Ginny scowls at her diary. She hasn’t written in it these last couple days; she’s been too busy to write during the day, and…
Well, day before yesterday, she’d forgotten everything between the sorting and going to bed.
And, she doesn’t remember anything between sitting down for dinner yesterday and going to bed.
It’s well before dinner today; she doesn’t want to miss writing for another day.
The problem is, she’s not sure what to write first.
Charms this morning had been very educational, even though she’d been one of the two teachers. As had been noted in the footnote at the bottom of her schedule, she’d arrived half an hour early, and met… Princess Cadence. Whose full name just happens to be ‘Mi Amore Cadenza’.
They’d talked. She remembers that conversation well- once she’d realized she was talking to royalty, she fully expected to be following the other girl’s lead- but no. Cadence had encouraged her to speak up, to voice her opinions. Apparently, she’s on vacation from princesshood.
They’d discussed the lesson plans Cadence had been devising since Charms the previous day- she hadn’t come up with any herself- and decided on what to do with the class.
Then, they’d chatted. Princess Cadence seemed to be very interested in her personal life, and had talked much about her life as a Princess of Equestria in return.
Then the class itself had happened.
She’d never known she could learn so much by teaching.
She stares at her diary for a minute longer before dipping her quill in her ink once again and putting it to the page. “Hey Tom.” She pauses again, unsure of what more to write.
Tom doesn’t seem to be unsure at all; he writes back. “Hello Ginny. Are you okay out there? It’s been a while.”
She blushes slightly. “I’m… mostly okay,” she writes. “It’s been a very long three days. Doesn’t exactly help that I can’t remember anything between dinner and bed ever since arriving at Hogwarts. Do you know what that might be?”
Tom doesn’t write back for several seconds. She’s about to start writing again, ask him if something’s wrong, when he does write back. “I don’t know. I know of several things that could do that, but none of them should be at Hogwarts- or work, if taken there. The wards are too powerful.”
His letters seem straighter than the casual scrawl he’s taken to using, almost like he’s writing carefully, but she ignores it. “Oh… I guess I’ll go to Madam Pomfrey- the school nurse- if it happens again.”
“Yeah, probably a good idea. Aside from that, how did the last couple days go?”
“I got sorted into Gryffindor, as expected… and guess what: I’m a teacher!”
“Wait, what?”
Ginny stares.
She’s not the only one, either, staring at the Slytherin in the Gryffindor common room. She heard a few of the older students mention that it wasn’t that uncommon for one of the Slytherins to come waltzing into here whenever she pleased- but not this Slytherin, no. That other one- by the name of ‘Bonbon’- was actually a very important person last year, as a leader of something. Nobody’s heard anything about whether that will continue this year, but someone did say she still has the ‘talking thing’ she’d talk into from time to time.
This Slytherin never entered this room before. He doesn’t have any of those talking things- and for that matter, he looks distinctly uncomfortable here, like he’s aware that everyone is staring at him.
He’s… Harry’s friend, it would seem. Harry brought him in through the portrait hole, and is now sitting down in the corner with him… and Hermione.
She blinks, and looks closer. Yes; Harry’s hair is exactly what she saw earlier: Curly at the ends, one half deep purple, one half dark sea green, split by a golden stripe.
Hermione’s hair is wavy, and metallic red with icy blue fringes.
And the Slytherin’s hair, also wavy, is shiny silver with two navy blue stripes splitting it into thirds.
She wonders, mildly, what they did to make their hair look like that. Perhaps if she did it too, she could fit in and… She blushes furiously. Though, she would like to have hair like that. She’s really not far from it already- just a little more length, and whatever they did to achieve that perfect cohesion.
Hermione waves to someone off to the side; it turns out to be Lyra.
… whose hair also has that perfect cohesion.
She takes a quick look around the room. Forget Harry, most of the first and second years seem to have that hair! Why not her, then?
She looks back towards Harry just in time to see Harry, Hermione, Lyra, and that Slytherin all vanish soundlessly into thin air.
She blinks, then stands up to come closer. Nobody else approaches; they all return to what they were doing beforehand.
She walks slowly up to where they had been, and looks around. Where did they go?
Lyra trots over, in response to Hermione’s wave; they’re ready for the explanation. “Good evening,” she greets, before glancing at the other two. “Now all we need is some privacy-!” She stops cold, blinks, and looks at Harry. “Sorry, I keep forgetting you have a Deaths’ Shroud… even though I’m the one that fixed it.” She heaves a sigh, sitting down with them… then pauses, looking at Draco. “Wait. You like your pony form that much?”
Draco shrugs. “Why not? Life as a Malfoy is a pain.”
“Oh-kay,” Lyra mutters. “In any case, I promised Index Eye- and by extension, you and Harry- an explanation for why the Gate’s been sealed all summer.”
They nod.
“Well… when we went home at the end of the year, I noticed something alarming- that is, our personalities shifted. A little research and I found it happened to every last one of us Equestrians- while we were here, we slowly became… childish. Like- like that whole thing with the Spoonata? That would never have happened if not for that shift. Fortunately, our personalities reset themselves back to normal within a week of returning- but mind-altering magics, especially combined with transformation magics, are how some of Equestria’s biggest enemies were formed.
“So I had no choice but to seal the gate until I could guarantee no personality-shifting would happen.” She shakes her head. “I never did solve it.”
Hermione scowls. “Then why are you here?”
She rubs her hair. “Well… funny story, that. About two weeks ago, Twilight started getting pushy about being ready for the next school year; turns out she really enjoyed studying at Hogwarts. So I explained why the Gate was sealed. Two weeks later, I still hadn’t gotten anywhere when she knocked on the door with the answer.” She shrugs. “I don’t understand half of what that spell is, but we applied it to the Gate and reopened it. We’re carefully monitoring our personalities to make sure we were successful.”
“What about us?” Draco asks.
Lyra shakes her head. “Actually, you’re immune. All the Papa Tangos are- remember that British magic facet that lets you take pony form on this side?”
All three nod.
“Yeah… that same facet allows your mind to be divorced from your form. Add that your Equestrian forms were formed around your mind, and you’ve got nothing to worry about. It’s only us native Equestrians that need to worry, because our human forms were formed based on our Equestrian forms… then our minds basically stuffed into them. I think Twilight’s solution works by multilayering the human brain- to give it the same capacity as an Equestrian brain.”
“Wait, what?” Draco asks. “If- If Equestrian brains are more powerful than human brains, why am I not smarter?”
“That,” Lyra nods, “would be because the Equestrian brain has a lot more work to do. Yes, our brains are more powerful overall- but a proportionately smaller portion of it is available for conscious work. You never realize just how much work it takes to keep active magic- of any form- stable until you dig into the specifics of the Equestrian form.”
Hermione scowls. “But- but wizards cast stable spells all the time!”
Lyra shakes her head. “That’s different. You’d be amazed just how much work your wand does to stabilize a wand-magic spell- and besides, that’s focused magic. Most wand-magic spells are only stable for a few seconds, after which they fall apart- but by the time they fall apart, they’ve already done their jobs and have been dispersed anyways. I’m talking about Equestrian magic: The hoofgrip, pegasus flight, earth pony strength, and so on. The innate stuff that happens automatically.” She sighs. “Unicorns are slightly different, in that we have conscious control over the thaumic segment of our brains, but that’s about it; that portion can’t handle conscious thoughts or other, non-thaumic tasks.”
“Oh.”
Draco looks up, at Ginny coming around the table as if looking for something. “Well hello there.”
“Ginny Weasley,” Harry mutters, looking up at her. “She seems… a little strange.”
“You know what I think it is?” Lyra asks.
“What?”
“I think she has a crush on you.”
Hermione tilts her head. “Actually… yeah, I wouldn’t be surprised. Remember that Equestrian relationship magic?”
Draco nods. “Yeah, I’m feeling it too. Muted, though… probably because she’s all human.”
“Hmm,” Lyra rubs her chin, looking contemplatively at Ginny.
“You are not doing that to her without her permission,” Harry declares.
“Well yeah,” Lyra shrugs. “I’m not stupid.”