Noble Arts this year is shaping up to be brilliant

[alt_seamus]

So today, Professor Dolohov showed us this fascinating spell that lets you use your own blood to lock a box so it can't be opened. It doesn't just work on boxes -- you can also do it with an envelope, for instance. But the material has to have once been something living (like wood).

I've been wondering this evening if it works on fibres -- wool, cotton, silk, linen. Cotton comes from a cotton plant, so surely that would work. Wool comes from a sheep, and sheep are alive but I'm not sure if the wool is? And silk comes from silkworms but I don't quite know how they make it so I'm even less sure about that. I suppose I could test it out on a sock, but I'm not sure how a sock even would lock, and I don't particularly want to get blood on my socks. I think I have a little wool pouch somewhere in my trunk, if I can find it (it's a pouch for my omnioculars) so I can test that out later.

He let us try it ourselves and taught us the incantation. (You only got to try it if you volunteered, but lots of people did. I suppose I don't blame the ones who didn't, because you DID have to use some of your blood, although he taught us a spell for that, you didn't have to jab yourself with a knife or anything.)

Professor Dolohov prefers the term Noble Arts but he does use the term 'Dark Arts' quite a bit in class, since that's what we're all used to. Anyway, it was dead interesting. The Slytherins and Ravenclaws will get to learn the box spell on Friday, I think. What was your double-period class like? Ours isn't until tomorrow. (I guess it's the Slytherins and Hufflepuffs who had it earlier in the week?)

Comments

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_sally_anne]

Oh, that's a good question!

What did he say?

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_ron]

Well. He said It was a good question and showed excellent reasoning skills, and he said it was good I was thinking about self-protection.

And then he said there's not much risk of this spell being turned against you because the magic gets directed inward on the object, and because it's just meant to make the object recognise you as its owner.

And then he said it's also not very risky because it only takes a little of your blood. But get this. He said someone could do as much against you by using your hair if you don't vanish it out of your hairbrush in the mornings, or if you cut yourself a little and bleed on your robes. He said that happens to everyone all the time, so if you wanted to collect someone's blood for a Dark charm, you could just lift it off their robes.

Do you vanish your hair out of your comb and brush?

Um. He did promise he'd tell us if he's ever teaching us anything that could be really dangerous to us. So we'd know before we did it.

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_sally_anne]

I don't vanish my hair.

Maybe I should start.