The pale morning sun filtered through the windowpane, casting a warm glow across Maurise's face.
He rubbed the sleep from his eyes and stretched, his joints popping in protest. He had been sitting in the same position for hours. In his fervor to decipher the intricacies of the Bone Calling spell, dawn had arrived without him noticing.
This particular branch of magic was far more sophisticated than he had initially anticipated. The spell did not just summon raw material. It allowed for the conjuration of specific, intricate bone constructs.
Bone spikes, bone spears, bone shields. He could probably even summon a bone vase if he felt particularly decorative.
It was incredibly convenient.
Of course, the most practical applications were the offensive spikes and the defensive shields. It was a crude, physical method of combat, but effective.
If one were particularly open-minded, Maurise mused, these calcium deposits could perhaps even be used to brew a hearty bone broth.
'I'll have to test that theory later,' he thought, rubbing his chin. 'I wonder what the flavor profile is? Chicken? Dragon? Or just… calcium?'
"Kruk... Tak... Gûl," Maurise murmured, focusing his intent.
In an instant, three greyish-white, serrated bone spikes materialized in the air. They were about the length of a forearm, hovering with menacing stillness.
With a flick of his mind, they shot forward.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
Three heavy, dull sounds echoed through the room as the spikes buried themselves deep into the solid wooden paneling on the opposite wall.
Simple, direct, and vicious.
Maurise walked over to inspect his handiwork. The spikes had embedded themselves nearly halfway into the wood. They held firm when he tugged on them. As far as kinetic force went, he had nothing to worry about.
Next, it was time to test the defensive capabilities.
Unfortunately, his current repertoire of offensive magic was rather pathetic. Aside from a few prank hexes meant to cause minor inconveniences, his only spell with real destructive potential was the Fire-Making Charm.
"Kruk... Tak... Gûl."
A large, curved shield made of dense, white bone floated into existence, large enough to cover Maurise from shin to shoulder.
Then came the heat.
"Incendio!"
He raised his wand, and a jet of searing orange flames erupted from the tip, roaring as it collided with the bone surface. The room was instantly bathed in a crimson glow.
However, the violent explosion of heat he expected never came. The moment the flames touched the shield, they behaved like water striking a smooth river stone, flowing harmlessly around the curvature of the bone.
After a full minute, Maurise ended the charm.
The heat dissipated, but the bone shield remained unchanged. It was pristine. There was not even a scorch mark.
He reached out and tapped the surface. It was warm, certainly, but nowhere near hot enough to burn skin.
Encouraged, he spent the next ten minutes firing every minor jinx and hex he knew at the floating barrier. Without exception, the spells bounced off harmlessly.
This was excellent news.
Once he mastered the casting speed, summoning a bone shield would be instantaneous. He finally had a qualified defensive measure in his arsenal.
Satisfied, Maurise collapsed into his chair for a brief rest.
He glanced at the Mage's Book floating in his mind. It seemed that new spells appeared without warning or fanfare. However, he had a working theory. New content only unlocked when he had achieved sufficient proficiency with the old content.
It was just a hypothesis, of course. The specific mechanics of the book required further observation.
Knock, knock.
The sudden sound at his door made him jump.
Maurise got up and opened the wooden door to reveal an older student standing in the hallway. The boy was wearing a Ravenclaw tie and a deeply annoyed expression. His eyebrows were furrowed so tightly they looked like they were trying to merge into a single line.
Maurise blinked. "Can I help you?"
He was fairly certain he had not offended anyone recently. Was this one of those classic boarding school tropes where the upperclassman bullies the new kid? It seemed a bit late in the term for that. They had been at school for two weeks already.
"I'm Roger Davies," the boy said coldly, looking like he was barely containing a shout. "I live in the room next door. You were being incredibly loud this morning. What in Merlin's name are you doing in there?"
"Ah," Maurise smiled awkwardly. "My apologies, Davies."
It seemed his magical experiments had disrupted his neighbor's beauty sleep. In that case, an apology was the only way to go. He was in the wrong, after all.
Seeing Maurise's sincere attitude, Roger's expression softened slightly, though he still looked perplexed.
"So," Roger asked, peering past Maurise, "what were you actually doing? Theoretically, these walls are layered with Silencing Charms. I shouldn't be able to hear a thing, even if you were wrestling a troll."
"Silencing Charms?"
Maurise glanced back into his room. The three large, jagged holes punched into the wall by the bone spikes were rather conspicuous.
"Ah," Maurise said, realizing the problem. "It seems my practice got a bit out of hand. I think I didn't just pierce the wood. I may have physically stabbed the Silencing Charm to death."
"You… stabbed the charm?" Roger looked incredulous.
"I was practicing a spell," Maurise explained with a sheepish grin. "Sorry about the noise."
Roger sighed, rubbing his temples. "Fine. Accidents happen. Just keep it down in the future. And make sure you fix the wall and reapply the Silencing Charm before the house elves see it."
The older boy turned, ready to march back to his bed. He was not interested in bullying a first-year who knew how to apologize.
"Wait!" Maurise called out.
Roger turned back, his impatience returning. "What now?"
"I don't know how to fix it," Maurise said, stating the fact with complete confidence.
He was, after all, a first-year. The Mending Charm and complex localized atmospheric charms like Muffliato variants were not on the first-week syllabus. In fact, he had not learned them at all.
"That sounds like a personal problem," Roger said, his face returning to a mask of indifference. "I have no obligation to clean up your mess."
"I have chocolate frogs," Maurise offered quickly.
"I don't want your candy."
…
Five minutes later, Roger Davies was in Maurise's room, fixing the wall.
Despite his verbal refusal, he eventually sighed and pulled out his wand. It seemed the Ravenclaw solidarity, or perhaps just the desire to ensure his own future sleep, had won out.
Maurise watched the wood knit itself back together with a sense of gratitude. 'The world really is full of good people,' he thought.
Hogwarts, for all its dangers, was surprisingly friendly. Harry, Ron, Hermione, the Weasley twins, and now the older Ravenclaws. He was genuinely starting to like this magical castle.
In the days that followed, Maurise settled into a comfortable rhythm. Class, library, dormitory. Repeat.
There was, however, one entertaining interlude.
News spread through the grapevine that the Weasley twins had been caught lurking near the third-floor corridor, the forbidden one on the right-hand side. Apparently, Professor McGonagall had caught them red-handed and delivered a lecture so blistering it could have peeled the paint off the portraits.
Maurise recalled Dumbledore's start-of-term warning vividly. "To those who do not wish to suffer a most painful death, please stay away from the third-floor corridor on the right-hand side."
Clearly, something was hidden there.
When Maurise asked the twins what they had seen, they admitted they had not seen anything before McGonagall descended upon them like a Scottish hurricane.
George was particularly salty about it, grumbling that Fred had not been watching the "map" closely enough.
As a result of their failed expedition, they were back in detention, scrubbing the second-floor toilets over the weekend.
Naturally, the twins showed zero remorse. If anything, the punishment only emboldened them. They immediately tried to recruit Maurise for a follow-up night expedition to uncover the corridor's secrets.
Maurise, possessing a fully functional survival instinct, politely declined.
He was curious, certainly, but not suicidally curious.
If he was going to break rules and risk expulsion or death, he would much rather do it in the Restricted Section of the library.
At least there, the things trying to kill him were books, and the knowledge he would gain would be worth the risk. A dusty corridor with a high probability of "painful death" just did not have the same appeal.