Rarity steps lightly to the music in the ballroom of the Ingatestone Hall. She works to be feather light in the arms of the heir-apparent of Barron Petre. The young man moves with practiced grace as they both twirl among the dancers in the huge ball room. The string quartet at the edge of the ball room is playing beautifully. She looks into the deep blue eyes of her partner and smiles demurely. She’s gratified by him smiling nervously back, looking back towards his father.
“Rarity?”
She flutters her eyelashes, “Yes, William?”
“Would you like to sneak away from this boring place?”
She puts a hand to her chest, “Oh, you find me boring?”
His face reddens and he stammers a bit, “Nothing of the sort, I would simply like to…” He is stopped by a single finger of hers placed on his lips. He smiles in response to hers.
“Say nothing more.” She whispers into his ear, “We can certainly take a walk together.” She holds out a hand, which he graciously accepts and she allows him to lead her from the ball room. They giggle together as they walk through the massive building and finally exit out into the cool evening. He opens a door gallantly for her, and she steps through.
A musty smell hits her, she looks around, they are in a horse stable, “William, what is this?”
She turns and somehow he’s changed clothes, he’s wearing tight riding pants along with a trim jacket, a riding crop tucked under his elbow. In his hands is…
“William, No.” She says as she steps backwards. She looks down, that sounded different, a brilliant white flank greets her eyes, along with her three diamond cutie mark. She looks back at William as he advances, holding a bridle, “No, William, I don’t like this.
“Why not, you will love living in the stables and sleeping on hay, but first we have to get you ready to play some polo.”
“William…” she whimpers as she backs away from him, as he gets close, she screams out, “NO!”
She’s awake, she’s wearing her sleep mask. She takes a moment to take off the mask and look around at her friends. Picking up the tennis ball sized device off of her bed, she looks at the time display on the face of it and shakes her head. Rainbow Dash and that little song of hers. She glances out of the corner of her eye as she watches her friend take her turn at the restroom. She rolls her eyes as her friend’s boxers and tee shirt are tossed from the room as the door shuts. She reaches over and pulls her wand out of her robes and points it at the discarded clothing. The wand glows and the sleepwear zips past her into a small hamper. Rarity pulls the sheer pink robe with lavender trim over her own sleepwear, a beautiful red silk one piece with spaghetti straps. She smiles as she moves over to her bureau. All the girls have pretty much the same dreadfully dull wardrobes. She has been able to do a little to personalize the robes. All her friends have their marks on the inner pockets of the robes, next to their hips.
Rarity chooses her clothing with care, while the slacks, ties and blouses are pretty standard uniforms, Rarity fingers the different choices she has today. She glances back, Rainbow and Twilight are busy cleaning in the bathrooms, everyone else is getting dressed. She looks back into her bureau and bites her lower lip. She is quick to don the white blouse, it only takes her a moment to decide on the sleek gray skirt over the slacks. She buttons the skirt and pulls out her shoes, she has to walk quite a bit throughout the halls of this school, and as much as the high heels are appealing, she chooses some attractive looking flats. Before pulling on her robe, she reaches on top and pulls out an electric blue scarf, which she ties on precisely. She looks at herself in the mirror on the door of the bureau and smiles. No drab uniform is going to stop Rarity from shining through. She turns around as she closes the door and stops dead, “Oh Rainbow Dash, that just won’t do!” She walks towards her friend, who has an absolute deer in headlights look about her as Rarity advances on her.
***
Rarity walks with Sunset Shimmer. The poor dear is still shaking from what she had seen in the crystal ball. Rarity shakes her head, all she saw in the blasted thing was an inverted view of the rest of the room. No deep meditation, no pinkie sense, no nothing had changed her view through the ball. She glances back at the door of the divination classroom, the teacher had proclaimed her imminent death. Hannah Abbott, one of the Hufflepuff girls, however, had whispered that Professor Trelawney had made this kind of proclamation in nearly every class. Though with that Grogar creature on the loose. She shudders to think how accurate that woman’s proclamations just might be. Watching Sunset get blasted by that creature, only to pop up elsewhere, had shaken Rarity to her core. Even though she had been busy trying to distract the beast, she had felt the icy cold glare of that ram. The power he contained dwarfed everything they had dealt with in the past, even Sunset Shimmer herself while holding the power of the Equestrian Element of Magic. Rarity shakes her head as Sunset starts to get more steady on her feet.
“Darling, whatever are we going to do?”
Sunset gasps, “I don’t know, Rarity.” She looks down, “If I had some way to train you. The defense against the dark arts class here is a help, but I need to put you and Twilight through some serious magical battle training.”
Rarity huffs, “How can us three with Equestrian magic even begin to hold a candle to him?”
A tear runs down Sunset’s cheek, “He’s gathering those Death Eaters, he’s using a version of compulsion on them.” She sighs, “I don’t know how to break it.”
“What about the mages here? Hermione knows a lot of wonderful charms to help with mind control.” Twilight says, adjusting her glasses.
Sunset shrugs off Rarity’s help with a grateful look, “I think I can handle it, thank you.” She looks over at Twilight, “The mages here use magic that is very different than what I use.” She draws out her wand and looks at it, “I know they can help, but teaching you…” She trails off as the wand glows softly, “I’m going to have to help you learn magic. And quickly.” The glow fades as she puts her wand away. She looks around at her friends, “Thank you.”
Rarity starts, but Twilight joins in and both of them hug Sunset Shimmer tightly, “To the end, darling.” Rarity says softly.
After a few moments, Twilight speaks up, “I’ve got Transfiguration with Hermione and her friends. I’ll see you.” She vanishes up the stairs towards the classroom.
Rarity looks at Sunset, “Charms?”
Sunset smiles brightly, “Charms it is.”
They walk together into the charms classroom, the diminutive teacher is holding his own wand and pointing it at the chalkboard, where writing is appearing on the green slate boards. He looks back and smiles at the two American girls as they find their own seats.
“Good morning students!” He says jovially as the final few decide to make their way to their seats. “Oh, you all are in for a treat today.” He say, clapping his hands, “We have lots of new charms to work with today. Open up your spellbooks to useful everyday charms.” He smiles, “That’s chapter five.”
Rarity opens the book and looks around. Doing dishes, dusting, sweeping floors, could this get any worse? She looks around at the other students. Most of them are looking at the pages with a bit of trepidation, one student, sitting next to her, is reading with rapt attention. Rarity leans over, “Don’t these look rather pedestrian uses for magic?”
He smiles shyly, hunching a bit in on himself as he looks up at Rarity, then over at the teacher. That gets a smile from Rarity, he’s shy, that one. She giggles and leans a little closer, “It’s all right, I don’t bite.” She offers a hand, “I’m Rarity.”
He blushes profusely, "N... ne...Neville Long Bottom, ma'am." He whispers softly, taking her hand for a moment, a quick shake, then he retreats.
Rarity grins, keeping her voice low, “Well, Neville, I’m looking around and most of the students here seem to have the opinion that the teacher is off his rocker when he’s talking about today being a treat. But you seem to agree with Professor Flitwick.”
Neville looks at the teacher, then back at Rarity, “These charms aren’t glamorous, they aren’t throwing fire, or fighting off dark mages.” He smiles, “But you are going to use these more than anything else.” He draws his wand out, “Any opportunity to use your magic to do things, even pedestrian, easy things, is a joy.” His blush returns, “Don’t you like using your magic?”
Rarity frowns, “I…”
“Miss Rarity, mister Longbottom, it’s time to pay attention to class.” Comes the teacher’s voice. Jarring both of them to the present, and getting a snicker from Sunset Shimmer. Rarity gives her friend a dirty look as the teacher launches into the lesson.
She lets his words wash over her as she thinks. It was almost a joy to touch magic, until a matter of days ago, she had no idea that she could do magic like this. She had felt the magic of ponying up, felt Equestrian magic flowing though her, changing her and tying her to the other world. Even then, however, something always seemed to be missing, disconnected, as if something was just beyond her grasp or understanding. AJ’s strength, Dash’s flight, Equestrian magic always gave them so much power. Though that power was actually a part of them, part of who they are. For her, though, it felt like something was blocking her.
At the teacher’s prompting, she draws out her wand, along with the other students. She looks down at the light colored and elegantly sculpted wood. The wand is a work of art unto itself, but is it the power? Does it hold the magic she’s been using? Or does it come from inside her?
Over the last few days, Sunset has talked about the magic coming from her, that the wand was just a conduit. Yet to do even the simplest trick, for some reason, she still needs this little piece of pear wood. Without it, the power was lost to her. Touching the power within it, when she connects with that power inside of her, it glows, as does Sunset’s wand. Yet none of the other students seem to have their own wands glow. She says the words just as the other students do, her own spell appearing to do the exact same as the other student’s spells, yet it feels, different. Does it mean something different?
Sunset had told her that her magic is more in line with Equestrian magic, and it’s less about the spell words that she says, in fact, unicorns don’t have to say any words to initiate a spell. It’s about the formula, the shaping of the magic into patterns. If it’s more complex than simple levitation, the spell forms are what the unicorn must learn, though some spells come instinctually for the unicorns, part of their cutie marks. The basic spells, what she is learning here, the words the human mages use help form those patterns in her mind. Sunset had told her to pay attention to the feel and shape of the magic. The energies other students are using, that will give her the spell forms for the more complex spell she will craft later. She looks at Sunset, her brow scrunched as she focuses on the multitude of simple spells the teacher is offering at a rapid rate. Even with the intense concentration of her friend, she can see the joy, the happiness of working with magic.
The joy of magic? Rarity sneaks a glance at Neville, he has the same look of joy on his face as Sunset does. Looking back to her wand she wonders quietly “What does this mean for me?”
She closes her eyes as she feels the magic flowing through her. Even doing such simple tasks, switching or hopping between charms, feels so liberating, so free. Much like the endorphin rush she has felt after intense exercise, or the joy she feels when she finishes a dress. This is exercise, of a sort, she’s using muscles that she didn’t even know she had before, had never touched before. She starts to smile as she adds an extra flick to the wand as she levitates a broom. Picking up multiple things at once seems to be a breeze for her, a dozen dust pans propped against the wall zip into the air, glowing with her magic.
“Rarity.” Sunset whispers fiercely as she flicks her wand at a several stacks of clean clothes, she pours the magic into them as they start folding themselves. She glances over at the big tubs of water that the teacher had set out. The brushes attack the crusted on food on the various plates. Rarity hums as she looks around the classroom for more to do, a small smile on her face.
“Miss Rarity!” Comes another voice, snapping Rarity’s attention.
She focuses on the teacher standing before her, “Oh my.” She’s able to mutter, “I’m so sorry, I just…”
Professor Flitwick pats her on the shoulder, “I can see you have a large amount of raw power right there.” He looks around at the carnage from her spells sputtering to a stop, “And a tremendous amount of fine control right here.” He smiles, “But could you let the other students also join in on the learning today?”
Rarity blushes deeply, “Oh dear, I’m so sorry sir.”
Neville leans over as the teacher walks among the tubs and the various brooms and other cleaning equipment, his own wand out as he cleans up, “That was amazing.” He murmurs softly.
Rarity looks at Sunset, who is now looking at Rarity, her eyes narrowed. Rarity looks back at Neville, “That was just so…” She looks around, trying to find the words, “exhilarating.” She says.
“Exhilarating for a common cur maybe,” the girl sitting behind the two huffs. She’s about Rarity’s age, maybe a shade younger, but her hair is raven black, cut short around her neck. She sneers, “Or one who shows little to no pride or ambition in their work.”
Rarity blinks, “Now see here…” She starts before being cut off by the Slytherin girl.
“I am aware that social standards across the pond are rather lax, but do try and remember, you are in our country now. Magic, is not for, how do you commoners put it? Horsing around.”
Glancing back Neville shook his head, “Millicent Bulstrode, house Slytherin.”
Rarity closes her mouth in a mix of shock and pain. Looking back down at her wand, her dream comes flooding back to her. ‘A… horse.’ Her hand trembles slightly.
With a gentle touch, Neville places his hand on hers to help steady her wand.
Sunset jerks and looks down, a jelly bean has bounced off her head, she picks up the small candy bit and looks around, Pinkie Pie is nearly vibrating as she stands at the doorway, Sunset looks at Rarity then slides out of her chair.
With a single nod to Sunset then a second to Neville, Rarity turns her attention to the teacher. Sunset quickly heads over to the door and whispers to Pinkie. Glancing towards her friends, Rarity tilts her head but is unable to make out the words. In moments, Sunset is back and Pinkie has disappeared, even without spells, Pinkie has always seemed to have the innate ability to just vanish when she wished.
Sunset turned her attention to Rarity with a big smile on her face, then whispers quietly as she leans over, “Pinkie found something, and it might be very helpful for us. I told her we will check it out after classes are done for the day.”
Rarity frowns as the teacher turns back, she leans over to Sunset, “Pinkie found something?”
Sunset nods, “That map that the Weasley twins gave her this morning has helped her find something that may make things a lot easier for us. So, we’ll meet after classes are over and check it out, okay?”
Rarity nods dubiously, “Okay.”
They both focus on the teacher as he turns back around, a somewhat forced smile on his face, “Okay students, let’s try this again.
***
Rarity walks from the great hall after lunch. The food was actually quite excellent today, with an interesting variety of treats she had heard of, but not yet had a chance to sample, such as Turkish Delights. Applejack, had taken the time to warn her, however, that she had talked with the house elves down in the kitchens about food preparations. It was quaint how Applejack had put it, ‘down home cookin’.” That means some American dishes will be showing up soon, starting with tonight. Given this, the Turkish delights might have to wait. After that, she had gone to talk to the young Weasley girl. Rarity leans back as the gong announces the end of lunch and the beginning of the first after lunch period. She doesn’t have another class for a while now, she has to admit, the scheduling for a boarding school like this is actually quite nice. Things are at quite a relaxed pace than back at home.
She closes her eyes as she thinks, usually free time would be spent working on new clothing designs, or trying to find more gemstones outside of town. She’s got a few ideas for her friends to wear if they ever get the chance to perform their music here. Though it seems the mages typically don’t care for more modern music. It’s quite nice for her, though, that some of the children here had lived in the muggle world, some being half-bloods, or even muggleborn mages. That means that some are at least exposed to the outside world, not stuck back in the middle ages.
Rarity sighs as she decides to get up, she turns and walks slowly out of the great hall and turn to head down the covered bridge that leads to the path to Hogsmeade. She gets to the middle of the bridge and looks out and down. When the mages were cleaning up, they neglected to repair much of the damage that Grogar had done to the rock face. With a shudder, Rarity looks at the place where Grogar had nearly killed Sunset Shimmer. The rock had been blasted hot enough to melt, then had solidified like that. She can see the claw marks in the rock that the wyvern had made as it was trying to climb away from them. Rarity closes her eyes, seeing again the frenzied creature attempted to gain purchase to get high enough to fly away. Or failing that, attacking her and her friends. She can remember the spell forms she had used instinctually, making blinding bright flashes of light, even using a spell that solidified the air to bind the creature. After the influence of Grogar was gone, it had calmed down quite a bit. She looks off towards the forbidden forest, hoping that the poor creature is happy back at home.
“I heard about your fight with Harry’s dragon.”
Rarity flinches and turns, Neville is there, he comes up next to her, “That was a Hungarian Horntail, one of the most vicious types of dragons.”
Rarity nods, “Yeah.” She says softly. “We nearly died there.”
Neville looks down then up at her, “But you didn’t.”
She flinches and looks at him, “I’m sorry?”
“You didn’t die, Rarity. You survived, you beat the dragon. Even I’m not brave enough to face one of those, let alone strong enough.”
She sighs, the students here, with very few exceptions, don’t know about Grogar, “You are right, there. But it was very scary.”
He nods, then he looks closer at the wall. “Just look at that blast mark. No Hungarian Horntail could do that.” He shakes his head, “The amount of heat, the concentration. No dragon at all could do that on its own.” He looks over at Rarity, “Something else happened here, other than you girls fighting that dragon?”
“I…” She looks down, “I don’t know what you are talking about.”
He huffs, “That’s the teachers for you, something happens, and they don’t tell the students. They don’t want to scare us but at the same time, they just let Harry and his friends take care of it.”
Rarity looks up, he brings a closed fist down on the railing, “Our first year here, I found out that Harry, Ron, and Hermione were going to go down to look for the Philosopher’s stone. I tried to stop them, they needed to get the teacher’s help. They had already gotten in so much trouble that year. But Hermione put a curse on me so they could go.”
“You stood up for your friend’s safety, you did what you felt was right.” Rarity says softly.
He barks a laugh, “But I was wrong. If I had been successful in stopping them, He Who Must Not Be Named would be reborn now. And we would be in a lot of trouble. They were right to stop me. What happens if the next time I make things worse?”
"Trust me, I know terror." Neville sighs as he crosses his arms on the rail looking down. "Both my parents were driven mad by Death Eaters, and all everyone did was lie about it. Now they are just locked up in prison. For their protection as much as for the protection of others."
"Neville..." Rarity blinks, looking at him. He’s looking down, but it seems he’s looking inside himself more than out. "They were strong mages and they couldn't even protect themselves." Shaking his head, Neville sighs, "They’re still out there you know."
"Who?"
"The Death Eaters. Every time I see them, every time I hear about them all I feel is terror and dread. But that's not the worst part. There's something else with them. I saw it once, and now when I close my eyes to sleep sometimes I see it."
"What?"
"Some... some goat creature with eyes that can see into your soul. Even the Death Eaters are scared of it. I told Professor Dumbledore, but of course, he said I must have imagined it." Neville shakes his head. "Maybe I'm just going crazy like my parents. Or maybe I'm just not worth telling the truth to."
Rarity’s eyes cloud, she remembers the fight, distracting that dragon, that demonic ram hopping from rock to rock, his voice cold enough to freeze the sould, “Grogar.” She whispers.
Neville jerks, “That was the name in my dream.” He looks intensely at her, “How do you know the name in my dreams?”
Rarity blinks and shakes her head, “I…I don’t know.”
For a moment, Neville’s face twists in anger, then he relaxes back, “It’s okay, you don’t have to tell me the truth.” He looks down, “I’m the one who keeps losing my frog. I’m the one who melted Seamus’ cauldron in potions.”
“Neville.”
He stops his rant and looks at Rarity, she sighs. They aren’t going to be able to defeat Grogar by themselves, otherwise they would have when he appeared just a few days before, she looks into his hazel eyes, “I’m sorry Neville. We came to this school to stay away from Grogar. Your dreams are right, he’s a demonic ram. He’s a necromancer from Equestria.”
His eyebrows rise, “Equestria?”
She nods, “It’s a world outside of ours. Sunset Shimmer is from that world. They are inhabited by intelligent ponies, unicorns, pegasi, earth ponies, and the fantastically rare alicorns.” She looks at him, “This needs to be kept close, Neville, you can’t tell anyone.”
He looks inward for a long moment, “You can count on me.”
She smiles brightly, “Thank you, Neville.”
***
Rarity bids Neville goodbye as she heads to her final class of the day. Defense against the dark arts, she climbs the stairs and finally gets to the door into the classroom. She smiles, Sunset Shimmer and Twilight Sparkle are standing there along with some of the other students. She smiles at her friends as the door is opened to admit the students. Rarity finds a seat between her friends. Before long, the rest of the students have found their seats. Rarity flinches as the door slams closed. The rhythmic thunk of the artificial leg of the teacher resounds through the room.
“Alright you all, time to open your books to chapter twelve.” He shouts as he gets to the front and whirls around to look at the assembled students, “blocking and counter curses.”
Rarity joins the other students in opening her book.
Professor Moody draws out his wand, “In a duel, or in a full on battle, curses will be sent at you, to bind your limbs, to blast your wand from your hand, you must be prepared for them. The trick is, though, what blocks a locking leg curse will do nothing to stop a redactor curse, or fiendfyre.” His bright blue fake eye whirls around, settling on the students, ““You have to think on your feet. Adapt and change. These things are not learned from a book, these are learned through practice.”
Flinging his wand in a wide arc in front of him, Professor Moody puts up a glowing shield in front of him. “While some full on shields will help with multiple different curses, they also use more energy, and must be dropped for you to be able to attack.” He smiles as his eye locks on Sunset Shimmer, “That is, unless you are gifted with enough strength, and the ability to split the flows.” He looks around at the other students, “You need to learn to block, move and attack. It needs to become instinctual.” Rarity sneaks a glance at Sunset Shimmer, who is nodding with a smile.
Sunset leans over, “Equestrian dueling is somewhat different here,” she whispers, “but the basics are sound.”
Rarity gulps before she nods as the teacher continues his lecture. Holding out his wand, he shows forms and grasps, talking as if every battle is life or death. With a glance to her side Rarity watches as Twilight pulls out a pen and takes notes. She leans back and listens, how can they all be so calm about this? This is magic, this could be life or death, one miss step and….
“Rarity.” Comes the booming voice of the teacher, jerking her to attention.
His smile sends a chill down her spine. Something about him tells her he’s seen more death, more darkness, “Come on up.” His false eye whirls around, “And now a proper challenger, Millicent!” He barks, getting the Slytherin girl to get out of her own seat.
As both girls come forward, he has the rest of the students move to the walls of the classroom, and with a wave of his wand, the desks disappear and the floor rises to form the dueling platform. Looking around Rarity trembles slightly as she’s lifted off the ground with the other girl on the six-foot-wide arena.
Taking a deep breath Rarity tenses, practical instruction, something she desperately needs. Against Millicent though? She remembers that girl from earlier. Professor Moody directs the Slytherin girl to the other end of the Arena, and positions Rarity opposite of her.
“Draw your wands, and bow.” He says firmly.
Drawing her wand Millicent smiles, “Come now Rarity, bow, the niceties must be observed, you wouldn’t want to forget your manners would you?” The girl says offering a sweeping yet dark bow.
Rarity looks to the professor then draws her own wand and watches as the professor moves to stand between them.
“I’m not looking for a big fight like the other day.” He says loudly, his eye again finding Sunset Shimmer, “But I want you to think on your feet. Block and counter curse, keep moving, keep your eyes open.”
Rarity bows slowly and the other girl nods her head slightly. Professor Moody flashes his wand once before stepping off, “Go!” He shouts.
Before Rarity is able to think she’s on the ground, vines wrapped around her legs. Moody moves over and counters the curse, bringing Rarity back to her feet. While his voice is still gruff, he says softly, “Think, girl, some casters are much faster than you will ever believe.” He steps back as they square off again.
She watches the other girl as she takes a step, she sidesteps the first curse and cries out “expelliarmus!” The spell is blocked by the Slytherin girl, who slides to the side and yells the same spell. Rarity’s wand is jerked from her grasp and it clatters against the wall behind her. Holding her stinging hand, Rarity trembles, backing up a step before she kneels to pick up the wand
“What’s the matter, do they not partake in dueling on the other side of the pond?” Millicent snarks, getting a huff from Rarity as stands back up, her wand ready.
“Again.” Moody shouts.
Millicent shouts out a spell, this time Rarity is able to block the spell, she moves a step to the side to avoid a second curse sent at her as she sends her own curse, which is neatly avoided by the Slytherin girl. Rarity finds herself needing to dive to the side to avoid a curse, but another curse hits her chest, making it impossible for her to breathe. She tries to gasp for a few moments then the curse comes off.
“On the ground gasping like a common animal. Unable to move.” The Slytherin girl sneers. “You might as well stay down and accept defeat.”
Rarity growls as she gets to her feet. She keeps an eye on the teacher, who smiles and nods for them to go again.
Rarity steps back as several rapid fire curses need to be blocked, she whirls around and shouts as she attempts to disarm the other student. In response, Millicent shoots a gout of fire, which singes her hair as she rolls to evade. She glances at the teacher, who is grinning as another curse is sent at her.
“Well, I have had just about enough of this.” Rarity huffed as she draws on her magic deeply, she first fires the same blinding lights spell at the Slytherin girl. Rarity smiles but another curse hits her legs, making the muscles completely loose. Rarity crashes to the floor.
“Ahh, a good use of the jelly legs curse Miss Bulstrode.” He says as he stumps over to reverse the curse. He offers a hand to help her up, which she accepts. He leans close, “You’ve shown you are learning, you can let another student have a go.”
“Now we see what kind of a failure she is, unlike her friends, she has no talent. All she does is let them down.” The Slytherin girl sneers in a cold voice.
Rarity shakes her head, “I will never let my friends down,” she mutters. Struggling to her feet, Rarity thinks back to all the times she’d been there for them. “I can’t, they count on me. They need me.” Wrapping her fingers around her wand tightly, Rarity lifts her head to look at the Slytherin girl. “I would give anything for them, everything.”
“Oh, the American seems to have some guts, I’ll give you that.” Millicent says, “But I still think you are an uncultured cur, a mule.” she says with a sneer.
When the teacher signals for them to start again, Rarity steps forward, raising her wand and for a moment blue diamonds spark outwards, then a blue-white light comes from her wand, fanning out at first it quickly forms into a pony. In a moment, the form coalesces into a bright white unicorn with an indigo blue mane, three diamonds on it’s flank. Rarity’s holds her wand towards he girl and the image lowers its head. Eyes filled with determination Rarity thrusts her wand and the unicorn charges at the Slytherin girl.
“Crucio!” the Slytherin girl shouts and a gout of energy emerges from her wand heading for Rarity. Without even flinching the unicorn takes the spell form head on, its horn flashing once as it scatters the spell before it. Without slowing the unicorn image slams into Millicent, throwing her against the wall. The entire room shakes and Rarity hears Sunset yelp before Professor Moody steps out with a shout.
“Attempting an unforgivable curse!” He shouts, “I should be calling the Aurors for that.” He continues as he stumps towards the prone girl. Then he stops and chuckles, turning back to Rarity, “You knocked her clean out. And I think she’ll have a hell of a headache when she wakes up.” He points his wand and she lifts off the floor, “I’m going to take her to the hospital wing.” His eye spins around, “Though for doing so, she has earned Slytherin a fifty point deduction.” He growls, getting groans from the other Slytherin students, “Just in case any other student gets the bright idea to use such a curse, especially in a classroom situation.” He stalks from the classroom with the girl in tow.
Panting a bit Rarity lets her hand drop, her wand trembles in her grasp as she watched the girl being carried off. “What have I done?”
Sunset turns to Rarity, “You did a patronus? I recognize the spellform, but it’s different than before.” Her eyes narrow as she considers Rarity.
Rarity looks back at the unicorn and watches as the pony walks towards her. Looking up at her, into her eyes she can almost feel a mix of love, pride and generosity. Nodding once she lets off the magic and the pony turns back into blue-white light and slowly fades, “I don’t know, I’ve never done it before.” She turns to look at Sunset, “I’ve never done or felt anything like that before.”
Sunset steps up and hugs Rarity, “You did well.”
“I… I could have killed her.” Rarity murmurs softly, shaking her head slowly.
With a smile, Sunset shakes her head, “I don’t think so, you have greater control of your magic than you think.” Letting go of Rarity, Sunset takes a step back and rubs her temple for a moment.
Forgetting her own doubts for a moment Rarity looks at Sunset with concern. “What is wrong? Do you have a headache darling? You sounded as though you were in pain at the end of the fight.”
Sunset shakes her head, “When she crashed into the floor, it sounded like a bell ringing to me. A massive church bell.” She pulls her hand from her temple and shakes her head, “We need to be extra careful, Grogar may not be able to get into the castle, but that doesn’t mean he can’t enchant people to do his dirty work for him.” She glances back at the door, “I don’t think she would have used that curse otherwise.”
Rarity thinks for a moment, “She was exceedingly rude to me in an earlier class.”
“Oh, that’s the same girl from charms?”
Rarity nods and Sunset frowns, “I thought I had recognized her.” She glances at the other students, most of them are gathering their things for the end of the day, “I wonder if she’s related to any of those Death Eaters.”
Rarity shudders as they move to pick up their own bags.
***
The Great Hall has been set up for dinner with its long tables filled with drinks, the food is yet to arrive, apparently. Candles float by the hundreds, scattered across the room in neat rows to give illumination. Rarity walks in and immediately her stomach grumbles at the sight of the tables as she realizes just how famished she is. She didn’t think spell casting was that intensive.
Sunset Shimmer has been working her and Twilight to the point of exhaustion today. Putting a hand over her stomach, Rarity does her best to restrain herself from running to sit down. She glances at Sunset Shimmer, who is humming happily as she walks. In her hand is a binder, Rarity knows quite well what’s in that binder. Homework. She finds her seat and relaxes for a moment. She stifles a giggle as Twilight sits down just as heavily, huffing and puffing just like Rarity. She glances around, her friends are all here.
“Rarity.” Comes a now familiar voice, getting Rarity to turn.
“Oh, hello, Neville.” She chirps.
He gestures to the seat next to her, “May I sit with you?”
Rarity looks around, Rainbow Dash is huddled with that Viktor guy she was talking about earlier, Hermione is sitting down next to Twilight, she looks up at Neville, “I would be most delighted if you did, my dear.”
He eases down into his seat, “She’s going to be okay.” He says softly.
Rarity flinches, “Millicent?” She whispers.
He nods, “I talked to Madame Pomfrey after classes. She doesn’t remember the fight, but she’s otherwise okay. Just a hard knock on the head. Did you really summon a patronus?”
Rarity breathes deeply, “Thank you, Neville. And, I believe I did, I’m not sure how.”
He smiles as a chime sounds through the room and the food appears. Rarity looks down at the food, then up at Applejack, who’s rubbing her hands together, a big smile on her face.
“Applejack, what is the meaning all of this?” Rarity asked as she raised an eyebrow at the selection of foods.
She looks at Rarity, “Well wrap me up and call me a fritter, they done and got us a real southern feast here. For those who don’t know, what we have here is…” She points, “Chicken fried steak,” She moves her hand, “Pan fried chicken, both with cream gravy, or black pepper gravy.” She points at another platter, “That’s a hash brown casserole, the mushroom gravy’s optional of course, and we’ve got green beans, and there’s collard greens, cooked with bacon. They even managed to wrangle us up some corn on the cob, sweet potato pie, and of course apple pie.” She reaches over and picks up a clover roll and pulls it apart, smelling the steam from the hot roll as she reaches for some butter, “Golly this is awesome!” Applejack grins before letting out a final, “Yea HA!”
Rarity shakes her head, she looks around at the students, many of them are looking at the different foods in shock. The American girls are happily piling food onto their plates. Sunset Shimmer even takes a small piece of chicken to go with all the greens she’s piled on her plate.
Twilight leans over to Hermione, “This kind of food is what we get when we spend time at Applejacks house, it’s all really good.” She glances over at Applejack, “I guess she talked to the house-elves.”
Absently Rarity begins filling her plate as she looks back at Neville, “I was worried that I had hurt her badly.”
“From what I heard, Slytherin is in hot water over her using a forbidden curse.” Neville says as he gets some food as well. “She needed to be taken down a step though. Thank you.”
“I… Your welcome but it wasn’t my intent.” Taking a bite, Rarity smiles, the casserole is actually really good.
Looking down at Rarity’s plate, Neville lets out a slight chuckle, “Sweet tooth much?”
“Pardon?” Rarity finds herself shocked at his statement before she realizes she had loaded her plate with almost anything with starch or sugar on it, “I… I don’t usually eat like this. I do apologize.”
“I didn’t mean to insult you.” Neville said, worried.
The utter silence in the room soon gets Rarity’s attention. The students are all looking at the food. Rarity feels a bead of sweat form on her brow, will all the students hate the food? She looks up at the teacher’s table, apparently the headmaster has noticed the silence. He clears his throat and stands up, “As our American guests have been so kind as to partake in our food. I felt it would be nice for all of us to try some of their foods. Tomorrow night, in honor of the Beauxbatons Academy of Magic, we will be having French cuisine for dinner. Finally for the Durmstrang Institute, a true Scandinavian feast the following evening!” He raises both hands, “Enjoy.”
Hermione looks at Professor Dumbledore as he sits down and slices a piece of his chicken fried steak. He takes a bite and smiles at the students around the hall. She finally grabs a spoonful of the hash brown casserole and puts a serving on her plate, she puts the serving spoon back and looks around. Half the Gryffindor’s are watching her like hawks as she picks up her spoon and takes a small bit of the food. She glances over at Rainbow Dash, who is stuffing her face as fast as she can, and sighs as she puts the spoonful in her mouth. Her eyes widen as she chews, she looks at Applejack, who’s smirking at her. Hermione swallows, “Okay, your food is pretty good.” She reaches out for a big slab of chicken fried steak as many of the other students start reaching for the new foods themselves. What Hermione has done is being repeated at the other tables, even many of the Slytherins seem to be opening themselves up to the new foods.
Applejack nudges Twilight, “I toldja, food is what brings everyone together.” She takes a bite, “And when it’s good ole southern comfort food, it’s even better.” She giggles as she swallows.
***
The sun has been down for hours now, they had spent the whole evening, with the exception of supper, in the room of requirement, as Hermione has named it, as well as the astronomy tower for a late night class. Her and Fluttershy had joined Applejack for the astronomy lesson which had gone fairly late. Rarity smiles as she crawls into her bed, the beds here at Hogwarts are incredibly comfortable, and it’s been a pleasure for her to sink into the luxurious mattress. She glances around at the other girls, Pinkie is snoring softly, Rainbow Dash is curled up under her own blanket, Sunset is reading an Equestrian spellbook, as is Twilight. Fluttershy is sleeping peacefully, a large cat is perched on her shoulder, growling at anyone who comes close, and Applejack is passed out in her own bed. Rarity pulls her sleep mask over her face as she settles onto her pillow with a soft sigh, today has been a beautiful day.