Creating a Monster [6-7]

[MAEVE THORNE]

Early September

Eloise Midgen was a little anxious about introducing the new topic. Teenagers tended to be curious and heedless; those were terrible traits to possess when studying the Dark Arts. If one of them decided to put into practice the theory she would be introducing during these next weeks...

Still, it was in the curriculum and she had to cover it. While not exactly common, the knowledge was not forbidden and could even be useful in certain professions. The course would cover a number of beasts and monsters that could be created by wizards and used for vile purposes. This first lesson would focus on the basilisk, while others to come would introduce the cockatrice, the inferius, and several other less-known ones.

"Today's topic is the creation and control of a basilisk. Can anyone tell me how this beast can be created, and what is needed in order to control it?" Every year, she was shocked to learn how well-informed her students were on certain dangerous topics she'd heard nothing about at their age. She wondered how many of them already knew about the creation of these living weapons.

LEWIS WHELAN, ACACIA TRAN, ILONA KYLLI ROWLE, MAEVE THORNE, SEPTIMUS WATERFIELD, PHOENIX SHADE

[MAEVE THORNE]

Maeve kept her head down, as was her habit in this class. She rarely ever volunteered answers, unlike in most other classes she attended. The desire to impress her peers was still there, albeit overshadowed by her awareness that revealing the extent of her knowledge on and interest in the subject would attract the faculty's attention. It was enough that whenever they were learning new jinxes, hexes, and curses in Defence Against the Dark Arts, she excelled in casting them. There was only so much she could explain by claiming the education at Durmstrang had been extensive. She had learned so much more since she left the institute, on her own, in secret. It was best if Professor Midgen didn't become suspicious.

The seventh-year held her quill in hand, prepared to take notes. Her eyes wandered the classroom as she waited for one of her peers to provide the required information. Today's questions were so simple someone was bound to answer correctly. There was rarely new information - or at least new to her - and it was introduced so carefully that Maeve no longer felt like she was learning anything useful. And they were forbidden to apply the methods and enchantments they were learning about, even the most innocuous ones...

She wondered, not for the first time, how many of her peers were growing fed up with these limitations. For quite a while now, she had been carefully watching her classmates during the Dark Arts Theory classes. The level of interest shown, the expanse of knowledge - nowadays, she was more focused on discovering like-minded people than on listening to what Midgen had to say.

LEWIS WHELAN, ACACIA TRAN, ILONA KYLLI ROWLE, MAEVE THORNE, SEPTIMUS WATERFIELD, PHOENIX SHADE

[ILONA KYLLI ROWLE]

Ilona raised her hand at Professor Midgen’s question. “A basilisk is created when a chicken’s egg is hatched beneath a toad.” It seemed like quite a rudimentary question for an advanced NEWT level course such as Dark Arts Theory, but she figured it was only the beginning of the topic and so they had to cover the basics to ensure everyone was at the same level. She left the other question for another student to answer, hoping not to attract all of the professor’s attention.

Unlike some in the course, Ilona was not particularly interested in the Dark Arts as a practice. Her interest in the class was more singular in focus: hoping to find some kind of cure for her brother’s lycanthropy. If a cure had not been found yet using regular magical practices, Ilona wondered if a solution could be found in the more taboo subject matter. She wasn’t necessarily against the use of Dark Arts, or its instruction, she simply believed in balance. All things had a need in certain instances, and just as life could not exist without death, she believed light magic could not exist without a bit of darkness.

TAGGED: MAEVE THORNE
Notes: N/A

[MAEVE THORNE]

Concealing the extent of her Dark Arts knowledge was Maeve's plan for most of Midgen's lessons, but she was guileful enough to recognize when not to feign ignorance. Today's topic was fairly easy; she would not volunteer answers to the professor's questions, but neither would she write down what her peers said as though it was a novel bit of information. Overdoing it would only attract the attention she was aiming to evade.

She listened to Ilona's answer, feeling a pang of disappointment that the sixth-year could not be extended an invitation to the Room of Requirement sessions. While knowledge and interest in the subject were present, certain other factors were off - factors the group had not officially discussed, but were taking into consideration nonetheless... Such as the company one kept, or a bond with the pureblood family one came from.

Her quill still poised to write, Maeve waited for someone to provide the remaining answer. It was a simple one - only Parselmouths had any chance of gaining control over a basilisk, and even then it was not guaranteed. That was probably the main reason why the large serpents were not being created that often, rather than legal limitations - it wasn't as though the governments regularly checked people's houses to see if there were any toads sitting on chicken eggs. The potentiality of perishing once that egg hatched was a far more effective preventative.

ILONA KYLLI ROWLE (mentions)

[LEWIS WHELAN]

Dark arts had been an impulse pick for Lewis. Despite Auntie Eula warning them not to go after revenge, Lewis liked knowing what the possibilities were. Just in case…

Basilisk were interesting creatures with an even stranger origin. Since he couldn’t talk yet, he simply took notes. It was quite the adjustment, being quiet was not his style. He wrote down; ‘Seems almost too easy to create one. But due to them being hard to control, it's likely not a popular choice.’ He scratched the basilisk as a revenge option off his chart.