Finished Stupid Feather PV Lamik

Alan nodded thoughtfully, Lamik had a point. People could simply just go around the tree, even as intruders. Only wizards and witches could go onto the grounds of Hogwarts and those must know about the Willow. ”It is an uncommon plant though... why else would they plant it on the school, if they could have put it anywhere else?”

Alan had no idea, but it was a question that made him curious. Why could there possibly a violent tree here, so close to students yet far enough away from the actual castle to bring anyone in danger; except for those students that wandered to close. It was dangerous and a safety hazard. Then again that would not be the only place dangerous. Alan took a glance at the Chocolate Frog Card he just unwrapped and showed it to Lamik.

”Do you need this one? I have it already”, it was not a special card. It was of some spell inventor and on the small moving picture they just cast the spell over and over again. A repetitive moving image, which for the second year was one of the most normal things. Every magical camera had that function as far as he knew. Then there were moving portraits all around Hogwarts, however those were a bit more difficult than moving images.

At first, Lamik wasn't going to take the card. Alan had already given him the chocolate frogs for no good reason, and Lamik didn't feel comfortable taking more. Curiosity got the better of him, however, and Lamik took the card cautiously while yelling at himself mentally. "Well... I don't have any since I haven't had a chocolate frog before." As the boy inspected the card he felt butterflies in his stomach. He didn't care whether or not it was rare, to him this wizard was incredible- purely because it was his first card. "Thank you." The boy looked back up at Alan with a wide smile.

The fact that the Whomping Willow was uncommon made the situation even stranger in Lamiks opinion. "You would think that A rare plant would be put somewhere safer- like a greenhouse or a nature reserve. No, that still doesn't work." Now Lamiks curiosity was building up again. He had been at the willow once before- almost getting detention- but that was only because some kid agitated it. All the first year wanted to do was have a look at the tree. Who knew what they would find? A treasure its guarding? Hidden passages to one of hogwarts dungeons? The possibilities seemed endless.

He looked at the other boy in shock, his eyes widening at the statement. ”You never had a chocolate frog?”, he asked as if it was a crime, maybe it was. Was it a crime to never have eaten a chocolate frog before? For Alan it clearly sounded like one. ”I should show you Hogsmeade when I have the chance, where you in Hogsmeade before? You should have, but were you?”, he asked, curiously staring at the boy.

Alan was in Hogsmeade a lot, even if it was not allowed. He was there probably once a month to restock his sweets, which involved mostly – what a surprise – chocolate frogs. He did not know where to put all the cards he had collected so far. Some of them he had above twenty times and he had no use for the cards, except the ones he still needed. But he would only need one exemplar of each card. ”You can get a folder for the Chocolate Frog Cards in Hogsmeade, in Honeydukes which is one of the most known Candy Stores. You cannot call yourself a sweet tooth before having been there once”, he said, mysteriously. Honeydukes was incredible, one of his most favorite shops in whole Hogsmeade.

Lamik nodded. His family didn't have much money- not much from the wizarding world, anyways. When it came to muggle money Lamik had never known a life where he didn't have what he needed. Of course, he didn't always get his way- the young trouble maker often didn't- but he always had the important things: a loving family, a roof to live under, food, clothes, and many comforts that any child should have. When it came to the number of Galleons that he had stored in Gringotts though, things were a bit different. Even though his parents had been given proof that magic was real, they weren't stupid. No one would just trade in several thousand euro for supposedly "magical money" that they had never heard of. No, his parents had exchanged just enough muggle money so that Lamik could buy all of the things he needed for Hogwarts, and a few things he didn't. "Never."

When Alan mentioned going to Hogsmeade the boy was a little bit confused. As far as he could gather, students needed some sort of fancy permission slip to get into the village, one that you could only get during your first year. He wanted to go pretty badly, of course. It sounded like a really nice place, but the boy had no idea how to get his hands on a permission slip. "Of course I want to go- We cant though. I'm only eleven."

Alan chuckled slightly and shook his head. ”I am no third year either! Not yet at least, but I will be soon...”, he explained a glint of cheek shining in his eyes. ”There is a store that sells fake permissions! I found mine, luckily; another student must have dropped it- But in Diagon Alley you can get a fake permission slip when you are home over the summer!”, he explained Lamik. ”But don't get caught using it or the professors will take it away”

”But it would be cool to show you Hogsmeade, especially Honeydukes! They have everything there Acid Pop, Cauldron Cakes; these are cool they have bubbling green stuff! And then there are Pepper Imps-”, he snickered at the memory of first trying them. ”You should go there at least once, maybe I could give you my Fake permission, when I am third year, because I would not need it anymore!”, he offered with a huge smile. Alan did not even pay money for it, since he found it, so Lamik did not even have to feel bad about it. At least that was the way Alan was thinking. After all he would not need it anymore, if he was officially allowed to go there.

Lamik doesn't immediately respond. It hadn't occurred to him that you would need an actual fake permission slip to get into Hogsmeade. Why couldn't you just sneak in? It wasn't like the village had an exclusive entrance- no gates, no magical barrier, just the peaceful town itself. "Is it even legal for a store to sell something like that?" Lamik knew that the laws in the wizarding world were different in some ways then those that he was used to, but the boy was sure that faking an official form was a big enough excuse to send you to jail in a second. He wondered how much a slip like the one Alan was talking about would cost, and made a mental note to start saving up money.

Suddenly, Alan made an absurd offer. "Hang on... you would give me the form? You barely even know me." The boy stared at Alan strangely, liking him more and more by the second. The second-year seemed very nice- but he was also humble and generous, two things which Lamik thought were extremely important in a friendship. He had already given Lamik a chocolate frog card and a few of the frogs themselves though, so there was no way that the boy could accept anything else. "No. I couldn't. You've already done enough for me."

He shrugged. ”It is not as if I paid any money for it! I found it on the grounds during my first year, so don't stress over it”, he tried to calm the other down. ”Just promise me to not use it for something that could get you into trouble!”, he insisted, looking at the younger blond. This guy seemed really friendly, making Alan smile slightly.

”As for the store? I don't know if it is legal... It is just printed paper, no? And what the professors don't know....~” he hinted, smiling with a bit of cheek. But Alan knew that he himself would probably never bought one of the fake permission slips, if he had not found one. He usually tried to get into as little trouble as possible, but in the end curiosity had won and if he was honest... he was not a Gryffindor for no reason! Or maybe he was, Alan was not sure why the hat had put him into the house of lions, but Alan could not complain. Everyone he had met there had been nice and welcoming... at least the majority. "So... how do you like Hogwarts? It's been nearly a year so you probably had some adventures!"

Lamik stared at Alan for a few moments, wondering how to answer. He couldn't promise something like not getting into trouble at all. Though the boy never had any ill intention at heart, he wasn't against going against rules some times. "I... think I could only promise not to get into trouble hurting someone else." Though he wasn't sure how someone could hurt another with a fake permission slip, Lamik only knew that though the rules sometimes slipped his mind, other people well being did not. Though he was slightly worried that his inability to promise much would make Alan change his mind, Lamik thought that being honest was, in this case, more important than getting the actual permission slip.

"Well yes, it is just printed paper, but so is money, and faking that is completely illegal." Lamik wasn't sure if printed money was something that pure-blood wizards knew much about, but he continued anyway. "I think it's called forgery." Lamik had actually learned the word from some news broadcast that he had seen with his dad about some political scandal or other a few years prior. The boy, being as curious as ever, quickly questioned his father about all things relating to the subject.

With a shrug he nodded. ”I just mean that you should not make it too obvious or get caught... You have to be careful or the professors will give you detention!”, Alan was still happy that he said he would not hurt anyone. Alan just did not want anyone to come to harm or get into trouble. But the blond boy seemed nice.

”That is why muggle money is so weird, I tired to pay with a piece of paper once when I was little... At a candy store for a bonbon!”, he said and shook his head. ”And they told me off so I got my parents who paid with a few coins- pennies? I have some of those up in the dorms”, he explained. He sighed. ”And when they buy other stuff, more valuable they pay with paper? How is paper more valuable than coins? Anyone could fake paper; it is not allowed, but anyone could!”, he said with a sigh. Lamik is Muggle-born so maybe he knew why paper was so expensive? Again Alan could d Nothing but shrug. The word was not familiar to him and it was fun to go to Hogwarts.

"I said that it is not allowed, but that is why I said that you have to be careful"

"I mean..." Lamik thought for a few moments. "I haven't had detention at Hogwarts yet. It sounds sort of fun if I'm being perfectly honest." As ridiculous as it may have sounded, Lamik wasn't joking. Nearly everything that the boy had experienced involving magic had had some form of positive impact on him- whether it was learning a new skill or just a few hours of good fun. Though he knew detention was always supposed to be a punishment, the boy wondered if doing it also involved magic. If it did, what was to say that it couldn't have been just as interesting and exciting as everything else?

The questions that Alan had about money were a bit more.... difficult to answer then Lamik would have liked to admit. "Well, it's not that paper is more valuable than coins- but money isn't valuable, it's just a stand-in for something that's valuable. Why put so much effort into finding and pressing precious metals when you could use something that's lightweight, easy to carry around, cheap, and easier to produce? And it's not like muggle money is easy to fake. If you look closely at coins and bills you'll see all sorts of things that are made to prevent faking. Tiny marks, symbols that are only visible if you put the bill in front of a light, special kinds of paper, wax seals- it's all there for a reason."