Bagsy Beetlehorn and the Vampire Affairs (The Bagsy Chronicles 4)

A New Term

Starrett's message had said to go to the Charms classroom when possible which, for Bagsy, meant the last possible moment she could excuse avoiding it any longer. Fearfully, she'd been expecting that to be double Charms the next morning. She was surprised to find, however, that Professor Starrett was acting differently in the lesson.

She wasn't rude to Bagsy, but nor did she ignore her, either. Instead, as she circulated the class, checking the students' wand movements and incantations, she paused by Bagsy and Mezrielda and gave polite feedback.

'Your movement is a little too harsh at the end,' Starrett said as Bagsy tried to cast the summoning charm. Starrett quickly motioned with her own wand how it should be done before moving on to Mezrielda, as if that would be enough for Bagsy to suddenly be able to cast spells. 'Miss Glint, you don't even have your wand out. That's another detention. If you continue to refuse to partake in lessons this term I will have to send you to the head professor and a permanent mark will go on your record.' She leant down to be eye level with her. She didn't need to lean down far. 'You don't want to anger me, Miss Glint.' With a sharp straightening of her back and a sweep of her red robes, she proceeded down the row to examine the other students.

'We haven't already angered her?' Bagsy whispered in disbelief.

Mezrielda looked stunned. 'Apparently not.'

'In that case, I hope we never do.'

'Agreed.' Looking like she was signing her own death warrant, Mezrielda sulkily got out her wand and, barley even looking at it, began to swish it about with as much joy as a lion would have eating dirt.

Their Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson was a little more interesting for the both of them, as for once it didn't involve spellcasting. This year, both Bagsy and Mezrielda shared a hatred for needing to cast spells.

'Why must everything we do use wands?' Mezrielda grumbled as they prepared for the lesson.

Almost as if they'd heard Mezrielda, Professor Fitzsimmons appeared in a burst of dust at the front of the classroom, the small explosion making the empty cages and creature skeletons hanging from the arched roof sway on their fixtures with alarming creaks. 'Wands away,' they announced, to angry grunts from the students, but a happy exchanging of looks between Bagsy and Mezrielda.

They spent the hour examining animated models Professor Fitzsimmons had provided them. The little models were of strange white caterpillars. Unlike the caterpillars found in the muggle world these ones, lovingly dubbed catercolumns or sneaky caters by the residents of Ancient Greece who first discovered them, were able to stand up perfectly straight in such a way where the ridges on their smooth bodies looked like the details in pillars holding up a grandiose structure.

The miniature figures of the catercolumns on their desk were rather cute and Bagsy jokingly named each one of them to eye-rolls from Mezrielda.

'And this one is Squeaky the sneaky cater!' Bagsy said, prodding the catercolumn pretending to be the pillar on the furthest right of the miniature building they were camouflaging with.

'No, they're not,' Mezrielda huffed.

'Why not?'

Mezrielda grumbled something quietly.

Grinning, Bagsy leant forward to look at her friends turned-away face. 'You've already named them, haven't you?'

'Don't be ridiculous!' Mezrielda dipped her quill in ink and filled out the worksheet they'd been given. 'Catercolumns are territorial and highly aggressive,' she said out loud as she wrote, nudging Bagsy to get back to work and drop the subject.