Dresden Academy

Who: Bernadine Ford, Steven Suzuki
What: Bernadine goes to the library to research when she thinks she might have actually cast some magic. Steven snoops.
When/Where: Friday, March 9th. Mullholland Hall.
Rating: SFW


The first time she cast a spell it was something of a fluke.

It was lumos and she thought for a good long while it was just something all wands did; in her mind any old muggle could pick up a wand and make it glow if they thought about it hard enough. It had to be a built in thing. She'd have to ask Pepper if her research turned up fruitless; she wasn't going to bug her cousin when Dresden Academy had a very impressive library.

She wasn't nearly as excited as she should have been, maybe a bit jittery. If she could actually cast... Well, it would change a lot of things.

She made her way to the library after she found her mind lingering on it again. She hadn't tried to cast anything else. Too afraid that she'd cause a ruckus and then the whole ruse would be for nothing because Abernathy Ford wouldn't be freaking out over casting a simple spell. She bypassed Miss Rochette altogether and headed for the section of books on wands. There weren't many books here, which boded both well and horribly for Bernadine.

Either this little fact about wands would be simple to find or it wouldn't be found. If it wouldn't be found she'd have to break down and ask Pepper. And then Pepper would start asking questions.

Bernadine plucked the most likely book off the shelf and was heading for a quiet seat to read when she ran headfirst into someone. "Watch where the fuck you're..." she trailed away, so practiced in her automatic responses that it was out of her mouth before she registered who it was that she'd run into.

"You're the one with your head in a book," Steven pointed out shortly, lips pursing into an expression that quite clearly laid the blame on her. His eyes flicked down to the tome. "Sudden interest in wandmaking?"

She frowned at Steven and then pursed her lips. "I have a cousin in wandmaking. Thought I might do some research, maybe work at her shop this summer." It was a plausible enough lie if he bothered to look into it, though she had absolutely no intention of spending her summer with Pepper. It was more likely that she'd be haunting Mother Criss' cave of a classroom, if the arrangement proved plausible.

"And waste all your time spent studying Divination. If you were that interested, you'd have done Magical Crafting." He snatched the book out of her hands before she could protest and turned it over to see the contents better. "Basic wandwork? Come on. Far be it from me to compliment someone, but even you're beyond this."

She crinkled her nose at him. "Was that a compliment?" she asked with delighted confusion. "Besides, I can check it out this summer and see if it's anything I'd be interested in before I devote an entire semester to it. I'd probably drive Rosenthal out of his skin." She wondered for a moment when lying had become so easy. She was always good at bluffing, but this was in another realm of skill.

He wrinkled his nose back. "Still. This book won't tell you anything you didn't learn in first year Charms. Properties of Magical Tools would be more useful." The idiot at the end of that sentence was clearly implied.

She could kick herself because that was clearly the better book to read. It could tell her if the tools came with inherent magical qualities. She took the three steps backward to the shelf, deposited her other choice carelessly on the shelf even while it hurt her to do it and picked up the book Steven recommended. "Thanks," she said dubiously.

Steven pulled an irritated, bitchier version of the previous annoyed face and moved to file the other book properly. "Heathen."

She grinned with her back turned to him and had to jerk her face back into a scowl before she turned back. "It's on the same shelf," she said as exasperated as she could manage. "I'm sure anyone looking for it will find it. Dewey Decimal be damned."

"I'm sure you're so flippant about it when the books you need aren't exactly where they should be," he huffed. "The least you could do is a Mobiliarbus. It's not like it takes you any more effort than leaving it."

Except that as far as she knew she couldn't use a Mobiliarbus charm. She shrugged as if it simply didn't matter. The library found a way back into order and the world carried on. "Do you organize your sock drawer too?"

"Don't you? Life moves so much easier when things are where they are supposed to be, with the things they are supposed to be with, when they are supposed to be. But please, don't let me stop you from making your own life difficult, by all means." He made as though he were going to leave her alone after that, but he planned on keeping an eye on her from behind the stacks.

She rolled her eyes at him, but she had the faint sensation that he wasn't just talking about socks. She took her book and found a quiet corner to sit and peruse. The table of contents didn't offer too many hints, but there was an entire chapter on wands that she flipped to for a start.

A few pages in and her frown turned into something else. She bit the inside of her lip so hard she drew blood. The metal taste was just enough to draw her out of her head and back into the library, book in her lap and words on the page.

"A wand at its core has no ability to cast. It must be activated by the ability of a witch or wizard, without which it is simply a stick of wood."

It wasn't specific in the least, but it answered her question. She closed the book and her eyes for a moment. It meant something, that simple, stupid ability to cast lumos. What it meant she had no idea and she wasn't even sure she could ask anyone else for the answers she needed.

Steven spied from behind a nearby book rack. He couldn't see what exactly was causing her such interest that she'd bite her lip down to blood, but curiosity overwhelmed him. He cast a revealing charm through the shelves, thinking to flip through the book after she'd left it in the completely wrong shelf in the library and see for himself. If she wasn't going to be forthcoming, then he would have to resort to underhanded measures.