seeking thestral

[occluminous]

Feral goes back to school. Bella goes to Charlie's house for the rest of the summer. She studies her textbooks and does her summer projects and owls her friends.

She thinks about Dementors.

Comments

[occluminous]

"- Is this why you weren't in Charms?"

[nobodyelse]

"Yes."

[occluminous]

Bella hugs him again.

[nobodyelse]

Hugs.

[occluminous]

Bella doesn't have another class with Feral until Magical Defense, so she runs off to find him while lunch is still ongoing.

[pythbox]

Feral is in his room!

"Hey, what's up?"

[occluminous]

"Sherlock warned me about what's in Defense today. It's these things called boggarts that turn into your worst fear when you look at them."

[pythbox]

"...I should probably skip Defense," says Feral.

[occluminous]

"I'm going to warn the teacher that mine might be a dementor and if boggarts are good at faking effects like theirs I should skip my turn. What's with yours?"

[pythbox]

"Uh... when I get really scared, everything catches fire?" he says.

[occluminous]

"That's true," allows Bella. "But like - the other thing I think mine could be is just myself dead and that would be unsettling but not scary, are you sure you'd get something that would scare you out of context?"

[pythbox]

...He gives her an incredulous look.

"Yes? And even if I wasn't, why the hell should I risk it?"

[occluminous]

"Okay, okay," says Bella, "skip if you want, it's the terrible memory charm teacher, goodness knows I wish I were comfy skipping classes. I'll tell you how it went after."

[pythbox]

"Great," he says. "See ya."

[occluminous]

Bella goes to Theory. She goes to Magizoology. She goes to Potions.

About a minute after Defense is due to start, she pounds on Feral's door again.

[pythbox]

He opens it almost immediately.

"Huh?"

[occluminous]

"He says boggarts can do the thing but he doesn't believe I've seen a dementor," Bella says desperately, "and he wants me to go in front of the boggart anyway."

[pythbox]

"...Fuck," says Feral. "And I'm supposed to what, back you up?"

[occluminous]

"If you don't I have to skip and I don't want him to flunk me. He saw me, he knows I'm not sick, and he already doesn't like me from the memory charm incident since Mrs. Stark didn't get him fired."

[pythbox]

"Okay," sighs Feral, "I'm game."

[occluminous]

"I'm sorry," says Bella apologetically, and she heads back to Defense with him.

[pythbox]

Feral follows. He's pretty sure that him setting a bunch of things on fire would do less damage than a Dementor showing up in the middle of the classroom, so he doesn't hang back when they get there.

[occluminous]

"I did meet a Dementor over the summer and Feral can confirm," Bella says, "and the boggart might well turn into one if you throw it at me and you can't do that to a whole room full of people."

[alicornucopia]

The teacher looks skeptically at Feral. "Were you even planning to show up? Miss Swan should not have had to fetch you."

[pythbox]

"I wasn't, actually," he says. "I have this problem where when I get scared things catch fire."