Open practice makes perfect

[Willow Cullen]

it was almost exam period. everywhere willow went in the school there were students settled down pouring over books with titles magical fungi of europe or goblin rebellions of the 1700's. being a seventh year willow was one of the few students who didnt have exams imminent. of course this was only a small relief as next semeste she woul be sittingthe hardest exams that the school offered the NEWTS. and she was doing some of the hardest most technical courses that there were. today she wanted a greak from sitting around. or reading. she had already been for a run. and the quidditch pitch was in use by a group of first years practicing for their exams so she made her way to the dungens and the duelling chamber. she didnt really have any plans. on what she wanted to do. it was more that she just needed to do something.
she set up the dummy in the corner to practice duel and set the difficulty to as hard as it would go. she needed to practice. she had her sights set on being the duelling champion this year. she needed something to come out of school with. and while she didnt mind that she wasn't quidditch captain, Jacob was good in that role. he had been on the team longer than her. and gave her a lot of free reign with her role. she was still a bit annoyed that analei had taken her chance of being headgirl and taken some of the prestige of leading the SDA from her. there was no way she was losing to her, or anyone else, again this year.
she set the music player up with a really old muggle song that always seemed to get her pumped and started firing whatever spell she could think of to the dummy. a mixture of verbal and non verbal and shields. sparks flying across the room both ways as the dummy matched her and gave as good as it got.

 

[Beckett Harrington]

Beckett decided to check the duelling chamber since he figured that it was where the members of the Students Defense Association got together. He entered the chamber to see the president of the club fighting some dummies. "Hey" he said hoping that she would listen to him in the middle of all those explosions and sparks flying "Willow, right?" he asked but pretty sure that that was the girl's name.
Beckett wished he could fight like that but he didn't even had charms yet. He did remember Willow telling him that he could learn some spells as a member of the SDA club so maybe she was willing to teach him something "Dare I ask what those dummies did for you to be so agressive towards them?" he said chuckling a bit.
It wasn't like him to socialise like this, or be so friendly, but he did signed up for a club to meet more people and work on his social skills, besides the SDA club seemed the club where he could learn the most on spells.

 

[Willow Cullen]

Willow wasnt expecting anyone to enter the chamber. "Protago Totalum" she said casting a wide shield to protect the poor boy from being hit by a bat bogies curse that was ricocheting around the room. "Be careful mate. you never know what spells are flying around in the practice chambers" she said. trying to make her way to the dummy to turn it off. getting hit by a disarming spell in the process but even then she managed to at least support a shield using wand free magic like she had tried in class. she actually felt a little smug about that. "Yes i'm Willow. and you are bennet, not that's not right" she said trying to remember his name as she switched off the dummy. it was close but not quite right. "It hasn't done anything. but I figured it was better he took the brunt of my venting rather than other students" she said. chuckling. "what brings you down here today?" she asked.

 

[Beckett Harrington]

Beckett stood froze for a moment while she casted a protection spell on him, he wasn't expected to be attacked as soon as he stepped into the chamber "I will keep that in mind." he said, still with a frozen expression from the scare.
"Beckett" he corrected her, on the bright side she remembered his name vaguely which was better than any other interaction he had, since no one seemed to know his name with almost a full semester of school. It wouldn't take long for them to know him, he'd be the brightest wizard in the school, he thought to himself.
He had to agree with Willow, sometimes as much as we feel like hurting someone we gotta be rational and think of other ways to focus that anger to "Well, you promised me spells when I signed up, so I came to claim them" he said with a smile "Wondering if you could teach me some of the advanced spells? I have some in mind if you want anything more specific, don't worry, I triple checked and it is they are acceptable for first years." he said hoping to tranquilize the other girl and to hopefully persuade her to teach him something "See the bright side of it, you can keep unleashing your anger. But this time you will have company." he added with his slight british accent.

 

[Willow Cullen]

willow was slightly glad that the spellls has shaken the boy a bit. it wouldnt do to have him walk in on someone who maybe not as on the ball as her and be hit by a stray spell. "Sorry Beckett" she said repeating his name.
when he asked if she could teach him some spells she couldn't see a problem with it. well the problem was that she couldnt remember what spells he would know. "what spells do you know already?" she asked. it would be sily to try and teach him something he already knew. "and which spells was it that you wanted to learn?" she added. maybe they would be the ones to start with. she was trying to think what were first year spells. it was so long ago for her.

 

[Beckett Harrington]

Beckett felt a bit embarrassed about telling the girl that he had learnt anything because he didn't have Charms or Defense Against the Dark Arts last semester. "Well, technically I didn't learnt anything, because I didn't have Charms this semester, but I've read the textbooks so I know what we are learning in class so we can skip those" he said as he didn't really wanted the girl to teach him Lumos. He did not had come all this way to the dungeons to learn Lumos.
The Ravenclaw boy, knew exactly what he wanted to learn. Some more complex spells that the textbooks referred to and as a first year he could learn but that he was sure the professors wouldn't teach them that. "I was thinking about Locomotor Mortis, the Trip Jinx, Petrificus Totalus and Everte Statum" he said fully aware that some of them were pretty complex and that he hadn't taken Charms yet but he was also very confident that his potential was more than enough to ace those spells.

 

[Willow Cullen]

Willow nodded when he said that he hadn't learned anything yet. fresh blood. she thought to herself. [b"just because you will be learning something in class next semester doesn't mean that you cant learn it now.[/b] she said thinking of a plan on the fly. the spells he suggested were interesting ones. some useful for duelling. some fun for pranks. but in the long run, they were not the most beneficial spells ever.
"before you learn any offensive magic you need to be able to protect yourself." she said, before silently and wandlessly casting the stunning spell at the dummy a jet of red light hitting it square in. the chest causing it to let out a hoot like a coo-coo clock. she was secretly glad that it worked. soundless wandless magic was something she was still working on, and she only got it to work 75% of the time. "When you came into the room a trip jinx would have done bugger all to help you from all the spells flying around" she said wondering how he was going to take this she knew it was one of the spells on the spell list for first years. but it was important, in any kind of conflict it was more important to protect yourself than to overpower the opponent. especially if they were older or more experienced "Protago is one of the most useful spells in any witch or wizards repertoire. how about if i teach you that, and if you can cast it three times I will teach you one of the ones you want" she said. "do we have a deal?" she asked. she hoped that it was fair.

 

[Beckett Harrington]

Beckett had to admit that Willow was right, he knew that it was probably one of the spells he would be learning in class but he was not against learning the spell "Maybe when I get to class I can practice the variations of the Protego spell" he said, not sure why he exteriorised that thought.
He couldn't help but being impressed by the non-verbal magic casted by girl, especially when she didn't use a wand too. That was the kind of advanced Beckett would like to be even he knew that non-verbal magic for a first year, even for him, was kind of a stretch.
"We have ourselves a deal. I presume that being trained by one of the SDA presidents will make me an expert in offensive and defensive magic? I bet that with my skills and your training I can win the tournament next year" he told Willow, kind of suggesting a pact between them but not quite sure if she would accept as she was probably very busy being a sixth year and everything "So when do we start?" he added eagerly.

 

[Willow Cullen]

Willow chuclled as the boy seemed so keen on the idea that he would practice variations of the spell. the variation that she had cast was one that she had only learned last year in class. "Slow down lets get the basic covered first" she said. she felt flattered by his comment about her being an expert. "I wouldnt go that far. I am far from being an expert.myself" she said thinking of the years of training she had ahead once she joined the auror department.
when asked when they started she pulled out her wand. "I was under the impression you wanted to learn something this afternoon" she said. "the incantaiton of the shield charm is Protego. and the wand action is an easy slashing" she said demonstraiting with her own wand. "are you ready to give it a go?" she asked as there was nothing else she could htink of explaiing.

 

[Beckett Harrington]

Beckett took his wand out of his back pocket. "Ready as I'll ever be" he said shaking his shoulders trying to get the slight nerves he was starting to get out of him. He was mostly afraid of the spell that Willow woupd use to test his Protego, the last thing he needed was to be put unconscious because a defense spell went wrong.
"Protego!" he said slashing his wand like the girl had showed him to "Cast something to test it." he incentivated Willow. As much as he was scared he couldn't allow fear to be in way of learning a new spell, besides, his transfigurations were all very successful so he guess that his magic potential must be high, meaning the chances of the Protego spell being casted right on his first try were fairly high.