190"Sit down," said Lyra, rapping her knuckles on her desk for emphasis. "You just had your lunch break, Draco, I see no reason for you to need to catch up with your friends now."
Ron didn't bother stifling his sniggers as Draco Malfoy grumbled under his breath, taking his usual seat. Harry wasn't certain what sort of riveting conversation could be had with Crabbe or Goyle, but the younger Malfoy was never as clever as he liked to pretend anyway. Ron turned around in his seat to meet Malfoy's eyes and mouth whipped, and Draco scowled fiercely in response. Lyra sat at her desk and folded her hands under her chin, scanning the class until they settled.
"Now," she said, relaxing a little, "the good news is that you've already covered the curriculum, thanks to yours truly. Which means we have about three weeks to wind down a bit, go over some past material, ask questions, and do a bit of extension."
Hermione's hand shot up immediately, and Lyra's gaze slowly drifted to her, reminding Harry a bit of Snape if he was honest. She gestured for Hermione to speak.
"Will we be covering any of our O.W.L. materials?"
"No," said Lyra. "You'll be learning that next year."
"But if we could get a head start —"
"No," said Lyra, more firmly this time. "The jump to O.W.L. work is significant enough that you'd be better off revising the previous material rather than barely comprehending something new that you'll forget over the summer anyway." A sharp look stopped Hermione from speaking again, and Lyra continued, "I want you all to have a good foundation of this year's magical theory before we move onto things like nullification or dark harmonics. Given the nature of the curriculum and the changing teachers, the studies can be a bit patchwork at times —"
"But Professor," said Hermione, apparently unable to contain herself, "I read that the Ministry is trying to reform the Defense curriculum, which might be as soon as next year, so wouldn't it be best to be over-prepared than not?"
Harry leaned back in his chair, resisting the urge to roll his head back to stare at the ceiling. He looked around the classroom instead, and noted that most of the students seemed to have largely tuned out as Hermione started that conversation again. To Hermione's credit, she did seem genuinely distressed by the possibility of the curriculum change.
Lyra pursed her lips. "Firstly, I'll thank you not to interrupt me while I'm speaking," she said, and Hermione flushed a bit. "And yes, the Ministry is negotiating — and that's the key word here — an adjusted curriculum. They still have to consult with certain groups and individuals on the matter. That it'll be rolled out next year is just propaganda from the Ministry, which they'll use as ammunition against Dumbledore when he inevitably refuses to adopt their half-baked ideas."
It had been a little bit strange when she'd first gone into these tangents, but by now they were used to it. Professor Malfoy was simply known to have a dim view of the Ministry, just another quirk of the rather eclectic wizards and witches that taught at Hogwarts. She was hardly as nutty as Mad-Eye or Lockhart or Quirrell, anyhow.
"But —" said Hermione, glaring at Ron when he kicked her ankle under the table. "Professor McGonagall started teaching O.W.L. content."
"For you, maybe," muttered Harry.
"Actually," said Lyra, standing up. "Then maybe there is something we can discuss, from what I've marked of your tests so far. If you want O.W.L. practice, I can give you that. I've been meaning to do this anyways."
On cue, Ron and Seamus groaned loudly, while Lavender and Parvati gave very put-upon sighs. Harry almost thought a ghost of a smile flashed across Lyra's face, but it was gone too quickly for him to tell. Hermione determinedly did not acknowledge the reactions, facing the front.
"One thing that the O.W.L. will challenge you on is critical thinking," said Lyra, grabbing a chalk and writing the letters in elegant cursive on the blackboard. "This is something you haven't really shown in your homework and assignments yet. That's okay. But as you get older, life doesn't get simpler. Quite the opposite. Adult society, and magic especially, demands elevated thinking skills. The O.W.L. exam, and especially the N.E.W.T., are tests of this very thing."
On the board she wrote and underlined several words:
Explain
Analyse
Justify
"All of these are common words in the questions of the O.W.L.s and N.E.W.T.s," said Lyra. "It's also the words that are most often misinterpreted by students. You might have also seen them in some of the assignments I've set you — not because I'm trying to prepare you for the O.W.L.s, but because I'm trying to prepare you for life."
Harry squinted at the board. Now that he thought about it, he had seen a few of those before, or the synonyms for them. Homework wasn't too bad for Defense this year, which was always a blessing, but when there was, it was usually split between 'master your wand movement before next week' or a paragraph-long response featuring one of those words. A paragraph that Hermione managed to turn into a full three feet's worth of parchment, until Lyra had started cutting marks for that. Harry felt a little smile float onto his lips at the memory of a silently fuming Hermione and an insufferably smug Ron.
"Let's start with the most basic level of questioning," said Lyra. "This one is — actually, let's ask someone else. Ronald?" Ron jerked in his seat, his head leaping off his palm as he sat up straight. "Let's say you're writing an article for Which Broomstick? for a new super-broom from Wallonia called… hm." Her eyes briefly raked over Harry's forehead. "The Lightning Bolt." Harry resisted the urge to scowl. "If your editor asked you to describe the broom, what will you write?"
"Er," said Ron, swallowing, "I guess the enchantments it has? What kind of Braking Charm it has, the Inertial Manipulation Charms. Uh, what kind of wood they used for the handles and the twigs, and… I guess acceleration, top speed, price?"
"Of course a Weasley would focus on the cost," Harry heard Draco whisper. Ron's ears turned red, and Harry turned in his seat reaching for his wand —
"Ten points from Slytherin," said Lyra offhandedly. "Good answer, Ronald. Describe means providing key characteristics. You should all be familiar with that. But you'll have to take it up a notch for the O.W.L.s." She drummed her fingers on her desk. "The Lightning Bolt is, we'll say, made of pink ivory wood for the handle, and its bristle bindings are made of variable electrum alloys, funneling the enchantments to ensure not one drop of magic is wasted. Also, it costs twelve hundred galleons a stick. Why is it so expensive?"
"Because ivory is export-restricted," answered Ron promptly. "And because it's supposed to be really hard to actually turn into a broom that people can actually ride. I've heard they're wild, trying to throw people off, and only the best broomwrights can carve them."
"Anything else?"
Ron shrugged, so Lyra turned to the class. Hermione's hand shot up, and when she realized that nobody else would do the same, she gestured to Hermione.
"Because electrum is magic-resistant, and Professor Vector said focusing enchantments through magic-resistant materials is supposed to be very difficult to do," she said. "Even for professional enchanters it's supposed to take a very long time, because you have to manipulate the material by hand, than by wand."
"Professor Vector is right," said Lyra. "So, Ronald? Why is it so expensive?"
"Because the materials are expensive and only a few people can make them?" said Ron, and Lyra gave him a nod.
"Good. That's an explanation." She tapped at Explain. "You're identifying the key components in this question — providing clear details and reasons, a cause and effect. In this case, you had to not only use the information provided in the question itself, but also information you gained from elsewhere, whether that be a different class or from a magazine. And that's what you'll also be expected to do at your exams, though it'll be drawing primarily from whatever you've learnt here or from your books in the past four years. Analysis, though, requires more thought. You might choose to look at the consequences, or a different perspective, or weigh the relative value of the relationships between the details you provided." Her eyes flickered towards the back of the classroom. "Theodore?" she said after a pause.
"Pink ivory represents royal authority," said Nott, lowering his hand. When he hesitated, Lyra nodded, prompting him to continue. "So there's a cultural interest in keeping it away from foreigners, which means there will be even less of them circulating outside the Kingdom of Zimbabwe."
"And any that do trickle into Europe will find that demand far outstrips supply," said a blonde Slytherin girl — Bluegrass? "There will be bidding wars, which will push prices up beyond the costs of manufacture."
Lyra clapped her hands together. "Good. That's analysis. Implications, perspectives, and more. If I were marking the O.W.L.s right now, I would consider those both valid for the purposes of marking. Take a point to Slytherin, each."
As the Slytherins patted each other on the back, she tapped at her desk, considering. "Justify is harder. Justify means that you're taking a side in an argument and provide reasons why. The argument might have a for or against, or it might have many more sides to it. Something like, 'which Quidditch team will win the Premier League next year and why'. Of course, you will be asked higher-level questions than that."
"Can you give us an example, Professor?" said Hermione, predictably. Harry heard Lavender sigh.
A smile briefly crossed Lyra's face. "I won't turn down an opportunity to get into one of my favorite theories of magic," she said, wiping down the blackboard to make a clean slate. "Here's the thing about magic. We don't understand its true source, but the degree to which it punctures the fabric of reality hints at an all-powerful force of some kind. We wizards have been able to create spells to travel through time — from a scientific lens, this is one of the most incredible feats of magic. Yet we can't conjure ready-to-eat food. Why is that?"
Hermione raised her hand and Lyra nodded for her to answer: "Food is the first of the five Principal Exceptions to Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration."
"Yes, but that's not the answer I'm looking for," said Lyra, turning her gaze expectantly at the rest of the classroom, though not expecting any of them to answer. "Why is food one of the Exceptions? What are the other Exceptions? Hermione?"
"The soul, unknown knowledge, magic, and treasure," recited Hermione easily.
"So let's take treasure: anything that those with souls might consider valuable material worth trading cannot be Transfigured or Conjured. This includes silver. So why can we travel through time, conjure matter, jinx abstract concepts such as job positions —" Lyra waved a hand generally at the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom "— but we can't conjure such a metal?"
"Magic works more off meaning," said Hermione. "Meaning, concepts, stories, and food is incredibly valuable to humans —"
"Also true, and very important magical theory too — but still not the answer I'm looking for. Let me rephrase: is it truly impossible to conjure food or treasure?" Lyra held up a finger as Hermione opened her mouth. "Let me specify further: do you think it is impossible for magic — not wizards, but magic — to conjure these things? Is there an innate limit in the power of magic that stops this?"
Hermione closed her mouth, frowned in the way she always did when thinking. Lyra cast her eyes across the rest of the classroom, a slight smile inviting opinions from everyone else, though most students just shuffled their feet and hoped they wouldn't be called on, as Harry did.
"What do we think, Pansy?"
Pansy Parkinson flinched a little in her seat. "No?" she guessed.
"No," Lyra agreed. "So where does the limitation lie?" Pansy didn't respond, so she glanced over the class until she eventually settled on Hermione. "What do we think?"
Hermione was chewing the end of her quill, as she always did when she wasn't sure of something. "In wizards, I suppose."
"Yes," said Lyra, sounding satisfied. "That was Gamp's conclusion as well, if any of you have read his Treatise on Metamorphic Magics — a read I thoroughly recommend, by the way, he has a surprising sense of humor. So, why is it that we can't conjure food? My response is that the limitation lies in wizards, rather than magic itself, based on wizards' perception of magic and the world. My justification is that past magical innovations or discoveries of natural magical phenomena are so wide and varied that our only real limitations appear to be anthropocentric in nature, of which I can cite multiple sources off the top of my head, including Gamp foremost. A justification isn't just my answer to a question, but why I chose to answer that way. Make sense?"
Harry, along with the rest of the class, nodded. Idly, he glanced outside, and saw one of the first years stuck on the spire of a neighboring tower, with Madam Hooch trying to coax them from it with increasing strength of arm. If only it were him on that broom instead…
The fire danced around in the safety of its pit, tossing warmth to all the Ravenclaws sitting around it. Lyra sat on a large cushioned chair she had conjured, a leg sprawled over an armrest and head in the lap of Larissa, who sat on the armrest, brushing her fingers through Lyra's hair. Lyra brought up the joint of valerian to her lips, inhaled deeply, and dropped her arm back down, watching the ashes drip onto the wet soil, extinguished after a futile moment's glow.
Near them sat James, occasionally taking drinks from his bottle of butterbeer as he stared into the fire, a look of deep thought etched across his face; it was at least his tenth bottle. To his left was Victoria, who sat a bit stiffly as she usually did, uncomfortable and never knowing quite how to act around Lyra anymore; past her was the seat for Roger Davies, but he was currently at the edge of the lake, washing his hands and face from Lyra banishing the contents of his bottle into his face after a teasing remark aimed at Victoria. That he'd entirely forgotten that he could conjure water as a wizard and instead mucked about like a Muggle peasant spoke to how long they'd been here and how many bottles of Madam Rosmerta's finest they'd gone through.
"That was mean," said Larissa, though it was a testament to her growth that she didn't seem that concerned. "You didn't need to go that far."
"I did," said Lyra, her wand still hanging loosely in her other hand. "Only I get to make fun of Vicky."
James rolled his eyes and Victoria gave her a look of exasperation. "Honestly, Malfoy."
Larissa let out a breath of amazement and shook her head. "You always say that after you do something terrible. Sure, he can be a bit cross, but you've always had it out for him." James raised his bottle at her words.
"Did not — I did nothing to him our first year. Or the second."
"Yeah," said Larissa slowly, thinking. "You only began to hate him our third year, about the time we started going out."
"You mean the first time you started going out." She shook her head and then blew out a raven made of smoke which flapped its way around the firepit. "I should just banish him into the lake while I'm at it and sober him up."
"I think it's kind of cute, your rivalry," she said, pulling Lyra's hair behind her ears. "You know, that'd actually make a lot of sense. Oooh, were you jealous of me?"
"Larissa, if you continue with that line of thought, I'll throw you in too."
"Right, of course, you like girls — how could I have forgot?" Larissa's tone was mostly mocking, but her cheeks betrayed her, turning red from whatever mad thought was running through her love-diseased brain. "Maybe you weren't jealous of me."
"What?"
"Maybe you were jealous of him," said Larissa, looking nice and innocent, but with the firelight she looked like a tomato. "You know," she said casually but carefully, "I think you're kind of cute, too."
Then she giggled, falling on top the back of the chair and trying not to fall off it or onto Lyra, who tried to not blush herself (and succeeded).
"I'd rather be dead than Roger Davies," said Lyra.
"Even though he went out with Fleur, and you didn't?" said James, and Lyra seriously considered hurling James at Roger and getting rid of them both.
"Oh!" said Larissa, sitting up again with the air of someone who thought they had just realized something fantastic. "Do you like Vicky too? Is that why you threw the butterbeer in Roger's face —?"
"Larissa!" said Victoria, looking unsure if she should be more frustrated with her or Lyra.
Lyra, looking at Victoria's expression, burst out a small laugh. "Yeah, if only." She looked closer at Victoria, a small smile growing on her lips. "She is rather pretty."
Larissa laughed at the tight look on Victoria's face. "Oh, she's blushing! Look!"
"Don't tease her, Larissa, she'll think I'm not being serious." This time a blush really did appear on Victoria's cheeks. "Hey, Vic, it's your birthday soon, isn't it?"
Victoria blinked from the sudden transition, and opened her mouth but it took a second for words to come out. "Yes, in two days. You knew?"
"Course I knew," said Lyra, looking entirely like someone who was about to spring a crafty trap upon a friend. "Who do you think got you that mixtape of all that muggle music you've been listening to this past year?"
Victoria opened her mouth again but this time words didn't come out at all. Lyra let the silence drag on, enjoying it.
Then James said, "That was me."
And Lyra shrugged. "You asked for ideas and I gave you half the songs. And anyway —" She held out an open hand to the air, looking absentmindedly at the fire as a few seconds passed by. There was the sound of something shooting through the air, and a cassette tape flew into her hand. Lyra tossed it to Victoria, who caught it without her expression of surprise changing. If anything, it seemed to grow. "That's a bunch of songs I thought you'd like that came out this last year," added Lyra. "I figure if I was going to put in the effort of thinking for James, I might as well do the easy part too and get some recognition. And to make up for the years of abuse or whatever."
James raised his eyebrows and said, "Wow."
The delight on Larissa faded and she made a face. "You've never gotten me anything that nice for my birthday!"
"Go throw Davies into the middle of the lake and this time I will," said Lyra, gesturing toward the shore, where Roger Davies had finally come out of the water, exhausted and piss-drunk and looking like he wanted to throw Lyra into the water in kind but was trying to hide it because he knew he'd be fighting his own drunkenness before he even got to Lyra herself in such an attempt.
It took Larissa about four seconds to decide, and up she leapt, moving past the fire and to the water where Davies panted. A silence descended on the three remaining, though they could slightly hear Larissa's distant explanation of why Davies should let her chuck him back into the lake.
Lyra conjured a small flame on her finger and relighted her joint, taking a few puffs of it and leaning back into her chair, staring up at the night sky. There was very little better than this, a fire and some drinks and friends, and a little something rolled up; it made her feel as though she was in water, a comfortable drifting though she lay in a chair.
"Lyra?"
It took her a moment for her to realize it was Victoria who said it, and she looked down at her. "Yeah?"
Victoria looked so vulnerable there that Lyra decided in that moment to never again be mean to her.
"Thank you," she said after a moment.
Lyra gave a small nod. "Yeah. Of course." And she went back to watching the night sky. The Moon was nice tonight.
At that moment, Moe finally stumbled out of the bushes and collapsed onto the log beside James, yanking at the fly of his jeans.
"All good?" said Lyra, beaming at him.
"Yeah, all fine," said Moe, throwing her a glance and rubbing his hands together as he stared into the fire. Then a bottle caught his eye and he reached for it, saying, "Still haven't pissed on myself, so I'll just take another one of these."
"You're going to hell," said James.
"No," said Moe. "I'm a good Muslim. Mostly. Allah will forgive me for this little sin."
Little? mouthed Victoria, glancing toward his and James' pile of bottles.
Moe looked around. "Where is Roger?"
"Drowning," said Lyra. "Hopefully."
"Hm," he said, a look of sage disapproval on his face. "You need more patience and kindness in your heart, Lyra."
Lyra rolled her eyes and said nothing. James held his bottle by the mouth and idly swirled it as he stared at the campfire, mesmerized. Victoria let out a soft sigh and looked up at the skies, almost leaning into James as she did so.
The silence was interrupted by a splash, where Roger had been bodily shoved into the lake, but Larissa, as inebriated as she was, had lost her balance and toppled in after him. Thankfully, Larissa surfaced — though Lyra didn't particularly care what happened to Roger — and they began splashing water at each other like the children they were.
James glanced over to the lake. "Do you think they'll get back together again, like the last three times they broke up?"
"Don't ask that," said Moe, "Lyra will get jealous."
"Where's this idea come from, that I fancy Larissa?" said Lyra in exasperation.
"Larissa?" said Moe. "I was talking about Roger. You fancy Larissa?"
"First Charlie, then the old Larissa, then Roger, then this Larissa, then Victoria." Lyra scowled. "Am I viewed as the school slut or something?"
"Mm, no," said Moe thoughtfully. "More you are viewed as the kind who should be the school slut, but is not due to the shackles nature has put on you. We should all be thankful, I think."
"What the fuck does that mean?"
"I don't know," Moe admitted.
James gave a confused laugh, like he didn't know why he found that funny.
Victoria spoke up, somewhat quietly. "Do you really fancy Larissa?"
Lyra's expression softened, and she looked over at Victoria with hesitance.
"I — I mean, no," said Lyra, frowning. "Maybe I wouldn't mind if… but…" She shook her head and shrugged. "I'm just a bit lonely. And not many interest me anyway."
"What about Fleur Delacour?"
Lyra shook her head slowly. "Maybe in a few years," was all she said.
Larissa and Roger made their way back up, giggling and sopping wet, and Lyra felt a pang of something dangerously close to regret. Davies was an idiot who routinely fumbled her plays when they were on the Quidditch team together, among other things, but he was a genuine idiot. Larissa wouldn't have dated him thrice if there wasn't something going for him; for all her ditziness, she was an exceptionally good judge of character. And Roger himself had become grown far beyond the coquettish fop with an overinflated ego that he had been years ago.
They'd all come far, in their own ways. Victoria's efforts were the most obvious; she was a shoo-in for the Head Girl position next year, and she was on track to complete her thesis before she completed her N.E.W.T.s, but Larissa and Moe too. Lyra had expected them to slack in her classes, taking advantage of their friendship, but they'd only pushed themselves harder, and it hurt her heart a little to think that they considered her worthy of such esteem.
Lyra raised her wand and cast a Hot Air Charm on Larissa, drying at least the outer layer of her clothes. Roger remained wet, until James took pity on him and did the same. Appearances had to be maintained, after all.
"Merlin's beard, I'm knackered," said Roger, stretching his arms over his head. "Should we head back in?"
"Not yet," said James, and everyone looked at him. He turned around, grabbing a satchel he had brought with him and hadn't interacted with the whole night. "There's one more thing I want to do tonight. I mean, you don't have to, but…"
James pulled out a paper bag, and held it upside down — no, not a paper bag, but a lantern. Pieces of twine connected the box-shaped lantern to a small candle at the bottom. In silence, James passed them out, one to each person. He held them reverently, well aware of his skewed sense of balance and the hours he'd put into making these.
"Oh," breathed Victoria in recognition.
"I guess we could just light it," said James, slowly setting his down on the ground. "But I thought, given the occasion, we could try something else." He drew his wand, and as it always seemed to do whenever he took it out near her, Lyra's own wand twitched in her pocket, recognizing its twin. He took a stance, took a deep breath, and softly spoke: "Expecto patronum."
The tip of his wand glowed with pale light that bloomed into a raven with wings as wide as James was tall, which settled its beady gaze to its owner before flowing into the lantern. Lyra felt her shoulders fall, freed from a tension that she'd not known was there, warmth radiating physically as much as it did emotionally.
"Expecto patronum," Lyra murmured, and she was not the only one. Her Patronus, another raven ever since Azkaban, came effortlessly. It hopped on the ground and fluttered onto Lyra's shoulder, nudging her cheek with a spectral beak, before diving into the lantern in Lyra's free hand. Larissa's labrador barked, staring up at Larissa's wand, as though waiting for her to throw it; Roger's boar snorted and attempted to charge a laughing Roger; Moe's stallion shook his head before languidly making his way over to his lantern; and Lyra was briefly blinded by the size and brilliance of Victoria's elephant, which protectively curled her trunk around her owner.
Though all of them walked into the lanterns, some with more urging than others, their disappearance did not take away their warmth, which now felt almost like the full weight of the sun, burning up their skin. Lyra held her lantern close, even as it strained against her hand, seeking the stars.
"Pretty," Larissa murmured, staring at the spectral flame as though bewitched.
Slowly, the lanterns began to balloon outward as the warmth filled it, and James slowly let go, as if expecting the lantern to fall and shatter like glass.
It did not fall to the ground, but began to slowly float towards the sky. Lyra hesitated, and then let go, her bird joining their journey. On the windless night, there was nothing to impede their progress, and they continued ever upward, taking their hopes and dreams with them.
And they continued to watch, standing in a circle, long after the flickering lights had disappeared like winking fireflies, drowned in the sea of stars. It might only have been Lyra's imagination, but for a brief moment, it seemed like the stars were shining brighter than before.