Brave New World (Jory/Hyacinth)

[Hyacinth Duprel]

Reuse it. Yes, that sounded good. Hyacinth wouldn't be able to show his work to his parents, no matter how well or how poorly he did. For the moment, his disbelief was suspended well enough to allow him to simply accept that advice instead of wondering at it.

He found himself with a basket of parchment scrolls and sheets of papyrus, a bottle of black soy ink, and various other things, such as a pewter quill sharpener shaped like a small bird. The quills he saved for last, finally making his way through feathers of all shapes and colors back to Jory's side.

"I have everything except a quill now," he said. "There are so many kinds!" There was even, he noticed, one which looked more like a porcupine quill than any kind of feather.

[Jory Addison]

"Yeah," Jory said. "You don't really need anything fancy, though, they pretty much all write the same in the end." There was the rare quill that wrote super smooth or blotted too often, but all in all as far as Jory was concerned the only reason to get a more expensive one was because of its looks.

[Hyacinth Duprel]

Hyacinth nodded, though he hadn't intended to buy anything fancy at all. He'd chosen the simplest and least costly of the things he needed, and would continue to do so. He had difficulty keeping himself from touching the frothy, multicolored feathers, but somehow found his way to a small display of basic quills. Even then, there were more choices than he'd ever been given at once, and he stood, as he had over every item, wondering how to decide.

[Jory Addison]

"Don't get too attached to the ones you get," Jory said. "They'll get broken and lost by next term, most likely." He had given up trying to keep up with everything and just decided to buy new generic quills whenever he needed one. However, he usually kept one good quill he used for his journal and letters. He grabbed an Eagle feather before he stopped by Hyacinth.

[Hyacinth Duprel]

"Thank you, Jory," Hyacinth said. He nodded, grateful for the advice, and ended up just grabbing a few basic quills at random. He couldn't decide, so he got a few of the less fancy-looking ones and turned back to Jory with a smile. It was difficult not to feel a little proud of having done so much in so short a time, but pride was sinful, and soon remorse at spending so much of his parents' money set in.

That remorse only deepened as they moved from shop to shop, his arms weighted down with bags of writing supplies, clothes, a cauldron, and all number of other things. He was wondering how he would be able to carry anything more when his eyes caught on a shop with several cages hanging outside, some of which contained owls.

"Owls are used for mail, yes?" he asked, flicking a glance at Jory. "That is a Pet Store?" It was difficult understanding how owls could be used for mail, but it was something his teacher had explained, and a reason he had special arrangements for his own mail while at school. Still, even if he were to accept that owls could deliver things, it was odd to think of the birds as pets.

[Jory Addison]

"Yeah," Jory said. "There's a lot of cool stuff in there, two of the professors, Dare and Michael Blackwood-Hardt, used to live there and run the place before they started teaching and moved to Hogwarts. Wanna go in?" He hadn't been in the place in a long time, but he remembered the various excited animals being fun to watch.

[Hyacinth Duprel]

"Yes, very much!" Hyacinth said. He had siblings with pets, mostly things they brought home now and then and sneaked into the house, but he'd never had one, no matter his fondness for them. He got another shock when they stepped inside, however. He'd never seen so many animals at once, and though it was difficult to hear through the noise, it wasn't at all difficult to see.

"What is this?" he asked, approaching a large glass enclosure displaying what appeared to be a gigantic tortoise with a jewel-encrusted shell.

[Jory Addison]

"I think it's a fire-crab," Jory said. "We haven't looked into them much for Care of Magical Creatures. They're pretty cool, but I think people hunt them for their shells, which sucks. There's a lot of regulations around magical creatures. Like crups don't like muggles, that kind of thing." He gestured over to the window where a little gaggle of crup puppies were playing.

[Hyacinth Duprel]

Hyacinth's brows drew together as he pulled his gaze away from what looked nothing like a crab to what looked like a bunch of rolling puppies with forked tails. "Those little dogs can tell if someone has no magic?" he asked. And they don't like them. It seemed wrong to dislike anyone for such a thing. Even his parents loved him.

[Jory Addison]

"Yeah, they're really loyal to wizards, though," Jory said. "I heard of some man who would dock one of the forks and sell the dogs to muggles. The jerk got put in jail for endangering muggles." There were certainly some bad apples in the wizarding world.

[Hyacinth Duprel]

Hyacinth dropped a handful of bags to cross himself, praying first for the innocent people involved, then for the dogs, though he understood neither the word dock nor forks as they related to animals, and finally for the man so led astray that he would do such a thing. Perhaps such evils weren't as uncommon as Jory had suggested earlier. The thought was frightening, and only the reminder that his wand was moral, that such a magical item could disapprove of evil, as though it was sentient, gave him comfort.

"We should leave, maybe," he suggested. "I still need books." And there were too many things which made him question whether he should have accepted any of this at all.

[Jory Addison]

"Most of the animals aren't like those," Jory said, grabbing a bag or two to help Hyacinth. He went over to a large, flat crate of pygmy puffs of all colors. "Like these? A lot of people have these, they're sweet and they kind of love everyone. And they'll eat just about anything so they're super easy."

[Hyacinth Duprel]

Hyacinth thanked Jory for the help and divided his remaining bags a bit more comfortably between his hands, then followed, unsure. He peered into the crate expecting to see something else which resembled a more familiar animal, but rather, they were balls of fluff which had no identifiable body parts at all. He wouldn't have believed they were alive, but they were rolling a bit, and some of them were piled up and seemed to be humming.

"These are animals?" he asked. He set his bags down. "Can they be touched?"

[Jory Addison]

"Yeah, definitely," Jory said. He reached in and picked up an orange one. "I've always kind of wanted one." He had had multiple pets that had been forcibly returned to the wild when he was younger, but since coming to school hadn't had any pets at all.

[Hyacinth Duprel]

Hyacinth watched Jory and the ball of orange in his hand a moment before daring to reach in and attempt to catch one himself. Not only did a soft blue one roll toward him, but the moment his fingers closed around it, it began to vibrate softly. "It is doing cat sound!" he said excitedly, and lifted it gently, then opened his hand. He mimicked purring for Jory, and looked bright-eyed as the creature purred ever slightly louder in response.