bubble bubble

[metamorphmaga]

Jenny has nightmares all night. Everything from she vanished all of her clothing by accident to she can't do anything except change form and everyone laughs at the stupid Muggle, and every other version of mucking up her first class that her sleepy brain can manufacture. She wakes up looking like she's been run over by a very sleep-deprived train, and her hair is curling in panicked ringlets of pure white.

But now she has Potions class to go to. She should probably get up and do that. Not going to class counts as mucking up, so she makes herself get up and get dressed. Can't muck up. If you do, you can't be a witch.

That thought turns the rest of her hair white.

Comments

[pleating]

"It's my first day too! Let's just - go slow," says Karen, and she starts narrating what she's doing, reading aloud the labels on things and the instructions on the board and assembling more piles and starting to chop up the lily petals.

[chanuphis]

Miranda, meanwhile, helps Emma some, but seems more interested in reading their textbook about the theories they're illustrating than actually making the potion. It's not like it's going to do anything useful.

[metamorphmaga]

"Thanks," Jenny says weakly. She starts measuring out Standard Ingredient into a phial. "Sorry, I'm sorta new to magic. Like, all of it."

[parental_guidance]

Emma's unbothered by this. Potions is just following directions. She is very good at that. As she grinds up some mistletoe, she peers over Miranda's shoulder. "Anything interesting?"

[chanuphis]

"Yeah, actually. There's an entire little appendix about potion smells and why they smell like things. Apparently most potions don't smell like their ingredients, which... is good, because some of them you have to drink and most potions ingredients aren't that tasty."

[pleating]

"Muggleborn?" asks Karen. "That's okay, you'll catch up. We know stuff from our parents, but we've none of us got to try things before."

[parental_guidance]

"Is this one in there? Why it smells differently, I mean?"

[metamorphmaga]

"Yep, Muggle," Jenny agrees. 'Muggleborn' is new to her and she files it away. "It's... there's just a lot, you know? There's all this general stuff I don't know. Like Potions being wandless! If Potions is wandless, where's the magic come from?"

[chanuphis]

"Nothing about this specific potion. But apparently mistletoe is in a lot of potions that wind up smelling funny -" Miranda starts shredding something that needs shredding. "It also does other things, but this is one of them."

[pleating]

"You're not a Muggle," corrects Karen. "Just your parents, so you're Muggleborn. Or if you want to be very polite to yourself you can say you're a first-generation witch. And we're still magic, even if we aren't poking our wands at things. So we can make potions, but we couldn't teach Muggles how to do it, it wouldn't work."

[metamorphmaga]

"See? Stuff I don't know! Muggle, Muggleborn, Muggleconfused."

[parental_guidance]

"Well, I dub this potion 'So Boring the Textbook Skipped It', then," Emma says mournfully. "At least this is straightforward."

As if on cue, something in the back of the room starts smoking. Emma successfully suppresses a giggle, but her eyes are laughing.

[pleating]

"Miranda says her mum is Muggleborn, so I bet she knows some things," says Karen. "That's probably why they went to Australia."

[chanuphis]

Professor Slughorn swoops down on the owners of the smoking potion, diagnoses the problem, and warns everyone not to drop their dry ingredients directly onto the burners.

"I mean, it's suppose to smell nice if you do it right. I guess you could dunk sachets in it?" says Miranda dubiously.

[parental_guidance]

"...I would say but who has those but I bet you if I look, my mum packed me some," Emma says, halfway between fondly and rolling her eyes. "We could check later."

[metamorphmaga]

"Er, do witches not normally go to Australia? Is 'avoid war zones' just a Muggle thing? ...please tell me if it is, that sounds unsafe."

[chanuphis]

"I don't think we're allowed in each other's dorms, are we? Do you mean a we that doesn't have me in it?"

[pleating]

"No, I mean, some people left, but the war was especially bad for Muggleborns, because You-Know-Who didn't like them. Uh, you might want to watch out for Slytherins, Slytherins also mostly don't like Muggleborns. Or Muggles."

[metamorphmaga]

"Er. You-Know-Who? I do not in fact know who! Is this that Vole guy Miranda mentioned?"

[parental_guidance]

"Yeeeah, I forgot that part. But, uh, no, that was a lie, um, I totally meant Jenny the whole time. Really!"

(Nope.)

[pleating]

"Uh, that's him, but that wasn't his name, but people don't like saying it, did Miranda say it?"

[chanuphis]

"I read it off Harry Potter's Chocolate Frog card," Miranda says to the neighboring table. "It's not dangerous anymore to say it. Or it wouldn't be on the card, would it?"

[parental_guidance]

"It's not," Emma confirms. "I think my parents mentioned? But, um, it's still- strange. I haven't, yet."

[metamorphmaga]

"It was dangerous to say his name?"

[chanuphis]

"People were afraid to say it even before that, but for a while it was actually dangerous, there was a spell on it and if you said it bad people would come find you."