“Good Lord,” Dumbledore mutters.
The other professors raise their eyebrows at him.
He chuckles. “We are going to have an interesting year.” Then he looks up. “Apparently, it’s possible to agree to come to Hogwarts with a riddle.”
Snape starts unfolding his own. “Ravenclaw, I’ll wager.” Then he sighs, and turns the freshly-unfolded letter to show the others. “This one’s done it with a single word.”
“Thank you.” The two girls bow their way out of the office, following the goblin runner back to where Professor McGonagall is waiting.
“So?” she asks. “How did it go?”
“The rate is set and the forms are signed,” Lyra states.
“And I have no idea how she got such a nice rate,” Bonbon answers.
Lyra chuckles. “Oh please. It isn’t that bad.”
Professor McGonagall raises an eyebrow. “Oh?”
“Yep,” Bonbon states. “And a mug of cider costs two bits back home.”
She blinks, waiting for the ball to drop. “Okay?”
“Like I said, crazy favorable rate. But the forms are signed, and the rate is set.”
“Though it is a little disappointing that I couldn’t get a single additional knut onto the rate,” Lyra states. “All thanks to the odd numbers of smaller denominations to make up larger in the wizard currency, it’s not possible to exchange only one bit at a time.”
Bonbon shrugs. “Oh well.” Then she looks at Professor McGonagall. “So, how much gold do we need, each?”
She blinks. “Um… Fifteen galleons should be more than enough. Each.”
“Alright,” Lyra answers, before turning to trot towards the counter again, Bonbon in tow- and the professor following.
“What is it?” the goblin behind the counter asks sharply.
“Good afternoon,” Lyra begins. “I’d like to exchange some foreign currency- Equestrian, specifically. Just signed the exchange rate.”
The goblin raises an eyebrow. “Alright, one minute.”
A minute later, the goblin returns. “Right then. The exchange rate is one galleon for two bits. How much to you have?”
Professor McGonagall blinks. Hadn’t Bonbon said a mug of cider was two bits? Something she’d often pay less than a sickle for, if she wanted it?
“Four hundred bits,” Lyra answers, placing a fairly tall stack of gold coins on the counter- before helping Bonbon place a similar stack next to it. “That’s two hundred each.”
“Oh boy,” Professor McGonagall mutters, while the goblin starts counting.
“Just what have we gotten ourselves into?” Professor Flitwick asks the air.
All the weary teachers look at him.
He sighs, laying the letter down flat. “Princess Luna will be attending.”
“... Oh.”
Snape sighs, and unfolds his next letter. Then he draws his wand to levitate the cake off of the letter, complete with platter.
All of the professors watch it go.
“Well that’s… interesting,” Dumbledore mutters. “Who is it?”
“An Equestrian,” Snape states, before looking down, blinking, and reading the letter aloud.
“Dear Professor Snape,
“I plan on attending myself, though unfortunately, the Cakes will not be coming, so I have enclosed a congratulations-on-inviting-Equestrians-and-sorry-the-cakes-couldn’t-come cake for you and the rest of the staff to enjoy; a party feels like it’d be inappropriate right now. I’m looking forwards to Potions!
“Sincerely,
“Pinkie Pie.”
“Is this… the only place for wands or something?”
“Yes?” Professor McGonagall answers Lyra’s question, as the trio enters Olivander’s.
“Ahh,” Lyra mutters, looking around. “I don’t know how many Equestrian students you’re going to have, but I hope this guy has a lot of wands.”
“I do,” Olivander states from behind them, catching only the professor by surprise. The other two fake it convincingly, though. “I have thousands of wands on these shelves.”
“Yeah,” Lyra nods. “And after only a single day, we’ve already confirmed- what was the number?- over seven hundred new Equestrian first years?”
The wandmaker stops. “Seven hundred?”
“Yeah. That unusual?”
“Yes, yes,” he states. “Quite unusual. I normally only get about forty Hogwarts first-years each year.”
The two girls share a look.
“We’re gonna break the system,” Bonbon states simply.
“Definitely,” Lyra agrees. “I mean, what’s the predicted number?”
“Eight thousand two hundred seventy-four, last I checked.”
The floorboards vibrate as the Transfiguration professor hits them, drawing the girls’ attention.
“Uh, I don’t think she was ready for that,” Lyra states. She looks back up at Olivander. “That estimate has an error of around forty percent… do you think you have enough wands?”
“I…” he begins. “I should. How… How do you suppose we’ll find the right wands for that many so quickly?”
“Hmm,” Lyra mutters, tapping her chin. “I don’t know- really depends on what that process entails. Shall we be about it?”
Blink. “Alright. Which of you wishes to go first?”
“Her first,” Bonbon states.
Lyra raises an eyebrow at her friend. “Oh?”
“Yeah- that way, you can see how it works and maybe come up with something to try and speed it up. If it works…”
“True,” Lyra nods, and steps forwards. “Alright, me first.”
Olivander blinks. “Uh, okay.”
Bonbon chuckles. “She’s got the experience to recognize what might be going on behind the scenes, in the magic fields or something.”
“Right. It is true, it is the Wand that chooses the Wizard, after all. Then, which is your wand arm?”
“Does it matter?”
“Ah, yes. Some wands favor wizards with very specific dominant arms.”
“So, my dominant arm is my wand arm?”
“Yes.”
“Ahh. That’d be my right arm.”
“Can you hold it out for me, please? Yes, just like that.”
Bonbon watches Lyra’s amused expression as the measuring tape takes over and starts measuring on its own. “How does a person’s measurements effect what wand we get?” Bonbon asks.
Lyra answers. “It’s not about the measurements, actually,” she states. “As a matter of fact, that tape isn’t even measuring my body. It’s measuring different facets of my magic, in what I assume is an indirect way to get a rough estimation of the magical core. Armed with that information, the wandmaker can pick wands whose magic signatures- no doubt memorized rather than scanned on the fly- are similar or complementary, creating a higher chance that the correct wand would be found quickly.” She sighs. “I could probably speed that up a bit, since I know how to view the core directly, but that still won’t take the guesswork out of it.”
“That would be a handy skill to have,” the wandmaker agrees, pulling down box after box.
Eventually, he calls off the measuring tape, and brings her the first box. “Thirteen and a half inches, Ironbelly heartstring, maple, nice and supple. Go ahead, give it a wave.”
Lyra raises her eyebrows as she accepts the wand, lifting it in her hand. “Thirteen points of conflict on the signature, but…” She gives it a wave; nothing happens. “Thought so.”
The wandmaker, having tilted his head at her mention of the points of conflict, takes the wand back, and goes to the next one.
Six wands later, after the wandmaker skipped a couple dozen, he finally offers her yet another. “Alright, try this one.” He draws in a breath to continue.
She speaks first, though, an eyebrow raised. “That’s more like it,” she smiles, accepting the wand in her hand- and gives it a quick flick.
The wandmaker blinks as sparks fly out from it- but he also notices the girl’s eyes aren’t focused on where she’s pointing it, but on the wand itself. He tilts his head for a moment. “Excellent,” he states. “We’ve found your match.”
“Interesting,” Lyra finally states. “Very… interesting.” She looks up. “You’re right, the wand does choose the wizard. Or witch, as the case may be. Though, it seems to make that choice when it is created, whether or not the witch or wizard in question is even born yet.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. This wand had a one-sided thaumic bond pointed at me, and when I touched it, it completed that symbiotic bond.” She grins. “And fortunately, detecting such bonds pointed at someone is much easier- and safer- than scanning the thaumic core.”
“Oh?” He sounds excited now.
Dumbledore looks up. “Hold on,” he mutters.
“What is it?” Snape asks. Then blinks.
“Minerva is unconscious,” Dumbledore answers, for the benefit of those not tied to each other through the castle wards.
“Feels like shock,” Flitwick observes.
Dumbledore closes his eyes, and drives his power through the wards. “The equestrians must be… very unusual.”
Professor McGonagall wakes up suddenly, feeling the support flowing in from Hogwarts. She sends them her thanks and rises back to her feet, in time to see Lyra pay the wandmaker for her wand.
Then the wandmaker takes one good look at Bonbon, and trots off amongst the shelves.
Moments later, Olivander returns, holding one wand, offering it to Bonbon. “Here, try this one.”
The girl takes it, raises an eyebrow, and gives it a swish.
A giant wrapped candy appears in midair, before crashing to the ground to make the whole shop shake.
“Excellent!” the wandmaker begins. “Excellent! That was perfect, Lyra!”
Lyra, meanwhile, looks at the candy, then at her friend, and back to the candy, before nodding. “An interesting manifestation,” she finally states.
Bonbon chuckles while the wandmaker vanishes the candy. “So, how much will it cost?”
Later, the two girls teleport themselves home from Platform Nine and Three Quarters, equipped with all of their school materials packed into their new trunks- and an owl each. They’d driven both her and the Eyelops proprietor crazy when they started chatting with the owls, so it’d been a relief when they'd announced they were ready for their quick trip to the station.
Very enjoyable so far, not sure I like the idea of the wands being pre-destined for there owners since it is possible to use another wizards wand or even take it for your own (Draco's wand straight up changes allegiance to Harry in book 7) and some wands get passed down through a family line not to mention repairing a wand is normally impossible so that would make things tricky for replacements.
It works well for accommodating a ridiculous number of students though and I suppose it doesn't matter too much in the long run as long as the Elder Wand remains an exception to normal rules.
Frankly, I'll give points for not just having everyone get the poor man to make them all custom wands based off their own hair. I always felt like that took a lot of the fun out of the whole process.
This seems like an error unless they decided to check out the train station after finishing in Diagon Alley.
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They did. Back in Chap. 2, that letter asked that she also help them find the station... that's the follow-up, to indicate that she took them to the station and, presumably, showed them how to get in. Because an Equestrian secret service organization would obviously plan ahead better than an 11-year old boy, so they'd never be left in the position that Harry was ("How do I get to the station?"). It's also practical for plot reasons as well- just imagine trying to get a couple dozen thousand funny-haired people to disappear casually through a brick wall in even an entire hour!
And yeah, the wand predestiny isn't my favorite either, but it got the job done- and she didn't say it was a permanent bond... Or even that it couldn't redirect itself. If it couldn't, there'd be thousands of wands sitting around pointing at long-dead witches and wizards, and noone would be any the wiser!
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Ah ok forgot about that, might be worth adding a line where they declare they are heading to the station before cutting to them leaving it.
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Yeah, it might... But eh. I kinda feel like the story flows smoother with it there as a subtle reference, for people to either miss or go "Huh?" at, then referring to it in more detail later on. That kind of a statement really doesn't fit in that timegap.
I seem to be good at those little references
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Yeah I get what you're saying, after giving it some thought maybe just a minor change to the last paragraph would work better.
From:
to something like this:
A little less jarring coming from the previous paragraph I think.
9579437
Probably, yeah...
There, little change.
Heh. And the shoe drops.
I have to wonder how Pinkie got the candles to fit in the envelope when she sent that letter. This will be interesting. Yes, I missed the point on purpose when I wrote that. Don't correct me please, it would spoil my own joke.
Probably followed by coins changing hands. I suspect it would be hard not to make bets on how this all goes, after all!
Summon Bigger Candy. I can see that having uses. I wonder when she and Pinkie have some sort of challenge? :D
Dear god, don't let her meet the Twins! That'll cause outright DISASTER!
Oh, you don't know half of it. I predict a headache portion and firewhisky will be on priority list of Hogwarts in the coming years.
Err...what kind of cake, though? Ice-cream cake? Sponge cake (my personal favourite)? Pavlova (my second favourite)? Multi-layered cake?
Detecting bonds is easy and safe? Maybe now Harry won't have to go out and bloody well martyr himself against the Dark Half-blood Orphan.
Goblins are anything but stupid. Unless black magic's mind control is involved, they would never allow this economic disaster to happen. Overall, I feel like Lyra have a bit too much initiative here. McGonagall was nothing more than 'get surprised'-machine here, which is never a good sign in fanfics and web-novels.
Yeah. Don’t fuck up. One of the heads of state entering the picture.
And keep the Ministry out of it.
Faust knows they have enough racists and bigots who will cause an international incident just by opening their mouths.
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That said, the goblins aren't stupid. They see the value of having an entire new world tromping through Diagon Alley and cleaning out the shops. Since the goblins view all currency as belonging to them, any influx is a net positive.
11236463
That said, Sajen was not wrong... and this was the first out of three renditions of the story, and the one that was the most... Wild, shall we say? The newest one, Accidental Invasion (which you may have seen already) actually shows what goes on inside that room- and it's very, very different... And more reasonable, in my opinion.
That said, the conversion rate remains exactly the same for both rewrites as well.
Anyways, AI has exceeded the point that The Gate or even On the Implications of Parallel Worlds ever reached (after rushing through the times they covered)- so while the two will offer some fairly small spoilers on some of the events, it's still going to have new stuff to explore... and as much as I hate to say it, it's ideal to read through the prior versions to fully understand the later ones. I haven't yet gotten the hang of independent writing. Each one- of The Gate and OtIoPW, at least- has a little skit at the end to point at the next rewrite in line, if you want to just read through them all.