The Fool, Upright - Teddy Lupin/Victorie Weasley

Chapter 14: Detention

Before giving Victorie a chance to worry, she received correspondence from Ciaran at breakfast the next morning in the form of an owl-delivered envelope landing on Maya's breakfast crumpet.

"It's addressed to you." She muttered and returned to her sullied crumpet in possession of one less letter.

Victorie was still holding it in her hand when she entered her first class of the day. Transfiguration. She studied the jet-black inked-in letters on the eggshell white paper. She re-read them on her way to her seat...

Would you care to accompany me on a walk across the grounds at 6 p.m. on Friday?

Making her way to her seat that day included bumping into five or so different objects, but she didn't mind. She sat down and before she knew it a deck of cards were shoved in her face.

"Pick a card, any card." He said. The voice belonged to Ethan and he was rotating the deck dramatically in front of her.

At a loss for what to say, she stayed silent and settled on putting the letter in her pocket with one hand, and sliding a card out of Ethan's deck at random with the other. When she looked at her card she was faced with none other than the Death Tarot of all things.

"Why are you using tarots?" She blurted. "I thought this was a magic trick."

Ethan sat down on the seat next to her. "No! I would need my wand for that." He said. "I was trying to do a tarot reading on you, isn't that how you do it?"

"Not exactly." She replied.

He took the Death Tarot back and began reshuffling his deck. "Jamie tells me you're good at this stuff, perhaps you could teach me?"

Victorie smiled to herself. "Did he?" She looked around at the other students who she had ignored up until then, but her mouth fell open in a pleasant surprise at what she saw. A few rows up from where she was sat, she saw Jamie sitting next to none other than Teddy. The two were chatting like normal, waiting for the lesson to start. Her smile broadened at the sight.

Ethan 'The Magician' was still waiting for a reply. Victorie faced him and pursed her lips in thought.

"Let me see that." She asked and took the deck. With one smooth motion she tapped the deck against the table to unite the cards. She placed her hand on top of it and closed her eyes, mumbling something inaudible.

"What are you doing?" He asked with slight unease.

But Victorie shushed him and handed back the deck with a smile. "Let's see you shuffle." She suggested in her most pedagogical cadence of speech.

He pulled his Hogwarts robe up on his shoulders and rubbed his hands together before accepting the deck back.

After pausing for a second, like he was waiting for some air horn to go off, he began clumsily flailing the cards in between his hands. But Victorie wasn't about to make remarks about his form. Instead she waited with anticipation for what was about to happen.

As Ethan kept fumbling with the cards, they began multiplying in his hand. The boy looked on in puzzlement for a second, but before he could properly react the cards took off into the air, spraying his face and a moderately large section of the classroom.

At that precise moment, Professor McGonagall decided to enter the classroom and Victorie snorted loudly and smacked her hand against her mouth to stop any additional noises from escaping.

McGonagall's eyes immediately targeted Ethan. She marched up to him and Victorie through a cloud of cards still sailing in the air and stopped.

"Ten points from Ravenclaw." She spat and slammed her hand on their desk, then turned toward a cowering Victorie. "...and Gryffindor."