hidden arte

Bella doesn't find a spare moment to practice with Feral again for a week and a half, which is just as well, since he does need time to try his hacked-together Occlumency strategy. Bella fills the time by reading her Philosopher's Stone book, twice, and following up on the leads in it, but apparently either the author did her research very thoroughly and there's nothing else to be found, or the ACAAM library just isn't that great.

The library is pretty great in some other respects, though. Whenever Bella finds herself at a loose end, she reads ahead and outlines essay assignments for the courses that are kind enough to offer syllabi so she'll be able to dash off and work on other things if the fancy takes her. She is strict about holding herself down to no more than one hour of outside-class flying a day, two on weekends, even when the weather is really nice (which it virtually always is). She got sufficiently nasty (and, for that matter, pleasant) surprises about features of the wizarding world in her first few days of immersion that she thinks it's probably a higher immediate priority to get a lot of reading in.

Then it's a Wednesday afternoon, Bella is between books, and she spots Feral at dinner.

"Hey, did you practice?" she asks him brightly.