Mo pondered deeply on The Question, holding his (red Solo) teacup in one hand and pinching his nose closed with the other. It was pretty bearable like this, and almost made it easy to focus on the issue at hand. Almost, although there was still a great deal of relief when Mo reached the dregs and was able to leave the last sips unsipped in the bottom of his cup.

While peering into the cup, Mo gave the liquid a good swishing around the interior. One. The tea leaves rose from the bottom. Two. They swirled gently in the liquid, caught up in the current Mo was creating. Three. Mo stopped the movements and watched his the tea leaves began to sink back down to adhere to the bottom and sides of his cup.

Quickly, he turned it face down on the parchment and emptied out the remaining liquid (as well as some of the leaves). Unlike a saucer, the parchment only caught and soaked up part of the tea, and the rest bled into the paper. The words stretched and bled, as did Mo's circle, and wondered if there was something in reading THAT shape.

He counted to three and turned the cup back over. Now then... what shapes could he find?

Mack squinted as she read the board, then re-read what the Professor had written, the steps to read tea leaves. deep breath

SPOILER!!: step 1

Step One: Flip cup over onto piece of parchment and then trace outside rim of the cup to create the 'saucer' out of the area made by doing this (Leaves on saucers don't have much purpose on their beginner readings without "real" saucers"). Retrieve 1 teaspoon of tea leaves from boxes at each table.

Leaning over Mack took some parchment and a quill from her bag, laying the parchment flat onto the table, she flipped the cup upside down onto the parchment and carefully traced the rim to create her "saucer". Looking up she carefully read step number one again, flipping her cup back over and sitting it inside the circle she had just traced she opened the box on her table, carefully she measured out one teaspoon of tea leaves. Placing them on the "saucer" quickly re replaced the spoon and put the lid back on the box. Mack nodded to herself "There step one complete"

SPOILER!!: Step 2

Step Two: Fill cup 3/4 full with hot water from cauldrons and add tea leaves.

Standing Mack made her way to the cauldron with her cup, carefully filling it to where exactly only 3/4 is full. Sitting back at her table, placing the cup once again inside the "saucer" the blonde places her tea leaves into the cup of hot water. Watching carefully as they begin floating for only a few seconds and then sinking to the bottom of the cup.

The textbook was fairly vague, and Alice liked that, because then she could contort them and twist the meanings of the symbols to apply to her nicely. She flipped around the pages until she found the first one she was looking for, the volcano. This one was for current situations, right? "A volcano," she murmured to herself, eyes still scanning the words, "suggests the chance of a bad argument. Avoid cantankerous or debatable matters."

That much was obvious.

Stupid volcano.

"A monkey." Alice continued reading, ignoring the irritation that curdled in her stomach at the first symbol. "A monkey can be warning you to stop and think before you do something stupid." She paused for a moment and glanced back at the board, noting that this one was supposed to predict what would happen in roughly two weeks. And for her last "And a purse. If a purse appears near the top of your cup it signifies a win or profit of some kind, but at the bottom of the cup it could mean that you-"

She read the line.

And read it again.

.. what? Alice squeezed her eyes shut for a second and considered the meaning of a purse before reopening them and extending a finger carefully into her cup. She glanced around to make sure no one was looking as she rearranged the tea dregs to look less like what it actually was and resemble more of a rainbow type thing. "A rainbow," she recited from the textbook, reading louder than necessary (so anyone listening knew she had gotten a RAINBOW and not a PURSE), "is a great omen. It indicates that everything will get better." She slammed the textbook shut again, a bit forcefully, and brushed her fingers off on her robes before documenting the meanings.

A rainbow. That was totally what she'd gotten. Her quill scratched out the word purse until it was covered by blobs of ink.

SPOILER!!: Step 3

Step Three: Allow tea to brew for 2 minutes. Clear your mind and meditate. No talking please.

deep breathing

Mack continued to peer into her cup, watching as the water turned from clear to a dark brown, almost black color. This was so cool to watch. "I wonder if I can drink it yet."

Looking up once again at the board, reading on to the fourth step

SPOILER!!: Step 4

Step Four: Let tea cool a bit and then drink. Try not to swallow many leaves. If you are right-handed, lift your cup with your left. If left-handed, drink with your right. If ambidextrous, reach for your cup, stop, and then use the other hand.

Once relaxed, identify the issue foremost in your mind. As you attempt to think of nothing in particular, is there a stubborn thought that keeps returning to your attention? If so, that is the subject of this reading. Focus on that thought. If nothing in particular comes to mind, then this will be a general tea leaf reading. Focus on your breath and the taste of the tea.

Leave a small amount of tea at the bottom of your cup.

Grasping the cup with her left hand she slowly lifted it to her lips, pursing her lips as she took her first drink...

UGHH, did she have to drink this?!

She continued drinking the tea, wishing she would have taken Professor Elwood's advice on another cup of water. She cleared the thought from her mind, and attempted to completely clear her mind, but of course that wasn't possible. The reoccuring thought that kept poppin gup in her mind, had been bothering her for the past week

"Are my parents alright?"

Neither her mother or father had written back, Apple (her owl) had returned without anything both times she had sent her to her parents. She had thought about sending Apple to her grandparents and asking if they had heard from them, but she didn't want to cause unnecessary worrying for them.

SIGH

She finished drinking her tea and sat it back down on her saucer.

Uggh, Tucker should have expected no cream or sugar. That was the only way he'd drink tea! Gross, he was just going to have to force himself to drink this nasty, cheap tea in order to complete the assignment. Resigning to this fact, he walked up and got a teaspoon of leaves as instructed.

Next, he headed to the cauldron and with care, filled the cup up until it was roughly 3/4 full before tossing the leaves in.

He wasn't too sure how long it took for the leaves to seep into the water, since he didn't drink tea very often, so he trusted that Elwood had it right when she said to wait two minutes. He sat down at his desk and waited patiently.

Mo notched the top of his cup at the 12 o'clock position so he wouldn't lose the orientation as he turned the cup around and around in his hands. It was almost impossible to identify the shapes in the dregs on the first pass, and Mo was actually thankful he'd gone for the clear cup.

At the top, just under the rim, there was a knotty looking clump of tea leaves that might be circle or a the head of an earless house elf or... hmm. Mo tilted that one back and forth before deciding it was a fist. A closed fist. He moved down to the middle section and found a half circle. Maybe a lemon slice? Or a... big smile? Hopefully it was a smile, although Mo thought it looked more like an ear, since there was some clumping in the center of the shape and it sort of went... lobe-y at the bottom. In the concave bottom of the cup, there was yet another clump of tea leaves, this one sort of like three sides of a rectangle. Not really an arch... more like a table, maybe? And beside it was something that MIGHT be a dog or some animal, although it wasn't Grim-like.

Carefully, Mo moved the wet parchment and cup to one side and pulled out his textbook and some parchment to take down notes on his tea leaves. Considering the fact that his mother liked to read tea leaves, Mo hadn't really tried it before... did it take practice to get really good at it, or was he right in assuming that some people were just gifted at it?

He tilted his head as Alice informed everyone around her that she had a rainbow. That was happy, right? Good days to come and everything she wanted and probably cake? Mo glanced in her direction with a wry little smile before turning back to his own parchment.

Alec took a moment to look at the step on the board and reach each of them carefully. Because he sort of... wanted to understand the task first before doing anything else. He reached for his quill and started scribbling down the steps too. Just in case, you know.

Once that was done, he took a deep breath and took out his wand. He needed to make it more... teacup shaped, yeah? "Concavus!" he said, pointing his wand into the cup and swishing it. SMILEY. A grin spread across the boy's face as the bottom of the cup started changing and resembling more of the teacups he was used to seeing.

... So... it was time to start, yeah?

The Hufflepuff flipped the cup over on a piece of a parchment and traced the outside rim of the cup with his quill. He flipped the cup back over and placed it in the middle of the 'saucer'. There. Now he had a proper teacup. He reached towards the box at the centre of his table and scooped out one teaspoon of tea leaves onto the saucer. Now stay!

... And... speaking of tea... Elwood had said something about it being bitter, yeah?

Frowning slightly, the boy took hold of his cup and walked over towards the far corner where the water was boiling in cauldrons. The water was poured three quarters of the way into his cup. He then walked back over towards his table and sat down again. The leaves were added into the cup and the cup was placed back in the middle of the saucer.

Now... it was just a matter of waiting, yeah?

Text Cut: Steps!

Quote:

Step One: Flip cup over onto piece of parchment and then trace outside rim of the cup to create the 'saucer' out of the area made by doing this (Leaves on saucers don't have much purpose on their beginner readings without "real" saucers"). Retrieve 1 teaspoon of tea leaves from boxes at each table.

Step Two: Fill cup 3/4 full with hot water from cauldrons and add tea leaves.

Step Three: Allow tea to brew for 2 minutes. Clear your mind and meditate. No talking please.

Step Four: Let tea cool a bit and then drink. Try not to swallow many leaves. If you are right-handed, lift your cup with your left. If left-handed, drink with your right. If ambidextrous, reach for your cup, stop, and then use the other hand.

Once relaxed, identify the issue foremost in your mind. As you attempt to think of nothing in particular, is there a stubborn thought that keeps returning to your attention? If so, that is the subject of this reading. Focus on that thought. If nothing in particular comes to mind, then this will be a general tea leaf reading. Focus on your breath and the taste of the tea.

Leave a small amount of tea at the bottom of your cup.

Step Five: Hold your nearly empty teacup in your hand and give it three good swirls. The tea leaves will disperse around the interior of cup. Gently dump out the remaining liquid by turning your teacup over into a saucer.

Wait at least three breaths before turning your cup back over.

Step Six: Because your cup has no handle, begin reading from 12 o'clock. Make a notation of the first symbol you see. Mentally divide the cup into three sections: rim, middle and base.

Rim - area is above the tea level when you first poured your tea represents the current moment in time.
Middle - area between the rim and bottom, represents near future (2 weeks)
*Both the rim and middle section represent influences in your outcome.
Base - The bottom of the cup below the middle section, represents the ultimate answer or conclusion.

Step Seven: Look up recorded symbols in Textbook and record your reading results.

Minerva sat patiently as the tea brewed. She liked tea, so she was use to waiting for it. As she sat she opened her book and skimmed some of the pages. Not really reading, but glancing at things. Checking her time she had sat only thirty seconds.. While this two minutes was going to be a long time, wasn't it.

Now she was suppose to clear her mind, that shouldn't be to hard, nothing was really bothering her. As she closed her eyes for a moment to relax of course her mind started going through everything that it was thinking about that she wasn't aware of, quidditch, classes, homework, Ethan.. no, no, no she was suppose to clear her mind not bring more in it. Breathing and counting she did the best she could to clear it.

Ding..ding.. ding.. two minutes finallllllly had come to an end, now it was time to cool. Min all the sudden remembered a time that she really burnt her tongue on the tea. It was horrid. Now looking at her notes she read what her next step was.

Picking up her cup she sipped it.. It wasn't great, but wasn't horrible. Keeping her mind off so many subjects at once, she thought of one that kept crossing her mind lately. Her future!! Something she had run from the thought of and now that's all she wanted to think about. What she was going to do after Hogwarts, how involved Ethan, would it involved Ethan. Her mind began racing through all these thoughts again as she drank her tea.

Focusing her brain again she stopped drinking her tea and looked down, that was enough leaves for a reading, well she hoped it was at least.

Must wait for tea to brew... must wait for tea to brew...

Were they allowed to mix it with a spoon? What about sugar? Were they allowed that as well?

This really was going to be bitter, wasn't it? Alec looked down at the inside of the cup and tilted his head to the side slightly. It didn't look too bad, actually. It looked tea-like, which was the main point here. And whether it tasted tea-like. And he really really hoped that it wouldn't taste too bad. Because this was make or break time and he really didn't want to be put off of tea forever.

Shaking his head, Alec sat back and closed his eyes, trying to pretend that this was a Defence Against the Dark Arts class. And this was... another yoga move he had to do. Because you had to do the same thing in Defence, right? Meditate? And not think... and take deep... calming... breaths...

...

...

This was weird.

Text Cut: Steps!

Quote:

Step One: Flip cup over onto piece of parchment and then trace outside rim of the cup to create the 'saucer' out of the area made by doing this (Leaves on saucers don't have much purpose on their beginner readings without "real" saucers"). Retrieve 1 teaspoon of tea leaves from boxes at each table.

Step Two: Fill cup 3/4 full with hot water from cauldrons and add tea leaves.

Step Three: Allow tea to brew for 2 minutes. Clear your mind and meditate. No talking please.

Step Four: Let tea cool a bit and then drink. Try not to swallow many leaves. If you are right-handed, lift your cup with your left. If left-handed, drink with your right. If ambidextrous, reach for your cup, stop, and then use the other hand.

Once relaxed, identify the issue foremost in your mind. As you attempt to think of nothing in particular, is there a stubborn thought that keeps returning to your attention? If so, that is the subject of this reading. Focus on that thought. If nothing in particular comes to mind, then this will be a general tea leaf reading. Focus on your breath and the taste of the tea.

Leave a small amount of tea at the bottom of your cup.

Step Five: Hold your nearly empty teacup in your hand and give it three good swirls. The tea leaves will disperse around the interior of cup. Gently dump out the remaining liquid by turning your teacup over into a saucer.

Wait at least three breaths before turning your cup back over.

Step Six: Because your cup has no handle, begin reading from 12 o'clock. Make a notation of the first symbol you see. Mentally divide the cup into three sections: rim, middle and base.

Rim - area is above the tea level when you first poured your tea represents the current moment in time.
Middle - area between the rim and bottom, represents near future (2 weeks)
*Both the rim and middle section represent influences in your outcome.
Base - The bottom of the cup below the middle section, represents the ultimate answer or conclusion.

Step Seven: Look up recorded symbols in Textbook and record your reading results.

Now it was time to swirl the tea leaves around. Min took her cup and swirled it around once. Then she swirled it a second time. Looking inside the tea cup she did the last swirl. Looking back at her notes, Minerva then took her cup and turned it upside down and let the contents run on the saucer. Because it was a homemade saucer she felt the tea going through the parchment. As she felt her hand get wet from the little bit of tea still in the cup, she took the three breaths and then turned her cup back over.

She then looked at the cup, alright so they had to look at twelve o'clock to star the reading. She stared at the tea leaves trying to make them out. The first reading was the rim. She she looked trying to figure it out.

After writing down that she saw what she thought was a Cherry, she turned her cup to look at the middle part of her cup.

Was that a Kettle? It really looked like it, funny she would see a kettle in a tea cup. Writing it down, Minerva moved on to the next part of her cup. The bottom.

Looking closely she decided it was a ball. Marking it down she then looked at her parchment again.

"Don't gush, darling. You'll make me start blushing..." Dylan gave her a rather saucy wink before shrugging some. "It wasn't too much work...and I didn't mind." Obviously...anything for her. Always...

...And watching her perform that spell reminded the Slytherin that he'd been forgetting to do something...and he quickly lifted both wand and cup to remedy this ALMOST epic fail. So caught up in his decorating and artsy thing...he was.

"Concavus!" SWOOP MOTION!

As the cup's bottom curved in and smoothed out, Dylan smirked. All was a go, yes? He could do the part with the parchment, right? Not expecting an answer to his internal thoughts, he pulled the parchment back over, laying the cup upside down on it. Grabbing his quill, he proceeded to trace the rim of the cup as was instructed.

Were they suppose to cut out the circle? No? Deciding not to, he just left it as was.

After what felt like two minutes, Alec blinked his eyes open and looked down at the cup. Now that looked more tea-like! And there was still some vapour rising out of the cup so... it looked like it was hot enough. And hopefully not too hot.

Picking up his cup of tea with his left hand, he took a cautionary sip... and immediately made a face. Elwood wasn't kidding when she said that the tea was bitter. Maybe this would be a bit better with some sugar or some milk. Or maybe this was an indication that he had too much sugar in his diet.

... Like that would keep him off of his ice cream. No way.

The sixteen year old took a couple more sips of the tea, trying to force his mind to think of an issue. But the only issue that was coming to mind was... well... this tea! ... No, maybe he could try and concentrate on the things that had been bugging him lately. Like the future and OWLs and mother things and fears and... him, actually. Was that possible? To be your own problem?

...

Shaking his head, he drank up the rest of the tea, focusing instead on the way the tea tasted which... wasn't bad now that he was getting used to the taste. When a tiny amount was left at the bottom, the boy stopped drinking and glanced over at his notes. Three swirls. Three swirls should do it.

Swirl, swirl, swirl...

Oh look at the tea leaves dispersing out! And... the cup was turned over and placed down over his saucer. ... Now... he had to wait again, yeah?

Text Cut: Steps!

Quote:

Step One: Flip cup over onto piece of parchment and then trace outside rim of the cup to create the 'saucer' out of the area made by doing this (Leaves on saucers don't have much purpose on their beginner readings without "real" saucers"). Retrieve 1 teaspoon of tea leaves from boxes at each table.

Step Two: Fill cup 3/4 full with hot water from cauldrons and add tea leaves.

Step Three: Allow tea to brew for 2 minutes. Clear your mind and meditate. No talking please.

Step Four: Let tea cool a bit and then drink. Try not to swallow many leaves. If you are right-handed, lift your cup with your left. If left-handed, drink with your right. If ambidextrous, reach for your cup, stop, and then use the other hand.

Once relaxed, identify the issue foremost in your mind. As you attempt to think of nothing in particular, is there a stubborn thought that keeps returning to your attention? If so, that is the subject of this reading. Focus on that thought. If nothing in particular comes to mind, then this will be a general tea leaf reading. Focus on your breath and the taste of the tea.

Leave a small amount of tea at the bottom of your cup.

Step Five: Hold your nearly empty teacup in your hand and give it three good swirls. The tea leaves will disperse around the interior of cup. Gently dump out the remaining liquid by turning your teacup over into a saucer.

Wait at least three breaths before turning your cup back over.

Step Six: Because your cup has no handle, begin reading from 12 o'clock. Make a notation of the first symbol you see. Mentally divide the cup into three sections: rim, middle and base.

Rim - area is above the tea level when you first poured your tea represents the current moment in time.
Middle - area between the rim and bottom, represents near future (2 weeks)
*Both the rim and middle section represent influences in your outcome.
Base - The bottom of the cup below the middle section, represents the ultimate answer or conclusion.

Step Seven: Look up recorded symbols in Textbook and record your reading results.

Minerva looked at her parchment, how on earth could these three things have any relation. They didn't seem even closely related, so how could their meaning have anything close. Finding it all very interesting though, she couldn't wait to look into it. Pulling her book off her desk she opened it and flipped to the first thing she could find.

Looking for the cherry she flipped to the C's of the symbol chapter. Moving her finger down the page she landed on Cherry. Now this was suppose to mean the present. Now reading the cherry she smiled, well that sounded about right. Her thoughts were about her future and right now she was in love, so it fit perfectly.

Next she looked for the middle that she had saw the Kettle.. K's.. k.. k.. finally finding the K symbols she moved her finger down a bit until she found Kettle and frowned. So if Middle is near future she was going to have to have a delay in something. Well she didn't like the sound of that. She had enough drama last term to last her a life time, so if it was a delay she hoped it was something other then her relationship.

Not liking the last symbol, Min quickly moved to the next one. She was kind of worried to see the last one. What if it was bad to. Frowning she moved the pages back to the b and didn't have to search long to find the ball. She shut the book and just looked down at the cup. Well this wasn't great either. Yes it wasn't negative, but it wasn't all that positive either, but as she thought about it, it made sense. It went with everything else she had up until now.

Pulling her quill she wrote down her findings and then waited for the next instruction.

Wait... wait... wait... three breaths...

Alec flipped his cup back over and... BLINKED at all the things inside. At first glance, it was all very very confusing and he didn't really know what to make of it. At all. Why was there so much mess in one cup? And what were you meant to do when all you can see were weird little blobs everywhere?

Gulping, he took a quick scan of his notes. Right. So he was meant to start from the top and divide the cup into three sections. And then try and see if he could spot any shapes that weren't weird blobs. AND take notes of what he saw and look it up. ... Why did this sound harder than it probably was?

Taking a deep breath, he turned his attention back towards his cup and looked up at the top. That was twelve o'clock, yeah? And then as he went down... that part was the rim and that the middle and that was the base. There, that was the first bit figured out. His eyes turned back up to the part that was the rim and he squinted, trying to find some sort of shape. Because... sometimes, squinting helped. A lot.

... What was...

There was a big blob somewhere at the top. Something that looked like it had legs and a big, oval body. ... An insect, probably? Maybe? Shrugging, he made a mental note of the shape before moving onwards. In the middle bit... was some sort of weird shape. And it was all curvy and if you took in the weird blob beneath it, it looked a little like a question mark. ... Well this is great, were question marks even in the textbook?

... That was a big question mark in itself...

Moving on... he now had an insect and a question mark and the last shape... near the base... were blobs. Weird looking shaped blobs. But some of them were in one big line and even those had lines coming down. So were those lines or just some sort of table? Maybe a table because... there were lines everywhere!

Frowning slightly, the boy reached over and quickly scribbled down the shapes he had mentally taken a note of. Yeah... these were really... weird.

Quote:

Rim - Insect
Middle - Question mark
Base - Table

Text Cut: Steps!

Quote:

Step One: Flip cup over onto piece of parchment and then trace outside rim of the cup to create the 'saucer' out of the area made by doing this (Leaves on saucers don't have much purpose on their beginner readings without "real" saucers"). Retrieve 1 teaspoon of tea leaves from boxes at each table.

Step Two: Fill cup 3/4 full with hot water from cauldrons and add tea leaves.

Step Three: Allow tea to brew for 2 minutes. Clear your mind and meditate. No talking please.

Step Four: Let tea cool a bit and then drink. Try not to swallow many leaves. If you are right-handed, lift your cup with your left. If left-handed, drink with your right. If ambidextrous, reach for your cup, stop, and then use the other hand.

Once relaxed, identify the issue foremost in your mind. As you attempt to think of nothing in particular, is there a stubborn thought that keeps returning to your attention? If so, that is the subject of this reading. Focus on that thought. If nothing in particular comes to mind, then this will be a general tea leaf reading. Focus on your breath and the taste of the tea.

Leave a small amount of tea at the bottom of your cup.

Step Five: Hold your nearly empty teacup in your hand and give it three good swirls. The tea leaves will disperse around the interior of cup. Gently dump out the remaining liquid by turning your teacup over into a saucer.

Wait at least three breaths before turning your cup back over.

Step Six: Because your cup has no handle, begin reading from 12 o'clock. Make a notation of the first symbol you see. Mentally divide the cup into three sections: rim, middle and base.

Rim - area is above the tea level when you first poured your tea represents the current moment in time.
Middle - area between the rim and bottom, represents near future (2 weeks)
*Both the rim and middle section represent influences in your outcome.
Base - The bottom of the cup below the middle section, represents the ultimate answer or conclusion.

Step Seven: Look up recorded symbols in Textbook and record your reading results.

Mo sketched out his plastic cup on the parchment, drawing lines from each of his descriptions to precisely where they were found on the cup. Not just the level, but also the position from the 12 o'clock notch.

First, the fist-looking thing. There wasn't an entry for a fist, so Mo moved through the book to try hands.

Hmph. It figured he got the closed hand instead of the open one. And it figured that it was up at the top, indicating his right now. His right now was pretty much consumed with a disagreement, and had a lot to do with the question he'd asked. The Question, that is.

Next up was the half-circle thingy. If it was an arch, then Mo was about to meet the woman of his dreams. Pretty neat trick, but he was 14 and super worried about that aspect of his life. If it was a rainbow, maybe he could have cake with Alice. But no, he was pretty sure it was an ear.

Mo chewed on the very tip of his quill, wishing he'd thought to bring a sugar quill to class. Now he had feathery bits on his tongue, and he spit those out with disgust. There'd been lots of advice recently, particularly the bit from both Odessas and a Fischer about not working so hard to please people. Probably could have to do with that. Probably. Or maybe it was an arch, after all.

The bottom shape, the table, was easy to find. Unless it WAS a box and he had wiped away the top of it. Or maybe it was U. A very point U. Or another arch. A very point arch. No, it was probably a TABLE.

Ugh. Mo put his head down on the table, right onto the wet parchment, and groaned at that. Out in the open was painful and not-happy making and besides, he'd TRIED to talk to people and it wasn't easy and... SIGH. Mo turned his head to glance around at people, displaying the nice clump of tea leaf dregs on his temple.

That wink and statement from the Slytherin Captain definitely earned a giggle!snort. "You're already blushing, actually...in case you didn't notice." He wasn't... Not yet. She just liked to get him worked up over his own circumstances.

She allowed him to cast the charm on his cup while her dark brown eyes lingered on the writings on the board. Seven steps. They were to follow those seven steps for this activity.

Okaaay.

Dylan had finished by the time she had read all of what was written on the board. Following his lead, the brunette brandished her quill, smoothed down a piece of parchment on the table and flipped over her cup onto it. Trace the rim so it will act as the saucer, right? Merlin....look at them. Using plastic cups instead of china, and improvising on their parchment for the saucers. Were they really this poor now? Sigh.

She was done tracing. And a perfect trace too. Well, close enough.

Next, she leaned over and scooped a teaspoon of tea leaves from the small box in the center of the table. She barely noticed that it was even there, to be honest. Then she turned to Dylan with a smile on, "Let's go and get water for our cups?" Like, stand up and head over to that far corner where the cauldrons were?

Copying his girlfriend's lead, Dylan leaned forward and scooped some tea leaves into his cup...Was he taking enough? He tried to take just as much as she had......and then slowly grinned. "Shall we?"

Not waiting for an answer, the Slytherin stood, leading her back towards the cauldrons of boiling water...Using a ladle, he went about filling his own cup with the burning liquid, being careful not to burn himself....but then he paused. Sitting the cup down, Dylan reached for the gloves he always kept in his back pocket, pulling them out and slipping them on. The cup...being flimsy and plastic, would've gotten REALLY hot....REALLY fast. So...best to protect his Seeker!hands. There was an important game coming up...and he didn't know if he was playing...

Waiting for her to get hers poured and situated, Dylan carried the cup back towards their table and laid it down. It was supposed to brew for 2 minutes...So, he just relaxed and waited. More likely the easiest step there was.

More waiting...

...and waiting......

...and STILL more waiting.........

Okay... so now he had to find out the meanings of each one of the shapes he had seen. This was sort of like the moment of truth.

Alec reached over for the textbook and flipped it open towards the chapter about Tasseomancy. Right. Symbols... symbols... and their meanings...

First off was the insect. I... I... I... THERE! POINT. This was the rim of the cup which meant that it was in this current moment in time. And right now, he was feeling insecty which meant... that there was a small worry or angst going on in his life? BLINK. Alec shuffled a little uncomfortably in his seat before scribbling in the information from the book. So he was worrying about things... things that he probably shouldn't be worrying about.

...

He shook his head and looked on. After all, it was probably only a coincidence, right? It wasn't as if the others were right. But the next one, the one that represented his near future, was a question mark. Which, according to the textbook, seemed to suggest that he should... act with care? So this had something to do with the worry/angsty feelings and he'd have to make sure to act carefully? ... Frown. He really didn't like what these things were suggesting.

Moving onwards, the next one was the table. Table... table... oh great. Discussion? Getting things out in the open? Did that mean talking about FEELINGS?! ... Yeah... could he give up on his future right now? Because there was no way he would be able to talk about his feelings properly without there being any awkwardness and tons of hair ruffling from the boy.

Alec sat back in his seat and frowned at his notes. Were these accurate? Was there a way to change things? And was he done now? Yeah?

Quote:

Rim - Insect
⊲ An insect indicates a small worry or angst.

Middle - Question mark
⊲ A question mark is a sign that you must act with care, this is not a time to throw caution to the wind.

Base - Table
⊲ A table in your tea cup indicates the need for a discussion or getting things out in the open.

Text Cut: Steps!

Quote:

Step One: Flip cup over onto piece of parchment and then trace outside rim of the cup to create the 'saucer' out of the area made by doing this (Leaves on saucers don't have much purpose on their beginner readings without "real" saucers"). Retrieve 1 teaspoon of tea leaves from boxes at each table.

Step Two: Fill cup 3/4 full with hot water from cauldrons and add tea leaves.

Step Three: Allow tea to brew for 2 minutes. Clear your mind and meditate. No talking please.

Step Four: Let tea cool a bit and then drink. Try not to swallow many leaves. If you are right-handed, lift your cup with your left. If left-handed, drink with your right. If ambidextrous, reach for your cup, stop, and then use the other hand.

Once relaxed, identify the issue foremost in your mind. As you attempt to think of nothing in particular, is there a stubborn thought that keeps returning to your attention? If so, that is the subject of this reading. Focus on that thought. If nothing in particular comes to mind, then this will be a general tea leaf reading. Focus on your breath and the taste of the tea.

Leave a small amount of tea at the bottom of your cup.

Step Five: Hold your nearly empty teacup in your hand and give it three good swirls. The tea leaves will disperse around the interior of cup. Gently dump out the remaining liquid by turning your teacup over into a saucer.

Wait at least three breaths before turning your cup back over.

Step Six: Because your cup has no handle, begin reading from 12 o'clock. Make a notation of the first symbol you see. Mentally divide the cup into three sections: rim, middle and base.

Rim - area is above the tea level when you first poured your tea represents the current moment in time.
Middle - area between the rim and bottom, represents near future (2 weeks)
*Both the rim and middle section represent influences in your outcome.
Base - The bottom of the cup below the middle section, represents the ultimate answer or conclusion.

Step Seven: Look up recorded symbols in Textbook and record your reading results.

Beezus stood up after her boyfriend and followed him off to that far corner where the cauldrons were stationed. At least the cauldrons weren't made of plastic too, right? As there were two of them, she let Dylan take hot water from one while she went and ladled in an approximate 3/4 of the cup from the other cauldron.

And because she had not brought a glove or anything that could protect her hands, she quickly scurried back to their table....but made sure she wasn't causing any spillage. "Hot, hot, hot....." She went about, sending blows of air on her cup as she slid back into her seat, carefully placing the cup on the table as she did. When Dylan had descended into his seat next to hers, Beezus reached out for the teaspoon of tea leaves she had readied earlier and added it into her cup.

Next was to let it brew.

So she sat there, took a deep breath and closed her eyes. It was time to cleeeear her mind. Oh, and..."Babe, don't talk to me." That sounded rather off. Her eyes flew open and she grinned sheepishly at her Slytherin. "I mean...don't talk to me for at least two minutes." Her eyes shut close again.

Meditating. Mhmm.

Rolling his blue eyes at her playfully, Dylan stuck out his tongue before closing said eyes...There was this meditation thing to do...It felt like DADA up in here sans Professor Romanos. That lady was always talking about meditating and clearing ones mind...

Didn't anyone realize it was almost impossible for him to do that? Hello. Slytherin here.

Even with his mind racing with...things...Dylan attempted to comply with the rules of the activity. ATTEMPTED being the key word...but there was just ONE thing on his mind. The one thing that was ALWAYS on his mind these days. Not being able to stop himself, the Captain looked over at Beezus and grimaced...

In fact, it was something so private and personal...that Dylan didn't even want to think about it...His paranoia kicking in and thinking that someone might read his mind...and that would NOT have been good. That would've been damaging...

The rules were clear, right? If there was a lingering thought...that's what the reading would be about, yes?

Confident that the tea had cooled enough for consumption, he lifted it with his LEFT hand and downed most of it in one go...It was DISGUSTING...and tasted cheap...but he tried not to think about that. The Slytherin had drank things leagues worse than this, anyway...

With it being empty enough, he swirled the cup in his hands three times and then dumped it out onto the parchment, taking care to be gentle in doing so. It was nerve-wracking, actually...considering what he knew this was going to be about...but he tried not to think too much about how devastated he was going to be. An emotionally broken down Slytherin Captain was NOT what everyone needed in this classroom. Nope. Upset Dylans were ten times worst than ANGRY Dylans...

After THREE solid breaths, he turned the GREEN SOLO CUP back over...

ANXIOUS!STARES!

10.......9........8.......7.......6.......5....... 4.......3.......2.......1 And done!

Now all she had to do was clear her mind, focus on a problem and drink. Which was easier said than done. Sky closed her eyes and focused on getting her mind blank. Wasn't working out too well. Her mind kept circling back to the Hogwarts fund loseage. Which meant that that was probably what her reading was supposed to be about. So, she focused on that as she drank her tea. The tea that tasted horrible. She was glad that Professor Elwood had warned them of that. But she wasn't going to drink water until she had all of this gross stuff down.

That has got to be the worst two-minute meditation of her life. The more she wanted to clear up her mind, the more things popped up, almost as if the thoughts were mocking her. And it wasn't a lone thought; there were loads of them. Although there was one thing in particular that kept coming back....consistently, effectively breaking through the wall she was trying to put up inside her head.

It wasn't a question that needed answering. It was more likely a....plea.

When she felt that the tea had cooled enough, Beezus reached over for the cup with her left hand since she was right-handed and that seemed to influence the reading or something. Why? She didn't know...maybe she'd ask later.

Merlin....it didn't smell like tea at all. Not like the ones she'd have before, anyway. The taste? "Ugh." It wasn't that terrible or repulsive. Just slightly. Still, she had to spit it out. The leaves seemed to want to cling to her mouth too. So...excuse me, more spitting here. However, when she had wiped off her mouth, she went over the whole procedure again. This time, she avoided spitting and drank down the contents of her cup as quickly as she could instead.

"Okay." Now she try and relax, right? Mind clearing part two......which was not even remotely working. She took a deep breath and released it audibly as if she was telling herself that she was surrendering to her own thoughts. It was a losing battle, really.

She held the almost empty cup tightly a gave it a good 'ol swirls of three. Of course, as expected, the bits of leaves scattered around the cup. And as she saw in the corner of her eyes that Dylan had turned over his cup onto his parchment aka improvised saucer, she did the same.

Then....one, two, three breaths....Beezus turned it back over and automatically reached out for her quill and another piece of parchment. She looked at Dylan and bit her bottom lip......because of reasons.

Carsyn finished scribbling the steps onto her parchment and then proceeded to follow the directions. She couldn't understand what caused Hogwarts to be so short-funded, but didn't devote much more thought to it. She didn't have much of a problem making the best out of a not-so-great situation, and the lack of a true teacup would be no major test of her imagination. There were worse things than doing a tea leaf reading out of a plastic cup, right?

With quill in her left hand, Carsyn did as instructed, turning the cup over so that the mouth of the cup touched the fresh piece of parchment. She inked her quill and touched it to the paper, turning the paper around 360 degrees while keeping the quill in one spot. For some reason, she found this easier than trying to drag the quill around the outside of the cup, which she was certain would have left her arms at awkward angles and her saucer looking like it was drawn while under a Jelly Fingers Curse.

When that was done, she set down her quill and flipped her cup back to its upright position. She used a spoon to scoop 1 teaspoon of leaves from the box at her table and was about to toss it in the cup, when she remembered that she hadn't cast the spell to change the shape of the bottom of the cup. Carefully resting the spoon of leaves down on the table so that none would spill, Carsyn picked up her wand and cast "Concavus!" with a check-swish motion on the cup. To her amazement, the spell actually worked the first time. With a somewhat awed (and perhaps a little bit proud) smile, she watched as the crevices in the cup disappeared, to be replaced by gradual sloping curves. This first year student was building confidence in herself by the minute!

When the spell had completed its transformation, Carsyn picked the spoon back up and tossed the leaves into the cup. She glanced at her note parchment again...

Oh darn! I was supposed to put the water in first! So much for that confidence... Carsyn quickly dumped the tea leaves out of her cup and back into her hand. With her free hand she filled her cup 3/4 of the way with hot water and then quickly dumped the leaves from her hand into the cup, glancing over her shoulder with a fearful expression. I hope no one noticed that! It seemed like most people were more concerned with their own progress than to notice her, but she still felt her heart begin racing and her face paling. Deep breaths Carsyn. Don't freak out now. You're fine. No big deal. You didn't screw it up that bad. It shouldn't effect the outcome much, right?

This internal pep talk prevented her from moving on to the next step right away, but that was fine, considering the tea needed to steep for 2 minutes anyway. She was struggling with the latter half of step three's instructions however.

Once Carsyn managed to hold the panic at bay, she was able to clear her mind enough to meditate... sort of. Wooosahhh. Focus on your breathing and nothing else. Blank slate. Empty mind. Empty stomach. Hungry. NO! Think about nothing. Breathing. Woooosahhhhh.

Yes, so the tea was bad? Callie had thought so.

The Divination professor had abandoned the idea of doing her own tea leaf reading for the fact that she needed to walk around and help the students more than she had originally planned, but that was okay. The blonde had done her fair share of these types of readings anyways and she could always do it another time and hopefully with better tea he co-workers had.

She was currently floating between a young Ravenclaw who seemed to be starting a tad late and the Slytherin Captain and Ravenclaw female Prefect who seemed to be working rather closely when she caught sight of the clock on the wall.

"Time is quickly running out students. Try to finish up your actual readings as soon as possible." She didn't want any incomplete Tasseography readings and then have them hanging on the workings of the Beyond without knowing what will happen!!

Kommoto looked at this older girl. Somebody didn't have a sense of humor.
"It was a joke," he said, his expression blank. "Relax."
The teacher had begun to instruct them, and Kommoto turned to listen. When she had finished, he traced the top of his cup. He filled his cup, and waited. He watched his watch tick until the two minutes were up. Kommoto reached for the cup before remembering he needed to use his other hand. Lifting his cup, he tasted the tea. Disgusting. He glanced around and saw that at least a few others didn't like the tea either. But Kommoto wasn't going to let them drink the tea while he didn't. He sipped the tea agian, and his eyes found the board. Relax, it said. Kommoto choked on his tea, spilling some out of his cup. How could one relax? he tried deep breaths, and felt something happen. But his mind was still jumping around. From house elves to his book up in his room, he couldn't focus. Finally, he put down his cup, closed his eyes, and did nothing. He felt ideas floating around in his head. Grabbing one, he focused everything he could on that one thought. Opening his eyes, he gulped down his now mild tea, and swirled the dregs. He turned the cup over onto the parchment, hoping it wouldn't seep through. Then again, it didn't really matter too much. Waiting, he thought about what he was going to see. Righting the cup, he peered inside. The rim was pretty clean, with a few spots where the tea had poured out. Was that a dinosaur he saw there? Yeah, there was the neck, and the tail... Looking further down, he saw some kind of face, or mask or something. he drew it, and it looked more like a mask. He saw some mass, and drew it. was it a weird island? he figured he might as well keep it like that. then he saw a big blob, only it had legs, and a snout. He drew the pig down as well. Moving onto the bottom, he saw a wonky kangaroo. Drawing it, he pushed his cup away, and looked in the text book.
Dinosaur-he was stubborn, apparently.
Mask-he needed to be more confidently
Island-He was going to return to a happy place. Probably was, his book was in his room now.
Pig-He was going to attract positive but he needed to be less stubborn
Kangaroo-He was making great strides toward his destiny. Interesting.