Looking for a Muse, or artificial substitute. on Library

Jessica Hayles

July 19, 2021 8:14 PM

Looking for a Muse, or artificial substitute. by Jessica Hayles

Her hair and skin looked odd, Jessica thought, when reflected in yellow gold. Her complexion looked almost normal, but the yellow tone didn’t quite fail to show up, and her hair just looked….

She frowned slightly, but not because of her reflection and what the gold did to its appearance. Or at least, not because she looked a bit odd in it. It was more the realization that she was, well, looking at her reflection at all. In the nib of her pen. Which was supposed to be used for writing, not as a makeshift mirror. Groaning internally, she put down her pen on the pad of paper in front of her and covered her face with her hands.

She had come to the library today determined to write, to stay in her chair until she had at least a rough draft of at least one new poem finished and in front of her. Instead of writing, though, she was idly gazing at herself in her pen nib, of all things imaginable…could she make something out of that? Vanity, gold, unreliable reflections…she pressed the end of her pen’s cap into the skin just below her bottom lip, but the ideas refused to coalesce. The words wouldn’t come to her, her brain just felt flat, and like there was a veil of fog between her and English. Nothing would rise and converge. She might as well have been a complete newcomer to verse, and one with no real inclination for poetry – one who wanted to write, but one who had no inherent gift, and no experience to draw on to make up for these dull edges and get her through it until the muses came back.

Maybe she should actually recite some of the Odyssey or something, try to encourage Calliope to visit her. Or….

Jessica glanced around at the books extending in all directions around her. She knew wizards could affect the brain with magic – they had learned Cheering Charms and Memory Charms, Calming Draughts and such in Potions. Was it possible, then, to magic one’s way into flow?

It couldn’t hurt to look, she reasoned. She put her pen and pad in her bag and went into the Charms section, skimming the rows of titles, unsure what sort of title she’d need – until, focused on trying to read often strange fonts in chipped gilt and keep walking at the same time, she only narrowly avoided bumping into someone.

16 Jessica Hayles Looking for a Muse, or artificial substitute. 1442 1 5

Sapphire Brockert

July 20, 2021 10:00 AM

Sorry to disappoint by Sapphire Brockert

Sapphire was so incredibly freaked out about CATS. They were getting closer and closer every single day and every single day, she woke up feeling like she couldn't breathe because the first thought that she had every day was that she was going to have to get up and study for the dreaded exams. Why, she was so anxious about them that she couldn't even get excited about the fact that Topaz would be graduating at the end of the year and that she wouldn't have to be around the Aladren as much after this summer. After all, what would it matter that her older sister had graduated if Sapphire flunked out?

She was honestly seriously exhausted too. Between getting up early and staying up late to study, being kept awake worrying about failing her exams, and the nightmares she had when she finally did fall asleep either about CATS or the good old fashioned ones about Topaz or some heinous combination of both, she wasn't sleeping very much or very well at all. Which, of course, made it hard to concentrate on magical theory that Sapphire not only found complicated but also did not find to be particularly interesting.

On the plus side, it did occasionally put her to sleep, but she never stayed that way for very long. For one thing, the Crotalus was afraid to sleep in any place that Topaz could access so if she drifted off in the library, for example, her sister could get to her. Sapphire was only comfortable sleeping within the confines of Crotalus because nobody there would hurt her. Even if Jezebel didn't like her, Sapphire didn't think her roommate would harm her. She'd had ample opportunity and would probably have done so by now if she was going to.

Still, the fifth year wasn't sure how much more she could take. Not just of the studying, which could be quite dull, but of the anxiety and lack of sleep. Half of the time she felt like she was either going to throw up or start crying. So far, she had given into the latter a few times, despite trying so hard not to, especially outside of her own house, being that Sapphire never knew where Topaz might be lurking. The Aladren would certainly give her a hard time if she caught her doing so.

All that Sapphire wanted was for it all to be over, both the CATS stress and living in fear of her older sister, not that she was at all optimistic about the latter ever being possible. And, of course, there were problems regarding the former as well. Yes, she wouldn't be on the verge of panicking so much, but nor did she like the idea of what would happen when she flunked out of school and ended up shaming her whole family.

Which meant that for now, Sapphire had to keep going. Today she was going to be studying for Charms and she had to leave Crotalus, where she strongly preferred to study because Topaz couldn't go there and she could have Allegra and Esme help her, not that they couldn't go to the library and elsewhere,-although for obvious reasons, Allegra also preferred to stay in Crotalus,- and go to the library to get a book she needed.

Sapphire headed into the Charms section, keeping her eyes peeled for Topaz. Which come to think of it, was a terrible idea, peeling eyeballs wasn't something she wanted to do for the seventh year or anyone else and totally sounded like something that the Aladren would actually do.

She was searching the stacks for the book she wanted when she felt someone approach and nearly jumped out of her skin, afraid that it was Topaz but only seeing Jessica Hayles from her house. "Oops, sorry." Sapphire apologized to the older Crotalus as they nearly collided.

11 Sapphire Brockert Sorry to disappoint 1459 0 5

Jessica Hayles

July 21, 2021 10:39 PM

If you're a hero, I could make you into a tragedy. by Jessica Hayles

Jessica put a hand up to her heart in surprise, even though the surprise was really very mild as far as such things went; her heart had given her a somewhat uneven, noticeable thump, but it hardly started racing. There was nowhere near enough adrenaline in this situation for making such a gesture. Great. Even her gestures were devolving into those of a total hack...

"Gosh, sorry," she said, trying to remember the younger girl's name. One of the Brockert girls - one who looked rather unlike a couple of her sisters - Sapphire? Yeah, that sounded right; she was in Jessica's House, but her name always made Jessica's brain try to associate her with Aladren. Because sapphires were blue, and blue was one of Aladren's House colors. Because that was definitely the thought of someone with the least glimmer of originality of thought or expression....

"Am I in your way?" she asked, distracting herself from her worries about her appalling dullness by putting on her prefect hat. A prefect was supposed to be fairly bland when being helpful to younger students and such. Originality wasn't totally anathema to a proper performance of the job, but it was low on the list of necessary qualities. "Or can I help you with anything?" she added, and then promptly shoved away the little voice in her head that made a snide remark about now sounding like one of the girls working on one of the Arvale counters in a department store.

16 Jessica Hayles If you're a hero, I could make you into a tragedy. 1442 0 5

Sapphire Brockert

July 22, 2021 9:32 AM

I'm actually trying to avoid that by Sapphire Brockert

"It's all right." Sapphire assured the other girl. "I should have been paying more attention." Which wasn't exactly true, she had been paying attention because she was hyper aware of her surroundings whenever she left her common room in case Topaz was lurking nearby. On the other hand,she was excessively tired, which was most likely seriously impairing her ability to be as hyper aware as she should be.

Besides, it was in her nature to be the one to apologize and blame herself. Sapphire wasn't sure why, exactly, because when she later thought about something logically, it was rarely her that was at fault. Usually, things were done to her, not by her. Still, she tried to avoid conflict at all costs and she supposed apologizing was a tactic to do precisely that.

So was not fighting back. After all, fighting back was absolutely the worst possible thing for Sapphire to do when the person she was up against was usually Topaz. That would only make the Aladren do something even worse back to her and the first thing was usually vile enough. Plus, she never would have been able to figure out what to say or do to stand up for herself in the first place and even if she had, she wouldn't be able to keep going for very long before her sister-or anyone but usually Topaz-eventually ended up beating her. Why prolong the agony?

Not that this situation was anything like that. Neither of them did anything to make a big deal out of. If anything seemed at all heightened, it was in Sapphire's mind. The exhaustion and her justifiable paranoia about her older sister just made her jumpy and nervous and skewed reality to make it all more dramatic in her mind. "No, you're not in my way at all." The fifth year replied. "I'm just looking for some books on Charms theory." Sapphire instinctively made a face at the mention of any sort of theory. She couldn't help it. Hopefully Jessica would simply take it as her finding the topic dull. Which she did. It was just that the fifth year also found it difficult to understand as well.

Maybe the two were related though. Maybe if Sapphire found it more interesting, she'd find it easier to understand. She doubted that though. She simply just wasn't smart enough. "I'm studying for CATS." The younger Crotalus added. Then she realized something. Jessica had taken the test last year. "Do you remember what sort of material was on it? What I might need to know?" Maybe instead of studying everything, Sapphire could do it more efficiently by focusing on something she specifically knew would be on there.

11 Sapphire Brockert I'm actually trying to avoid that 1459 0 5

Jessica Hayles

July 22, 2021 6:43 PM

Oh, uh...how about a deus ex machina? by Jessica Hayles

Jessica smiled at the younger girl and considered the effort (and potential for endless circular spiraling as they both did the thing polite girls did and kept trying to absolve the other until they just sort of wanted to knock each other's teeth out instead) involved in carrying on with trying to reassure her. She decided it would be a better use of time for everyone involved if she just split the difference and called it a day. She knew she hadn't been paying enough attention to what she'd been doing, but a consequence of that was that she couldn't actually say if the same was true for Sapphire or not.

"Let's just call it no harm, no foul on both sides, okay?" she suggested instead.

Her mood brightened a little when she was asked for advice about doing well on written exams. This, at least, was something she could still speak authoritatively about in good faith. Probably. "I remember it pretty well," she agreed, thinking back on her Charms CATS exams. "I'm guessing they probably change up the specific questions from year to year, but there's probably general trends in the subjects, and how the questions are put together. Want to go sit down?" she offered, gesturing back in the direction she had come from. "I have some paper and a pen if you want to take notes." Probably a pureblood girl would be slightly confused by a fountain pen, but it worked similarly enough to a quill - the only real difference was that it was a bit easier to grip and didn't need dipping all the time - that it should be fairly easy for her to adapt to if she needed.

16 Jessica Hayles Oh, uh...how about a deus ex machina? 1442 0 5

Sapphire Brockert

July 24, 2021 11:23 AM

I kind of like the sound of that by Sapphire Brockert

"Sounds like a plan." Sapphire replied. It honestly was not worth the effort to keep going back and forth apologizing about something that wasn't really any big deal in the first place. She had far more important things on her mind. Like whether or not she was going to pass her CATS. The fifth year felt like she had to spend every spare minute of the day studying or she was going to be completely and utterly doomed to fail the written part and flunk out of school.

All that Sapphire really wanted to do was stop and take a break. She could not remember the last time that she had done something that was fun or relaxing or even remotely pleasant. She knew full well that she was not built to be constantly on the go and doing something that, for her, took a lot of energy and effort, the former of which she was obviously quite low on considering the fact that her sleep had been interfered with.

And not only was her sleep affected, but so was her appetite. Sapphire was so stressed and anxious about potentially failing her CATS, flunking out of school, shaming her family and having to deal with the harassment that Topaz was going to inflict on her, that her stomach was constantly in knots. Therefore, she could barely eat anything at all.

She knew that going on like this was not good for her, that she really wasn't taking care of herself at all and that could affect her epilepsy. Sapphire was afraid that she'd been having seizures again, but being that she was currently overall fairly out of it, she couldn't tell if the reasons she was zoning out here and there were seizures, general fatigue or the effects of reading (or attempting to read) seriously difficult and seriously boring theory.

The truly depressing thing though was that even when Sapphire finished taking the test, she still wouldn't be off the hook. First there would be the unbearable waiting to see if she passed at all, let alone with good enough grades to keep taking the classes she wanted to keep taking. Then even if that was the case, what would really be the reward? Having to actually take RATS level classes with RATS level theory. Honestly, Sapphire wished there was a way where she could just do the practical parts of Advanced lessons. It wasn't as if she was going to have a career in the first place so why did she need to know how a Transfiguration worked? Especially if it was going to involve stupid Muggle science stuff.

Which just reminded the Crotalus that even once she got her scores back and even if she did really well overall...her summer was still not going to be a relaxing break really. She was sixteen years old which meant parties. Which meant having to try to impress others, especially young men. Sapphire was naturally worried that they would find her too dull, both in terms of intellect and in terms of being an interesting person. After all, her classmates didn't seem to be interested in her, so why would anyone else be? She was legitimately worried that the only kind of men she'd attract would be the brutish type like her uncle who were only interested in girls who were pretty and from a good family.

Anyway, Sapphire was happy for the moment that at least Jessica was willing to help her study for a bit. "All right. Thanks for helping me." She replied sincerely.

11 Sapphire Brockert I kind of like the sound of that 1459 0 5

Jessica Hayles

July 28, 2021 12:04 AM

Great! Now just to find an engineer.... by Jessica Hayles

Jessica felt a surge of warmth toward the younger Crotalus when Sapphire thanked her preemptively, mixed with something like relief. She had a goal, she had someone she could help and therefore could ignore her own problems and justify not dealing with them. Plus she even indirectly profited, going over material again. There was a lot of material to keep in her head - five years worth of it even before she'd started this year - and she had no idea what was going to be tested on next year in the RATS. Any chances to review without the tedium of doing so properly were welcome.

"You're welcome," she said cheerfully. "Come on, let's get to it."

She put her pen and pad on the table for Sapphire to use if she wanted to, then sat down again. "So, the biggest things are incantations and wand movements," she said. "There's a lot of questions that ask that, or what a certain incantation does. 'What is the name of the charm with the incantation rictusempra, and what are its effects?' kind of stuff." She felt her back relaxing, but doing so by straightening up, not touching her chair; her voice had slipped into the well-enunciated register she used when she was giving a presentation. "There's another kind of question when you have to say what the effect of the charm is, and then explain what two other effects it could have - let's use rictusempra again," she suggested. "You might get a two-part question. The first part might be to say what the main effect of the charm is. The second part would be to name two other effects the spell could have and explain why you say that. Want to give that a try?" she offered. There were at least two other forms of question on the exam, but she thought it might be more helpful to look at one in more detail before rattling off a whole complicated list that might not make sense without specific examples like this.

OOC: Based the example questions Jessica has used so far off an official paper from an OWL Charms Theory exam which...ended up on the HP Wiki at some point, I believe from the very, very first version of Pottermore, back when it looked like a desk, before book 7 was even posted. Though I could remember that part wrong.

16 Jessica Hayles Great! Now just to find an engineer.... 1442 0 5

Sapphire Brockert

July 28, 2021 2:29 PM

Yea, that's definitely not me by Sapphire Brockert

Sapphire sat down at the table, determined to give Jessica her full attention. After all, the older Crotalus was not one of her siblings or cousins and did not have to do this. She supposed Allegra and Esme and Jasper, who was also trying his best to do what he could to help her despite being a third year,didn't have to help her either-after all, Topaz obviously wasn't-but they would be more understanding if she was having issues with paying attention than a non-family member. Jessica was really doing her a favor and the fifth year was incredibly grateful.

Her mouth dropped open in surprise when the older Crotalus told her what the main questions were. "Really? It's basically what spells do and what their wand motion is? I actually know that stuff! I've never had any issues with the practical part of things." When it came right down to it, that was the important part of magic. You didn't need to know all that extraneous stuff about why something was a transfiguration and not a charm and vice versa.

And certainly you didn't need to use science at all. Sapphire would believe people when they said something was a scientific fact, largely because she didn't know any better, but she just didn't want to have to use it at all because it was difficult, confusing, not that interesting and made her head hurt and brain shut down. Besides, Grandfather said that science was this thing Muggles had to use because they didn't have magic. Which made Sapphire feel really bad for Muggles but better about her own future because she would never actually need it.

"All right." She replied. She was so incredibly grateful for Jessica's help that she would do just about anything the older Crotalus suggested in terms of studying." The main effect of rictumsempra is to weaken a target with laughter. It's often used in dueling especially when you don't want to truly hurt someone." Sapphire considered the second part of the question. "I suppose it could also be used if someone is sad and you want to cheer them up by making them laugh. Although I think a cheering charm is the one you would usually use for that."

Jessica had also mentioned that you had to know wand motions. Sapphire considered this and replied "I know how to do the wand motion for rictumsempra and I could draw it but I'm not sure how to explain it with words. Also, I'm not sure about a second use because the one I came up with has a better charm associated with it." She looked down at the table, somewhat embarrassed that she wasn't sure about these things. It was showing a weakness towards someone whom she didn't know all that well and she knew full well that weaknesses were either judged or mocked or exploited. Jessica was not a relative or a Teppenpaw and even the former was not always a guarantee that those things wouldn't happen given that it was her older sister who did them to her the most. Despite the fact that Topaz had been the one to cause most of them, other than the epilepsy.

Still, she hoped Jessica would not do those things and continue to help her.

11 Sapphire Brockert Yea, that's definitely not me 1459 0 5

Jessica Hayles

July 28, 2021 10:32 PM

Oh well, I'm sure there's one around here somewhere. by Jessica Hayles

"That's great!" said Jessica with a smile when Sapphire exulted over knowing the wand movements and incantations. "Yeah, it's not the only kind of question, but you'll see a lot of those. I guess the idea is that they can cover a lot more material there than they can in the practical exam, just in terms of how much time the examiners spend on each student," she explained, or rather, hypothesized. She didn't actually know for sure that that was what was going on, but it made sense to her, looking at the facts and how many days the exams took place over and everything.

She thought about the answer that Sapphire gave her to her hypothetical question about rictusempra. "That's still not too bad," she judged finally, taking into account what Sapphire said about struggling to describe the wand motion in words. "I think I remember from Beginner's Charms, something we did where we learned about wand motions specifically - if you have your old book, or you can find one in here, you could study that for ideas about how to describe things better," she suggested. "But still - not bad. You'd definitely get at least half-credit for that one, and enough half-credits stack up, you know? Definitely better than no credit. If you do well in one area, it can make up for others. For this one, I would answer pretty much how you did on the purpose," she continued. "For the other - I'd add something about how it could strain the muscles of the person I put it on, or make them fall down. To get there, I'd imagine what it feels like to get tickled a lot, how awful that is, even though you can't stop laughing...."

She realized that might sound a little dark, especially beside Sapphire's much nicer idea about trying to get someone to have a dopamine hit from laughter. "I really hate being tickled," she excused herself, shifting the weight of her hair over her shoulder. "But yeah. The point is, a lot of those questions are so open-ended that you can write pretty much anything you can think of and get at least half of how many points that section's worth. Tests are easier to game if you think about them that way, at least for me. Especially with extended responses. I mean...I don't know exactly how they score the CATS," she said honestly. "But back home, for something as long as one of those, there's all these different boxes, and each one of them is worth a certain number of points. You can literally not know much beyond the provided documents, but pass because you added a few sentences of speculation to them, assuming your writing mechanics are clear enough for the examiner to understand what you're saying. They used to tell us - if you can, say everything you know and explain it well, but if you're running out of time, or don't know many things, then explain one or two things really thoroughly and try to squeeze in any extra facts as filler." All of which was rather generic advice. "If you want, you could try writing an answer to a sample question, and I could look over it for you," she suggested. "It might be easier to hook the ideas onto something that way."

16 Jessica Hayles Oh well, I'm sure there's one around here somewhere. 1442 0 5