A picture in oils, as they say. Repin would take a break. Blood and guts everywhere, and a forest beast prowling about. The kids are huddled together, tempting the monster with their fear...
Alright, enough with the poetry. Not the time for that.
The beast was a young sumpurni. Half-dog, half-wolf, with some humanoid features... But most importantly, it was enormous — larger than a hippogriff. Still, this one was clearly younger than its adult kin, not having grown to full size yet. And judging by the blood matted into its fur in several places, it was wounded. No way this was the work of a bunch of thirteen-year-olds or younger; the creature was far too strong and agile for that. Most likely, it had failed a hunt earlier and made the desperate decision to try its luck with these unexpected visitors to the forest. After all, wizards, with their magic, make a more nourishing meal than any magical version of a sheep. But they are also much more dangerous than that hypothetical sheep.
Judging by the scraps of clothing scattered around... Hmm, looks like it's already managed to eat or tear apart two, maybe three of them. And now it's eyeing the remaining ones... but they've got a pretty good position. They're backed up against a thick tree trunk, and they can fire something painful at the beast. It wouldn't be able to dodge a direct spell charge.
It probably hasn't realized this yet — sumpurni aren't known for their intelligence — so it's likely taken a few hits to the face from these thieves. Yep, there's definitely a wound on its face from a cutting curse. Too clean of a line; no claw, tooth, or horn would leave a mark like that.
Right now, the beast is circling the tree. Waiting for its prey to tire out, I suppose… Not the best strategy. If they get their act together, the remaining four could injure it badly enough to make it retreat... But the magical creature got lucky. Its would-be prey is too scared, and there's no way you can expect coordinated action from such young wizards, even under normal circumstances. I've seen their pitiful attempts at teamwork when I assisted our Magical Combat and Dueling instructor.
And where is the equipment I'm after? Of course, it's with the survivors. Throwing the stuff away to run faster?
No-o-o. Naturally, they had to grab the brooms and part of the gear and huddle up with it at the tree.
Idiots.
I think my eye just started twitching. Ha-a-a...
It's obvious that the brooms will be in a very bad state if the sumpurni starts tearing these morons to pieces. So, what to do?
Do I have to play the role of the hero, pretending to fight the monster for their sake? Oh magic, how did I end up in this situation?
But there's no time to come up with a clever plan. Either I barely have enough time or I don't, but I'm not used to taking such risks, and I'm not about to start now.
Cracking my neck and knuckles, I drew my wand from its holster. A pleasant warmth spread across my right palm, naturally induced by magic.
Bakaut wood and the heartstring of a steel-belly.
Quite a heavy wand, but that's compensated by the power of the spells it casts. If I were to compare it to a weapon, it'd be the magical equivalent of a zweihander.
Alright, time to get started, before the creature runs out of patience and destroys the unfortunate equipment.
Taking a sharp step out from behind the tree trunk, I made a precise sweep of my wand, drawing the shape of a hexagon in the air.
"Wind Kugel!" I shouted, as firmly and clearly as possible.
And it worked. A perfect sphere of swirling wind began to form a meter in front of where my wand's tip pointed.
A couple of seconds later, it shot forward, heading directly for the sumpurni, which had heard the spell incantation and jerked to the side. If this had been some kind of beam spell, it might've dodged, but the effective range of Wind Kugel was much wider, and the creature's side was successfully slashed open.
Not deeply enough to be fatal, but judging by its pained howl, it wasn't a pleasant experience.
The spell flew onward and crashed into a thick tree trunk, cutting into it pretty well.
Once the magical creature came to its senses, it charged at me. But I wasn't just standing there like a statue.
"Erstarren!" I quickly traced a new figure with my wand, sending a German version of Stupefy at the beast. It's more powerful, but also drains more energy.
Like Stupefy, it moves fast, so the beast didn't even have time to understand what hit it. But it would be naïve to think that it would stop it for long. No, it only bought me time for the next round of spells.
A new sequence of wand movements.
First, a ball of conjured water hit the now-paralyzed magical creature, followed by an icy wind that froze the wet fur instantly, down to the skin.
Howling, the sumpurni, freed from Erstarren, shook its whole body. Bad idea. With the ice, chunks of fur ripped off, sometimes taking skin with them.
To my relief, the beast finally realized that this two-legged figure was far more dangerous than its previous prey and bolted deeper into the forest. It was probably hoping I'd chase it. No thanks, I'm not desperate enough to hunt it down for ingredients. Besides, the annual magical beast hunt—the wizarding world's equivalent of a noble hunt — was coming up soon. If I want to run around after game, I'll have plenty of chances then.
"Pa-a-al, O-o-orosh..." I said, deliberately drawing out the vowels with clear satisfaction. "Quite a meeting…" I added with an open smirk, looking at the gloomy fourth-year staring at me. "Who would've thought — recruiting young idiots, Oros?" I shot back, quickly earning hateful glares from those who clearly forgot who just saved them. "Well, well... I can already imagine the headline that'll echo through all of Durmstrang: Fourth-year, with a junior squad of underclassmen, robs an entire House and nearly gets killed by a young sumpurni! Brilliant. Kram will be so proud of how his fellow Gryffons are making a name for themselves." I kept talking, much to the growing horror of these fools.
Despite his political views, even their gang respected Kram. After all, he didn't care a bit about blood status. It wasn't the most popular opinion, but he was gaining so much respect that even the most diehard pureblood supremacists forgave him his eccentricities. And those extremists weren't particularly popular these days anyway. Nobody wants to ruin the reputation of noble wizards in the eyes of the half-bloods.
Sure, the Cold War with the Ministry and the Americans in particular might be over, but we're not about to hand more power to potential adversaries. The old families went through too much during the world wars to not adjust a few things. This isn't like England, where they could sit comfortably on their little island, untouched by either Muggle or magical battles.
Sure, there were bombings, but those didn't touch Britain's purebloods in the slightest. Unlike the continental wizards.
"What do you want?" the Hungarian grumbled, realizing the consequences I was describing. The Bathorys would be furious when they found out one of their own got mixed up in this mess. He wasn't some nameless Muggle-born; he was a bastard of a pureblood family, even if they were nearly extinct.
A potential heir, should the current two die. As far as I know, I've got a similar situation — an older half-brother. But he's studying at Beauxbatons. Our mother, sensibly deciding not to set us up as rivals, sent him far away. If things go well for him, he'll establish a new branch of the Stahlwolfs.
After all, the great Wolf family, whose seventh head was the first dean of the House of the Snow Wolf, once had many branches that became independent families after the main line died out. As you can guess, the Steel Wolves went through that process.
"Are you mocking me, half-blood?" I decided to wind him up even more, because otherwise, I wouldn't be able to blow off steam. Any other methods would be worse. Alcohol? Hard to come by, and the consequences wouldn't be great. A good fight? Not befitting an aristocrat, and I'm not a fan of brawling, especially with magic available. And dueling doesn't exactly help with stress relief. As for sex — let's not even go there. This body's too young for that anyway.
And where would I find a half-blood — or a pureblood, for that matter — who wouldn't go blabbing to her friends about how long we were together, in what positions, and all that nonsense?
So yeah, the only way to vent is through venom.
"Did you happen to hit your head on something hard while running from the sumpurni?" I sighed with exaggerated disdain. "I won't be negotiating now, and especially not with you, my thick-skulled foe. Now, grab the stuff and march! Schneller, schneller!" I barked at the end, speeding up the underclassmen.
I'm not going to strain myself using magic to carry all the sports gear when there are a few perfectly willing — definitely willing — volunteers here for that. Let them work with their hands and feet. Maybe the physical exertion will improve their brain function.
Still, it's a shame corporal punishment is banned these days. We've moved on to gentler disciplinary methods.
If it were up to me, I wouldn't mind, and I wouldn't hesitate to whip the stupidity out of these idiots, to ensure they'd never pull off such a moronic stunt again.