alittlemirror | wit beyond measure is man's greatest treasure

wit beyond measure is man's greatest treasure

To say Jade is displeased would be an understatement. It's not that he cares about this detention tarnishing his record, no. He doesn't really care about his record. What he does care about is how it cuts into his studying time. He had just come across a particularly fascinating snippet on the nature of death and the soul...

(And besides, those Hufflepuffs had started it with their incessant chattering. They're like a less annoying version of Saphir, and nobody had ever really objected when he hexed Saphir. And it's not like he used a serious hex; he just sealed and removed their mouths. Easily reversible, if they knew what they were doing - and knew how to use nonverbal spells.

After all, what kind of first-year doesn't know how to use nonverbal spells?)

But someone had taken offense to his hex, and now he finds himself trudging to Professor Rammsteiner's office, growing increasingly irritated at the loss of his study time. From what he's heard of detentions, they usually entail doing useless, mundane tasks easily accomplished with a little creative wandwork. He's thought about ignoring Professor Rammsteiner's orders more than once, but he's also been told that it would just lead to more detentions and thus a bigger waste of time.

Oh well. He's here now. With one last irritated sigh, he raises his hand to the door and knocks.

"Professor Rammsteiner? This is Jade Curtiss."

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He doesn't even know what he did?

This really is a waste of his time. Jade looks at Heine as if he's the teacher burdened by a troublesome student and not the other way around.

"I hexed a group of Hufflepuffs." He replies flatly, the thought of lying never having crossed his mind. He's never been one to shy away from his own actions. Besides, in this case, he thinks he had acted in a perfectly justified manner.

Heine's had worse looks, so his only response is to raise his eyebrows.

A group of Hufflepuffs had been sent to the infirmary, he remembers that much. They'd been hexed so that their mouths were unusable. Pretty messed up, but the harm had been reversible.

"Well, don't do that." Yes. That's what he's supposed to say. Heine wracks his brain for the rest of the lecture he's supposed to deliver. "It's not safe. Especially if you're doing it to a bunch of people at the same time."

That's not a very persuasive argument. Jade meets Professor Rammsteiner's raised eyebrows with yet another impatient look, all narrowed eyes and downturned mouth.

Which, granted, is almost his default expression.

"Hexing people isn't meant to be safe." For the people being hexed, that is. He can't imagine why it wouldn't be safe for himself.

"Directing hexes at multiple targets isn't safe," Heine amends, looking back down at his work. "How old are you? First year? You've taken a semester of Charms. Something's going to blow up in your face."

Something had blown up in his face before (and all around him - a whole building, in fact), but Jade doesn't mention it. Doesn't even react to it much, even, aside from looking at Professor Rammsteiner a little more intently.

Not that the Professor is looking at him. He doesn't seem very interested in administering this detention. Maybe he'll get to leave early after all. Jade shifts his gaze away as well, looking around the room.

"It worked fine," he says, matter-of-fact. Abruptly, he changes the topic. "So, what are you going to make me do?"

He'd like to get this over with as soon as he can.

Heine's Transfiguration classroom is neat enough, in that everything that's used for one lesson is shoved away in its own cubbyhole or shelf, separate from items for another lesson. He doesn't want anyone moving things out of place, either, so cleaning is out of the question. Making a considering sound, he taps a pen against his lower lip before writing a mark and sitting up again.

"Make you feel bad about what you did." He crosses his arms, and adds or something mentally. But he's distracted now. "How'd you come up with that hex?"

"Oh."

He doesn't really feel bad, though. He feels bad that he's been sent to detention, but that's it. If anything, the success of that hex was...nice. The sudden quiet was definitely nice, at least. He enjoys being able to study in peace.

He gets the feeling he shouldn't mention it if he wants to get out quickly, though. So he'll just shrug in response to Professor Rammsteiner's question.

"I read about it." Simple. Straightforward.

Nevermind that the hex should have come from reading material above his reading level, and really ought to have blown up in his face.

"You shouldn't have read about something that destructive yet." Heine may not be completely up-to-date on first year curriculum for classes other than his, but he's got an idea of it. Not the mention the fact that offensive hexes require a lot more control than nearly all first years have.

He shrugs. "I read a lot."

That's an adequate answer...right...

He doesn't really understand why Professor Rammsteiner is quizzing him on this. He managed to cast the hex. That's all that matters, isn't it? And none of this is making him 'feel bad', so this conversation isn't productive either, in the sense of achieving the purpose of this detention.

He tries to steer them back onto course. "How are you going to make me feel bad?"

That really isn't a sufficient answer. Heine's really paying attention now, spinning his pen between his fingers but staring at Curtiss.

He ignores the attempt to bring them back to the topic of detention.

"What's the cast for the hex?" Could be verbal, could be mental, could be physical. Heine doesn't make it a habit to read books of hexes (or... books in general), and he can't guess it from just knowing the effects.

They're still on this topic? Jade sighs out loud this time, his small frown growing more pronounced.

"I can demonstrate, if you want." It doesn't even sound like a threat, just a genuine offer. He can't get into trouble for hexing a teacher if it's with their permission, right?

Heine balks at the thought of letting any student practice on him. Any kind of magic, and certainly not a hex.

But he is curious.

There's a box of cigarettes on his desk. Heine picks it up, turns it over in his hand, and on the second turn it becomes a white cockatoo, clucking and fluttering its wings.

Heine holds on to its feet and extends his arm to the side. Hopefully the kid's at least got aim.

He's been at Hogwarts long enough that even the skill required to perform nonverbal transfiguration fails to impress him, especially when the result is something as commonplace as a cockatoo. It only gets one unimpressed look, then he looks back to Professor Rammsteiner.

"I don't know how it works on non-humans," he warns, but his wand is already out and pointed at the cockatoo. Let it never be said that Jade is adverse to trying new things.

Claudereos, he thinks, the tip of his wand moving in a subtle, precise figure-eight movement, ending with a flick. Suddenly, the cockatoo's clucking stops as its upper and lower beak snaps together and begins to fuse. For a moment longer, the bird continues to make muffled panicked sounds, but even that dies away as its tongue wells and fuses to the roof of its mouth, until its oral cavity is one solid mass.

Jade watches, unaffected, calmly slipping his wand back up the sleeve of his robes.

But he tries it, and more than that, succeeds, which does make an impression on Heine. He watches closely both Jade's motions and then the effects on the bird. While it's still clucking he moves it to get a closer look, grasping it by the neck and head firmly but not harshly.

Completely gone. Heine waits for a moment longer, in case the hex is weakly cast enough to dispell itself. When it isn't, he smooths his hand over the bird from head to tail and it's cigarettes again.

How is he supposed to treat children again? He's probably best off giving the kid some menial labor to do, but he really doesn't have any to assign. And as for trying to make someone feel remorse, Heine isn't the type either, so he's got nothing to offer.

"How'd you pick up nonverbal casting?"

Maybe it's time to resign himself to the questioning. Professor Rammsteiner doesn't seem very interested in making him feel sorry, so he won't.

The question is met with another shrug. "I read about it." Yes, he's a bookworm. "Then I taught myself."

It wasn't any great feat, no more than teaching himself that hex was. Magic had always come naturally to him. It also happens to be his only interest. Natural talent (or maybe unnatural? He knows his parents and neighbours thought that way) coupled with intensive study ensured that very little challenged him, and what did challenge him, he tackled with grim determination until he succeeded.

He wants to know everything. He knows that's impossible now, after all that had happened, but he still wants to know as much as he can.

At least now he knows the kid reads a lot. Heine isn't sure what value that observation has, however, and starts fiddling with the cigarettes for lack of anything else to do with his hands. Despite having a wand, it's not constantly in his hands, used as he is to magic without it.

"What else have you taught yourself?"

He looks at Professor Rammsteiner's hands rather than his face. It looks like the Professor has a lot of experience playing around with cigarette boxes, although he's not sure what that says about him - if anything.

"A lot," he answers. He's not bragging, although it might seem that way. He's simply stating facts. "Are you going to test me?"

"What? No." This isn't a class. Though it is a classroom. Heine spins the carton once more on the desk and then stops it with his palm.

"I'm not supposed to hex students either. Unless you want that to be your detention." Maybe they can go into the Enchanted Forest and collect crap for Herbology? Or for Care of Magical Creatures? That seems painful enough to be punishment...

Oh. A test would be more interesting than this pointless talk they're having. At this point, Jade is half-tempted to accept the offer of being hexed, but his pride stops him. If there's one area of magic he has no skill in, it's healing and restorative spells. He'll have to go to the Hospital Wing if he really does get hexed, and he hates being reminded of his limitations.

So he shakes his head with another frown. "Then what are we doing? You didn't plan this out, did you?"

Respect for teachers, what's that...

"No." Straight-up, no, he didn't plan this. When giving detention Heine usually foists it off on one of the other professors who always need some hard labor done.

"I'll find something for you to do. Come on."

The Herbology professor has their list of requirements, which he'd offered to pick up things for in repayment for the massive favor of not having to teach the subject. It's traditionally Hufflepuff and all, but God knows he's not suited for plants.

A deep area of the Forbidden Forest he shouldn't be bringing students to, now... that he can do. Heine gets up from behind his desk, patting himself down reflexively to ensure that his wand is in the pocket of the robe he's wearing over decidedly not-wizardy jeans, t-shirt, and canvas sneakers. He leads the way out of the classroom and starts down the stairs in a slouch.

He didn't plan this. He really didn't plan this. Jade's irritation is more pronounced than ever as he stares up at Professor Rammsteiner with narrowed eyes. This is a waste of time.

But, fine, it looks like Professor Rammsteiner is finally ready for them to get started. Hopefully he can be out of detention within the hour. He's a little curious when the Professor rises to his feet, but the majority of his focus remains far away, on that tome he had found earlier this morning.

"We're going somewhere?" He asks, ready for it to be some place boring. He's heard that cleaning up the dungeons was a common detention.

Heine remains the worst professor.

Especially when he casually replies, "Yeah, the forest." He waits a moment for the moving stairs to set them down at the right place and walks more quickly, not caring if Jade's little legs have to work faster to keep up.

Professor Rammsteiner is probably walking faster on purpose, is he? It's a good thing the mention of the forest takes Jade by surprise, or he might have (lazily) kept to his old pace. As it is, he speeds up to a slow trot, keeping pace with the Professor.

"The Forbidden Forest?" He asks, with a slight emphasis on the Forbidden part of the name. Not that he doesn't want to go - the opposite, really - he's just making sure that's where they're really going.

"Yeah. Why, you got a problem?" Heine goes down the last flight of stairs and shoves his hands into his pocket as he goes out a side door, slowing his pace at last as they start crossing the stretch of lawn that separates the building from the forest.

The sun is setting. Seawort grows only in the light of the moon, but it'll take them a while to get to the deep part of the woods where it grows. Of course, nightfall also spells the beginning of many creatures' active periods, but it is what it is. Heine just hopes the kid will shut up at some point.

Unfortunately for Heine, 'shutting up' is not a skill within a Ravenclaw's repertoire. Jade shakes his head, then immediately asks another question: "Why?"

Maybe he should be scared. The forest must be forbidden for a reason. But he won't get anywhere by being scared, and he had thought about looking around the forest before anyway.

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