Scorpius and Yvette continue to be in the Scholomance
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… this is deeply weird.

She’ll go… sit with Alexei? Because he tolerated her before she caught Scorpius’s eye, and she knows what loyalty is? But this is so weird, she has no idea how to navigate cafeteria politics when she’s actually a participant instead of a weird outcast girl looking on from afar.

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They give her space to sit and none of them give her disgusted looks.

Alexei looks down at her general stomach area before looking back up at her face, raising an eyebrow very slightly in a wordless "How are you feeling?" question.

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They also mysteriously have one extra seat open too, right near her. How strange and unexpected.

The concern gets a very slight (and only a little pained) smile, and a tiny shrug. Which is to say: yeah she’s still recovering from a stab wound, and it hurts like a bitch (especially now, after the long trek to the cafeteria) but she’s handling it well enough. She’ll be fine. Probably. She’ll probably be fine. And having people be weirdly welcoming to her is… useful? While injured?

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He nods and turns back to look at the people who were already at the table.

    But Natalya looks at her and asks, "Hey, would you swap for milk? The lower tray was looking weird, I steered clear," while gesturing at an untouched spring roll on her plate.

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(And here's Liu, coming out of the queue and looking for somewhere to sit.)

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“Yeah, sure,” says Yvette, who is unaccustomed to actually having trade offers. This is a strange time.

But she might as well use it, right? She gives Liu a welcoming wave and a smile. Look, there’s an open seat and everything! Not at all saved for someone else!

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...isn't it? Saved for someone else?

But, well, Alexei seems to be fine with it, himself, and, well...

..........

She likes Yvette.

So she'll go over there and ask, "Is this seat taken?" in English.

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"No," he says, also in English, before anyone else can say anything.

And if you're paying really close attention the corner of his mouth is twitching a tad.

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And so she sits, to the visible dismay of everyone else (except Natalya, who maybe looks only very slightly guilty for some reason).

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(Why is Yvette great, he has no idea, but she is, and he wants more of her in his life.)

Scorpius, who's been kind of lowkey watching this exchange from afar, is gonna sit with some Argentinian kids and even try valiantly to do a little bit of Spanish in their direction rather than force them to speak English for his sake, which when the school is always looking for the first opportunity to dump you with five classes of a new language is not just corteous it is downright friendly, even if at least one of English or Mandarin is pretty much mandatory to get in anyway.

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Yvette isn’t dismayed. In fact, she’s the opposite of dismayed. She’s downright bubbly, even, though not really sure how to… engage with most of the people at this table. Instead she can gently entice Liu into small talk about classes, because they’ve ever actually conversed before Yvette drew the attention of the school hero.

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Sure, they can do that.

"Have you finished your artificing project?" she asks, after she's gotten going enough to not really be shy. "What was it anyway?"

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"I have not," she sighs. "It's, um." Incredibly risky and likely to turn evil? "... a dagger."

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"A dagger?" Alexei asks, his first words this afternoon. "Even artificers stay away from it." He remembers belatedly to make his accent thicker then asks, "Why did you choose it?"

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"My other options were significantly worse," she says wryly. And they were, the other available artificing projects were 'cup that poisons any liquid in it' and 'literal bomb,' but the literal bomb could be used against a bunch of mals all bundled together and be safe, and the dagger is, well. A dagger. Technically speaking, it's an athame, meant to stay eternally sharp, cut through many materials daggers shouldn't be able to, to keep the things it cuts fresh for longer than it should, steer itself a bit to find the perfect weak point, and enhance the power of things she uses from, that sort of thing. And, if she pulls it off correctly, cut through magic warding. Which, for the record, she wants to use for cutting through mals, which also sometimes have magic warding, but obviously when it comes to her, everyone will think the worst. A sharp knife is an ordinary Freshman project, like mana batteries, and for her to go for a dagger now, at the end of Junior year, putting actual power and knowledge into it instead of just 'stay sharp,' well. It implies things, about how she will intend to use it for more than just self defense. A knife made by a Junior could do some real damage, and everyone with a brain here knows it. So, sort of alarming to mention as one's end-of-term project. This is kind of why she kept a lid on what she was doing.

But it's bound to get out eventually, and this is the best time for it to do so, so soon after she killed a literal maleficer in self defense and everyone's feeling sympathetic for her. It's not that bad to make a murder implement her Junior year? Right? ... Right???

"And... I could really use something for self defense, if something gets too close to me. Incanter track. You know."

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    "Going to join your new boy on his adventures?" asks Sofia.

Alexei is still frowning, though. "So if you're Incanter Track, then..."

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"I expect I'll need an artificer's help, yes." She gives Sofia's comment the attention it deserves, which is none at all. "And possibly also an alchemist's, but I might be able to manage that myself."

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"And do you have an artificer?"

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"Not... currently, no."

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"Hmm." Chew chew om nom food. "What's it worth to you?"

Which, on the one hand, yes is still framed as a trade, but on the other hand is still an actual offer, clear as day.

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"Well it is my end of term artificing project," she points out wryly, "So quite a lot."

Which is to say: nothing she's going to offer here in the middle of the cafeteria! It helps that furthermore she doesn't actually know!

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"Hmm," he repeats, and doesn't continue pursuing this line of inquiry. They can discuss price later.

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"Do you know any alchemy-track kids who would want to help?"

She's trying to be casual but she knows people don't really......... like........ Yvette, the recent bout of attention caused by Lake notwithstanding. It's probably related to the way being around her feels like everything is about to go wrong, like you were expecting a package in the mail that you were really excited about but when you answer the door there is someone wearing black looking somber instead, and they have a letter, and you're not sure what the letter is but it's not your package and it's probably way way way worse than your package. Like that.

And Liu is sympathetic, or she would be? This kind of aura is what maleficers get after a while, she's been bracing herself for years, but recent stuff indicates Yvette is actually not a maleficer, not at all, and so nothing makes sense anymore.

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"At least one," she says, in a perfect deadpan that does not involve her looking at Scorpius at all, nope. "But the alchemy side of things is pretty straightforward, it's primarily an artificing and incanting job."

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"Okay. Good luck."

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