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[Jerara Tapsell]

Jerara had been in Italy a good six months, his Italian was conversational, his latin fairly good and his knowledge of alchemy growing by the day. It had been a completely different pace of life, a completely different pace of work. He had enjoyed it from the very beginning and though at times it was challenging it was too good to pass up. He’d done a bit of travelling around Europe, gone to places he’d always heard about. He got days off here and there, but the full on nature of it so far meant his travelling was reserved to two days at best. But, he’d timed the trip for Ellie perfectly. His teacher was off gathering some rare thing that he didn’t want Jerara doing just yet and so he had a few days to relax, mind the alchemy shop and just enjoy himself. It helped it was the height of summer and the streets were overflowing. Both magical and muggle. ​

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Rome was simply dripping with magic, old buildings filled with old magic and old practices. Having come from Australia and then New Zealand, this was a place miles away from what he’d been raised with and not a bad thing either. Ellie had arrived the night before, he’d suggested it for the timezones, just to be sure she could sleep and then be refreshed for the day. He had left a note to say he was in the shop and she should just come down when she was up. It wasn’t a busy store, it was slightly off the beaten path, but had a number of potions and trinkets all around. It was an airy place, with a large vaulted ceiling but it was not a busy place. He wasn’t sure where they stood yet, perhaps they were now friends, but he thought it would be nice to experience Rome together. ​

 

[Eleanor Hope]

Eleanor hadn't seen much of Italy yet, but from what she had seen, she had to admit that she was rather impressed. There was some anxiety in travelling by herself however. She wasn't used to being alone, and if she didn't have someone with her, she had her plants, and that was enough to give her some company. Luckily, Eleanor had her belladonna plant with her, mostly because she was too scared about leaving it on its own. It was only young, had only just started to sprout, and the last thing Eleanor wanted was to come back from Italy and discover that it was root-bound because it hadn't been trimmed enough during the most vital stages of its life. She kept it on the bedside table next to her, its shears sitting right beside it. When she woke up that morning she made sure to trim it carefully, moving it from the bedside table to the window sill where it would hopefully feel the most comfortable whilst she was gone.

Eleanor made her way down to the busy streets of Italy as quickly as she could, and smiled at the different buildings around her, some of which sold some things inside that she had never even heard of. She definitely wasn't in New Zealand anymore, and as much as Eleanor wanted to explore, and hopefully find a store that sold things to do with plants, she had to find Jerara. She was very thankful that Jerara made some time for her even when he was busy with his future, and she didn't want to keep him waiting. She entered the alchemy shop and beamed as she found him almost instantly. The shop wasn't as busy as she thought it would be, and she hoped that this meant Jerara would then be able to spend more time with her. "Hey Jerara!" she exclaimed, making her way over to him. "Is this the shop you're working at? It looks so cool. What sort of things do you sell?" She looked around a little bit, knowing that it all had something to do with alchemy but not knowing enough about it to know exactly what everything was.

 

[Jerara Tapsell]

Jerara smiled at Ellie as she walked into the store, it was odd to see her hear, in this life here. He’d invited her into it, but after six months of it being so apart form his old life, it felt odd. He gave her a smile though, he was sure that there were plenty of things in this shop that she might find interesting. Plenty of things for her to enjoy. ”Potions, alchemy trinkets, the odd ingredient. It’s a bit of everything,” he said, ”But my teacher who runs the place isn’t very good at actually running it. His books were pretty awful,” he didn’t mention they were old, that though he knew his teacher hadn’t owned and run it for more than probably forty years, it had been in different families for a while. All of them alchemist, all of them people who passed down that knowledge. ”We have a few people in every so often asking if we have a philosophers stone. Which you know if we had one we’d be selling,” he laughed, but he began putting things away. ”Do you want a coffee? I’m just gonna close up shop and then we can head out?” he said, ”No way I’d make you stick around in this shop all day,” He pulled out a muggle guidebook and pushed it towards Ellie, ”Thought we could go classic tourist for the day?”​

 

[Eleanor Hope]

Eleanor had never really been into potion making, but was more into providing the plant ingredients. She wondered if Jerara knew much about making potion ingredients himself, but thought he might considering he was working in a shop that sold them. The woman frowned when Jerara said the guy who runs the place was awful. It was a shame really to be owning a shop that you didn't know too much about, and Ellie was sure the place was running better when Jerara was there. After all, Jerara was one of the most intelligent people she knew and she had definitely learnt a lot from him.

As Jerara mentioned the Philosopher's Stone, Ellie beamed, having never seen one in her life before. It made sense that a lot of people would be asking about it as it was such a rare object. "Oh yes, coffee sounds lovely!" Ellie exclaimed in response to Jerara. She wondered if perhaps coffee in Italy tasted different, although she also thought that the possibility of this was low. As Jerara gave her a muggle guidebook she opened it excitedly, looking down the list of all of the possible places that they could go. "There's so much to do! Where do we start? There's the leaning tower of Pisa, Pompeii, the Colosseum! Are we able to do all of this in one day?" Eleanor was amazed at all of the activity options. "Do you think there are any shops around here though that sell any cool plants? Like rare ones?" Ellie thought that perhaps there would be. After all, it seemed like the most likely place.

 

[Jerara Tapsell]

Jerara was vaguely closing up the shop, he carelessly with some wandless magic got the coffee machine going and soon the room was filled with the smell of two brewing coffees. He looked back at Ellie and smiled a little, with apparition all those things were possible, definitely possible. ”Well, the colosseum isn’t too far, we can start with that, then apparate to Pisa to see the tower and then again to Pompeii. Then we can come back to Rome and visit Vatican City, it’s a whole country within a country, it’s quite wild,” he had always known about it, known about muggle religion being raised in a muggle place, but it was definitely still both cool and funny to him with the fact that there was a whole other country just within Rome. The coffee machine beeped that it was ready and he walked over and brought her a coffee and then the other for him. ”There probably are. I know a few herbologists, we can go check out some shops for some stuff too,” he said, he was rather good at finding things. It was something he was doing for his teacher and he was good at it. He just had a knack for finding things. ”Anything in particular or just wanting to see?” he asked. He took a little sip of his coffee as he waited to know what sort of places he might take her to to find it. ​

 

[Eleanor Hope]

Eleanor watched as Jerara began locking up the shop and making a coffee for them both. She couldn't believe that Jerara was willing to do all of this with her in one day and hopefully he would help her learn more about Italy as they went. "Vatican City? It's an actual place?" she said, having heard of the name before. It sounded like something from a book, but Eleanor really knew nothing about it. She thanked Jerara as he gave her the coffee, taking a couple of sips as he told her that there probably were a couple of shops around that sold plants. She found it very interesting that he even knew a couple of Herbologists that were around. Eleanor didn't have any Herbology friends that she spoke to, and so it was exciting to her that she might be able to meet some. "How did you make friends with the Herbologists? Does it tie in with Alchemy somehow?" Eleanor asked, wanting to know more. She hoped she would be able to buy a souvenir or something in one of their shops. "I don't mind where we go at all." she said, answering his question. "I've never been to Italy, and by the looks of it there's so much to see, and I want to see everything!" She beamed, taking a few more sips of the coffee.

 

[Jerara Tapsell]

Jerara looked at Ellie as she spoke, he wasn’t sure if she was joking or genuinely didn’t know. He couldn’t remember now if Ellie had been raised by magical people or by muggles. Though he was pretty sure from that it was the former. ”Yeah, it’s an actual place, within Rome,” he told her. ”We’ll go, there’s some pretty amazing muggle art,” the man said. He finished his coffee and nodded, ”Alchemy is like potions at times, slightly more specific, but that means ingredients, so herbologists,” he told her, he didn’t give any more information on it, they wouldn’t be going to some places, but the less he said the easier for him. He smiled, ”This is technically my first time in Italy too, well...when I first got here it was, it’s a different place from Australia or New Zealand, it’s just….I know magic will have always existed in some form in New Zealand and Australia, but it’s different here,” he had never really experienced the magical areas of Australia, but perhaps it was time to. Once he got back from all of this. ”With apparition we’ll get to things way quicker. I’ve used apparition a lot, I’ve gone to different places in Italy and Europe with it, since I’m in the area. I know I could’ve before but it’s easier when you’re like actually here,”​

 

[Eleanor Hope]

Eleanor knew that perhaps she had to travel more. She knew absolutely nothing about anything and instantly regretted not doing her research before coming. She wasn't really ever one to do research however and found more fun in taking things as they came. As Jerara mentioned the art, Eleanor thought that perhaps she should take Lilyanna there one day after she explored it all herself. Lilyanna hadn't done too much art lately, and so perhaps seeing the muggle art would give her some more inspiration. Eleanor nodded as Jerara explained to her the link between Herbology and Alchemy, and it definitely made sense. She listened as he then spoke about how the magic in Italy was different, nodding at his words as she took more sips of her coffee. "I feel like magic would be different everywhere! Not every country is up to date with each other, some still have more to learn, and everyone has their own way of doing things." Eleanor said, adding on to what Jerara was saying. She agreed with him that apparition would be much easier and was looking forward to apparating with him around Italy.

 

[Jerara Tapsell]

Jerara nodded in agreement with Ellie, he knew she would agree with that, ”Exactly,” he said, he had always been curious and perhaps it was not the best thing a lot, it let him down some paths that he knew others wouldn’t be so keen on. But Jerara didn’t mind it. He liked learning, he wanted to learn more and more. After all he didn’t have that background knowledge that people who’d always existed in this world did. He didn’t have the book collection that he had seen some wizards with, though he intended to start one. He had really, his apartment with Tristan in New Zealand had been filled with books and this one too was filled with different books. He had picked up italian and latin and while they weren’t perfect were certainly still helping him as he was trying to improve his knowledge and his books. ”I do intend to go back to New Zealand after this year, but I think I’ll have to keep travelling and learning about different magic’s,” he admitted, ”There’s just so much out there that I want to find out about,” he wasn’t sure how that could factor in with Ellie, he would invite her if she wanted to but he didn’t really want to presume. ”I’m going to have a bottomless box filled with books by the end of all the travelling, but it’ll be worth it,” he always thought learning was worth it. ​