Chapter 21: Professor Marlow

"Mom?" To say I was surprised would be an understatement.

"While we're in this classroom — call me 'Professor Marlow,' " Ariel replied with a smile. I hadn't expected to see her for the next three months. The title "professor," by the way, means something a bit different in the magical world: it's just a formal way to address a teacher, not a sign of a doctorate. The equivalent of a doctoral degree is called "master."

"Very well, Professor Marlow," I replied, grinning as I took my seat.

When the bell rang and everyone settled down, she began her speech:

"Good afternoon, children. I am your new transfiguration teacher, Ariel Marlow, for first through fourth years. Madame Laurent is no longer so young and couldn't handle the workload, so she asked for a replacement for the younger years. But that's all background — we're here to study the beautiful art of transfiguration.

Transfiguration is the discipline that studies magical ways of turning some objects into others, inanimate objects into living ones and vice versa, and even some living things into others. It also includes creating objects from nothing or making them disappear. The subject is extremely complex and requires both magical power and strict concentration. Transfiguration always requires a wand and knowledge of the right formula.

You should know, children, that transfiguration is one of a wizard's most useful tools, right alongside charms. Create water in a desert? A house on a deserted island? A guardian for your home? Transfiguration can do all that, though there are some limitations you'll learn about later. But for now, let's learn the movement and words for our first spell — turning a button into a hairpin. Barrettefors."

***

While Ariel taught the class the spell, adding stories about failed transfigurations and why precision is so important, I found myself thinking about transfiguration in general.

Transfiguration is divided into three classes: inanimate-to-inanimate, inanimate-to-living, and living-to-living. Each class is more complex than the last. Turning a button into a hairpin is one thing, but turning a rat into a dog — and then back again, alive and unharmed — is a whole different level of concentration and magical effort.

Then there's higher transfiguration, which actually fixes the transformation long enough for the astral body to take on a new form. Sleight of hand, no fraud.

Someone unfamiliar with the magical world might wonder — why teach children such "useless" spells? Tickling charms, dancing pineapples, turning buttons into hairpins? But even in the ordinary world, you don't put a child straight onto a lathe or hand them a weapon without long preparation. Well, some people do, but that's not a sign of great intelligence.

The issue here is complexity and safety. Take transfiguration: there are three universal spells for each class, but to use them, you need a certain level of skill and magical power. Also, inanimate-to-inanimate spells don't work on people, so you don't have to worry about some idiot turning his friend into a glass and breaking him. Third, these highly specialized spells are hard to mess up — if you get the words or wand movement wrong, you won't blow up half the school. Most likely, nothing will happen at all.

Wizards aren't stupid, not at all. Strange? Yes. Do they hide a lot? Absolutely. But thinking they're idiots would be, well, idiotic.

Transfiguration does have its limitations — Gamp's Laws of Transfiguration:

{ 1. You cannot create food. }

Although, the Sumerians could materialize food by removing the matrix from the required object. I haven't reached that level yet, studying so many different fields. Also, there's the Aguamenti charm, which seems to ignore this rule and creates water. I suspect it's because transfiguration works with imagination, not the infosphere, and to create food, you'd need to know and imagine its composition down to the molecules or atoms.

After all, transfiguration without special spells doesn't create real copper, for example, but an amorphous metal with the properties of copper as imagined by the wizard. So, if a wizard turns stone into a dog, he doesn't create a real dog — it's a golem, animated by the wizard's idea of what a dog is. If he doesn't imagine the dog's structure accurately, it'll look like stone inside, not flesh and blood.

{2. You cannot turn anything into a human.}

Actually, you can create a human body using biomagic, but it won't have a soul — such a creature is called a Cadaver. Usually, they're inhabited by subordinate souls or summoned spirits who will serve you just for a body. But only the Creator can create a soul.

{3. You cannot turn an ordinary object into a magical one or create anything magical.}

Nonsense, pure nonsense. The real problem is the colossal mana expenditure if you try, and the titanic matrix you'd need to remove. That's why wizards prefer to get the right ingredient or material rather than bother with such things.

{4. You cannot transfigure money, gold, or precious stones.}

You can, and quite easily. I suspect this rule was invented by the government to control counterfeiting. The only truth is that natural diamond or gold has a much more developed third shell and can hold more enchantments. And yes, even stones have souls — the first and third shells. Living things like bacteria get the fourth and second as well. The fifth — emotional — is possessed by more developed creatures like dogs, lizards, birds, and others capable of feeling emotions. The sixth is for all intelligent creatures, and the seventh for all humans, whether they're active wizards or not.

The saddest thing is that there are many people in the world with the seventh shell, but wizards despise them, even though they're fresh blood and new talent. I'm not about to convince them otherwise — if I ever released a method for "granting" magic to Muggles and Squibs, they'd find and lynch me. Maybe I'll help someone, not without benefit to myself, and in complete secrecy.

I'm getting distracted again.

{5. You cannot transfigure time.}

Here, I agree — time can be accelerated, or locally turned back to create a loop, but the souls of the dead who've gone to reincarnation won't return, and you can't turn back time for the whole universe. It's easier to get into a parallel world, kill your double there if he exists, and change history as you like. If, of course, you're ready to accept that everyone around you already has completely different souls, even if they look and act the same.

***

The Sumerians had their own laws of magic — just three:

1. Law of energy conservation. Nothing disappears into nowhere, and nothing can appear from nowhere.

2. Law of irreversibility of events.

3. Nothing can interrupt the chain of rebirths.

I've already talked about the second. The third means you can't completely destroy a soul — even if you sever all the shells, the indestructible core, the fourth "shell" to which all the others attach, will just go to rebirth. And the first is basically a law of physics, not magic. It makes sense — in magic, nothing appears from nowhere. Mana comes from the surrounding ether, but you can't pull it from nothing.

I've heard about quantum physics and the theory that some fluctuations occur in absolute vacuum, but I don't know if they can be used as energy. Otherwise, there'd be another way to get mana. Maybe a new art would be added to the sixty existing ones — quantum magic. Ah, dreaming doesn't hurt.

***

Finally, the lesson ended. As before, I kept reading Flitwick's book, which turned out to be surprisingly interesting. Unlike most wizard authors, he doesn't waste words or use too many technical terms, and if he does, he explains them clearly. I'd like to meet him someday, but I've heard he teaches at Hogwarts.

"Mom, what are you doing here?" I approached Ariel after everyone left.

"Surprise! Or aren't you glad?" she asked, grinning.

"No, I'm glad, but you could have warned me. It was so sudden."

"I saw your face — it was priceless!" She ruffled my hair. "Everything happened quickly. Ludwig said the headmistress was looking for a new transfiguration teacher and suggested I talk to her. Turns out, Madame Maxime had heard about me and our inventions, so even though I'm not a master, she took me on probation. And here I am!"

"And I have absolutely nothing to do with this?" I raised an eyebrow.

"Partly," she admitted. "But mostly, I'd have been bored, and I needed to find work anyway, so why not?"

"Then I'm happy for you," I said, smiling.

"I see you decided to keep the fairy as a pet?" she pointed to my shoulder, where the fairy was swinging her legs. I really should think of a name for her.

"Yeah," I nodded. "Though honestly, she decided to stay with me herself."

"Take care of her. It's rare for a magical creature to choose its own master." She tried to pet the little one, but the fairy hid behind my ear.

"But we're magical creatures too. Does that mean I should look for a master?" I made a mock-frightened face.

"Ah-ha-ha!" Ariel laughed, her voice ringing. "Go on, pet, I need to check some work."

"Should I help?"

"No, I'll manage. And by the way, being my son doesn't exempt you from homework. On the contrary, I expect the best from you," she warned.

"Yes, ma'am. Will do." I gave a mock salute and marched out.

I understood Ariel's motivation, though I'd have preferred she found work elsewhere. Not that I minded being the teacher's son — it has its perks. It was just so unexpected that my mind was in chaos and I didn't know how to feel.

I calmed my emotions with mind magic, as usual, and decided to just let it go. Do what you must, and let what will be, be. At least now I won't worry about her. Not that I could protect her from everything, but dying together is better than regretting for the rest of your life that you weren't there.

***

After dinner, back in my room, I cast the usual set of charms on the closed canopy and, taking the chirping fairy from my shoulder, set her on the pillow.

"Arthur," I pointed to myself.

"Pee!" she repeated, copying my gesture. Well, at least she was trying.

"Fairy!" I pointed to her.

"Pee!" she repeated, looking at me with her black bead-like eyes. This was going to take a while.

Half an hour later.

"Arthur."

"Pee!"

"Arthur, not Pee!" And then she started crying. Only then did I think to check the books and found out that fairies can't talk at all. Either their vocal cords aren't designed for it, or something else. What an idiot I am!

I gently petted the fairy, soothed her with veela charm, and gave her a piece of chocolate, which she happily started gnawing as if nothing had happened. Either a very cunning or a very forgiving creature.

Well, I'd have to go the hard way. I took out a sheet of paper, wrote the French alphabet, and prepared for a headache — I'd have to transmit mental images very precisely so as not to fry the little one's brain.

Why not just leave her alone? Because she's as intelligent as a small child and has weak but real magic. And not teaching my child is sacrilege to me.

If she learns to read and write, that'll be a victory.

***

The training was simple: I gave her a reduced "Reducio" writing quill and tried to explain, through images, the meaning of letters, what words start with them, and what images go with those words, repeating everything aloud. A child knows words because they learn to speak, but she doesn't.

If the fairy wrote a letter or drew the right image, she got a treat and a pleasure impulse from veela charm. If not, she got nothing. At first she was fussy, but then she got into it and started enjoying the game.

But we didn't achieve much — just a sheet covered in tiny drawings. I even had to take the quill away — she chirped and resisted, she liked it so much. But she'd draw on everything if I let her!

***

Late in the evening, I left the dorm with everyone and went to astronomy class, which was always held at night. On a platform in one of the two towers flanking the central wing, we listened to Monsieur Weber's lecture about celestial bodies and looked through enchanted telescopes at the moon.

These telescopes were different from ordinary ones — they had enhanced clarity, higher magnification, and protected your eyes. You could look at the sun as long as you wanted.

On the way back, I deliberately lagged behind my classmates.

"And I was wondering when you'd show up. You're pretty fast," I called out to the five guys who stepped out from around the corner.

"What, scared? Not so brave now as you were in the great hall?" Delacour said, trying to sound tough.

"You're repeating yourself. It's boring. What did you want? To get beaten before bed?"

"You'll answer for your words. And for talking to my Apolline!"

"Yours? I didn't see a brand on her. Look, I get it — hormones and all that. But did you ever think to just befriend the girl instead of declaring her your property? And provoking her friend? Go sleep and think about it."

"What, scared?"

"No, I just don't like beating up children."

"You bastard! I'm sick of this! I challenge you to a duel!"

"Go ahead," I bowed mockingly.

"Defend yourself!" I thought he'd come to his senses, but no. We moved to opposite sides of the corridor. "Petrificus Totalus!"

"Protego," I whispered, though there was no need. Protego can be stationary or mobile, and it can absorb or reflect spells. I used the latter, sending Delacour's spell right back at him. Immediately, four more spells flew at me from his minions. Futile — I reflected them all. There was no point in attacking myself.

"What bastards you are. Expelliarmus." I approached the paralyzed, bound, and stunned boys, collecting their wands. "You know, if you'd just attacked alone and head-on, I wouldn't have done anything to you. Everything fair: you attacked, you got hit. But you gathered a whole crowd to attack a first-year. I even gave you a chance to come to your senses, but you took it for weakness — stupid. So I'll treat you like the bastards you are."

Gathering them all with "Wingardium Leviosa" — levitation charms — I floated them into the nearest classroom, whose lock opened with a simple "Alohomora." I bound them with "Incarcerous" and cast "Silencio" to silence them. Let them lie there and think about their behavior. I tossed their wands onto the nearest table — I didn't need them.

***

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Thank you for the help with the power stones!!!