This was a really clean mirror, no really, just look at it. You could see for miles through this thing thanks to whoever had cleaned it while she was busy staring at her bowl of water. This was real nice of them and just went to show how decent humanity still was if you looked hard enough. Lex beamed at her own reflection then beamed at the reflection of her kneazle who looked to be falling asleep. She really couldn't blame him, unless you were a student with an inner eye, there was nothing much for you to do.

Er...but concentration and staring needed to be happening so she tried to focus. All that was there to it was focusing on something without focusing too hard? Man oh man how cool would it be if she actually saw Snow White like she said she and Grayson had???

Shame the Professor was back to normal now, she could use another pretend class. It was actually kinda fun having it run through the class like that. Oh wait.

Wait.

Waaaaaiiitttt. She was getting distracted again.

Stare. Something had to give.

Jasmine continued to stare into the water, not having to remind herself to blink this time. She maintained her slow easy breaths and her concentration was good, at least she thought it was. After what seemed like an enternity of staring, the water seemed to become opaque. Was something about to happen? "Stay focused focused Jasmine, just let it happen", she thought to herself.

To Jasmine, it seemed that the water was becoming swirly. She waited, almost afraid to breathe. She did not want to break the connection again. Whatever was trying to form in the water was very hazy. Jasmine couldn't make out anything clearly. It was just too blurry and murky to be identified. This was soooo frustrating and Jasmine's patience was wearing thin......fast.

...

.....

Contrary to the bowl of water just now, something was meant to be happening, yeah? Like if she stared long and hard enough images would start dancing across the reflective surface and she would be able to say she did a successful scrying? Then if that was the case, why wasn't it happening yet? Maaaybe she just needed a little more positive energy! Lucky for her she was chock full of it today! Legit, soooo many good feels and so little time to get them all out.

THEY COULD BE FOCUSED ON THIS MIRROR HERE!!

The Gryffindor stared even more intently at the mirror as if willing things to start happening. If this was all in your mind then after a while you could trick yourself into thinking something actually happened...yeah? So that was the game plan, just had to TELL herself there would be something in the mirror.

Alright, she was ready.

OKAY. Now that she was temporarily done with the self loathing--HA--she opened her eyes and stared down at the mirror, thinking of nothing, being...NOTHING. She hardly even blinked as she stared at the mirror. And it was...was it her imagination...or was she seeing...SMOKE in the mirror--it was clouding up--Eden blinked and it was gone.

GONE.

She was so IRRITATED that she growled kind of loudly------oops. Glancing around, she made sure no one thought she was crazy. Good. No one was looking. GOOD. She stared down at her mirror again, thinking of her Mam and her dad....in the background--or trying to--and just...the cloudiness was appearing again and Eden had to reign in her excitement before it disappeared again. She thought she saw the outline of two people--her parents? She wasn't sure--but she couldn't HELP her excitement with the mirror actually WORKING--MERLIN--

And then when she blinked--once again--the smoke was gone--but Eden could SEE her mother in their kitchen, cooking---WEHIFHIUFHIH Eden smiled and wanted to speak to her--she missed her SO much--and then in an instant, she was gone. And Eden frowned. She felt the overwhelming need to send her Mam a letter now..

Zhenya was still trying to calm herself down when Professor Cassie started speaking to her. She looked up at her timidly, "I'm… I'm fine Professor," she said, then in a smaller voice, "I think I just saw something that happened in the past…" she was quite scared. She didn't like that memory. In fact, it still scared her to this day.

But oh no, Professor Cassie had noticed her hand! She shook her head, not wanting to her why she wore her glove inside. Not with other students around. It was horrid! "I'm not cold, Professor, but thanks anyway."

She didn't want to use the mirror anymore, so she stood up carefully, grabbed the mirror and put it back where she had got it from. Then she walked to where the bowls were all stacked, though the collection now more sparse than at the start of the lesson. She got one, walked it back to where she had been sitting, put it a textbook which was on the ground, and peered into it.

Oh right - water!

She grabbed her wand and pointed it at the bowl. "Aguamenti," she said, and allowed the bowl to be filled to a good level.

Just when Jasmine thought that nothing was going to happen, she had a breakthrough. Things started to clear up in the water and in a good way. She saw water. Not the water in the bowl, but like a lake. It wasn't the lake at Hogwarts, but for some reason it looked strangely familiar. Jasmine stared, trying to figure out what she was seeing and what it meant.

As hard as she tried, she couldn't figure out where the lake was or why she was seeing it. She tried not to think so much, rather she wanted to keep concentrating. She could analyze everything later. On the side of the lake, she saw what looked like a bookbag with a book laying next to it. Jasmine squinted, trying to see things more clearly. Then she saw the book more closely and her hand flew to her mouth. She had finally done it. She'd gotten a vision and it was a clue. Jasmine wasn't sure what it meant, but she was pretty sure it was meant to tell her something. She kept staring, waiting for more. Much to her dismay, the image dissolved. Jasmine moved back, stunned by what she had seen.

... and staaaaaaaaaared.

But nothing. The most that really seemed to be occurring over here was that occasionally Toby would tune out enough that his imagination would run away with him and he'd end up daydreaming strange little scenarios that would play out before his eyes LIKE he could see them but NOT QUITE. And then Tobias would blink and the images would clear. But he wasn't Seeing them, like SEEing them, y'know? He didn't have that weird nauseous feeling, didn't feel like his mind was really clear enough, none of that.

Though he still tried. Not one to give up so easily, Tobias simply shut his eyes once more and let the background noise of the classroom sort of lull him into that more relaxed state.

Relaaaaaaax. Relaaaaaaaaaaaaaax.

When he felt more settled and his breathing had slowed and there was nothing in his mind other than how it was time to try again, Toby opened his eyes and stared back at the water, really zoning in on it and phasing out everything else as much as he could. Stare. Stare stare stare.

If anything was going to happen, now would be the time. And... there it was. The surface of the water seemed to cloud over. Toby went on staring and waiting and maintaining his focus.

Since when was snorting the end of the world? Apparently Angel had her knickers in a right twist and AJ was not going to humor her. She saw her sticking her tongue out at her, and AJ just rolled her eyes. The comment also did not go unheard, but AJ was not in the mood to fight over a snort. Angel was being a drama llama, and AJ wasn't biting. Besides, who forgot about the water spell?

Angel was doing absolutely nothing for her concentration either, but you didn't hear her whining. now did ya? Hmph. Anyways... it was time to put her attention back of the water bowl.

Oh, water bowl, why can't you show me anything? Stare, stare, stare. Nothing was showing up. All she could see was the water and her reflection a tiny bit. AJ lowered her face down to the bowl and her nose was grazing the water. this was pointless. She might as well move on the the mirror.

Poke. Pokepokepokepoke.

Something had to give. The girl that'd been shouting earlier was on about something she'd seen and Lex still wasn't at that point yet. That's why the mirror poking was happening but you know what? She was beginning to think that wasn't gonna work either.

Perhaps....

Alexa stepped even closer to the mirror, squinting at the reflections all around her as if at any minute, one of them would start contorting into something of a prophecy. Any minute now. Annyyyyy minute now. All it took was patience and concentration and and and a whole lot of things that just maybe Lex didn't have right now because the reflection she caught of her kneazle was the CUTEST thing ever right now with the way he was yawning and stretching all cute like.

Just lookit him! Could she go over and cuddle him while she waited for the mirror to activate its special magic. That was obviously it, you know. The mirror had special magic, all you had to do was wait and the Gryffindor could do that. Honestly she could.

Zhenya was actually quite nervous to repeat the process. What if she saw more of what had happened to her on that awful day? She really didn't want to! Despite the occasional twinge in her left hand fingers, and the visual defect, she could almost pretend nothing had ever happened. But of course it had happened, and she was determined not to look into it. Her wounds were still a little raw, emotionally, and she didn't want them bursting open in the middle of a lesson.

She tried, anyway. She closed her eyes, the same as she did before, took a few deep and slow breaths, then tried to picture her inner eye again. It felt a bit cloudy, like something was blocking it. But she tried. She tried harder. She needed to pry open her inner eye… come on inner eye, OPEN!

After a while of sitting there, fully immersed in her effort to open her inner eye, she had progress. She saw her inner eye twitch, then slowly open and look around. IT was odd, picturing an eye inside her own mind that could open and close if she tried hard enough.

Stare. Stare. Stareeeeee. This was so boring and all Caleb could see was his handsome face! This was bogus. Was he supposed to just suddenly see something in the stagnant pool of water? It's not like magical things just started to APPEAR out of thin air...

But as soon as he had thought that, he noticed a small shadow in the upper part of his bowl start to take shape. Was it...a cat? Maybe it was a cat. He didn't know any cats - he was all about the dogs, yo - but maybe that was Sophie's cat. Did she still even have the kneazle? He couldn't remember if he'd seen it recently or not...maybe the poor thing had snuck off and died in a terrible accident! Was his spirit trying to reach him?! WHAT WAS HAPPENING?!

Norah slowly opened one eye and then the other, still letting her breath flow in and out steadily. THE FOGGY STUFF. IT WAS BACK. She focused on her breath to make sure her excitement was in check. She was not going to freak out this time. She was notttt. Every couple seconds, her eyes flicked upwards towards the mirror just to check if the fog was still there. And it was. Eeeeep. She squinted at it, hoping some sort of image would reveal itself. As exciting as the fog had been, it was kiiiiinda starting to get a little boring. Maybe her inner eye needed glasses. That's what they told her little brother when his seeing was all foggy.

But wait. A thing. There was a thing. Norah stopped squinting and instead opened her hazel eyes as wide as they would go. Some shape was starting to be clear in the foggy stuff, but she had no idea what it was. Back to squinting, she stared at it, trying to make the steadiness in her breaths go and unfog her inner eye, 'cause she was looking at the mysterious thingy mabob for so long that her head was starting to feel funny. What WAS it? A bear? A dog? A potato with legs? ZOMG MAYBE IT WAS A CAT AND SHE WAS GETTING A KITTEN AND SHE COULD NAME IT CHARLIE AND THEY COULD BE BEST FRIENDS. And then she was excited and thinking about types of cat food and what color his collar would be and by the time she looked back to see her beloved, foggy cat/bear/potato with legs, it was gone. Just foggy fog left. Sighhhhh. Guess it was time to breathe again.

Siiiighing in annoyance, Eden scooted off her desk to return the mirror and grab a bowl. For the water portion. But she didn't imagine that going any smoother, honestly. She went back to her seat--and filled her bowl with water using her wand.

Right.

Now she felt THIRSTY and she wanted to drink some water but--that was neither here nor there.

SIGH. Eden lived such a HARD life, man. She dipped her finger in the water and twirled it around a bit...was this similar to the mirror stuff? She had to glance at her notes to make sure--

Oh man.

Oh. Man!

They had to scry? Using a bowl and a mirror? Oh MAN! He was gonna fail at this, especially since he had seen a lot of fog and mist and even had time to examine the table but he certainly hadn't seen anything worthwhile in the crystal ball. And then Professor Cassie had to go ahead and say that this was gonna be harder than that, which caused him to internally groan. Don't get frustrated? That was gonna be hard, he could feel it. And if the OWLs included trying to see something in the crystal ball, he was gonna fail.

............... LOL, don't think about that, Whitty.

Getting up, Grayson headed over to get himself a bowl. It would be easier to pretend that he was looking into a crystal ball with this which might make this whole process easier. That's what he was going for: easier. And whatever freaking worked for him, even if it included making things up just to get by. The bought of that caused him to look around the room for the familiar face of a certain Slytherin who'd given him that brilliant advice. But he couldn't see Ruby anywhere so, after a couple of seconds, he busied himself with picking up the bowl and filling it up with water using magic. Of course, it had to be full but not brimming or likely to spill everywhere because that would be a disaster. Or funny if someone slipped on it and fell on their bum.

When that was done, he headed back to his desk and set the bowl down. This was a good place to work, right? He certainly hoped so.

As Caleb was getting a bit nervous about the fate of Sophie's kneazle, he noticed Grayson nearby, looking nervous. Hmmm. For some reason, the urge to take his bowl and dump it over his head just to give him a shock overran him...but he didn't because of many obvious reasons. Hehe. That'd be FUNNY though. He smirked to himself and then looked back at the water.

Ok, so Sophie's kneazle might be trying to contact him from beyond. But WHYYYY? He looked into the water and hoped to see something, anything, that was going to tell him why he was seeing cats. He wondered if maybe it just meant he was going to get a cat...which he wouldn't be sad about. Animals were awesome. He'd take another pet!

Instead, it looked like...a tree. Was the kneazle stuck in a tree? OH NOOOO!

Cinna drank about half her tea, when she started to feel really relaxed. Enough to do this scrying anyway. She had only gotten a few flashes of things in the crystal ball over the past few lessons. And the mirror she wound have been better off scrying at a wall. She didn't see anything at all. She was going to do a few slow breathing excerises. She closed her eyes first. breathe in, ah. Breathe out, ahh.

Cinna took a few more sips of her tea. Clearing her mind of everthing and filling it with positive thoughts. And she opened up her eyes. Then set her teacup down beside the bowl.

Peering into the bowl, she focused on a spot of water in the bowl. Now let's see if she was going to get anything. Anything at all, well that would be a good start. Wait, was that the water flickering or was that something more?

A sip of tea was taken before he glanced down at the bowl of water. Why? Because tea was meant to be relaxing or whatever but all it did was make him even more nervous. This was why he didn't drink the stuff unless he absolutely had to, like right now. Any means to stall this whole process was a means that he was happy to go along with. He was practically a Seer with the way he knew what was gonna happen but a part of him couldn't help but hope that he would actually see something in the water or the mirror. It would be better than saying that he saw mist again.

Deep breaths were being taken before he leant forwards a little. Concentrate on a question? Something he wanted to see within the water? What if he merely wanted to see anything? Anything interesting, mind you. Kinda like the way Professor Cassie had seen him sitting by the lake before. Why the LAKE? He liked going down there, sure, but what was he doing down there? Had she seen any more than that? He kinda wanted to know, especially if it was something that would either help him or harm him.

Seeing his own reflection was great. Look at his face. Wink.

Was he seeing anything else? No. No ripples either, which he was taking as a good sign because vibrations were distracting. A lot of concentration was taking place right here. Concentration and staring into the depths of the water.

Alright time to go to the water bowl. He got his own bowl from the front of the classroom and went back to his seat. He calmed himself and saw Cinna she got herself a hold of some tea. You know that is not a bad idea. He grinned and went over and poured himself some tea. He got an apple spiced cinnamon tea bag and put it into his hot tea cup. He let it sink and let the water get some flavor. He smelt it and thought it smelled delicious. After he blew on the cup and waited for it to cool down, he sipped it and felt relaxed. He closed his eyes and breathed in and out....in and out....

He realized he forgot to fill the bowl up with water and he smacked his forehead and said, "Aquamenti!" and then the fill was filled to a good level. He said "Finite!" so the bowl wouldn't be overfilled.

As he sipped his tea and got into his relaxed mind set, his eyelids felt very heavy and he managed to look at one part of the water bowl which was the center. He saw something forming but he couldn't be quite sure. He thought he was seeing things. He shook his head and the image was gone. Grr...he would try again.

She saw something in her past! EEEEEEEP!!!!! She gave Zhenya snaps, "That's wonderful that you saw something. Even if it wasn't pleasant, seeing something is great!" Plus it could mean she needed to look at this event closer, maybe there was something she had forgotten that needed to be remembered.

Still looking curiously at her hand she wasn't sure she believed the girl. "Are you sure? I can warm the room up or is there something else wrong?" She didn't seem like she wanted to talk about it, but it was Cassie's job as a professor to make sure the girl was alright. She seemed alright other then the hand. Was it a fashion statement? She'd much rather wear some great heels for a statement instead of a glove, but to each their own.

The surface had clouded and Toby was totally in the zone but... still nothing. Perhaps he was just TOO in the ZONE and had ended up missing something, y'know? Or perhaps the bowl of water was just something he wasn't able to master. It happened, finding some things way more difficult than others. Maybe he'd have better luck with the mirrors.

Hearing Professor Morgan's voice, presumably talking to another student, Toby suddenly snapped out of whatever ZONE he was in and looked around the classroom. It seemed like there were some people waiting for the bowls, and he'd spent long enough hoarding this one. Plus, there was a free mirror that was up for grabs.

Vanishing the water from the bowl, so it didn't get spilled before the next person could take it, Toby returned it and headed straight for the mirror. What had Professor Morgan said? Tobias had left his notes where he'd been sitting but he was pretty sure he recalled her saying something about maybe sitting off slightly to the side so you wouldn't be distracted by your own reflection. That was exactly what he'd had trouble with LAST time, so that was some GOOD ADVICE. And... turning the mirror so he could just see the blank wall in the glass. Toby did just that, and then he was ready.

So, cleeeeear the mind. Cleeeeeeeeeeeear the miiiiiiiiiiind.

Eyes shut again, Tobias worked on that. He didn't try too hard this time, as he found that the more he TRIED to clear his mind, the more he ended up thinking about it. So he just stood there and relaxed and let himself zone out a bit so his inner eye could try and open.

After a good long while of this, Toby opened his eyes (his actual eyes, though hopefully the inner eye was doing the same) and looked right at the mirror. At first there was no change, and then the glass seemed to cloud over, as though showing him a foggy room. The fifth year waited to see if anything would show itself to him.

So this was not working.

It wasn't that he wasn't trying because he WAS. This wasn't like a piece of home work that he was doing half-heartedly because he hated the lesson and didn't understand and generally had very little motivation for anything. No. He could feel himself trying hard to stare into the depths of the water to try and see something other than his own reflection but nothing was working. All it did was make him steadily more and more frustrated with both himself and this means of scrying.

Freaking bowl of water showing him NOTHING. Grayson prodded it with his wand, letting the ripples flow out. In the meantime, he could think of a NEW question. Try harder. Whatever it took. The fifth year closed his eyes and tried to clear his mind of all thoughts. Kinda hard but whatever. He could TRY and there was a chance that it could pay off well. There was a chance that he wouldn't have to make things up but that didn't mean that that option was off of the table. Oh no! He needed a backup.

His blue eyes snapped open and he glanced down at the bowl of water. Concentrate. CONCENTRATE. He wanted an answer to questions about his future because maybe, just maybe, that would make him less scared about it all. And the bowl of water had better not lie. All Grayson could see was his own face glaring back at him but he wasn't paying attention to that. Nope. See? Full level of concentration happening here.

And what was the water showing him? Nothing, that's what.

Grumble.

Remembering what he had done in previous lessons, Benny closed his eyes to cut himself off from his surroundings. An attempt to help limit the outside stimulation to his mind and thoughts and perhaps give himself a better chance of focusing. He wasn't all to sure it really helped each time he did it but at least it was a place to start and so he did it, especially when the professor advised it as part of the practical steps.

Taking a few deep breathes, he finally opened his eye lids once more and let his gaze drift smoothly to the solid surface of the water in his bowl. From there the Gryffindor tried his best to keep his attention on one spot to focus in hopes of receiving something. Benny had only had some sort of luck with looking into a crystal ball but he still wasn't sure it hadn't been a complete fluke.

Focus...focus...focus.

Zhenya wasn't so sure it was great that she had seen something in her past, but she could see where Professor Cassie was coming from. She had seen something. She had managed to open her inner eye enough to see something in the mirror, and she should be pleased about it… shouldn't she?

No, she was, she was definitely pleased that her inner eye had opened enough to see something. It was just old memories opening up, making her quite sad.

"No, Professor, I don't want you to warm up the room" she said quietly, though touched that the Professor was willing to do that. It helped. She took a deep breath, telling her tears NOT to come! "I was frozen," she said, very very quietly so that only Professor Cassie could hear. "My body was frozen a few years ago and my hand is a bit… damaged. I saw what had happened in the mirror, and I… I didn't like the memories," she admitted, looking down.

So..... A lot of time had already passed by and he was still staring at the dumb mirror. And there still wasn't anything happening. How long did he just have to stand here and wait for something cool to happen? Because nothing was happening yet...

The Gryffindor shifted around on his feet, rather impatiently. Blank stares ahead. Letting out a small sigh, he decided to try and do the clearing the mind thing. He hadn't really given this whole thing a go actually... Rather than trying he was really just standing there hoping it would work.

So counting to three he slowly tried to clear his mind of all the weird thoughts buzzing around. Like the book he was reading about Neville Longbottom, the revenge plan against Professor walton, and the potions homework he still hadn't gotten to.

There was just so much to think about all of the time. Scrying was hopeless for this child.

And he was officially done with mirrors. Now he could move onto the next, cause, yeah... just, effort, and still so much to do.

Moving around the class, Zeke found himself a water bowl, took it to where he was sitting on his cushion earlier, and started by filling it with water. What use was a water bowl without water? Hmmm?

"Aguamenti," he recited, watching as the water came from his wand tip, once he had enough, he ended the spell. "Finite."

Now.... this scrying with water thing. What had Professor Cassie said before? Look where the water wasn't moving? ... well so long as nobody bumped his table, that'd be fine. In fact, nobody needed to be touching the table at all. Cue looks to those around him. Yeah! NO BUMPING TABLES!

...

And so he stared at his water bowl.