Rula examined the dagger thing for a few seconds once it was passed to her, but she passed it on to the next person quickly enough. These things were more of Bastien's specialty and interest than hers, and he'd probably be able to point out a lot more details and uses than she could. Plus most of the answers she would've thought of had been pretty much said - though that cutting sandwiches one Rooney mentioned was probably her favorite one. It really was just a big knife, basically. So why not use it for cutting sandwiches and fruit and stuff?

She should suggest it to Bast sometime. Hehe.

But anyway, where to get one if you didn't already have one? Hmm... "Maybe you could transfigure smoke into a dagger?" she suggested, raising her hand. Might not be right, but she wasn't sure how else a dagger had something to do with smoke. Aside from what Skylar said, that was also a good idea!

Professor Stewart had written her answer and loads of others on the board. Emmeline wondered if maybe they should be writing these down, but in the end, she decided that it was too much work. Besides, a lot of stuff about smoke could be figured out anyway, maybe.

The silver dagger sheath, and then the revealed blade, caught the first year's attention. It looked really pretty from here! The professor's questions were sort of weird, though. There weren't that many uses for daggers, were there? She thought that her classmates had covered the topic pretty much completely by the time she was ready to answer. Stabbing, cutting, fighting and defense, what else were daggers used for?
The second question also seemed kind of obvious to Emmeline, but only because they were in Transfiguration class. Obviously they were going to transfigure something and the professor's question made Emmeline feel sure that it would be related to the dagger somehow. That could be pretty cool!

She took the dagger when Jessa passed it over, not really paying attention to people's answers anymore. They all ended up on the board anyway, and she had a slightly short attention span, if people hadn't noticed yet. She liked how detailed and nice this dagger was; it was even prettier in person, and it really looked just like a mini-sword. Emmeline twirled it around in her hand with its sheath on to look at the pretty object from all angles before passing it to either Derf or Stasya. They could both reach it from how she was holding it out to them, after all.

Now, how to answer the professor's questions? She knew her answers wouldn't be very good, because lots of good answers were already taken, but she thought maybe she could be specific and get away with having similar opinions. Raising her hand, she answered: "I think daggers can be used in Defense Against the Dark Arts. Maybe against evil vampires as a last resort or something. And, there's a cool charm Professor Marchand knows that lets him summon things from other places, so we could use that to get a dagger!" True enough, though she was still super sure that the professor wanted a Transfiguration-type answer. But at least she'd tried, right?

A dagger?

First, a smoke and now a dagger. Okay, Ava was totally clueless if there was a correlation between these two. Were they going to transfigure the smoke into a weapon, she didn't know if that was possible. But well, this was magic and everything seemed possible, you know? She observed the dagger closer as someone passed it onto her. Yeah, it looked very sharp and shiny. Was it made from the finest goblin silver by the way?

To be honest, this dagger looked way much cooler as a weapon. The Gryffindor passed it to another person and listened to the professor. "If we talked about that dagger, I'd probably will keep it and hang it on my bedroom's wall because it looks very expensive. But the usual function of a dagger is for weapon." She answered as she put her hand on in the air. And transfiguring one was the obvious answer so, she'd rather not to repeat the answer.

...........................

..................

.........

Sorry, but Olivia REFUSED to touch that thing. For triggering reasons. Only associating this type of weapon with a horrific memory, the blonde put her head down while it was being passed around; not wanting anyone to see the sudden panic on her face. Nor wanting to be offered to touch it. She simply wasn't comfortable having one in hand.

With a deep breath, she thought about other things outside of the classroom. Like Winter Holidays coming up....Putting up the Christmas tree and decorating the house....Geezus, g i f t s. Put a pin in that brain.

Peeking to see that the dagger wasn't in danger of being passed her way, Liv felt slightly more confident rejoining the conversation. "They can be used to hurt people. And not just on a self-defense front. In the wrong hands, they ruin innocent peoples' lives." Pause. Deep breath. Exhale. "...I suppose you could conjure this type of weapon if you had the right materials available. Or simply purchase one." Because that's what you did when you needed things. You bought them. None of them present in this lesson were bladesmiths, as Ace had brought up. But his mentioning of Goblins did make her remember the Sword of Gryffindor.

"To add onto what Ace said...these types of weapons have a lot of different properties in our world, too. Thanks to magic...Though, I'm not really sure what this all has to do with smoke, Professor."

Uuuuuh...Derf didn't really want to touch the dagger and his hands were kind of full anyway with his Extendable Ear as was sooooooooo he shook his head when it was passed towards him for the next person to take. Which meant he was sort of missing out on half the explanation he supposed, but this was just the theory portion anyway AND he assumed that the dagger was a transfigured one AND since they were taking about smoke that implied things SO he assumed that this dagger was prooooobably lighter than usual.

He could always find out later anyway.

Whispering a few things to Abey, the professor's response to him CLICKED and his hand shot back up in the air. Yes, he DID know HOW! And someone else - or a few people - had already mentioned it as well.

"What would Minerva McGonagall do!?" he chirped. WWMMD?! "S-She would transfigure smoke into daggers as a means of self defense."

Accepting the dagger from the last student to have held it Camilla wrapped it back up in the cloth and set it aside on her seat. "You all gave some wonderful answers. Daggers can be used in a variety of ways, the main way being as a means of self defense as many of you suggested."

"Buying one if I needed one or just wanted to have one in my possession is easy but it could get costly. If I was in immediate danger and needed to have one right this moment I would need to magically get my hands on one." So buying it was out of the question as was asking a friend or anything else if they had one. "Conjuring one is a bit more difficult to do then what we will be doing today." It had been mentioned by a few students.

Camilla walked over to stand side by side with the fire-pit that was centered before her seat. "As a couple of you guess we will be changing smoke into daggers. It's not as complicated as conjuring one but it does take a certain level of concentration. You need to focus on the smoke, watch the way it moves around. You need to be able to see the smoke condensing together in your mind, slowly forming the blade and handle and sheath, changing into a dagger." It wasn't a hard spell by any means but the focus had to be there.

"Take out your wands please." She waited for everyone to do this holding her own wand firmly in her hand. "The wand movement is a simple circle motion around the smoke you are using. The incantation is Fumus Lamina. Let's all try saying that together first, FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah" she repeated more slowly breaking it down for them correctly before flicking her wand and making it appear on the board.

"I want you all to try saying the incantation a few times and giving the movement a try before you work with the smoke. When you're ready you may get up and found a spot in the room to try this or you may stay seated if you like. Remember clear focus. Picture the smoke forming into the dagger you want it to be, a simple one will do." No need to try to get very fancy. "You want there to be a sheath as well when you picture it in your mind."

She would be walking around making sure no one was messing about and offering assistance as well. If anyone was truly uncomfortable with this they were welcome to come speak with her.


OOC: Here's the mini activity everyone! They're turning smoke into daggers, a circle wand movement over the smoke they're using while saying the incantation. The older the students are the easier in forming a true detailed dagger and sheath will be, so feel free to have them not be formed well or whatever you like! Please no major injuries! We'll be moving on in about 30 hours but Cami will be around if needed

...

Why exactly were they turning smoke into daggers? Vivian was kinda lost. She didn't think she'd ever come to a moment when she needed a dagger in her possession when she could just flick her wand and cast a Severing Charm. It was kinda... well, weird. Why need a dagger when you've got a powerful wand that can do anything? The blonde was filled with confusion and a lot of questions in mind, but she decided to reserve that for later. Despite her opinions, she didn't bother to voice them out, so she proceeded to practice the spell's incantation and wand movement. She was just trying to get onto the professor's good side so they could have time to roast her marshmallows.

Taking her wand out, Vivian practice the wand movement. She made a circle, as if trying to trace the path which the smoke was making. She was more intrigued by the smoke than the actual movement of her wand, to be honest. She sometimes wished she could fly free, like the smoke did and all. Ahem, anyway...

"Fumus Lamina... Fumus Lamina," the Slytherin said, focusing on pronunciation of each syllable. "FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah." That sounded better, didn't it? Putting the emphasis on certain syllables. Of course, she just wanted to get it right and move on to eating the marshmallows she had brought. She was also feeling extra friendly today, so she'd probably share for the whole class. They'd have to make sure they all had at least one marshie. Three packs were enough, hopefully.

Curious and bothered about something in mind, Vivian raised her hand. "Professor, I have a question," she said. "What exactly does smoke have that makes it possible to turn into a dagger? I mean... we could use stones instead because it's solid and hard, so why smoke?" There, she'd said it. The Slytherin then went back to practicing the wand movement.

Now THAT was a useful spell to learn. Matt was super excited now and he hoped he'd get it straight away.

Though he had to admit it sounded like a slightly complicated thing to learn as they were transfiguring such a... non-substantial thing into a POINTY dagger that would cut through things. Yeah, he could see it taking him ages to get it right.

Ain't nobody got time to just practice the incantation on its own, so Matt got up straight away and went to find a smokier area.

"Fumus lamina." He said out loud after getting his wand. He made the circular motion, making sure there was always some smoke within the circle. "Fumus lamina. Fumus lamina. Fumus lamina?" Hello-o? Come on, smoke.

The Gryffindor only now started to picture the dagger in his mind. He stopped saying the incantation and doing the circles with his wand and thought long(ish) and hard about an awesome dagger. He picture some details but not that many as the quicker he got that spell right, the better. He'd think about making it more difficult for him later.

Besides, when someone needed a dagger to stab someone, they probably wouldn't care about the details anyway, as long as it was sharp. "Fumus lamina!"

The Professor didn't need to go telling her that. Jessa was accutely aware of how difficult transfiguration spells could be and how much focus they required. Despite this...or perhaps in spite of this, Jessa adored the subject--plus it allowed her the ability to do amazing things that usually came in handy in her experiments. Win-win right there.

And if that wasn't an interesting concept she didn't know what was. Smoke to daggers. Moving from a gas to a solid. Huh. It would be an interesting challenge to say the least.

Jessa drew her wand, ready to begin practising.

By now she must have drawn a million circles with her wand and felt little need to practice such a movement but the young girl did it twice anyhow--just to let the Professor see she was working progressively throughout this lesson.

The incantation she practiced separately, to avoid any misfiring while she was still getting the hang of it. "Fumus Lamina....Fumus Lamina!....Fu...mus La..mi...na." Over and over she repeated the incantation being sure to enunciate just right and speak as clearly as she could. While her wand was typically cooperative, she wanted to leave little room for error.

Pulling out her wand as per the Professors instructions, Felicity held it in front of her and didn't move it whilst she repeated the incantation. "FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah," she said, with diction, making sure her accent wasn't going to interfere with the spell. "FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah." After repeating the spell a few more times, the Snake finally looked up from the fire and into the smoke it was producing.

She wasn't sure how much it looked like a dagger, but if she squinted at the curling tendrils and tilted her head just so, she could maybe imagine a glint of silver, a pointed edge. Moving her wand in a circular motion around the shapes she was imagining in the smoke, Flick began to chant. "Fumus Lamina. Fumus Lamina." Ensuring that her emphasis was in the right place, and her pronunciation was accurate. She didn't want to imagine what would happen if she said the spell wrong, not when smoke and daggers were involved.

However, it did bring a question to mind, and she raised a hand, momentarily pausing in her (thus far unsuccessful) casting. "Professor?" A frown formed on the girls face, hoping that the woman wouldn't think her question stupid. "You said if you were in immediate danger and needed a dagger... But... Why wouldn't you just use magic to defend yourself, rather than creating a dagger?"

Once she felt like she'd gotten in enough practice with the incantation, Jessa felt she was now ready to create a dagger of her own. Concentration was gonna be key which gave her doubts about remaining where she sat....especially given Derf's aptitude for making things go wrong. Usually, it was fine and she didn't mind but NOT when it came to Transfiguration. As it so happened, nothing terribly distracting was going on so the girl opted to remain in her seat.

Jessa tried her hardest to imagine the dagger she'd just seen and to imagine the smoke slowly taking the form of the dagger.

Before beginning, the young girl took several deep breaths, choosing to pay very little attention to the questions her classmates had raised. They were brilliant ones, but a distraction all the same. Listening to them would land her with a half formed dagger at best and that simply wasn't acceptable.

Blue eyes settled on a section of the smoke. With it all looking the same, it was a little difficult keeping her gaze but she did her best given the circumstances.

Okay Jessa....focus...concentration. Envision the dagger...the sheath, the handle....the blade.....

"Fumus Lamina." And a circle drawn in the smoke. The Ravenclaw's eyes widened when the shape of the dagger DID appear, sheath and all. It was...she'd done it? First try?? Eager to test her results, the young girl lowered her wand and unsheathed the blade but, to her disappointment, it couldn't be removed at all. They had been formed together. Ugh. "Typical."

Not particularly discouraged, Jessa took aim. "Reverto." And back to smoke it became.

Once again she drew a circle with her wand, never removing the picture of the dagger from her mind. "Fumus Lamina." And again she could see the dagger forming. This time, there was less haste as she lowered her wand to inspect it, but there was no need for skepticism this time. In her hand now sat a fully formed dagger, removable from the sheath and all! Eeep! Just took a little extra concentration, that was all.

The professor hadn't liked her answers this time, because she hadn't even responded to her. That was okay with Emmeline, because they weren't her best answers anyway, and besides, Professor Stewart had a cruppy in a kennel near Sirius. So the first year was willing to forgive the professor for a LOT worse than ignoring an answer.

As the whole class practiced the incantation, Emmeline joined them: " FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah." She actually muttered it under her breath a few more times, to make super doubly sure that she had it down. Turning smoke into a dagger was a really cool spell, and she wanted to be able to do it! The first year practiced the wand movement separately a few times too, even though it was just a circle. New spells in Transfiguration were usually even harder than new spells in Charms, so everything had to be perfect before she tried the spell.

Once she was sure that she could both say the incantation and do the wand movement correctly, Emmeline aimed for a relatively thick (for this magical stuff) patch of smoke. She envisioned an even prettier dagger than the one the professor had passed around, with rubies and diamonds and other stuff she could take off and give to the nifflers in the barn. She kept that shiny picture in her mind and muttered: [b]"Fumus Lamina!"/[b]

Nope. After five more attempts at the spell, the Gryffindor decided that maybe detachable gem stones on her sheath was too much to ask of the smoke. It would be really fancy after all, and maybe the smoke didn't want to work that hard.

Her next potential dagger was about the same length as the professor's but much simpler, with a plain golden handle and a simple red sheath. That wouldn't overwhelm the smoke, right? Time to find out: "Fumus Lamina!" Emmeline focused realllllly hard on the dagger in her mind as she said the incantation and drew the circle around her patch of smoke. To her delight, the smoke was definitely solidifying! What looked like a dagger fell into the first year's outstretched hand and Emmeline was about to be thrilled with every inch of it, except --

There was only half a dagger in her hand! The handle and the red leather sheath looked okay, except that the blade (and the sheath with it) randomly ended about half way down. There wasn't a point at the end or anything, it just stopped. This dagger definitely wouldn't be stabbing any vampires. Emmeline tossed it aside in disappointment. But this spell had been made famous by Minerva McGonagall, Derf had said so! McGonagall had been a Great Witch AND a Gryffindor, so she and Hermione Granger-Weasley had become a sort of role model in the first year's eyes. Which meant she had to master this spell!

Emmeline took a few deep breaths before she tried again. This time she thought of a smaller dagger with a plain, bronze handle and an even plainer, black sheath to cover it. The first year stared and stared at the smoke she was using for at least ten minutes as she practiced imagining how the dagger would come to life. Finally sure that she could visualize this better than she had on her last attempt, Emmeline picked up her wand again and drew a circle around her patch of smoke once more: "Fumus Lamina!" She pictured the smoke slowly coming together and forming each part of her dagger from the smoke. The image got clearer and clearer as Emmeline stared at the smoke, until finally a small dagger dropped into her hand. This time, the dagger matched her mental image exactly! Except that it was smaller than she'd meant for it to be. Emmeline thought it would still work against a crazed vampire, though.

It wasn’t that she didn’t know the answers to the questions Professor Stewart had asked. Or at least, Stasya could have given answers even if they had been not entirely right. She’d thought about conjuring when it had come to the question about how someone could get a dagger if they didn’t have one around, anyway, but her housemate had already mentioned it so she’d stayed quiet. Plus, there were plenty of distractions. The dagger, Derf with the Extendable Ear that she knew was connected to Abey somewhere…she’d thought she had caught a glimpse of Cameron outside the classroom before he had disappeared again. The curling smoke and the dagger being passed around. A lot of distractions, and she was finding it hard to focus. But now, she had to. A spell had been introduced, and they’d been told to try it so that meant she had to focus.

First, though, she’d quickly scribbled down any notes she’d missed from before, along with all the information about the spell. Then she finally took her wand out and just practiced making the little circle movment. Not always around wisps of smoke, but it was important to get the movement figured out. Only then did she try out the incantation, setting her wand in her lap so she wouldn’t accidentally cast anything before she wanted to. “Fuh-moos lah-me-na,” she said first, deliberately working on the syllables so she wouldn’t mess them up. “Fumus lamina. Fumus lamina. Fumus lamina.”

Okay, that question that Vivian had made sense. Except, wasn’t smoke kind of like carbon or something which was almost metal so maybe that’s what made it able to be turned into a dagger. She didn’t know, but she decided to wait to see what the answer was. She had to try the spell. Plus, she’d seen Emmeline try it, so that meant she had to. Just to see if she could. “Fumus lamina,” she said again, tracing a circle around a wisp of smoke that had curled near her and focusing on an image of a dagger in her head. She had watched with wide eyes as the shape of a sheathed dagger had formed, but when she’d reached up to see if it was real her hand had gone right through it. It was like a ghost dagger, which was kind of cool but also useless. She wanted an actual dagger. Maybe with a pink sheath. Mhm.

“Fumus lamina!,” she said again, tracing the tip of her wand in a circle around a bigger wisp of smoke n focusing all her thoughts on that dagger in her head and not stopping until it dropped to the edge of the fire pit and her eyes widened. It was real. As real as she’d managed until now, anyway, even if it felt too light to actually do any damage. She’d made a dagger out of smoke, and she checked to make sure there was a blade inside the sheath. Pretty, she thought, turning the dagger from side to side and watching the magical flames reflect off the metal.

When the professor finally moved on to the mini-activity, Etta was already beginning to feel excited. Transfigurations spells were always very interesting to learn but difficult too.. and she wanted to be so good so that she could use them in self-defence as well. It was a tough ambition to have but practice makes perfect, right?

Now, the spell.. Fumus Lamina. She started to make circles with her wand, making sure she got the wand movement right. Simple enough. Now, moving on to the enunciation. "FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah". That was correct, yeah? She cleared her throat and spoke clearly, repeating the spell a few more times. "FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah, FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah, FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah." Once she'd practiced it enough, she went back to practicing her wand movement once again.. you know, just to be a hundred percent sure. She didn't want to risk messing it up.

... and finally she was done. Etta was confident that she'd practiced enough times so now it was time to move on to creating a dagger of her own.

They could transfigure smoke into a dagger. Wow, how could she not know about this? Although Ava was not use why on earth exactly they needed to transfigure smoke into a dagger? Like, she always had a wand whenever she needed for defense, and for possession purpose, the original goblin-made silver dagger was more possession-worthy. She was about to ask that but thankfully a Slytherin girl (Felicity) had did it first.

Let's just move into the practice. The Gryffindor grabbed her wand from her holster, practicing the wand movement by drawing a circle around the smoke. This was not difficult though. Perhaps she should practice the incantation. "Fumus Lamina. Fumus Lamina. Fumus Lamina." Once she felt confident, Ava tried to find a spot to practice the spell. She pictured the dagger with the sheath in her mind and kept focused on that, then cast the spell by drawing a circle around the smoke as she said the incantation clearly. "Fumus Lamina!"

She rarely succeed a spell on a first try, and today was one of those days. Okay, let's try it again. "Fumus Lamina!" And a silver dagger appeared from the air with the sheath. Oooh, fancy.

With how quickly the answers from her questions were coming at her Camilla had somehow managed to not miss the reply of one of her younger students. Now it wasn't that she hadn't heard her or deliberately didn't respond to the young girl for that was something she would never do! Seeing the young girl working on the spell already as the other students did the same Cami walked over to her. She watched Emmeline try the spell several times before getting it right and smiled warmly. "There you go, practice and focus makes perfect. If you didn't already summon one it could certainly help you against vampire enemies." She smiled at her letting her know that she had indeed heard her reply earlier.



A question. Professor Stewart made her way over towards where Vivian was practicing the spell. "Very good question. We could very well have used stones today as the chemical materials would be very similar. I mainly choose smoke for today's lesson for the simple reasoning that it takes more focus from you. You would need to form the dagger in your mind, see that dagger in the smoke around you. It's like looking at clouds and seeing a face in it or a creature, everyone sees it a bit differently." She paused a moment. "There's also the fact that it rains a lot here and there's fog which is very similar to smoke. So if you could make a dagger from smoke then you shouldn't have trouble making one from most other things." Hopefully that had made sense and she hadn't confused her even more.



Camilla smiled hearing another very good question. "Well for me the dagger would be more of a distraction or used in close combat when I couldn't get a clear spell cast with my wand. If I wasn't alone, maybe I'm being attacked with others I wouldn't want to accidentally harm someone that wasn't a danger to me." There's many reasons she could have given but why make things harder then they needed to be.


OOC: Great job so far everyone! There's about 7 more hours left before we move on to the main activity!

Etta took a few deep breaths as she stood up. She had to focus, yeah? Besides, surely it wasn't going to be as hard as she thought. She'd practiced enough and if she just followed instructions.. it would be easy. She made her way slowly to a nearby fire pit, staring at the smoke slowly drifting upwards. Okay.. now she had to have an image of a dagger and it's sheath in her head. Concentrate on what she wanted.. the Hufflepuff simply stood until she had the image completely fixed in her head. She ignored everything.. her classmates chatting, the professor answering questions.. any kind of distraction, really. The last thing she wanted was to mess it up and create something that didn't resemble a dagger at all.

Right. She drew a simple circular motion around the smoke with her wand and spoke, the incantation loud and clear. "Fumus Lamina." ... nothing. Nothing happened. What? Etta frowned, not sure what just happened. Maybe she hadn't focused enough? Sighing, she tried once again, this time trying to concentrate even more.

Come on, Etta. Dagger.. sheath.. focus. Once again she drew a circular motion with her wand and said, her mind still completely focused on the image in her head. "Fumus Lamina!" .. and this time she could see the dagger forming! How exciting. Soon enough, she stared in wonder at the dagger in her hand, sheath and all. Wow. She'd actually done it!

So it was possible to transfigure stones into a dagger. Brilliant. Vivian made it a point to try the spell on one soon, but she had to finish the task at hand first. Despite Professor Stewart's reply, the Slytherin was a tad bit confused. Because they had to focus more when working with smoke? Basically... it just made the lesson harder. Okay, it was sort of weird logic for the blonde. Nevertheless, she nodded at the Professor and smiled. "Thank you, Professor." She hoped she looked enlightened even when she was still slightly lost.

Anyway, she went back to practicing. She didn't have a problem with the wand movement at all since it was basic. Vivian had more difficulty with the incantation and trying to focus on the appearance of her dagger. What did she want on it? To be honest, she didn't even want it to have gems or rhinestones or a fancy handle. With a moment of pondering, the Slytherin finally had a design in mind. But before anything else, she kept on enunciating the incantation. "Fumus Lamina... Fumus Lamina... Fumus Lamina... FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah." Once she was contented, she decided to give it a try.

Focusing her mind, body, soul, and will on the appearance of her dagger inside the sheath, Vivian was ready. "Fumus Lamina..." she said, and created a circle that was following the path of the smoke nearby. Slowly, it began forming... and Vivian smiled a little. However, the supposed to be dagger looked more like a kitchen knife for cutting. Eh. "Reverto." She'd have to redo.

Giving it another try, and she was determined to finish this as soon as possible, Vivian focused hard again -- on the detail on the dagger, the metal it was made of, the shininess of the blade, and the sheath that came along with it. "Fumus Lamina...." A circle on the smoke, and Vivian still focused on getting the dagger she wanted as it began to form in front of her.

And there it was. Her dagger. It was a little bit longer than the one that Professor Stewart had passed, but what she liked about the one she made was that it was simple. It had no fancy handle nor intricate sheath; it only had Vivian's name and initials engraved on the blade, and that was what the blonde aimed for.

Ugh. UUUUUUUUUUUUGH.

Derf slouched down in his seat with the Extendable Ear and POUTED. There was an 'S' in the spell. Which meant he was doomed. With his eyes just barely peering over his robes which had now bunched up around his face from the slide, Derf watched his classmates perform the spell with varying levels of success.

He should...probably...try this then. Which meant practicing the incantation until he was blue in the face really.

"Fumus-s-s Lamina," he squeaked. "Fumus-s-sssss Lamina...Fumus-S-SSSssssSSSS Lamina...Fumus-s Lamina."

Er....at least the wand movement was simple enough?

Olly thought that was a pretty cool spell. It turned smoke into a dagger. Very cool. Not that he had ever used a dagger before or could forsee a time when he might need to use one in the future, so it wasn't the most useful of spells but it could be in case of emergency? Besides, it was just cool. That's what mattered, right?

The first step was making sure he could say the incantation right. Usually professors instructed them to try that first, as Professor Stewart was doing. Olly always did that anyway because he knew that if he was confident with his pronounciation it would make concentrating on the spell easier for him. So he tried this one. Fumus Lamina. He said it to himself a few times. It wasn't hard and he felt confident with it quickly enough. That meant it was time to actually try the spell. He stayed where he was and held his wand before the smoke in front of him. The wand movement was easy too. Just a circle over the smoke.

"Fumus Lamina." Olly made a circular motion with his wand and stared at the smoke. He focused in his mind, watching it come together into the desired shape of a dagger. That was actually pretty easy for him. It might have something to do with the fact that he was an artist and really good at picturing shapes and patterns that he wanted to create. He could see the smoke forming into the shape of a dagger and then it really was one. The dagger clattered to the ground and Olly quickly picked it up. It definitely looked cool. The sheath was made up of intricate swirls, and there was a matching pattern on the hilt. Olly grinned at what he had been able to make.

Fumus Lamina.

Noelle hoped that she would never have to use this spell, but it was another technique to defending yourself. Even if using it to scare someone away. She made notes of the pronunciation and wand movement and other essential information before deciding to practice.

"FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah" Noelle said, getting used to saying it. She said it a few times before she was comfortable with it. Then she did the circular wand movement. That was easy enough as well.

Looking at the smoke and concentration would be the hard part. Intent. For some reason, Hirsch's voice came into her mind. She could do this. Intent.

Pointing her wand, she started doing the circular motion while saying "FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah" She concentrated on the intent of the spell. To make the dagger. She pictured the smoke and the way it moved. She imagined it forming into a dagger. She didn't handle daggers well so she pictured what she knew.

A few chants and circles later, smoke had turned into a dagger. Merlin's Beard! She touched it and grinned. She'd done it! Of course... the dagger was probably the ugliest one in the world, but there it was! From SMOKE!

Changing smoke into daggers.

It would be curious to know just how that spell had been created. Probably a story about somebody being in danger and that someone needing some sort of protection out of nowhere. But one didn’t normally think of daggers when you saw smoke. At least it didn’t come right to mind for Cassie. Gas to solid…the smoke congealing into a dagger. Something innocent unless you breathe too much in to something that could cause harm. Cass took out her wand as directed and tried mimicking the wand movement as show by the woman with her own. The simple circle around the smoke seemed easy enough.

Fumus Lamina

She listened intently as Professor Stewart continued describing the spell and its requisite parts that they needed to learn in order to cast. The Ravenclaw copying the information on the board into her notes for further reference. Now the incantation…usually the trickier of the two given that miss-pronunciation could cause troublesome issues. “Fumus Lamina… FUH-mus LAWH-meen-ah… Fumus Lamina…FUH-moos LAWH-meen-ah.”

Now if she just put it all together.

"Fumus Lamina." Circle. "Fumus Lamina." Circle.

Oh oh oh they gonna be creating daggers out of thin air errr... smoke? Oi color him even moarrrr impressed!

But of course he gotta practice that spell. Where be his smokes eh eh? He squared his position around the fire pit and tried saying the incantation already "Fumus Lamina......Fumus Lamina." Intent. Intent. Wants to make pretty pretty dagger intent....

There was something happening with the smoke.... and then he stopped abruptly. Because something just occurred to him-- and in a room full of people with him doing magic this can spell disaster because Gryffindor. Up goes the hand "Professor, does this spell just create daggers with sheathes right away? Or like are they just gonna be created as static objects? Or is it ....is this something like the Bird Conjuring spell where one ends up shooting daggers instead of birds? "

Camilla couldn't be sure here but something told her that her reply might have confused the girl even more. However she was given a smile just then and thanked rather then asked anything else. "You're welcome. If you have any other questions just ask." As always questions were always welcome.



It was just about time to move on to the main activity! Oh, wait, someone had a questions first. Or rather a couple of questions. Professor Stewart walked over to speak with Tenacius rather than talk over all the other students working. "No, the sheathes do not just appear. If you don't visualize it, it will not appear. If you wanted just a dagger then that's what you would get." She paused a moment before continuing. "You will not be able to shoot daggers like the Bird Conjuring spell. The daggers are however true daggers, they will remain as such until the spell is canceled."




***************

Now it was time to continue on with the lesson. Hopefully the students would have a bit of fun as well. "Great work everyone! I've noticed some very nice handy work in detailing your daggers. If you have managed to make one I want you to keep a hold of it for now, if you haven't then you may keep trying." They would need to be able to make some type of dagger even if it's deformed or not fully functional.

With a few waves of her wand and muttered spells the seat Professor Stewart had been sitting on earlier and the small fire-pit were gone. In there place along the wall were two very large cardboard rectangles each with eight holes in them (just like the photo below). Beneath each colored circle is a box with random numbers in them (1-10). The boards are on a slight slant so that whatever goes through the holes will land inside a bin that's behind it.



A line was drawn on the floor of the room about twenty from the wall. Another line was then made several feet behind that one. "Alright I want everyone to form two lines. One person behind the other it doesn't matter which line you stand on just so you are more then arms width from the person on the line next to you." Professor Stewart waited for everyone to line up.

"When it is your turn you will step up to the first line... no one should pass that second line until it is there turn." She didn't want any accidents to happen. "You will then be able to throw or toss your sheathed dagger at the board. Just like you would if you were playing bean bag toss. The only thing with this is it's the dagger you made and you want to try to aim for your houses color... should the dagger end up going into a different colored hole...well then that house gets the points." Did that make sense? Hopefully. This was all about teaching them to focus, take aim and then follow through.

"Once you have taken your turn you move to one of the fire-pits and create another dagger before getting back in line. Every single dagger must be sheathed. If it is not try again."

"Oh, and mind you...the colors do change as do how much each one if worth." Otherwise where would the fun be?


OOC: Alright it's time for the main activity! The students are basically playing beanbag toss but with sheathed daggers! You can have them miss completely, get it in a different houses circle, you can have the color change on them. The points are 1-10 so you decide.
Please label your post with the color house if they get it in and the points!
You have roughly 60 hours to get at least three posts for this part. You may make a dagger and try the game in the same post.
If anything is unclear please let me know and I'll do my best to explain!

Blink, blink. Was Professor Stewart OUT OF HER MIND!??! She was teaching teenagers how to create daggers out of smoke?! For protection and self-defense that could have been more easily accomplished with a wand? Okay, well, unless your name was Kitty Valentine, who probably would have preferred the muggle way of defense and protection. But Skylar was not going to think about that. Props to Felicity and Vivian for asking some very important questions; like why use smoke? Or what was wrong with the wand? The answers though, were not very motivating.

Like to use smoke because it would be more difficult and challenging? But what about the first years? Who weren't as experienced with transfiguration and wand things? Surely the Professor could have offered stones for them to practice on as it would have been easier and the older students have to try with something more difficult. Also, if she couldn't get a clear cast with her wand, how was she meant to get a clear cast to create a dagger??? Or was she supposed to create the dagger beforehand? And if she was, well, again, how would she know she was going to need it? How long would the transfiguration last on the dagger? These were important questions, to which were bugging Sky, except the Professor was introducing the activity and she still hadn't even created her dagger yet.

Wait. Wait. If she thought creating daggers was bad, now they were THROWING THEM?!? Sure they were sheathed and it was at a board, but what if the sheath came off mid-throw? And the throw went awry? The fourth year was fairly certain this was irresponsible of the Professor, as she wasn't that sure about some of classmate's throwing abilities. Or her own for that matter. She was a beater slash seeker; chasers threw things in small holes, not required by beaters or seekers.

But enough thoughts about that. She had to create her dagger. Focusing, she said the incantation a few times, "Fumus Lamina. Fumus Lamina. Fumus Lamina" practicing the circular wand movement about the smoke in front of her... also, did Vivian just engrave her name on one? "Wow. Wicked." Sky said in awe of her friend.

Once comfortable with the wand motion and incantation, she focused on the intent. Forming a simplistic dagger in her mind, with the sheath... and just for safety measures, she also imagined the dagger to be plastic, because why not? "Fumus Lamina!" she said again, encircling her wand around the smoke. Opening her eyes fully, she smiled ... no engraved dagger, but she did have a plastic dagger. Sheathed.

Now time to throw and it seemed she was first up to throw. Great. Deep breath, she could do this. Focusing on one of the green holes, she extended back her hand and then threw. Except the lightness of the plastic dagger, it fell just shy of the board ... as it arched downward and landed in front of the board. Oops.

Guess it was back to the drawing board to make another dagger and try again. See, this is why she wasn't a chaser.