After a decent run yeah

Moving at the speed Alister set was oddly exhilarating, the fact you were followed by a large pack of others might have added something a little extra. You glanced up every now and then at the pictures, after all the causal magic you’d seen, honestly you expected the pictures to move or something. But no just kinda paintings.

The pace Alister set began to slow until it stopped. You heard at least one person breathing kinda heavily, though with the activity some of them were getting into just before there is probably another reason aside from the running.

“Ok so the ceremony will tell you how much magic you’ll be working with, don’t freak out it’s just a first test, after a few month training it will go up but it will give you and everyone else a good idea of what you’re working with.” Alister opened the door with a grin. “Size isn’t everything thing pups.” It get a round of laughter from everyone, more nervous than anything else.

Everyone starts walking inside, except you, you figure now’s a good time to ask Alister about your pin. “Hey Alister.”

“What up pup? Worried you won’t measure up.” He grins at you.

“Actually its about this.” You hold out your hand and show him your pin.

“Well that’s… new.” He takes it from you and turns it this way and that before shrugging. “It’s probably just a reaction to your magic, I’ll see about getting you a new one, don’t want you locked out of your room hey.” He grins again before handing your pin back. “Hold onto it for now, there’s a whole thing about keeping you pin on you at all times. Better hurry up or you’ll miss the measuring.” You’ve a feeling he really like innuendo.

Entering the main hall you are stunned by the size of the thing. The ceiling is so high there is only a faint glimmer of wooden supports visible from which huge chandeliers hang making a decently size blaze from the amount of candles on them. The walls are lined with tapestries depicting what you assume are great magic users or important events. You know none of them but get the feeling there are tests in your future.

Looking more at ground level you see four long tables with chair lining each sides. On the edge of each are the house animals, Cerberus on the left, Phoenix next to it, then Wyvern, and on the right Pegasus.

Each table had students sitting close to the end of the main hall, a few students were still milling about but where you were was very empty. You noted you’re the last student to enter and as the doors bang closed behind you people look up to see you. You seem to be in the habit of make a sense today.

Your fellow Cerberus house members wave you over as a group. It was nice to see that even though you haven’t gotten a bunkmate everyone seems willing to accept you.

You approach and hear the chattering of your fellow students grow in volume. It doesn’t surprise you all that much when you see amber eyes grinning at you and patting an empty seat. You should really try and remember her name.

“Aye good smellin’ boy.” You hadn’t really heard it but there was a definite Scottish accent there.

“Um hey.” You answer, a little weirded out when she starts sniffing. “Could you please stop.”

She looks surprised by your saying that before relaxing. “Sorry I didnae ken how to act round…” You can see her leaning closer and you lean back. “Sorry.” She leans back and honestly she has mastered the kicked puppy look.

“It’s ok, never met a werewolf before.” You answer forcing a chuckle.

She smiles at you and leans in for another sniff. You still feel weird but let her. “Mmmmm, good smell.” She hums before pulling away and looking at you. Those amber eyes are awful big and the part of little red riding hood where she talks to the wolf dressed up as grandma suddenly pops into you head.

“Students!” The booming voice make both you and her jump slightly. You both turn to see an ancient looking man standing at the head of the room before an older looking lectern. He is dressed in what can only be call the most excellent of robes. Long, deep blue and wait why is it green. The entire robe just shifted colours. Which would be cool if the hat wasn’t taking up a lot of your attention. It was massive and seemed to be designed with fake drawers in the top.

“Welcome to Ash Forest Academy of Magic. I am the headmaster Frederick Hallgrave. Here you will learn all the skills needed to go out there and get a job.” The last part kinda took some of the majesty out of the whole thing. “You’ll learn accounting, how to file forms in triplicate, and how to properly write up a request for magical activities.”

Wow suddenly the whole magic thing seemed kinda like work. It seemed everyone else thought so too as there was a definite lack of lustier spreading around the room.

“Also how to do this.” The man behind the lecture spread his hand wide and suddenly a fireball erupted out and rolled over the students.

You swear you feel your hair singe as it passes over you. Once it reached the end of the hall it floods over like a wave and shifts its shape. Suddenly instead of a wave of fire it’s a dragon, large enough that it’s head is almost touching the ceiling. And then it lands. Massive claws stretch along the length of your table and being near the end it is uncomfortably close.

Your eyes follow the claw up the dragons arm and to it’s chest, made of fire or not there are very obvious scales etched in fire. You keep following it up until you see it’s head. It’s head that is now very much below the chandeliers and getting way to close.

Your eye find one of the dragons flaming one and feel as if the thing made of fire that is absolutely not alive and is just a display of awesome, it looking directly at you. As the neck cranes lower it becomes really hard to not believe it is looking at you.

When the head is only a few metres from you it breaths out. The air is incredibly hot and sweat beads on your forehead. And as soon as it was created it vanished, there was not even a hint of burned wood on the table that the dragon had been standing.

You looked at amber eyes and saw her giving you a confused look. Right she probably see that every other day. You look up at the headmaster and see his head turn away from you.

Suddenly there a round of applause from the students. The headmaster bows and you can see him holding back holding back laughter.

“Now you will be called up one at a time to begin your test. I myself am at 97. But I am sure many of you will be impressed with the power you actually have.” You can’t help but feel like he was looking at you when he said that, but he seems very good at public speaking so every student would likely feel the same as him. He waved his hand and a clear ball on a stand appeared draped in purple finery.

He started calling up students one at a time. Each walk up put their hands on the ball and the headmaster called out their number. It seemed kinda mean to call out peoples numbers to everyone but Alister did say that number can go up.

As more students got their numbers you got an average ranging from 45 to 60. There were a few outliers mostly on the high end, a few were very low and the people who got them looked sullen, then the headmaster whispered in their ear and they brightened up.

One interesting case was a Brunette from Pegasus. She scored a 93 and left her whole house cheering.

Finally it was your turn and you walked up feeling you hands shake. As far as you knew no one in your family had any magical power. You had a feeling those people with very low scores were soon to feel better about themselves.

The headmaster looked you up and down. “Would you show me your pin?” He held out his hand. You hadn’t attached the pin to your clothing still feeling weird about having a failure attached to yourself. “Haven’t seen an Amarok before.” He hands back your pin as if there was nothing strange about what just happened.

“W-what?” You try to get out keenly aware of the fact the entire second year was staring at you.

“Come on can’t keep everyone waiting.” He pats the ball making it glow each time.

You walk over and shyly reach out. Your finger touches the ball and there is a feeling. Like a pull, your hand keeps moving to cover the ball but the pull doesn’t stop once your palm is firmly pressed against it. The ball isn’t glowing as brightly as it did for the vast majority of other students. The pull is still there and you don’t know what to do about it.

You wished someone told you something about this. Do you give in to the pull, do you resist, is the pull not supposed to happen and you broke the thing?