation completed in time nine times out of ten, but which was slow and careful.
She worked in silence for a few minutes, making sure she was giving her root and Heinrich's demonstration slices clear and careful attention, and allowing him to continue his own work.
"I read an article in a potions journal during the holidays," she commented, as she finished up, figuring that any damage she was doing her practical reputation here could hopefully be made up for with academics. "There's this rather extreme school of though that you should just mash everything to pieces. It releases the most juice and has the maximum surface area that way. It tends to make potions that are deathly strong, but most of which can then be diluted down to something useful - they argue it's the most effective use of ingredients, better than something too weak which is no use to anyone. Someone investigated that for the ten most commonly made potions. Suffice to say, I don't think we'll be switching to that method any time soon, even if it would save time," she summarised, with an amused smile.
"You refine your slices afterwards," she observed, sifting through her pile of sliced roots, paring a little extra off one even though she suspected it was actually fine. "I mean, I do too, if there are any that are obviously wrong, but I think I also put a lot of pressure on myself to get things right first time. I'd rather not make mistakes in the first place than go back and fix them. Do you think one way works out faster overall, or do they average out?" she asked.
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Sylvia Mordue
Being popular is important
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