Wizarding World Works
East Asian Magic
Traditional East Asian magic is most notable for the use of written spells, most particularly Chinese characters written on scrolls. It is believed that the more beautiful the characters, the more potent the magic. Older scrolls written by the more reknowned wizards (and the occasional ambitious witch) are known to contain within them some powerful magic, which can affect those who bear the scrolls or open them. Different scroll materials and brush hairs are believed to have different effects on the characters written, as well as the intention of the drawer.
In modern times, magic has Westernized along with the rest of the area. Old scrolls, while still taught in schools and saved in massive vaults, have now largely been replaced by wand-based magic. Due to the difficulty of correctly pronouncing Latin-based spells for speakers of the Asian languages, however, a number of spells have had to be modified/adapted for their new surroundings. A remaining advantage of old scrolls is that scroll magic is largely undetectable by most current Western spells.
The Organization
This organization has no formal name, and its members refer to themselves not at all. It is not known when exactly it was founded or by whom, but its purpose through the ages has been to protect the sacred nation of Korea. Despite modern politics, they still recognize the area as a unified Goguryeo, suggesting they were founded when Goguryeo existed as a kingdom.
The organization's home base is a massive stone fortress deep in the mountains, wrapped with layers and layers of enchantments, some probably as old as the organization itself, others new and advanced, all meant to ward off, trap, and maybe even kill anyone who could come across them. It is extremely old in style, but still maintained in perfect condition.
Uncharacteristically, the organization is always run by an elder woman known as 대어머니 - Great Mother. As a secret organization, it does not recruit members by normal means. Instead, abandoned magical children are found by members of the organization and brought in to be raised there. They are separated by gender and raised in bulk, but not mistreated. Children are given names bestowed by the Great Mother when they first arrive, and reminded of those names during a meeting with her once a year, but they are referred to by a number by the rest of the organization until they "earn" their name in some way and prove their loyalty to the organization, to the sovereign nation, and to the Great Mother. After they have earned their name, they are given a little bit more freedom to leave the fortress and experience the outside world, but few earn their name before they become fully-fledged adults. Members are only allowed to leave the organization if they have been powerfully obliviated first, and any betrayal to the organization results in torture and death.
A unique aspect of the organization is what is informally known as the wand ceremony. Each child is taken out individually on the day of their birthday to see the Wandmaker. The Wandmaker is an old Korean wizard who has been making wands for nobody knows how long, and he is well-known for having crafted four massive wands modeled after the Four Auspicious Beasts in Chinese "astrology," which are said to be able to judge a person's character and produce powerful magic, if used for the right types of spells.
Wizards and the British Government
It is a commonly known fact that British wizards largely harken to the Ministry of Magic, which in turn communicates with the Prime Minister directly, if somewhat minimally. While this allows witches and wizards to hide in plain sight, it does mean that the citizenship of magical people can be a bit complicated. They don't interact with computer systems, have birth records recorded in any muggle databases, or require muggle travel visas. They don't use muggle money, and many of their residences can't even be found by regular means. In other words, for all intents and purposes, they don't exist. This makes things... interesting when witches and wizards marry muggles, buy muggle properties, or do something that causes people in the government to look them up.
Spy
by firejay1
The story of how Averill Trevelyan's parents, a muggle spy and a wizard, fell in love and got together, despite knowing each others' secrets. (Also stretches on to after Avery was born to the more important moments in his life.)
July 17th, 2003. 8:00am:
Somewhere in an insignificant office in an uninspiring building fronted by a store that sold goods no one really cared about, a man dressed in a simple suit was sitting, staring out the small window that seemed to be his only connection to the outside world. There was a knock on his door. “Who is it?” He called, voice laced with irritation as he twisted his chair back around to the front, placing his hands on the keyboard of his computer as if he’d just been working.
The door opened. “I’m the new hire, Desiree Wray. Is this the office of Mr. Gideon McGuire? I was told to report here to start my training.” In stepped a woman. The woman was unexceptional in appearance, with a tan that didn’t quite suit her and imperfect, angular features. She was on the taller side, or perhaps looked more so because she was fairly skinny, lacking in prominent womanly curves. She was also wearing a suit, though it was of an unimpressive material and didn’t seem to suit her very well. Her sharp grey eyes trained on the man in the room, looking clearly unimpressed and less than eager to begin her on-the-job training.
The man coughed, adjusted his suit and stood. “Yes, I’m Gideon McGuire. Pleasure to make your acquaintance.” He stretched a hand out towards her for her to shake. “What position have you been hired for?”
“Secretarial work, Mr. McGuire.” The woman replied without pause, sounding as if she were struggling to muster up some enthusiasm. “I was told you’d be able to give me some more specifics on what my exact duties would be.”
Gideon McGuire sat back down and nodded to the door. “Do you mind?” The new hire closed the door behind her and waited for his second nod before pulling a chair up to his desk and sitting across from him. “You don’t have to pretend anymore, Ms. Wray. You’re an agent, are you not?”
The woman blinked, her eyebrows raising in surprise. “Excuse me?”
“Come now, I know who you are. Let us speak frankly. You’re the new agent, they’ve sent me, correct?”
The woman’s black eyebrows rose slightly and she scoffed, “Is this some kind of joke?”
She received a frown in reply. “You know it’s not. Now if you don’t mind, drop the act.”
Desiree Wray stood up, her somewhat coarse black ponytail whipping behind her as she shook her head. “I’m sorry, I must have stepped into the wrong office.” A look somewhere between confusion and amusement had set itself into her face.
McGuire stood up abruptly, his hands pressing against the top of the desk. “Please sit down, Agent Wray. I’ve already told you that this room is secure.”
Wray flinched backwards, her arms moving upwards protectively, apparently afraid by his sudden outburst, and finally aware that he was being serious. “I-I- don’t know what you’re talking about.” She stammered, taking several more steps backwards.
Just as she had reached the door, however, it opened calmly and she jumped away from the imposing figure blocking the way. The woman stared at the newcomer warily, glancing between him and the person at the desk. “Is there a problem?” He asked, his expression mild, though he seemed to be frowning at his colleague slightly. “I hope McGuire is not playing one of his horrible pranks again.”
“Oh. Haha...” Desiree gave a slightly shaky, relieved laugh.
Ignoring her reaction, the second man smiled and held out his hand for her to shake. “Ryker Mills, CEO. It’s a pleasure to meet you. I always come to check on our newer employees, if I can. Especially ones assigned to McGuire.” He said, laughing slightly.
Clearly becoming more comfortable, the lady laughed back. “That’s very kind of you, sir. I’m Desiree Wray.”
“Welcome, Ms. Wray. Please, make yourself comfortable. There’s some coffee in the break room a couple doors down, and if you need the restroom, just follow the signs.” He turned his attention to his troublesome employee with a sigh. “Gideon, can you come with me, please?”
Desiree let them leave the room first, then made her way to the break room, understanding that she was not supposed to stay in the office. She poured herself a cup of coffee and let out a hefty sigh as she drank it. For a while she stayed there, drinking her coffee and even picking up a magazine and flipping through it idly, but after enough time had passed, she began staring at the door, tapping her fingers on the kitchen counter, checking her watch. She sat down, then got up again, impatience written into every corner of her being. Finally, she stood up, and as if for want of anything else to do, went out into the hallway. She looked up, something in mind, and stopped as she saw the sign to the bathroom. It was just the universal symbol for “bathroom” with an arrow pointing down the hall. She found it, went into the lady’s restroom and began powdering her nose. She had just finished, when she seemed to notice something on her shoe. In annoyance, she plucked the whatever-it-was from her shoe, glanced at it in disgust for a moment, then tossed it in the wastebasket. She strode out of the restroom, but instead of heading straight back to the break room, she stopped by another person’s desk. “Excuse me.” The person looked up. “I hope you don’t mind me asking, but I’m new here and I’ve been waiting for ages for my mentor to come back after the CEO went to have a talk with him. Do you think you could tell me where to look?”
The man gave a little piffling sigh. “We have this problem every once in a while. You shouldn’t intrude on Mr. Mills’ office, but it’s probably a good idea to wait right outside, there’s a waiting room there.” He drew a quick map and handed it to her, telling her where to go.
“Thank you so much.” She said gratefully, following his instructions and making it to the waiting room. Once the door unhurriedly closed behind her back, however, she didn’t stop to sit down. She calmly went straight to an unmarked door against one wall. It had the distinct look of a storage closet or some such that no one would usually pay much attention to. Without the smallest hesitation, she pulled a single hairpin from her hair and deftly picked the lock, slipping inside a room that was clearly not a storage closet. She locked the door behind her and stepped into the crisp, impressive office, where Mr. McGuire was waiting, a small smile on his lips, his hands folded in front of him. “I must say, for a recruit that came to us with so many commendations from her teachers, you were rather slow, Agent Wray.”
The woman no longer seemed frightened or clueless, her grey eyes were cool and unconcerned, trained on the man with a slightly frightening intensity. “A convincing performance cannot be carried out with too much haste, sir.” Her expression was unreadable, making it impossible to tell whether or not she meant to be impudent.
He smiled back in turn. “Yes, indeed, and you were quite convincing. If I hadn’t already read your file in detail, I would have worried I’d made a mistake and you were one of our normal employees. May I ask, though, why you chose to pick up the message in that manner? Most of our recruits have spilled things over themselves, or some such to make an excuse to go to the bathroom, but not only did you just walk there, you also picked up the message by stepping on it, of all things. It was not perhaps the most prudent move to have simply thrown it straight into the trash.”
Wray smiled, a slightly impish expression of self-satisfaction. “I should think the answer to your questions should be obvious, sir. Normal people don’t give reasons for wanting to go into the bathroom to powder their noses, and goodness how suspicious it would be if I spilled my things all over the floor my very first trip there. Get a little water on a heel with good traction, and it’s almost guaranteed to stick if I step on it with the correct amount of force. As for throwing it straight into the trash, now whoever said I did anything of the sort?” She held up the very tiny crumpled note that simply had the words “ask and then enter” printed on it, though it looked like it had been ripped off of a larger sheet. “Simple sleight of hand would have convinced anyone that the lint I threw into the trashbin was the thing stuck to my shoe.”
Gideon laughed. “Well done, Ms. Wray. Welcome to MI5. I can see you will be quite the asset.”
“Thank you. I’m sure I shall be.” She spoke with mocking self-confidence, her grey eyes glittering with silent laughter.
July 31st, 2003. 8:00am:
Desiree’s first mission was to investigate suspicions of an extremist group based in one of the suburbs of England. Her first mission was not quite what she was expecting, though perhaps in a way exactly what she’d been expecting. That was to say, it was not nearly as exciting as she’d thought it would be, but her training had told her all along it would not be. Desiree was used to living with few possessions and little to no personal space, so having a 1200 sq ft house all to herself and opening up boxes and boxes of items, some of which were useful some of which were clearly not, was a bizarre, out-of-body experience. Anything of true value she owned could easily fit into a single box and maybe a duffel bag. Several very beat up old novels, a small stuffed monkey on a keychain with long arms and Velcro hands, a Swiss army knife, a mug that showed star constellations when you poured hot liquid into it, a pocket flashlight, and a very small, ornate knife that mostly functioned as a letter opener. That was it. Everything else was interchangeable, unimportant. Everything else she could leave without a moment’s thought or hesitation. She picked up a picture frame from one of the boxes. All of the pictures were faked, of course, they couldn’t risk her real family or friends being put in danger if her cover was blown. It felt kind of sad, to not be able to have a single picture of her foster parents, but well, it was safer that way.
She sighed quietly as she placed the picture on her new desk, having set up all the furniture the day before, when she’d arrived. The spy stood up and began opening up some more boxes unenthusiastically, showing no surprise at any of the contents, though she hadn’t actually known what to expect. It was just a regular move, with the regular, tired routines of setting oneself up. This nonsensical porcelain duck went here, the kitchen appliances all go over here, so on and so forth. The doorbell rang, and Desiree paused in surprise. Who could it be?
She got up and went to the door, careful not to hesitate or grab for a weapon. She opened the door without checking the peephole, an act of carelessness that bothered her at a fundamental level, though she had to do that to keep her performance convincing. Just in case. The door swung open, revealing a dorky-looking teen with a cheerful smile and scruffy black hair. He had sort of clueless-looking brown eyes, and seemed harmless enough, holding a paper box in his hands. “Hi. Sorry to intrude, I just heard you’re new to the area. I’m Lysander Trevelyan. Pretty new myself, actually. Erhm…” Desiree watched as he fumbled for his words, suppressing a smile, but then he surprised her by thrusting the box into her hands. “This is a pie!” Her thin eyebrows lifted slightly, the corners of her mouth twisting upwards. “That is to say, the people around here tell me my apple pies are pretty good, so I thought you might like one.” Before she could even get out a proper thanks, he had popped off again, blushing.
The dark-haired woman laughed and shook her head. Her grey eyes glittered with a sort of wicked amusement, and as she closed the door, she muttered to herself, “Cute.” With that, she continued to unpack her things, bustling about the house. She was very inefficient about the whole process, putting things over here, mulling items over in her hands, shuffling things around, it was enough to drive an efficient woman like herself absolutely batty. She had only gotten through about five boxes before she decided to stop for an early lunch. Brushing off her hands in a frustrated manner, she went to her kitchen cabinets, which she’d had the presence of mind to stock with some snacks and drinks. Pulling out a box of Lucky Charms cereal, she plopped down into the single, stiff wooden chair beside her small dining table, having to scrounge around the boxes some more before she found the appropriate bowls. Looked like this was going to have to be lunch. Desiree’s role this time was as a divorced real estate agent settling herself into the suburbs for a change of pace. She was supposed to be lonely, single, and ready to move out at any moment, a role that was perfect for her job as a spy.
So, instead of waking up at six on the dot, unpacking everything within three hours, and cooking herself something with the freshest ingredients she could find in the nearest market, she was eating dry cereal for lunch, having barely unpacked the first few boxes. The whole situation felt rather abysmal.
July 31st, 2003. 11:30am:
Desiree reached into the fridge for some bottled water she’d bought from the airport, and that was when she saw the box. Apple pie, huh? She shrugged. Might as well. Grabbing the box, she took out a slice. It looked safe enough to her, so she made possibly the biggest mistake of her life and placed a bit in her mouth. Before she even realized quite what she was doing, she was violently spitting out the contents into her plate, coughing it up rather as if she was throwing it up. Running to the faucet, she began washing her mouth out in a harried, desperate manner. After she had managed to throw up most of the taste, she turned back to the table and stared at the innocent-looking piece, entire expression consumed by shock. Desiree had eaten almost every disgusting thing under the sun, and by the time she had passed her first year at military school she could have sworn she’d been able to eat anything, no matter how gross, without much more than a polite cough. This was like every bug and entrails and fermented bean and stinky fruit she’d ever eaten rolled into one. She couldn’t even describe it. All she knew was that whatever she’d eaten, it was definitely downright evil.
What was that kid’s deal? Pursing her lips in a displeased manner, she decided to do something decidedly unlike her role and completely like herself. She snatched the box up again, and knocked decidedly on her next door neighbor’s house. A crotchety old woman answered the door. “Do you know where a Mr. Lysander Trevelyan lives?” She asked, sharply.
The woman, who looked like she’d been about to snap back something very rude, noticed the box and seemed to soften. She sighed and shook her head. “Right down the street, the house with the blue star painted in the right window. It’s best not to bother with him, dear; he means no harm.” Desiree’s jaw tightened and she marched off again.
It wasn’t hard to find the house. While it looked like any of the other houses, the blue star immediately attracted the eye. Waltzing straight up to the door, she rapped sharply on it twice. For a moment, there was no answer, then a clearly confused voice yelled, “Hold on a bit, I’ll be right there!” Then there was a crash and a bang and the door was roughly pulled open. The boy’s black hair was mussed, and he was now wearing a pair of red-rimmed glasses that made him look even dorkier than before, uncomfortably askew on his nose.
He opened his mouth, but before he could speak, she gave him a tart smile and said, “Hello. Nice to meet you. My next door neighbor just gave me the most disgusting thing I have ever put in my mouth. Would you like to try some?”
The boy’s eyes widened and he gave the woman a very confused expression. If he was acting, he was good. But he seemed to get over his surprise and confusion and composed himself rather to Desiree’s begrudging admiration. He blinked at her in an owlish manner and said calmly, “Would you like to come in and have a cup of tea?”
Eyeing him slightly distrustfully, she stepped inside, and it was her turn to stop and stare in surprise, letting the emotion show easily on her face. The house was insane. It wasn’t that it wasn’t neat, it was the picture of orderly, but the items themselves were bizarre. None of the lights were on and the curtains were closed so the house was dark. The bookshelves were full of books with strange titles like “Living with Muggles” and “Wandless in Rwanda,” a rubber bird sat on one of the small display coffee tables, pecking at the tabletop occasionally despite the obvious lack of any kind of windup mechanism. In another corner was a small tower of very brightly colored… fluffy… somethings. What were those? And then there was a flat machine sitting on top of one of the bookshelves, burping bubbles occasionally. Literally burping. Out of a mouth. There was a clock hanging on the wall that only had one hand and words that ranged from “impending doom” to “very safe” instead of numbers on the face. The hand was currently shifting from “near disaster” to “in trouble.” As a matter of fact, it seemed the kid was an avid collector of clocks of all kinds, because several others were hung around the room, like one that had his name printed on the hand and only the words “home” and “outside” on it, and another that had the neat label “guest” printed above it and emotion words on the face. She felt it to be rather accurate as the hand was currently quivering on “surprised.” Her anger temporarily forgotten, she looked around the dark room, sitting down on the edge of the squashy sofa in a sort of dazed wariness. The Trevelyan boy, on the other hand, had bustled off and appeared to be fixing tea.
He arrived moments later with a small tray of tea, having taken his glasses off. She sniffed at it first, not willing to take chances after that pie. “Now, uhm… Ms….” He flushed brightly and she realized he’d just remembered he’d forgotten to ask her name.
“Desiree will do just fine, thank you.” She said. “Now do you mind telling me why you tried to poison me my first day here?” She folded her arms across her chest and gave him a look.
He pulled up a chair across from her and sat down in it. “I’m actually not quite sure what you mean by that. Did you not like it?”
She stared at him. “Of course I didn’t like it! I cannot even begin to describe how foul that tastes. I’m still not sure if I’ll ever get it out of my mouth.” He frowned in confusion and the woman pulled open the box, pushing it towards him. “Go on, try it.” The teen did so without hesitation, and to her surprise, without flinching.
He simply stuck it in his mouth, chewed, swallowed, and said, “It tastes fine to me.” Desiree didn’t bother trying it again. She knew that no matter what was wrong with him, it wouldn’t taste any better the second time. He stood up again and said, “Actually, I’m making some lunch for myself, would you like some?” He went into his kitchen without waiting for a reply, and came back with a plate of pasta with some yellow sauce. “I hope you don’t mind if I go ahead and eat.” One sniff and the spy knew that it must have tasted like trash. She rudely swiped a bit of the sauce off of the plate, and tasted just to confirm this hunch. The taste had her covering her mouth to prevent the dry gags. He looked at her in mild surprise, but decided that that must have been permission to go ahead and eat.
She tried to stop him as he rolled the pasta around his fork and put it in his mouth without the slightest bit of hesitation, but was surprised to find that he made no expression at all, and simple continued to eat. She stared at him a while again, then finally said, “Is something wrong with your nose or mouth? Did you have a nasty fall or some other kind of accident that would have had some impact on your olfaction?”
He outright laughed at that. “No, not at all. My dad did say something about a cu-” He coughed on his food and corrected himself. “That is, my dad can eat pretty much anything, too, but I think I can tell the difference between good and bad tastes by now.”
Desiree sniggered, then snorted, then began chuckling to herself, until she was full out laughing from the absurdity of it. She stopped laughing abruptly and stood up, startling the boy. “Clearly not. And you are not eating that. It tastes as though it’ll make you ill unless you’ve got an iron stomach as well as a stone tongue. I can’t imagine how you’ve survived this long.” She dragged him upright and hauled him into his own kitchen, where she began raiding his cabinets for groceries. In minutes, she was cooking some kind of sauté of greens and rice-a-roni. She sat back on her heels in satisfaction, as she surveyed the two plates she had in front of her. The boy had been watching her in obedient amusement this entire time, but when she shuffled around his kitchen and brought out the utensils, he gallantly snatched them from her and helped her set the table for two.
She sat down and let him place her own plate of food in front of her, before he sat across from her at the coffee table. Rather than directly diving in and beginning to eat, however, she stopped and just stared at the food, a sort of unease on her face. The boy stared at her, refraining from eating as well. “Are you alright?” He asked.
“Yeah.” She said, sadly. “It’s just… I was just thinking I haven’t had a meal like this in a while. Ever since, well, since my-” her breath hitched for a moment, “my ex-husband Bill and I split I just- haven’t had anyone to eat with like this.”
He instantly sobered. “Oh. I’m… sorry to hear that.”
There was an awkward silence for a bit, but she let out a little puff of breath and gave a slightly cheesy grin. “I’m sorry about that. Even after I promised myself I’d quit it with the pity parties, I still find myself dwelling on it at times.”
Smiling back at her, he shook his head understandingly, “It’s alright, that’s simply how things are, sometimes. Why don’t we eat?” The two of them began to eat. As they ate, she started asking him some questions about himself, almost hesitantly at first, trying to prevent another awkward silence.
“So… uhm… how old are you?”
“Seventeen.” He responded easily.
Her eyebrows lifted slightly. “Aren’t you still in school?”
“Erhmm…” The boy hesitated, clearly not sure how to answer that. Was he playing hooky, or something?
Desiree Wray wouldn’t have cared. Desiree Kinsley, on the other hand, was a dedicated family lady. Kids shouldn’t play hooky. Shaking her spoon at him, she scolded, “It’s important to make sure you stay in school. Unless… are you in summer vacation?” She looked up musingly, pressing her finger against her chin for a moment. She hadn’t gone to a regular secondary school, so she couldn’t be sure, but she knew for sure secondary school ended at age 18, not 17.
“Well…” Desiree watched him, wondering what he was thinking. He seemed to be struggling with some kind of dilemma she didn’t quite understand. Her mind whirred as she tried guessing just what it was he was hiding. Was he perhaps part of the extremist group?! Alarm flashed through her, but she continued to look at him with nothing more than a little scolding in her keen grey eyes. She’d have to keep this one under surveillance, though. “no. It’s not summer vacation.” He said, but he looked very uncertain about that fact. Why would he lie about school? He’d answered too easily to have been lying about his age, and why would he lie about his age without researching the school first? “I’m just skipping.” He laughed, sheepishly.
“I knew it!” Desiree said. “That’s bad behavior. Stay in school, or you’ll end up like me.” She laughed. “Divorced by 24 having to rebuild a career in the middle of nowhere.”
“Didn’t you stay in school?” Lysander asked her, mildly.
She shrugged. “Well, I got married early after a pregnancy scare and dropped out of secondary school in my second year.” It was all completely a lie, of course, but she herself was almost convinced by it as she spoke, it came that easily for her to say.
“I don’t know,” he said, quietly, “I think it’s pretty impressive for a divorced 25 year old to still look as good as you do.” He joked. At least, she assumed he was joking, considering his expression hadn’t changed at all.
Her face lit up in surprise and laughter, then her tanned face reddened slightly, embarrassed for him rather than for herself, and she leaned over the table to grab him in a very uncomfortable head-lock. “What are trying to sweet-talk an old lady like me for?” She laughed as he spluttered and clutched at her arm.
August 1st, 2003. 5:00am:
Desiree’s eyes flashed open in the dark before sunrise, two spots of gleaming silver in the shadows. She slipped out from under her blankets, keeping low to the ground. She wasn’t going to be here for long, and she wasn’t exactly undercover, so now was the time to first get to work. According to the intel she’d received, there were three particular people who were displaying suspicious behavior in their spending habits. It was a small community, but not far from a major city where they could have a significant impact. She had to concentrate her surveillance efforts into a warehouse, they’d told her, that all three men had rented jointly after about a year of therapy under the same man – a religious radical who had posted some rather inflammatory blog posts a few years ago. In other words, all four of them were amateurs. They were putting her on this case because she was an amateur too, and she knew it, but she was still determined to her job with a competence she knew they were not expecting from her.
Dressing simply in slightly old-lady-ish semi-formal garb, she walked out of her front door without pretense. If anyone was up at this time, they’d take less note of her if she didn’t seem like she was hiding anything. In a meandering, uncontrived style, she strolled through the neighborhood, appearing to get lost at places, and doubling back sometimes. Using this method, she managed to pass all three residences and the home-office from which the charlatan ran his little therapy business. She went nowhere near the warehouse, as she knew it would be suspect. Stopping at a house across the street from one of her targets, she paused to take a picture of the flowers, using the opportunity to plant a very small, low-quality camera into the unkempt shrubbery. It wouldn’t be enough to capture any sound around there, but it would certainly be enough to keep track of his movements for now. It would give her a small advantage before starting intensive surveillance.
After a bit more meandering, she found the grocery store, bought some groceries, returned home, and put together a small and very simple incendiary device with some of the ingredients she’d bought. It was nowhere near military grade, but it would do for at the very least a distraction, if she was cornered. The only weapon she’d been allowed besides a small pistol hidden deep in the floorboards under her boudoir was her Swiss Army knife, so she’d felt the need to stock up a bit. She wouldn’t be officially “awake” until about 8:30, anyways. Letting out a small sigh of discontent, she quietly slipped back into her bed. She’d have to check on that boy, too. Even if he wasn’t part of the extremist group, there was still most definitely something off about him. She just had to figure out what.
Isastian
by firejay1
A slice-of-life chronicle of the interactions of Sebastian Prince and Isanne Eads in Hogwarts.
("Pawprint" by Dru! is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0. To view a copy of this license, visit: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0)
First Incident
Isanne noticed Sebastian from the moment they got off the Hogwarts Express.
She had spent the ride in a room with her siblings, and presumably he'd done the same, as he came out with an older girl and boy, both of whom shared features with him, but as soon as she saw him, her newly granted eyes locked on. Though he was just as small as the rest of them, there was some sort of… aura he gave off. It was hard to tell. Someone bumped into him and his head swiveled around, wide grey eyes blazing. She saw his fist clench instinctively, but the blonde girl with him touched his shoulder to get his attention, and he relaxed and turned away. Interesting.
"What you looking at, Isanne?" Cronan asked weedily. He slung an arm around her shoulders and leaned down so his view was level with hers, looking in the direction she'd been staring. "Someone catch your eye?" She nodded silently, ignoring the sidelong grin he cast her. "Hmmmmmmm." He chuckled quietly, just for her to hear. Not like she cared.
"Isanne! What are you doing? Hurry up and go follow Hagrid with the rest of the first years! Hurry up go!" Myrna exclaimed, pushing her forward, before racing off to see some of her friends.
Isanne went without complaint. It was the same direction the interesting boy was going, anyways. She walked forward and wherever she went, people shivered and unconsciously shifted away, chilled. She didn't reach the boy in time, but she did not stop staring at him, eyes following him even from a different boat, completely missing the usually awe-inspiring sight of the castle looming above them. Once they landed, she managed to make her way through the crowd and grabbed his hand, turning her magical eyes off. He was warm.
She felt him start in surprise and try to pull his hand away. "Hey, let go." He gruffed at her.
"No." She responded back in that airy fairy voice of cold whispers. Almost as she'd expected, he didn't flinch from the cold. She held on to his hand very tightly and didn't let go, judging from his movements whether there were steps ahead and what direction they were supposed to go. He kept trying to shake her off, but didn't raise a fist to her.
It was her misfortune that her name came before his on the list. "Eads, Isanne!" The headmistress called, and Isanne let go without another word, turning her eyes back on and making it to the Sorting Hat. It sat upon her head for a bit, then told her with a mutter, "Well, I see no place for you but RAVENCLAW."
She sat next to her brother at the Ravenclaw table instinctively, but kept her eyes on the boy, finally gleaning his name. Sebastian Prince. He sat far away from her, and she didn't bother to get up and move, but it wasn't like that mattered.
Cronan followed her gaze. "That boy, huh? He's in our house. Lucky you." His fake, yellow eyes were cold, though, calculating. He didn't seem pleased by what he saw. It was no wonder, really. Someone patted Sebastian's shoulder with a friendly smile and he'd instinctively turned to glare, refusing to offer friendly greetings in return. Two words left his lips, and the person backed off.
Second Incident
Sebastian didn't know what he'd ever done to deserve an unfortunate… limpet. She had never raised a hand to him. She held his hand, clung on to him, stared at him, petted him, offered him food, but his policy was to beat those who deserved it, and pay back whatever he received in full. What was he supposed to do? Pet her back? He'd gotten into fights with people in her presence, but she didn't walk away.
Today, in fact, was one of those days. He was sitting in the Ravenclaw head of house's office, arms crossed over his chest, sporting a red mark on is cheek where his opponent had grazed him. They were still first years, so fist fights were still the correct manner of establishing dominance. As he had expected, all along. What he had not expected was to end up in the office… with this girl still sticking to him. She was sitting in the seat next to him leaning her head on his shoulder and, if he was not mistaken, falling asleep like that, with her eyes wide open.
The professor had called Sebastian into his office after being told by another professor that he'd been caught rolling around on the ground with a girl, punching her in the mouth repeatedly. She had been sent to the infirmary to deal with a bleeding nose, and he'd been told to walk himself to the office to await his head of house. As far as he was concerned, this was probably because the professor who had caught him found him somewhat creepy, and had been looking for an excuse to hand him off, rather than mete out punishment himself.
"So, uhm… Mr. Prince." The Ravenclaw head of house was speaking to him, but she was clearly distracted by his pet limpet. "You- oh bollocks. Ms. Eads, are you here for a reason?" She snapped. The girl did not so much as blink. "Ms. Eads." She demanded again, tone harsh.
"It's no use, professor." Bas said, bluntly. "She's probably asleep."
"Mr. Prince. You are not allowed to attend disciplinary meetings with friends." She scolded. "No matter how close you are."
Bas sighed and rolled his eyes. "We are not friends. I'd get rid of her, if I could, but I can't. Please continue." He did not want to be here all day trying to argue about something he had no control over.
The professor eyed the girl a moment longer, but seemed to eventually agree that there was really nothing to be done about her. If it was anyone else, she probably would have protested more, but they were two months into the school year, and Isanne had a reputation all her own, mostly involving her lack of any emotions to speak of. She spoke when called on, and performed her lessons almost flawlessly, but she did not communicate with her classmates or her teachers, nor seemed to care about… well, anything. Nicely put, she was weird, and expending effort to try and get her to leave the room was more trouble than either the professor or Sebastian was willing to go through.
Her eyes slowly swiveled back over the Bas. "As I was saying, Prince, it is not acceptable for you to be engaging in fist fights." The boy just sat there, clearly used to this sort of scolding, and uninterested in its content. She sighed, unsure of what to do. As the Charms teacher, she had had the other two Prince kids in her classes, and it stunned her how different the three of them were. Not that most siblings were similar in temperament, she'd been a teacher long enough to have seen several sets pass through the school, but that didn't make it any easier to wrap her mind around a cheerful, loud, and boisterous little princess, a very polite young man, and a small gangster being siblings. They made such an odd little trio. She wasn't really sure there was a right way to deal with this one, if there was a way at all.
She leaned forward in her desk. "So you punched Ms. Margoth in the face. We're only two months into the school year, young man. I don't want to be sending you to detention all year, so what can I do to convince you not to hit people just because they irritate you? Unless there is some other reason you hit Ms. Margoth?"
Sebastian raised one eyebrow, and the professor bit back another sigh, because these eleven year olds really were such posturers. She couldn't remember being such an awkward child. "What?" He asked.
"Was Ms. Margoth harassing you in some way, Mr. Prince?" She asked, pointedly. He sounded more surprised by the question than truly confused by it, but she wanted to expedite this conversation, if possible.
He uncrossed his arms and sat up a little straighter, beautiful grey eyes staring holes through her skull. "If I said yes?"
"Those are the types of things you are supposed to tell the professor, not take into your own hands." She sighed and pressed her fingers against her forehead.
"Girls cry." He said, shortly.
"Huh?" The professor asked back, thinking that this kid needed to take some lessons in communicating.
It was his turn to roll his eyes, apparently. "Girls cry, and don't get blamed. It's easier to fight than talk."
For a second, the professor just gaped, wondering what had happened to make this kid the way he was. Then, she took a breath. "What exactly did Ms. Margoth do?"
He said nothing, then, mouth closed obstinately. So it appeared the kid was violent and cynical, but not a snitch. Or maybe he was just too proud or angry to talk about it. Whichever it was, it seemed his companion didn't share his qualms. Isanne blinked and rubbed her eyes, saying, "She and Anna Frenhill and Carrie Wilhelm intentionally knocked over Kara Frazier's cauldron."
"That's it?" The professor asked skeptically. That didn't seem like something to punch someone over, though it wasn't good behavior, sure. More importantly, it didn't seem like the sort of thing that would get Isanne Eads to waste her breath talking.
"They've been bothering her all week, professor." She said, though her tone said she wasn't much bothered by it, simply stating the facts. "They pushed her face into her food on Monday, put someone else's toad in her bags yesterday, and ripped her notebooks. The professor thought she'd spilled it, and she had to stay after class to clean it, and one of them kicked her as they were leaving when the professor wasn't looking."
"So you were protecting another student, Mr. Prince?" She asked, shifting her attention from one student the other in surprise. She hadn't gotten that impression from their talk.
"No." He said. "She was annoying me." All of this brought them back to the main point, which was him hitting people because they irritated him. As if he could read her mind, he added, "You can't stop me."
Throwing up her hands, she said, "Mr. Prince, you get detention on Saturday. You get to help Professor Greenwick sex the Blast-Ended Skrewts. Ms. Eads, five points from Ravenclaw for interfering in a meeting you were not invited to. Both of you are dismissed." She shook her head, absolutely certain this would not be the last time she'd summon one of them to her office over the next seven years. Unlike most of their peers, their respective punishments did not seem to worry either of them very much, if at all, and both went without any argument.
The journey back to the Ravenclaw common rooms was characteristic of them; neither spoke, and Sebastian was nearly carrying Isanne half the way there, since she wouldn't let go of him. Unfortunately, classes were over for the day, so the second Bas crossed the threshold of the common rooms, Isanne in tow, he was jumped. Kara Frazier rushed forward and grabbed one of his sleeves, though unlike Isanne she let go as soon as he moved to shake her off. "Are you okay? I hope the professor didn't scold you too much on my account."
Her eyes darted momentarily to Isanne, but the other girl wasn't looking at her, seeming to be scanning the room for something else, probably her brother. Bas took a moment to shake Isanne off of him as well, since it seemed she was finally finally distracted, then pushed past the girl, unsmiling. "It wasn't on your account. And don't touch me."
The girl looked a bit crestfallen, but blushed a little and whispered shyly, "I'll come back later," before rushing off to her rooms.
Cronan, who Isanne had indeed spotted and was sitting with, watched the exchange with some interest. "That doesn't bother you?" He asked, pointing a crooked finger towards Bas and his new little admirer.
Isanne looked where he was pointing, then simply tilted her head to the side and gave Crow a bemused look that made it clear it hadn't even registered as an event, much less something to be bothered by. Yep. That was his sister, alright.
Cronan had decided he didn't like this underclassman his sister was mildly obsessed with. Or maybe not obsessed with so much as comforted by. He saw no reason why she should be either, considering Sebastian Prince was mostly notable for his bad temper and taciturn unfriendliness. Isanne wasn't exactly ever normal in her tastes, but this boy in particular had no real charms to speak of, so far as Cronan was concerned. The only thing that had stopped him from planning his murder was that he hadn't actually done anything to Isanne. Also Isanne would probably never forgive him for hurting her rare buddy. He didn't find her scary, but a small piece of him would never want to upset her that way.
He stewed over this in deep upset after a certain incident had happened. More specifically, Sebastian's roommates had apparently woken up for class and a chorus of shouts had gone up, because Isanne had been sleeping curled up next to him. The boy had apparently also proceeded to wake up in a foul temper and beat the living daylights out of his roommates for being so loud in the morning, before realizing Isanne was in the room and physically hauling her into the hallway of the dorm rooms. It had been all anyone in Ravenclaw had been talking about all day.
Crow knew what had happened. Isanne had been of the habit to drift to one of their rooms and cuddle whenever she woke up with a nightmare. Only problem was, that "their" consisted of the Eads family children. Not some weird boy they'd both only known for 5 months. It was almost downright insulting when his room was closer to the common rooms.
Sebastian didn’t seem to care that he was the recipient of such rare attentions from Isanne, nor did the girl herself seem to think it was really worth being concerned about. It made Crow downright suspicious. Bas on the other hand, had bigger things to worry about.
Third Incident
The slender boy stared up blankly at his upperclassmen. It had been almost 3 months since the incident with Margoth. The girl had given him pointed glares from then, but she was clearly terrified of him. He had, after all, given her a bloody nose and a black eye, and fractured one of her ribs for apparently no reason. She had also left Kara mostly alone. He knew that had spread rumors that Kara was under his protection. People thought that just because he wasn’t a chatty person, he also wasn’t much of a listener. At first, they would whisper when they noticed him, but when he apparently ignored them, they got very comfortable gossiping in the same room, even when their hushed voices carried clearly through the silence. There was a lot Sebastian Prince knew. Which was why, when he was cornered by three 4th years in an isolated hallway between classes, he knew exactly who was standing in front of him and why.
He didn’t bother saying anything, knowing that the antagonistic upperclassmen would waste no time in telling him not to mess with Gemina Margoth unless he wanted to deal with them. They did not disappoint. He rolled his eyes. “No.” He said, not wasting extra breath on explaining that he didn’t care about fights. He was busy sizing them up and trying to figure out which of the spells he’d learned so far might be useful if they tried to hex him. Just as he’d expected, the ringleader, Margoth’s older sister, gave a cry of rage and drew her wand. He moved without thinking about it. In a flash, he had jumped up and plowed a small, bony fist into her face. She shrieked and dropped her wand. Before the rest of them could cast any spells as well, Bas was punching and kicking them as well.
Someone grabbed his shoulder from behind, and Bas whirled, drawing his wand and hissing out the very first spell that came to mind, “Incendio.”
The whoever it was hastily retorted, “Protego,” and Bas was forced to duck as his spell ricocheted, singeing the top of his hair and causing the girls behind him to scream and scramble out of the way.
The Prince surveyed the person in front of him with sharp eyes. His new opponent was clearly several years older than him, dressed in Ravenclaw colors and possessing sandy hair. His hands were held up in a surrendering gesture, but he held a gorgeous, whippy wand of a pale brown still clutched in the fingers of his left hand. Left-handed, flexible by nature, apparently not upset at having just been attacked. Bas decided not to try anything else. “I’m not going to do anything to you!” The boy tried to explain.
Bas rolled his eyes. “I know.” The ‘what do you want, then?’ was implied in his voice and body language.
The boy appraised him with a little surprise. “Huh. You really do.” He said. Bas decided he was probably a good guy to associate with. He didn’t look like the discerning type physically, but his actions told a different story, and Bas knew better than most how deceiving appearances were. So, apparently, did the boy. He looked off to where the three girls had run off, swearing loudly. He opened his mouth with whatever he had seemed to want to say originally, but then he visibly changed his mind, and instead said, “Join the Ravenclaw dueling club, kid. Trust me, you’ll like what you see there.”