welcome to chimera!

[Janus Thickey]

Janus slipped his own wand from his pocket, although he wasn't entirely sure about what he was planning on doing with it. That Vicky could cast even a wispy Patronus from a whispered charm was impressive; even though there was a troll nearby, Janus had his priorities, and among them was the recognition of people who were good at things. First, though, was staying alive - not, of course, that he felt particularly in danger at the moment. The troll seemed interested in the Patronus until, right when Janus allowed himself to exhale a breath he hadn't realised he was holding.

Then something happened - or he thought that something happened, because suddenly the troll stopped and turned towards them. Again he reached out and grabbed Vicky's arm, fingers closing around her wrist without really thinking about it. "Don't move," he whispered sharply, although he himself turned and, with a tap of his wand over her head, cast a nonverbal Disillusionment Charm over her before casting the same spell on himself, hoping that at least a vestige of invisibility might keep the troll from noticing them. The feeling of water trickling down the back of his neck had never been exactly pleasant, but it was certainly better than being seen and attacked by a bloody troll, so he stood there silently, hand still around Vicky's wrist, although he'd have to release her if he wanted to make a break for it, the way he was standing.

[Victoria Summers]

She might've thanked him, but being quiet seemed the best thing to be at the moment. Reckless, yes. Death wish? No. And despite herself she was pleased to have the comfort of another body beside her. The troll, thankfully, was not the brightest creature and the Thestrals didn't warm to it getting too close. Without having to interfere at all, it was in fact the skeletal horses that frightened the forest creature off by repeatedly rearing, charging the fence and snapping at it; they had quite impressive fangs.

After a bit of a struggle with what would look like thin air to Janus, the troll, out numbered, retreated into the forest. Vicky let out an audible sigh then and scratched at the back of her neck, where the icky feeling of the charm still lingered. "Quick casting,' she commended - certainly a lot smoother than she would've been able to do. Vicky had always found she was best at spells that relied on strength of emotion.

[Janus Thickey]

He watched, wide-eyed, as the troll retreated into the forest; his expression was certainly a far cry from the disdainful aloofness that usually characterised Janus's face, although he didn't for a moment feel embarrassed about it in the slightest. "Thanks," he said, unable to take his eyes off the troll. They hadn't really been in real, legitimate danger, since he was certain the pair of them could've outrun a troll that (probably) couldn't even see them, but it was certainly more exciting than theory in class.

And practical application was what Janus loved best about Hogwarts. It really was a pity that there wasn't more of it.

As the troll crashed off into the forest, he realised that he still had his hand tightly on her wrist and let go, flexing his fingers to work feeling back into them. "Sorry about that," he added, brushing his hands together. "Good work with the Patronus, there, that's an impressive charm."

[Victoria Summers]

Having not even noticed that he was still holding her wrist until he let go of it, she only shrugged and rubbed it with her other hand. It was dark, looking at him was weird and wobbly because the charm was still in place and she found only after she could no longer hear the troll could she take a perfectly at-ease breath. That had been exhilarating, to say the least. Rolling her shoulders and looking back to the castle and finding, despite everything, she didn't want to go back, she waved a hand in front of her face. "How long do these things last again?"

At the compliment to her patronus, however, she frowned. "It wasn't supposed to be a shapeless blob. And it should've lasted longer."

[Janus Thickey]

"You cast it in a whisper, though," he said sticking his hand into his pocket, giving his wand a lazy twirl with the other. "A shapeless blob that catches a troll's attention is a still a useful shapeless blob." He frowned for a moment, trying to reconcile her two statements, until it suddenly dawned on him what she was talking about when he looked at her and saw a girl-shaped shimmer in the dark. Oh, right. The Dillusionment Charms were still on them. "I can take these off, hold up a moment."

Janus reached over and tapped his wand on her head again, easily saying the counter-incantation. It had always struck him as funny that casting a Disillusionment Charm was nonverbal, but that removing it required a verbal component unless the wizard had mastered wordless magic. Then again, he supposed that someone casting a Disillusionment Charm was trying to hide, and what was the use of being invisible if you spoke and everyone knew where you were?

"There," he said, tapping his wand over his own head and shivering slightly at the feeling of water running back up his neck, underneath his collar. First his shoes were visible, then his pants, then his shirt, then his shoulders, then his face, serious once again. "Better?"

[Victoria Summers]

Jittering a little at the sensation, once she felt it creep all the way off and knew she was fully visibly because Janus was and Janus was a lot taller, she nodded. "Yeah, much." Even if it felt like having an egg cracked on your head.

Rubbing her arms now both to warm up and remove the vestiges of the feeling left from the disillusionment charm, she shifted her weight and looked around. Although the encounter with the troll made this seem like it had not been the best idea, she wasn't ready to go back and call it a night. "Want to check out the Hippogriffs before we leave?"

[Janus Thickey]

Impressed with the ease of uncharming the both of them - even himself - Janus allowed himself another twirl of his wand before slipping it back into the pocket of his robes, where it was still within easy reach if he needed to grab it again. He didn't expect anything like a troll to happen again, since certainly there weren't two wild trolls running around near the edge of the Forbidden Forest and, after whatever invisible thing had happened, he didn't think it would dare to come back.

"Absolutely," he said, rising up on his toes for a moment before settling back down on flat feet. "We should go look at something I can actually see." But the tone was joking, as it had been for most of their impromptu trip out to the Care of Magical Creature pens. In no way did Janus envy Vicky her ability to see thestrals (well, maybe academically he did, since he didn't like that he didn't know what they looked like), but he wouldn't mind being able to appreciate the hippogriffs.

[Victoria Summers]

Glad he'd agreed, she hurried off towards the next pen - the one she'd thought had contained the troll. Instead, a pair of Hippogriffs stood side by side, their heads tucked under their wings in slumber. Their build was very similar to a thestral's. That would be an interesting crossbreed; perhaps there was a way to restore the thestral's to a more meaty, lively look. She'd much rather the crossbreed work - even if she had a year to thing about it - rather than sate curiosity and produce some malformed abomination.

She stepped up on the fence and leaned forward, letting the fence be the only thing that stopped her from toppling into the pen. Reaching out a hand, she made a clicking noise in the hopes of enticing one of the Hippogriffs. She'd read that there temperaments varied wildly and she just hoped Kettleburn had picked a pair of friendly ones.

[Janus Thickey]

Janus followed her at a slightly more leisurely pace, hands in his pockets, walking at more of a stroll than in a rush, although he was at the pen only a half a minute or so after Vicky, leaning against it as well but keeping his hands firmly in his pockets. He'd always liked hippogriffs, the proud way they carried themselves, the fascinating mixture of the colouring of birds and great cats; it was a pity, in his opinion, that it was too dark to really tell what sorts Kettleburn had managed to get for the class. They were probably decent specimens, though, if they were to be used for experimental breeding.

"Aren't you supposed to bow first?" he asked, glancing over at her, hands still in his pockets. He was hazy on the details of introducing oneself to a hippogriff. After all, it had been a few years since Kettleburn had taught them the process, and although he'd been one of the volunteers and it had ended relatively well in that Janus hadn't died, he couldn't quite recall exactly what you were supposed to do.

[Victoria Summers]

"They've gotta be looking to see you bow,' she replied and continued to click until the elegant beasts looked up, perhaps slightly annoyed at having been woken. To compensate, her bow was especially low and she tapped Janus's shin with her foot to make sure he did the same. One of them seemed too grumpy to pay them any attention, but as it was likely the inferior of the two, all it did was turn its back. The other snuffled at Victoria's hair and she tried not to wince as she realized just how sharp its beak was. It stopped, eventually, and she stood and smiled hugely.

This was her favorite; these animals weren't really fairly classified as such. They were not cats and dogs, they had their own intelligence that was entirely fascinating. "Oh, he's beautiful." She breathed, not caring how much she sounded like a girl in that moment.

[Janus Thickey]

Janus bowed as well, grabbing the fence with both hands as he leaned over it, standing on the lowest run so that his waist was level with the top of it and he could bow as low as Vicky did. He looked up to make eye contact, but Vicky had already taken care of that with the only hippogriff of the pair interested in them; instead, grinning, he stepped down off the lowest rung and leaned against the fence, arms crossed casually over his chest, rumpling his tie. It didn't bother him that the hippogriff wasn't interested in ruffling his hair - he was quick enough to see the wavering in her smile at first, with the beak in her hair.

"He is," he agreed mildly, more watching the hippogriff than her smiling. Merlin, he wouldn't like to meet one when it was in a bad mood - or even, possibly, if it was in the wild. Janus's imagination didn't paint the most vivid pictures, perhaps, but it was easy enough to imagine how effective that beak and those claws were. It had, after all, driven away a troll. "This one's rather affectionate, isn't he?"

[Victoria Summers]

Affectionate in the way these animals got, she supposed. It seemed Kettleburn, or someone else, had socialized them so they weren't entirely adverse to new people as untamed ones might be. She held out her hand and simply left it there, palm facing out, fingers outstretched, as though she were trying to give the Hippogriff a high-five, but of course she was simply waiting to see if it reciprocated her attempt to touch it. "I've heard some people get to ride them. I wonder what that would be like."

The idea had her daydreaming for a second and she blinked back to herself realizing that if Janus had said anything, she hadn't been paying the least bit attention. She looked to the side to see if his mouth was moving and was instead surprised by the line of his jaw; it was very neat. And then for no reason at all besides that she liked the line of his jaw and she just didn't ever think much about anything, she kissed him.

A split second after she'd done it she realized what a horrible mistake this could turn out to be, but it was against Vicky's very nature to act embarrassed and so decided in that split second to go through with it like her stomach wasn't already curdling in embarrassment.

[Janus Thickey]

He'd been in the middle of relating to Vicky the contents of an article he'd once read about what it was like to ride a hippogriff - how the lack of a mane made it difficult to get a firm grasp with your hands, the way beating wings upset your sense of seat and balance, and how it was supposedly similar to riding a horse, but as he'd done neither (despite his aspirations as a curse-breaker, Janus wasn't exactly the most outdoorsy of people), he couldn't really tell her whether or not that description was accurate - when he realised that she wasn't actually listening to him. But he didn't have a chance to realise much else before, very suddenly - and, to Janus, unexpectedly - she was kissing him.

Janus had kissed other girls before, of course, but it had usually been him who had initiated the action. He'd never really been kissed, and the feeling was startling. Even so, he didn't pull away; his eyes were open for a moment (Vicky really did have nice hair, he guessed) until he remembered that he should probably close them. After a moment, when he needed to breathe (as she'd caught him off-guard), he pulled back, blinking rapidly. But he didn't want her to think that it was for good (it wasn't), and so he grasped for something to say - and came up short.

"Er," he said, finally, not having moved from where he stood, although his arms were now at his side rather than crossed. And he usually always had something to say! "Hello. Ah." Then he gave up and put his hands on her shoulders and kissed her properly this time.

[Victoria Summers]

Worried for a moment that he was going to try to awkwardly brush her off she instantly began scheming how she'd pull herself out of that with dignity in tact, when he kissed her again she took a moment to be relieved they didn't have to do awkward conversation. After a second of relief, she relaxed and began to thoroughly enjoy herself. Pressing her palms against his torso, their height difference wasn't as awkward as one might think.

Vicky had kissed a handful of boys in her young life and it had only been the last one or two experiences that had left that awkward head-bobbing, too much teeth, tongue, lip, spit stage. At least she wasn't so green that she felt nervous now.

[Janus Thickey]

After another minute or so, he drew back again, although time his expression was less shocked and awkward and more in a sort of amused half-smile. Janus certainly hadn't been expecting this when he'd run down to the basement and invited Vicky out for a walk to the Care of Magical Creatures pens. If anything, he'd expected the most interesting part of the evening to be perhaps a lively discussion about which creatures would be best to cross without creating something slimy and useless. Certainly not this.

He left his hands on her shoulders, though, uncertain about what to do with them otherwise, fingers brushing against the fabric of her robes. "Well," he said, falling back on a familiar joking tone, rather at a loss about where to go next. "Do you think cigarette smoke would bother the hippogriffs?"