SMILE » n. longbottom

ii

"ARITHMANCY"

Alana stayed up writing the copy of her Arithmancy notes for the clumsy Gryffindor boy that she had just officially met a day ago. Despite the announcement of the Triwizard Tournament, schooling lessons at Hogwarts still continued. Arithmancy is an advanced subject at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry that studies the magical properties of numbers, including predicting the future with numbers and numerology. The Hufflepuff and the Gryffindor had Arithmancy, and the Gryffindor struggled terribly in the class. Alana Wallace carries along a Muggle "oxygen tank," she is connected more to it than it is connected to her. Every six seconds it enters oxygen to her lungs, it works 24/7 — when she sleeps, when she's commuting from one class to another, Alana relies on the Muggle health device; it's as if she's been given a third lung.

It's just a matter of time before this "third lung" becomes erupt as well.

Alana currently walks the halls of Hogwarts to her first class of the day: Arithmancy, with her oxygen tank rolling beside her. Once she's there, she sits nearby the window of the classroom. Alana has noticed that Neville is in the front of the classroom, so she pulls out the copy of her notes, and walks up to the desk that he is sitting at. He is reading a book about the Tri-Wizard Tournament, so Alana places the piece of parchment on top of his book. "Hello Neville, there's your copy."

"Oh. Thank you, Alana." Neville smiles. She nodded in response and continued to walked back toward her own desk until hears a voice call out from behind her, "Um — Alana?"

"What is it Neville?" she turned around to see him, turned around in his seat.

"Are you good at Arithmancy?" Neville closes his book, and holds the parchment of notes that she has given her.

Alana Wallace might not be under the category and not the stereotype of a  Ravenclaw, but she knows some things about certain subjects. "Actually, yes."

"Could you help me with numerology?" the boy asked. He looked awfully uncomfortable, and compared to others: sick.

"Sure," Alana spoke. Just because she was diagnosed with a disease, that did not mean she could abandon her Hufflepuff traits. She still could be helpful and encouraging, but she didn't have to smile. As their conversation ended immediately, Alana finally walked back to her seat, and pulled out a book entitled "Arithmancy Notes" from her backpack, and aswell as a quill and ink. Her birthday was a month ago — just four weeks after her third school year at Hogwarts had ended, and just a week before she was to be diagnosed with Pneumonia. Her parents had bought her golden-yellow winter robes and scarfs for her Hufflepuff attire.

"Arithmancy begins...," a voice called from the back of the room, it was Professor Septima Vector. Just as the students in the class heard her voice, they rushed to their seats. As the professor reached the front of the classroom, she erased the chalkboard, which was covered in chalk, "...with numbers to predict the future." Professor Septima Vector is an Arithmancer that attended Hogwarts long ago, and is rumored to have excelled in Advanced Arithmancy Studies. "Now, I don't expect any of you to enter my advanced classes, but you must pass this class for every exam — or your homework doesn't count for credit," Professor Vector held out her wand toward the chalkboard. "Is that clear?"

"Yes, Professor Vector," the students of the Arithmancy class echoed.

"Good, now lets begin," she wrote down a complicated equation that ended in "=fate". "Open your book to page 127, lesson 7: Fatigue, Opposite of Succession." The class finished at page 150, and their brains were literally fried. Two classes had passed, and there was a free-time in which students could roam the castle, or enter their name in the Goblet of Fire if they qualify. Most students gathered around the Goblet of Fire and studied, or walked out in the Main Hall amongst the students of Beauxbatons and, or the students of Durmstrang.