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Chapter Text

With two more weeks stuck at Privet Drive and not much else to do during the day, Marigold read almost non-stop. The only times she put her books down were to sleep, tutor Dudley, eat, and - of course - put what she was learning into practice. As promised in the book Mary had picked up on the topic, even though she could cast many charms nonverbally and with incomplete somatics, when it came to wandless casting, it was far easier to pull off if she used the proper incantation and somation. It felt like a step backwards at first, having to go back to more careful casting, but as the book explained, wands were heavily enchanted to be able to adjust the somatics performed.

As a demonstration, it recommended using the tracelight charm, scribiā, to draw both simple shapes and runes. When looking closely, Mary could discern what the book had described - her runes had perfectly straight lines, round circles, and her polygrams were perfectly regular. However, when she drew a circle on its own, or disjointed lines, there were jitters all over the place - not to mention how they wiggled back and forth in space, rather than the perfectly planar runes. In fact, now that she knew what she was looking for, she saw how as she was in the process of drawing a rune, it had all the tell-tale imperfections of being drawn by hand, but once the wand recognized what rune she drew, the lines of light snapped into place. It was hardly any wonder then, why she couldn't get away with half-measures in wandless casting - though the book assured her that with practice, that would come as well.

Still, being able to cast at all without having to rely on a wand was incredible! Reassuring, too, considering how powerless Marigold had felt when Tom stole her wand in the Chamber of Secrets. Sure, she could only manage simple charms like lūmos and bïrā, but even with just those two, she could light up a dark room and pick up her wand from a distance - and once she had it back, she could cast whatever she wanted. Dudley was also quite impressed by her display of wandless magic when she showed him later that night, though Mary was rather confused when, after using lūmos to produce a light at the tip of her index finger, he asked if she was going to “phone home”. Supposedly, it was from some American movie he had seen.

With the basics of wandless magic covered, Marigold dove headfirst into transfiguration. Conjuration, it seemed, was essentially the reverse process of vanishing - nothing too surprising there. The detailed explanation was… more than a bit confusing, though. Essentially, from what she could glean, conjured objects didn't really exist? Most of the time?

In order to get around the absurdly high energy cost of creating mass out of raw magical energy (the speed of light squared was a very steep price), conjuration was optimized for efficiency. It apparently utilized a state of existence known as “superposition”, where something both did and did not exist at the same time. However, rather than a superpositioned object being ethereal - as Mary had initially been visualizing the phenomenon, based off of her first-hand experience with ghosts - it was only ever fully there, or fully not. The result one got when observing (or otherwise interacting with) the superpositioned object was random chance, though it could be weighted more towards one way or the other. The average result of repeated testing was the closest one could get to observing it in a partial existence, and could be thought of as the object’s “true” state. In nature, only individual particles could be in superposition, but then again, transfiguration was literally magic. However, besides the magic of creating an entire object in superposition, conjuration also affected the outcome of playing those odds - though not the odds themselves. To put it in terms of Abbeys & Adders, it was like needing to roll a natural 20 for the object to exist - and then proceeding to get a critical success, every single time, without fail. The result was an object that seemed to exist, but the moment the caster stopped supplying magic, it would collapse back into non-existence.

The whole affair was all rather headache-inducing, really.

It took many, many trips to Flourish and Blotts - and even the local moxy library - before Marigold understood it (to a degree, at least). It helped that apparently, she'd been putting objects into superposition for the past two years at Hogwarts, without even realizing. It was why vanished objects could pop back into existence if one wasn't thorough enough, and why the fixing charm was used to make a transfiguration permanent - the targets were actually in superposition, but because they were weighted far enough one way or the other, messing with the figurative dice rolls wasn't necessary.

Still, despite not fully understanding the exact mechanics at play, it was enough for Mary to make an attempt. Lighter elements were inherently easier to conjure, as they had less mass, but conjuring a planetary metal would be even easier. Iron was thus the ideal candidate, as it was the lightest planetary metal. Not only that, but with a body-centered cubic crystal structure, the arrangement of the atoms was about as easy as could be - a three-dimensional grid with an atom at each vertex and an atom in each cell.

So on Friday, a little after 4 pm, Marigold oriented herself south, where Mars was - presumably, if her calculations were to be believed - at its zenith, and attempted her first ever conjuration.

Down, a curve to the right, a clockwise circle, then continuing right, and finishing with a curve up. Taurus. Another circle, then an arrow, up and to the right. Mars.

“Constrūo ferūm¹.”

Mary pushed magic through her wand. The theory was still odd and confusing, but she held it in her mind as best she could. She poured more magic into the spell. Theory aside, she'd scanned enough iron ingots in McGonagall’s class that not only did she know what she wanted to conjure, but exactly how the iron atoms ought to come together to do so. Marigold pumped out as much magic as she possibly could, willing the metal into existence. Just enough of a push to get it into superposition, and then she could rig the odds to-

Pop!

She stared in shock and disbelief at the shiny little cube.

Pop!

…And it was gone, the momentary lapse in her concentration being enough to let it blip out of existence.

But for a brief, glorious moment, she had done it. She had done it! Marigold was positively shattered from all the magic she had spent forcing the spell to work, but she had done it!

Mary flopped into bed, a giggling mess, as the reality of what she had accomplished sunk in.

---

The next week - her last week with the Dursleys for the summer, thankfully - was a whirlwind of experiments with transfiguration. Mary kept practicing iron in the afternoons, but around 9 in the morning, Venus was at its zenith, perfect for conjuring copper. Being close in weight to iron, it wasn't that much more difficult, but it was still just as exhausting the first time around. However, both metals paled in comparison to gold.

The first time Marigold tried to conjure gold, she nearly fainted from exertion, yet didn't even have anything to show for it. The sun had been at its peak, but with 79 protons and 114 neutrons in each atom, gold was far, far heavier. The next day, having had time to recover, Mary had another go at it, though she aimed for a mere fleck of gold - about a millimeter cubed. Thankfully, her efforts payed off, and she added gold to her rotation of metals to practice.

As her stay at Privet Drive came to a close, Mary was exhausted. Constant conjuring required energy, which meant eating as much food as she could manage without upsetting her stomach. Uncle Vernon quickly grew aggravated by how much money she was costing them with her increased appetite, and eventually shouted at Mary to go buy her own food.

Honestly, she was kicking herself for not realizing she could do so earlier. She would have to remember that for next summer. Regardless, she greatly appreciated not having to go through her relatives every time she was hungry - and judging by the way Dudley scarfed down several cereal bars at the start of each of their last few study sessions, so did he.

“Mnf, god, you're a lifesaver, Mary.” he mumbled between bites. “Algebra is hard enough as is, I dunno how Dad expects me to learn it on an empty stomach.”

“Don't mention it.” she waved off her cousin's concerns. “Ah, and you would have to flip the inequality here.”

Dudley frowned, thinking. “Oh! Right, ‘cos of the negative?”

Mary nodded. “Exactly! See? You're getting it.”

“Slowly but surely, I s’pose.” he sighed.

Marigold kept reading through her transfiguration text as Dudley continued working on his maths assignment. She'd wandered away from the curriculum for third year after following a rabbit hole in conjuration, all the way to something called “elemental affinity”. Apparently, besides the position of the planets, it was another factor in how much magic it took to conjure certain materials - though it was different from person to person. The four primary elements, Mary recognized easily: fire, water, air, and earth - or ignis, aqua, ventus, and terra, as their runes were known. The four secondary elements, as the book termed them, were each located between a pair of primary elements. Lightning, fulmen, between fire and air; ice, glacies, between air and water; metal, metallum, between water and earth; and magma, with the same name for its rune, between earth and fire.

“Mary?”

Rather oddly, a wix’s elemental affinity seemed to be correlated with their personality, though the book didn't specify if there was any sort of causal relationship one way or another. While Marigold had initially wanted to write the whole subject off as an unreliable personality test out of a magazine, the author pointed out that animagum forms also tended to correlate with a wix’s character. With no counterargument for that, she kept reading.

“Mary!”

“Hm?” Marigold pulled her nose out of her book. “What was the question?”

Dudley rolled his eyes. “I was asking when you're leaving.” he said, a slightly amused smile on his face

She winced slightly. “Oh, er, tomorrow morning, actually.”

“A-ah.” He seemed to deflate. “That makes sense.” With a sigh, he idly tapped his eraser on the desk a few times. “Does…”

He faltered.

“Yes?” Mary pressed.

“Does it ever get easier?” he whispered. “The punishments?”

She grimaced. “...No. Not really.” Mary closed her book, rifling her thumb along a corner of the pages. “You get used to it, but… It never stops hurting. You just… go slightly numb, I suppose.”

Dudley sniffled quietly. “...I'm sorry, Marigold.”

“Yeah.” she sighed. “I'm sorry too, Dudley.”

---

The next morning, the 27th of June, the Grangers picked Mary up from Number Four, Privet Drive, heading straight for the airport. Hermione and her parents obviously already had their passports, but Mary - rather than bothering with the moxy process - had owled Griphook, who arranged things for her. A few days later (and a few days before leaving the Dursley's) her passport arrived by owl, straight from the Department of Synchronicity in the Ministry of Magic.

Flying to Marseille was a bit of an ordeal, and Mary couldn't help but think it would've been easier to get Mr Weasley to enchant the Grangers’ car. Still, it wasn't too long of a flight - customs aside - and soon they were greeted at the gate by Valerie’s family, the Barbeaus. Marigold struggled to parse her way through the introductions, which certainly weren't any easier given they were in French, but Hermione helped translate for her. By the end of the greetings, Mary was at least able to identify Valerie's parents and siblings, though when it came to which of Hermione's cousins were the children of which of her Aunts and Uncles, Mary was absolutely clueless.

Over the course of her first week in Marseille, Marigold had been to just about every museum the city had to offer. They would often eat out for lunch, already being out and about as they were, but when it came to dinner, Hermione’s grandmother cooked for the entire family. Sometimes they were French dishes, other times Malagasy, but almost always some variation of rice and/or seafood. Additionally, with the constant immersion, she was starting to hold conversations in French - albeit rather limited ones. Mary enjoyed getting to know Hermione’s extended family, but from time to time, she would retreat into the room she and Hermione were sharing to read about and practice magic. Hermione was absolutely flabbergasted the first time Mary performed conjuration in front of her, though Mary was equally shocked at how effortlessly Hermione casted wandless magic. However, both young witches were running up against the limits of what they could learn from the books they already had, which meant there was only one thing to do - get more books.

Thankfully, Hermione had picked up a guide from Flourish and Blotts that covered how to find the magical quarters of various large cities across Europe. Methods varied from country to country, and often even city to city, but for Marseille, while there were several entrances of various types throughout the city, the simplest ones to find were along the metro. Following the guide, Mary and the Grangers went to the Castellane station, soon finding a door without a handle. With a light touch of magic though, the door opened itself up, allowing them passage.

Unlike Magical London, the entire wixen section of Marseille was underground - though it avoided the gloominess by having many, many one-way skylights, giving the illusion of an open-air street. From there, it wasn't hard to locate the local bank to exchange currencies, and from there, a few bookstores. Understandably (though unfortunately for Mary), the books were all in French, but Hermione graciously agreed to help translate. Marigold picked out several more books on conjuration, fascinated as she was with the subject. She also had more than enough time, as Hermione and her parents were diligent in keeping an eye on Mary's injury, which meant if she was hurting too much (or if the family was going to the beach, an activity Mary was uncomfortable joining even without her disability, given her anatomy) she would stay home with an adult, maybe a cousin or two.

Regardless, she wanted to figure out her elemental affinity, and the easiest way to do that was to simply conjure each of the primary and secondary elements and see which one came easiest. While Mary had learned to create fire and wind in first year Charms and metals over the past few weeks, the rest she had yet to touch. Ice and water, she could easily find through regular means and then scan them to understand their structure. But lightning, earth, and magma? Those would undoubtedly be trickier.

In the first place, what even counted as “earth”? Dirt and stone were composite materials, full of different silicate minerals and often organic compounds. Was it any crystalline structure? If that was the case, what about pure metals? Hell, ice was even a crystal, it just happened to have a very low melting point! If “earth” wasn't a specific mineral crystal or group of minerals, was it a combination of many different minerals? But then why would it be easier to conjure a menagerie of compounds rather than a uniform substance? And everything that was an issue with “earth” also extended to magma, since magma and lava were just melted rock! Water was magma!

Marigold seriously hoped the books would clear things up.

---

Unfortunately, as the days passed by, Mary was left unsatisfied on the magic front. The holiday as a whole was going fantastically, but she had made little headway in her academic pursuits. She could conjure ice and water now, but neither seemed to be her elemental affinity. By her fourth trip to the bookstore, she was starting to get frustrated. The same clerk as her last few visits greeted Mary as she entered the store. She was a beautiful young witch, probably a couple years older than Mary, with blue eyes and light brown hair with a single white streak framing her face, and though Mary was certain of her own orientation, even she couldn't help but blush as she returned a stuttered “Bonjour”. After browsing for a bit, Mary limped over to the clerk with yet another book, plopping it on the counter. As the witch behind the counter punched a few numbers into the mechanical register, she gave a slight smirk, asking something in French.

“Er, pardonne-moi?” Mary asked, scrunching up her nose in concentration.

The clerk repeated herself slower, but at Mary's continued lack of understanding, changed tactics.

“Still no luck?” she asked, a slight accent to her words.

Mary blushed in embarrassment, realizing the clerk had taken notice of her frequent visits, as well as the subject of her purchases. “Yes- er, oui.” she answered.

“English is fine.” the witch said, a glint of amusement in her eye. “Conjuration is not an easy topic, combat with it is even less so.”

“Oh, I'm not interested in using it to fight.” Marigold clarified - though it was an understandable mistake, as duelling was the most practical use for the raw elements. “Really, I'm just curious.”

That got the clerk to chuckle. “You are very peculiar, Mademoiselle…?”

“Marigold.” she introduced herself, reserving her surname for the time being.

“Marigold, enchanté.” she said with a smile. “I am Fleur.” She glanced at the register. “That will be two livre, forty denier.”

As Mary fished out the correct change, Fleur continued. “If you would like, my shift ends at the hour. I would be happy to help with your studies.”

Marigold blinked in surprise, then glanced over her shoulder to Dennis, who had accompanied her on this trip.

“Your call.” he responded to her silent question.

Mary gave her a nervous smile. “Er, yeah, if you would like.”

Fleur’s smile was dazzling. “It would be my pleasure.”

---

According to Fleur, the materials that fell under the jurisdiction of terra and magma runes was moreso a matter of anthropology rather than science. That made absolutely no sense to Mary, at least until she remembered Professor Higgs’ lecture last year on why magic worked. Specifically, wixen imparting their linguistic notions upon Magic through sheer force of will. Thus, as Fleur explained, individual mineral crystals as well as rocks composed of many crystals all counted as “earth” - not including ice and metal - because that was what wixen in the past considered “earth”. “Magma”, therefore, was the liquid form of anything that counted as “earth”.

With that out of the way, Fleur pointed Marigold towards a store that sold a variety of crystals that she could reference, though she strongly cautioned Mary against trying to conjure magma until she was back at school and had proper supervision. Given most rocks and minerals melted at temperatures easily upwards of 1000 degrees, Mary readily agreed. Finally reaching the end of the impromptu study session, the two witches exchanged contact information. Fleur Delacour was certainly surprised when she put two and two together and realized she had been tutoring a foreign celebrity for the past hour, though to her credit, she kept her reaction subdued and didn't draw any attention, which Mary appreciated.

When Marigold and Dennis returned to the Barbeau home, Hermione was mildly jealous over the learning opportunity - at least until Mary assured her that upon learning that Mary was in Marseille with one of her classmates, Fleur had extended an invitation for both of them to visit her home, if they wanted.

---

The rest of the holiday whiled away pleasantly, split between family, touring, magical experimentation, and visiting the Delacours. The only downside to the trip that Mary could find was that she was separated from Hedwig. It was regrettable, but getting an owl through customs would be hellish, and while Mary could have had Hedwig just fly to the Barbeaus’, there wasn't really a Statute-compliant explanation for her pet owl flying hundreds of kilometers to find her. Every so often, Mary plucked at her familiar bond, just to check in. Unfortunately at that distance, all she could send and receive were more basic emotions. Still, even with that, she could send “worry” and get back “happy”. It wasn't much, but it gave her peace of mind that Hedwig and Athena, the Grangers’ owl, were both doing well.

As the 23rd of July - and thus the end of their stay in Marseille - drew nearer, Marigold was sad she'd be leaving behind new friends, but excited to see old ones again. Promises to write were given all around, both to the Barbeau cousins, and to Fleur and her little sister, Gabrielle. The day of, after many tearful goodbyes at the airport, Mary and the Grangers boarded their flight and left France behind.

Hedwig was, of course, overjoyed to see her witch again, a sentiment Mary shared. There was a pile of mail that the two owls had arranged on the dining room table, but as exhausted as they all were from the flight, it would be left till tomorrow. Instead, Marigold and the Grangers unpacked the bare minimum, changed into comfy clothes, and gathered in the living room to eat takeaway and watch whatever happened to be on the telly.

It was as one show ended that Valerie was flicking through the channels for something else to watch, only to change to a news broadcast.

“Oh, boo!” Dennis teased. “It's been a busy day already, switch it to something I don't need to think about to enjoy.”

“Hush, you.” his wife shot back. “It's just for a minute, then we'll be right back to rotting your brain.”

He sighed dramatically, grumbling and gathering dishes and taking them to the kitchen in the meantime. Personally, Mary didn't mind watching the news for a bit. All the way in Marseille, she'd not been getting letters or the Prophet, so she felt a bit out of touch. It wasn't long before the programming switched from the weather forecast to current events.

“Our top story tonight,” the newscaster announced, “The search continues for the fugitive, Sirius Black, a convicted murderer sentenced over a decade ago. Authorities report that Black is armed and dangerous, and urge viewers not to…”

Marigold stared in terror, her blood ice cold, at the disheveled man in the mugshot. Her ears rung and her breath quickened as she studied him - pale skin, sunken grey eyes, a long, straight nose, unkempt black hair and a scruffy mustache connected to his sideburns.

The man who betrayed her parents to Voldemort.