Chapter 10
“Professor Spencer!” a girl’s voice called after Almathea as she was exiting the Great Hall. Darn, she was looking forward to escaping the Halloween Feast early and unnoticed, before Severus remembered that she hadn’t had an Occlumency lesson in two weeks. “Professor Spencer, Miss!” the girl called again and suddenly several things happened.
Almathea stopped and turned toward the girl just as she was in arms reach, in time for Nearly Headless Nick to pass through the wall between them – on his way to the Headless Hunt, maybe? The girl started and tripped, tried to grab at a tapestry to right herself, but she took a wrong step and tumbled forwards instead of remaining upright. Concerned, Almathea made to try and catch her, grabbed her arm and stopped her from hitting her head on the floor. And then the tapestry plummeted on top of them both and Almathea found herself buried in dusty cloth, with an armful of Nymphadora Tonks. Brilliant! It took some time for them to disentangle the tapestry, but when they were blessedly free, Almathea breathed a sigh of relief.
“I have heard rumours in the corridors, Miss Tonks, of your penchant for accidents. I daresay I never imagined myself a victim of one, considering I am not actually your teacher.” She said, smiling at the young girl, who’d not only blushed to her ears, but who’s hair had turned an alarming shade of violet. “Don’t worry, I am quite accident prone myself. Two left feet in the best of circumstances.”
“I hadn’t realised you knew my name, Miss.” Tonks said as she tried to regain her composure.
“I have heard mentions of you in the teacher’s lounge. A Metamorphmagus that most of the times wears short pink hair.” Tonks smiled at Almathea and her hair changed back to the aforementioned colour. “I took a wild guess you were the one. How can I help you, Miss Tonks?”
“Professor Spencer, I have a friend in Sixth Year, Marilyn Middlemarch, she attends your Magical Enhancement class.”
“Ah, Miss Middlemarch. She’s quite gifted.” Almathea offered.
“She likes your class a great deal and she’d told me a lot about it. It sounds fascinating.” Tonks eyes sparkled with enthusiasm and Almathea wanted to hug her. No one had called anything she did here fascinating up until this point. “I know the class is only open to sixth years on a trial basis for this year, but I was wondering if an exception could be made. I’m a seventh year and I’m not going to have another opportunity to try it.”
“I see.” Almathea said softly. “I’m afraid I can’t answer your question at this time. The Board of Governors approved the curriculum for the year with the Headmaster. It’s not exactly subject to interpretation.”
Tonks’ face fell and Almathea had to admit she was a little heartbroken too, to disappoint her. It would have been lovely to share some time with Nymphadora Tonks before she left Hogwarts for the Auror program, and she could definitely improve her Metamorphmagus powers from an adapted Magical Enhancement regimen. Alma could feel the wheels turning in her own head.
“I could speak to the Headmaster.” She said finally. “I could tell him that a seventh-year student has expressed a desire to participate in my course. We shall see what he decides in that regard.”
Tonks eyes brightened immediately and her hair turned radiant, as did her face. Yes, she could definitely use some control over her abilities. They were a dead giveaway of her emotions and an Auror couldn’t have this kind of weakness.
“I hope he agrees.” Tonks said hopefully. “I’m starting a student program after the winter holidays with the Ministry. A career orientation of sorts. We’re going to sample various Ministry jobs and decide on our future employment. I want to join the Aurors.” She added excitedly.
“I’m sure you’ll be splendid in any career you choose, Miss Tonks. I hope the same for all the students of this school.” She added in a rush, hiding her own discomfort at the familiarity she felt toward the girl.
It wouldn’t do to lose herself again in feelings of admiration that came from knowing characters in a book. Miss Tonks was a real, breathing human being and deserved to be treated as such, like all of the professors. Just because Almathea knew her future didn’t mean she shouldn’t get to know the person she was here, in the past.
“Enjoy the rest of the feast, Miss Tonks.” She dismissed the girl, smiling as kindly as she could.
“Thank you, Professor Spencer. And thank you for trying, as well.”
***
Nymphadora Tonks had a free period Thursdays before lunch, so the Headmaster agreed to allow her to put that time toward Magical Enhancement. Almathea had to concede she was thankful to him for allowing her the opportunity to teach someone one on one. The class with sixth years was quite interesting, and they took to the meditation and exercises with gusto, but Alma was looking forward to the opportunity and challenges of a personalized program.
Almathea sent Nymphadora a note with a house elf, informing her that the lesson would take place in Greenhouse five, that housed plants that needed a warmer climate. With temperatures growing colder, Almathea was considering moving all of her classes in Greenhouse five, because closeness to nature was proving quite beneficial to meditation. And that was a crucial part to getting better acquainted to one’s magic.
At five minutes to eleven, Tonks ran into the Greenhouse like her life was being threatened by ravenous beasts. Almathea smiled and motioned her toward the matt that rested on the floor, next to a small glass bowl full of water.
“Hello, Professor. Thank you again for taking on extra classes with me.” She said as she sat down.
“No need to thank me, Miss Tonks. It was the Headmaster that allowed it.” She smiled indulgently and adopted what she hoped was a decent professor face. “I hope I shall provide an adequately fascinating experience.”
Tonks blushed and looked at the bowl in front of her. There were a few other things next to it. A feather, a candle, an unstopped vial of sand and a twisted piece of some sort of metal. She tilted her head to the side, confused.
“Since this is your first lesson, I shall provide the introduction I served your peers during their first lesson.” Almathea began, as she adjusted her position. She knelt in front of the objects, and motioned for Nymphadora to do the same. “Last year in January, I began an official study into my Mastery of Magical Theory, asking myself the question: is magic malleable? As one attends Hogwarts, one learns spells, potions and the like, but one is not encouraged to experiment with what already exists. Hogwarts offers a great deal in critical thinking, with the essays the teachers provide you, but apart from Potions, as far as I can tell, innovation is not encouraged.”
Almathea took a breath to gather her thoughts a bit. She’d been teaching for two months and speaking in front of an audience without making a fool of herself hadn’t gotten easier. “In this regard, I come from a different background. I was home schooled and for an extended period of that time I relied on copious amounts of self-study to answer the questions I had about magic. I therefore have developed a rather more fluid understanding of magic, one which I hope will help you expand on your own unique magic. Now, in my experiments, I have found that to enhance and better control one’s magic, it is helpful to have a medium to focus on. As such, you have in front of you a representation from natural mediums. Today, we’ll both try and discover if you share an affinity with at least one of them.”
Because she knew that wizards scoffed a bit at the use of wandless and wordless magic, Almathea had decided to choose her battles wisely and used her wand, even if she sometimes forgot to use proper spells. Wordless magic was far more acceptable to wizards, she’d found, than wandless was. She waved her wand gently over each of the mediums in front of her.
“The elements we are going to experiment with today are air,” she made the feather float in patterns over the others before setting it back down.
“Fire,” she lit the candle and grew the flame impossibly large before extinguishing it.
“Water,” she moulded the water in the bowl into a little cup.
“Earth,” she extracted the sand from the vial and compacted it into a cube before replacing it inside.
“And thunder,” she touched the tip of her wand to the coiled wire and electric sparks travelled through it.
Nymphadora watched all of this in fascination and Almathea could see her excitement bubbling, hands itching to grasp her own wand to attempt any of the manipulations she had seen.
“I am sure there are a number of spells that create the effects that I have just demonstrated, but the purpose today is to allow your own magic to free flow and choose one of these mediums naturally.” Almathea set her own wand in her lap and motioned for Nymphadora to do the same, which she did immediately. “For this we are going to do a little bit of meditation. We’ll start with a breathing exercise.” She took out a metronome and set it between the two of them, starting the rhythmic motion of its pendulum. “I’d like you to close your eyes and take breaths in while counting to four and then exhale while counting to six. To start with, I shall count for you, until you can regulate this action on your own. Focus on the sound of the metronome as you breathe, it will help.”
Almathea watched as Tonks nodded and closed her eyes, taking one large breath in and releasing it. She began to count, assisting her, tapping her finger against her leg as she observed the slow rise and fall of her of her chest and shoulders. She was doing quite well, truth be told. During her first lesson with the Ravenclaw – Slytherin sixth year class, only one Slytherin and one Ravenclaw each had managed enough control to find their natural affinity the first go around. She assigned practice meditation to all the rest, and they’d all succeeded in the next class. Funnily enough, even though all other houses disregarded them, it was the Hufflepuffs that had done the best in the meditation exercise. Perhaps kindness and level-headedness was the secret to their success?
She spent a while with Tonks on the breathing exercise, observing the slow changes to her natural appearance as her posture relaxed and her muscles lost their tension. Her pale heart-shaped face lost the spiky bubble gum pink hair. It grew to her shoulders and became mousy brown, which Almathea assumed was her natural colour, or as close to it as possible. It was a sign that her magic was calming, so Almathea decided to move forward.
“Now that your breathing has regulated, I’d like for you to imagine a room with a mirror. The room is all grey, walls, ceilings, floor, everything, except for the mirror that is in front of you. It’s a large mirror, as wide as the wall in front of you, as tall as the ceiling. Continue breathing deeply, as I’ve instructed, until your reflection in the mirror shows yourself, as you are. Imagine your eyes, your hair, your ears and cheekbones, the length of your limbs, the clothes you’re wearing. Tell me when the image you are imagining is perfectly clear.”
The image was not the exercise, of course. Almathea had found that during her own experimentation with this exercise, the image in her imagination had not entirely resembled a reflection one would see in the real world. Instead, the imagined reflection is more about personal perception. For someone such as Nymphadora, who spent her days as a different person than she normally was, imagining her inner self may be an entirely different experience altogether. Perhaps she wasn’t seeing any sort of real version of herself, but something her mind would fabricate based on her desires regarding her appearance. There had to be a reason why her Metamorphmagus abilities were so attuned. Surely her difficulty to settle on an image was due to some insecurities, or perhaps a continued experimentation until she found what she liked.
“I think the image in the mirror is clear now, Professor.” Tonks said, her eyebrows raising in surprise to her hairline. She didn’t open her eyes.
The water in the bowl rippled. Ah, water. Yes, it would make sense as an element for a Metamorphmagus. Water is malleable, fluid, forms pathways without adjusting its environment, so also perfect for a Hufflepuff. Almathea smiled and spoke.
“Now, if the image has cleared, I’d like you to approach the mirror. The reflection should match you. Extend your arm to meet your reflection’s hand on the mirror.”
If all went well, Almathea should see the result of the interaction. And sure enough, not thirty seconds later, the bowl with water began to vibrate, its surface rippling violently. Then suddenly, the bowl released all the water. It floated for a while in the air, then shifted, changing. Finally, it settled on the shape of a rabbit. Oh, nice, that was her Patronus before she met Remus! This could open a whole different kind of statistic in the class. If the affinity to elements could also reveal a potential Patronus, it could be revolutionary to the study of core magic.
“You may open your eyes now.” Almathea said gently. Nymphadora did and blinked a few times, as if chasing sleepiness from them. Her eyes widened as she saw the floating shape of water over the bowl. “Congratulations, Miss Tonks, you’ve discovered an affinity to water.”
“I didn’t do any magic.” Nymphadora said, still in awe.
“Yes, that was quite the purpose of the exercise. You were not meant to do magic, simply allow it to flow through you, and you did it.” They both smiled at each other.
Almathea enjoyed the camaraderie of it. Teaching a class of ten students was different, you didn’t get to appreciate each and every achievement individually. This one-on-one experience was proving, on the whole, far more satisfactory.
“Now, our time is almost up, so I will relieve you to lunch in a second. I’d like for you to continue to meditate, as I’ve instructed today, until we meet again next week and move on to the next step.”
Nymphadora nodded and lifted herself from the ground, tucking her wand into a holster attached to her waistband. “Thank you, professor. This had been a fantastic lesson.”
She was almost halfway out before Almathea realised she’d not made her aware of her change in appearance. “Miss Tonks! You should be aware that while you were meditating your Metamorphmagus abilities slipped.” She smiled gently. “Just in case you’d wish to modify them before anyone else sees you.”
Tonks thanked her and left, while Almathea breathed a sigh of relief. If only one-on-one Occlumency lessons would ever go as well as this.