She planned for that, at least; they're not school books or anything. But she wants to get this potion right,and more importantly, she wants to have it done before exams. So today she can be found in the Magic Box, digging through the herb selections.
"Ugh, least organized spices ever," she mutters to herself.
"You look familiar...? Maybe?" she says dubiously to the other girl.
"Hi, Alli. This is my sister Bella, the one who can't get any magic to work. She's a junior."
Or at least 70% odds, instead of 40%.
She stops on the next page with a triumphant sound. "Aha! Potion recipe staring time?"
She goes over the recipe for Soph. There's quite a few steps, involving at least two Latin chants, extremely specific stirring directions, and bundles of precisely measured herbs. Some of it's smudged and hard to read, and the whole thing's rather... vague, in that way magic books often are.
"You see why it's such a pain in the ass?" Alli asks rhetorically.
"Yeah... like I said I haven't got into potions but I have got a little bit into Latin, I switched into it a few weeks ago when I discovered that there is almost no Spanish in spellbooks, and I know almost none of it so far, but is that conjugated right?" She points at a verb.
"...No. No, you're totally right. That's the wrong tense. Damn it all. I didn't think to check the Latin- I thought I measured something wrong-" she starts to scribble things down on a spare sheet of paper from her backpack. She's on her third year of Latin; she's not the world's best student, but she's past the basics. "And this is in the dative instead of the accusative, and this should be plural... who wrote this, they should be banned from magic."
"I am glad of that whenever I'm not doing my homework. You should do my homework, we're in the same level of Latin anyway."
"That would kind of defeat the purpose of you actually taking it. Besides, when I tried to help you with a spell you said it came out feeling wrong, whatever that means to you magical types."
She finishes scribbling out her corrections and looks up, pleased. "Got it!" She looks at Soph. "You're the best. I owe you potion if it works." To Bella, she adds, "Did you want to try a spell with not-your-sister? I can show you the glitterlight spell, or something."
"If you think you'll have better luck getting spells out of me than Soph and various books have, I'd be more than happy to try the glitterlight spell."
She poses (unnecessarily), says "Nitidi!" and sweeps her arm through the air. Sparkles follow.
"As far as I know? The Latin's required. The arm wave isn't necessary, I guess. But if I don't move it, no sparkles happen? Since it's a spell for "sparkles follow movement". The rest is just me thinking magic is really damn cool."
Nothing happens.
"Correct my form?"
Alli shrugs. "There isn't form. It's just- an incantation. It might just not work? One of my books was written by-" she puts on a Snobby Scholar Face, "-by an Expert in the Field of Magicks Who Tragically Lacked The Power To Himself Become a Practitioner." She reverts to normal. "Or something like that. But old person talk for 'knowing how to cast spells does not mean you can cast them', anyway."