Kylie's brow furrowed. The questions in Transfiguration always took a lot of creative thinking. She raised her hand, "Well...couldn't you transfigure the wizard chess piece into a muggle chess piece? Or.." Kylie paused, "Or transfigure the muggle chess piece into a wizard chess piece?" Kylie concluded lamely. She wished she was more creative with those sorts of things. She could cast spells, she could give you information about muggle and wizard history, but when she had to think of how you could get from point a to point b, she was nearly absolute rubbish.

Kiri raised her hand. "Professor, Piertotum Locomotor transforms inanimate objects, like, er... statues, or... or chess pieces," she said, glancing down at the black rook on her table, "to sort of, you know, become mobile and do what the witch or wizard who cast the spell told them to do."

EEE. She should start participating in the class, now. Get some points. CLAW POWA! Livvy held up her hand into the air to answer the professor's question. She knew this one, luckily. "Piertotum Locomotor is used to animate, or 'bring to life'," she held up her hands to even do the air quotes. "- Statues and suits of armor to do the caster's bidding and to follow the caster's every command."

Alexandra put her hand up and then answered, "I believe that it makes inanimate objects move. It kind of brings them to life. During the Battle of Hogwarts Professor McGonagall used it to make the suits of armor help defend the castle."

Difficult question. Kiri picked up the chess piece and rolled around in her hand absent-mindedly as she tried to figure out an acceptable answer. Finally, she raised a hesitant hand.

"The difference between a charm and a transfiguring spell is that a charm only sort of... acts on an object, transfiguring, er, changes the nature of it." She hastily tried to think of an example. "Say... casting Wingardium Leviosa to make this chess piece," she held it up, "fly is a charm. But, er... adding a pair of wings so that it would be able to fly itself would belong to Transfiguration." She paused for a moment. "Possibly?"

Alexandra raised her hand and said, "Well, you can direct the object to act as you please when you use Piertotum Locomotor, can't you?" She began to absent mindedly twirl a strand of hair around her finger.

Carter raised his hand. "Would it be that Piertotum Locomotor physically alters an object while a charm would just animate an object in the form it was already in?"

Destiny raised her hand slowly, because she didn't know if her answer was right 'With piertotum locomotor you would need a counter-spell to stop it moving right, and a charm you wouldn't?' 'Maybe.'

Ooh! Ooh! Keeley knew this one! Her hair turned pink, for pretty much no reason. "It makes inantimate objects come to life." Yay! She could finally do something for Ravenclaw!

"What is the wand movement for it sir?" Alexandra asked quietly with a raised hand

Peeps? That got an eye-raise from Kiri. Even the rather cheaply-made looking Muggle chess rook in her hand seemed to radiate indignation. Still, she was a little pleased with herself for delivering an apparently acceptable answer.

She put the rook down on the table and pulled out her wand. Aiming at nothing in particular, she waved it about and muttered the incantation under her breath. The 'Piertotum' in particular turned out to be a little difficult to pronounce, and as Kiri tried to say it correctly, she philosophised idly about what had motivated witches and wizards of the ages to make their spells so difficult to speak aloud.

Deciding to give it a try, she aimed the wand at the rook and said, "Pierre... No, no... Pee-err-totum Locomotor!" Nothing happened. Kiri wasn't surprised.
She laid the spell's syllables out in her head. Concentrating hard, she made another attempt: "Piertotum Locomotor!" To her excitement, the chess piece on the table moved! Sure, it only sort of wobbled back and forth a bit, but her spell had clearly had an effect.

That realisation brought a question, though. Kiri put her wand down on the table and raised her hand. "Erm, Professor Svensson? I have a question. Once we've, uh, figured out how the spell works, how do we actually tell the chess piece what to do?" She paused for a moment, then added, "Do we even have to tell it?"

"Wha- We can't have them fight each other?" she asked, sitting up in her seat and staring at what the Professor was writing on the board. Would have been cool to have the pieces duel one another. Sighing, Evelyn took out her wand and stared at the Pink peep...pink...ew.

Resisting to turn it green like it should be, she pointed her wand at the rabbit shaped marshmallow and said "Piertotum Locomotor" rather confidently and clearly while doing the half moon and flick. For a moment, it seemed like it didn't do anything, making her frustrated. She always got things right on the first try! About to say the spell again, the little peep suddenly wiggled it's ears and started hopping around slightly, which somehow reminded her of chocolate frogs which then led her to be reminded of the one Josh had given her. She still had it...amazingly.

'Do those things ever go bad?' she thought, while poking the bouncing pink bunny, glancing around at everyone else and seeing what they were doing.

Kiri nodded. "Thank you, Professor," she said. That sounded simple enough, although the often crucially difference between theory and practice could of course lead to... complications.

She twirled her wand reflectively while thinking very hard of what she'd make the rook do. Walk across the table, maybe? Yes, that would probably do to start with. She took aim and said loudly, "Piertotum Locomotor!" and focused on a walking chess piece.
The rook sprang to life so suddenly that startled her. At first, Kiri was pleasantly surprised at how easy the spell seemed to be, but then... "Hey! What are you doing?" The rook was not walking around in a small circle like she'd specified, but was instead rushing towards the edge of the table at speed. Kiri flailed after it with her wandless arm, but it was too late - the rook went straight over the edge and smashed on the floor.

Great. Apparently I make little stone chess figures suicidal. She snorted derisively, then waved her wand to summon the pieces. A second flick restored the rook. Kiri put it down on the table with slightly more force than was necessary and gave it long, cool look as if daring it to misbehave again. "Piertotum Locomotor!" And don't do that again, she added silently.
The rook began to move. It meandered back and forth, but never strayed too close to the edge. Kiri kept a watchful eye as, little by little, the errant motions turned into what vaguely resembled a circle. Wondering what the proper mathematical name was for lightly-dented-egg geometry, Kiri let the rook wander about for a while.

Then she stopped the spell. With a final wobble, the chess piece came to a halt.

Oooo! Practice time!
Rolling up her sleeves, like she does at every transfiguration class, Destiny took out her wand and did the half moon and flick and said 'piertotum locomotor!' Nothing had happened. 'Whaaaat?'
She picked up the rabbit peep and examined it close to her face, but as she picked it up the peep used his wee little 'hands' and slapped her in the nose? She threw the peep onto the desk. 'I don't like you.' and she poked it with the tip of her wand, right in the peep's 'belly'. 'Now do push ups.'

Alexandra nodded her head and tried the wand movement without saying the incantation. Then she prcaticed the incantation without the wand movement... she didn't want to make anything crazy happen. "Piertotum Locomotor" she said clearly. Turning to the peep and chess piece she did the wand movement and said the incantation.