Hex The Sneezing Hex, First Year

Lallie had been curious about learning this charm. On one hand, this is probably a fantastic spell to know going into a duel. On the other hand, she knew what it was like to have a sneezing fit, considering she always had one whenever she sneezed, and it wasn't a very pleasant experience. She decided to go since this would be a good spell to learn that would distract an opponent without hurting them.

Walking into the History of Magic classroom she saw nothing but a bunch of students and some tissues. That meant they were going to be testing the spell out on each other. 'Boy this is going to be chaotic.' Lallie thought before sitting down in one of the desks.

Lallie sighed in sadness at the professor's announcement. Lallie finally realized the school year is almost over. That meant that she would be going back home for the summer. She was excited to go back home and all, but she had gotten used to this place and she would miss her friends and professors.

'Ok STÉ-lee-us.' Lallie thought repeating the incantation out loud a couple of times. She then took her finger and repeated the hand movement. She did it again with her wand. It kind of reminded her of an overhand throw except, at least Lallie hoped, it didn't get thrown out of your hand.

After practicing for a bit Lallie went to go find a partner. Everyone else seemed to have picked a partner so Lallie went over to someone in the back who seemed to be lost in thought.

"Hey, do you want to be partners?" Lallie asked. The person nodded in agreement.

Standing a couple of feet away from each other they had decided Lallie would be the first "test dummy". Bracing herself she felt a blast of energy and then suddenly she started sneezing like there was no tomorrow. The sneezing fit only lasted a couple of seconds though and it wasn't anything Lallie wasn't used to so she bounced back pretty quickly.

After the sneezing fit, she went through her incantation and hand movement again before turning back to the classmate. She took a deep breath and focused all her energy on the magic about to come out of her wand and the words she uttered. "Steleus" she yelled bringing her wand down towards her target. She felt a pulse through her body and looked to see if her classmate had started sneezing

Professor Edit: Zahid walked past one of the Gryffindors as she successfully hexed her classmate. He stopped for a moment to give her a nod. “Good work, Miss Luna. But remember, you do not need to yell your incantation to make it work.” With a slight smile he moved on to correct a Slytherin boy's pronunciation.

Steleus learned

As she walked into the History of Magic classroom, Bridget discovered that today would be another practical lesson for learning spells. She stood on her tiptoes to see over the other First Years. The Professor wasn’t here yet, which was odd, because he was a very punctual person.

A moment later, he entered and explained that today would be the last lesson like this, active and unrelated to history. The Sneezing Hex would be the spell learned today. Although Bridget wasn’t interested in dueling, she figured it was good to know a few spells to defend herself. She was bound to have to duel in Defense Against the Dark Arts, and this spell couldn’t injure someone—or could it? She’d have to go to the library later to find out how powerful the Sneezing Hex could be.

As instructed, Bridget practiced the incantation and movement separately before attempting to cast the spell.

“STÉ-lee-us,” she said, quietly so as to not draw any attention but loud enough to clearly pronounce the syllables. She repeated the proper pronunciation seven times before she felt she had it down. She had struggled with the pronunciation last class, and she didn’t want to make the same mistake twice.

Next, she silently practiced the wand movement. Although it was harder than the movement in the other classes, it was still relatively simple. She pretended that one of the desks along the wall was her target. Pointing her wand towards it, she swiftly brought her wand in a downwards direction. She did it one more time for good measure, then went to find a partner.

Personally, this would be the hardest part of class. Although all she had to do was walk up to someone and ask to work with them, Bridget found the task hard. She was shy and did not just strike up a conversation with a stranger.

‘You’ve been in class with these kids all year—this should be easy!’ she scolded herself. But it wasn’t easy—everyone else seemed to have a partner already. She was the odd one out.

Then someone tapped on her shoulder. She swung around to find a smiley Hufflepuff girl (NPC) who asked her to be her partner. Bridget agreed, saved from having to be the one making a move.

Bridget went first. Although this was a hex, which had different casting rules than charms, she still concentrated hard on making her partner sneeze.

“Steleus!” Bridget said firmly with the pronunciation she had practiced, bringing her wand down in the direction of her partner. She waited for the girl to start sneezing. She was about to find out if she was any good at aggressive spells.

Professor Edit: As Anna Cornwall collapsed into a fit of sneezing, Zahid stopped next to her and her partner. "Impressive, Miss Collins." The power Bridget had put into her spell might have been a bit excessive but that's why they practiced.

Steleus learned

Another interactive class? There were so many, Millie didn't have a clue what to think of it. Were these simply classes for fun, or were they really preparation for duels. Funnily enough, she didn't know anybody she would want to duel with. Maybe Min-seo, but even then, she had begun to soften her emotions towards the Slytherin. She didn't have enough hate in her to want to actually hurt someone. Well, maybe someone.

But that thought was past her. She didn't want to hurt someone. Perhaps sneezing wasn't even a real tactic of pain. It was sneezing! A natural bodily function. Sneezing, it wouldn't hurt anybody.

"STÉ-lee-us." The pronunciation seemed more than unreal to her, and perhaps so to anyone else. Magic wasn't unreal, she had grown up with it! It wasn't something scary, nobody in her immediate family was a muggle. She didn't have any aunts or uncles, and her grandparents on her mothers side, who were muggles, had passed away.

"STÉ-lee-us. Easy. STÉ-lee-us, for sneezing!" Proud of herself, Millie turned towards the group of people, now time to find a partner. Most people had turned towards their friend, but she didn't recognize many people. Both Lallie and Bridget had found partners already.

A tap on her shoulder made Millie turn around. She saw a Ravenclaw boy, who asked to be her partner. She agreed quickly. Thank god. But she was going first. No way she would submit to all those sneezes first! She sounded like a chipmunk on drugs when she sneezed!

"I'll go first," She chirped. She practiced waving her wand downward and outward, and deemed herself worthy. "Steleus." She said, waving her wand, a definite note of determination in her voice. When she finished casting, she looked up at the professor. Who knew if she was going to be good at this?

Professor Edit: Passing the Gryffindor and Ravenclaw duo, Zahid nodded in satisfaction when Euphrasia succeeded in casting the hex on her frist try. "Very good, Miss Millie."

Steleus learned

This seemed to be the last spell learning lesson for first years from Professor Zahid, and who would have thought that a History of Magic Professor could also be a very excellent Charms teacher. Not that she ever doubted his ability to teach spells, it was quite refreshing. Normally, Griseldis really loved learning all kinds of different Charms but Hexes and Curses...she wasn't sure about it. But when Professor Zahid explained that the Sneezing Hex could be used in a duel, maybe it should be worth it to learn this Hex after all. Compare to the last two spells, this one was a bit challenging.

Griseldis and the other students first practiced pronouncing the incarnation of the Hex and the hand movement separately for a while until Professor Zahid wanted them to pair up with someone to try the Sneezing Hex on each other. She looked around the classroom, seeing a few students paring up together. "Hey there, wanna team up?", she turned around and saw a Slytherin boy with curly red hair walking toward her with a friendly smile. "Sure, why not.", both decided it would be wise to stand near where there was a tissue box on the desk.

The Slytherin boy was generous enough to let her go first, "Ladies first.", he said in a gentlemanly manner. "Thanks, hope you're ready for the sneeze.", Alright, I already practiced this for a few times now, let's go through this real quick! The correct pronunciation of this incarnation is STÉ-lee-us, wand movement is first downward then outward at target. It somehow turned into a habit now that every time she was about to cast a spell, she would take a deep breath and it truly helped her focus. "Steleus!", she said in a firm voice, swiftly waved her wand downward and then outward at the Slytherin boy.

Professor Edit: Stopping next to a Slytherin-Gryffindor duo, Zahid watched as first Gris and then her partner tried to hex each other. "Good work, Miss Edelhardt. Mr. Braden, the stress is on the first syllable not the second."

He waited for the boy's second try before moving on to the next students.

Steleus learned

Professor Zahid was seldom late to class, so when the blonde had entered the room, desks against the wall with several students stood awkwardly in the middle, she wondered if something had gone wrong. It wasn't long before he entered the room however, greeting them all and announcing this would be another practical class. Any spell learned was enough to please the young blonde girl.

"Ste-lee-us," she muttered to herself and shook her head, no she needed to be firmer on the first syllable. "STEE-lee-us" she said again testing the word on her tongue but she knew it wasn't quite right. "STÉ-lee-us" The word finally felt as it had sounded, and she repeated it a few more times without her wand. Next would be the wand motion, and she traced the motion in the palm of her hand discreetly.

She loved experimenting with magic, and though she still had much to learn before she could truly test the boundaries of magic, she enjoyed discovering new incantations to channel through the length of Chestnut she removed from her robes wand pocket. A few times she traced the downward motion, careful not to point at anyone or cast any intent. When she was ready she finally partnered up.

Her partner failed the first time and it gave Angellica hope that she could be first to succeed. As she stood, pointed, slashed and focused, using proper pronunciation, she had thought she'd succeded, but her partner had only yawned. Disappointed she prepared for the other girl to try again, finding herself yawning. Silly contagious habit.

"STÉ-lee-us," she said firmly, drawing her wand down towards the other student and watching with victory as she sneezed before a hand could make it to her mouth. Angellica was smug, she'd been first, but she also knew she was to be next. As the other student tried again, she felt the discomfort herself, body thrown into a sneeze she tucked in the corner of her arm to muffle the high soprano of her sneeze.

Professor Edit: Making his way through the throng of students, Zahid noticed a pair that was currently yawning. Really? He'd come to expect that (sadly) during his normal lessons, there were enough students that found History to be tedious and boring no matter how it was packaged, but during spell practice?

With a sigh he observed as the two went on to actually practice the spell - the Ravenclaw even succeeded on her first try (as far as he had seen) and he nodded to her. "Well done, Miss Rowley." Hopefully her success would wake her up - as the sneezing should wake her partner.

Steleus learned

David bit his lip as he entered the History of Magic classroom. He always felt nervous when the classroom was altered for practical lessons first thing. It gave the impression that the spell he and his fellow students would be learning would be more complicated and actually require the full duration of time available.

More oftent han not, he found this not to be the case, especially if the class was not necessarily oriented towards teaching spells. The spells for classes like History of Magic were normally rather simple and were more practically oriented. Simple Charms for day to day convenience of flights of fancy were what he might expect. Despite this information in mind, he still felt a tinge of anxiety enter his thoughts when he heard that the spell they would be learning was a Hex.

Hexes were more offensive and nature and presumably more dangerous to use and more complicated to perform than something like the Cleaning Charm. He gulped nervously. His time as a first year was almost over and he was still getting jitters over learning new magic, even though he was enamored with the idea of expanding his repertoire as much as possible.

He watched as the professor demonstrated the charm and was surprised at the simplicity. A relatively short incantation with a brief wand movement. The motion looked more or less like what David had assumed all spells were cast like, just a quick downward motion of the wand. The professor had no sooner ceased his demonstration of how to pronounce the spell before David began muttering the incantation under his breath, determined to hang on to the words before it could have a chance to fade from his memory.

As the students began to disperse into partners, David soon found himself opposite of a Ravenclaw girl who seemed to be struggling to find a partner herself. They both briefly nodded at each other before readying their wands. Before David even had a chance to ask who would be going first, a sharp "Steleus" rang sharp and within an instant, David found the irresistible urge to sneeze consuming his thoughts. He doubled over with the first one in surprise before hastily retrieving some tissues to cover his face.

After a few seconds, the Sneezing subsided and David briefly wondered to himself if she couldn't find a partner because she had a knack for springing spells on people when they weren't expecting it. He shook out his arms briefly to try and let out some of his tension before returning to where he was standing and readying himself. Before drawing his wand, he pretended to grip an invisible one in order to practice the steady cut he'd be making with his wand downward and outward towards the Ravenclaw girl, who was looking rather impatient that David had to actually practice before using a new magic.

After a few more attempts, David brought forth his wand, standing with it out the ready. He saw the Ravenclaw girl brace herself, something David wished he could have had the opportunity to do earlier.
He began to perform the motion of the hex and a crisp "Steleus" came from his parting lips. He felt a shift inside of something magical having possibly happened, and felt a twang of guilt as he checked on the status of his partner. He didn't really enjoy hexing people.

Professor Edit: Seeing a student erupt into giggles as their partner's hex hit them… that was new. He hadn't seen that reaction to a Sneezing Hex before.

"Take care to enunciate the incantation properly, Mr. Moore. It's STÉ-lee-us," he encouraged with a slight smile.

Steleus not learned

As you did not include the proper pronunciation of the spell, you did not learn it this time.
You can still learn the spell by making a new post writing how you try again - just make sure to include both the wandmovement and the pronunciation this time.

History of Magic could be mundane at times with talks of wizard history and memorizing dates and all that but this was one of those special classes she was looking forward to. Entering the classroom and taking her seat near the front, the class began almost immediately as the professor introduced the Sneezing Hex performed on some poor volunteer. It was an useful to have, that much was for sure.I know a few people who probably deserve this.She thought darkly recalling an incident back in the Great Hall. She watched intently as the teacher gave his instructions and recalled the incantation before breaking them off into pairs. As much as she was eager to learn the spell, the thought of breaking out into uncontrollable sneezing was not on her mind. She smiled at the Slytherin girl who was her partner and barely a second afterwards. Elena found herselfs hit by the spell and she felt it, it was a strong one alright as her sneezes echoed around the classroom but they subsided soon enough. Her partner was enjoying this too much evident by the smirk on her face.My turn

She had to make sure she had the incantation perfect first however, looking like a dud in front of a Slytherin was not on her to-do list."STE-lee-us....STE-lee-us.."She muttered the words over and over tracing the wand gesture in the air with her hands to get a feel for it bringing her palms downward and out as she had seen the professor do. Her Slytherin partner was not too appreciative of her practice attempts exhaling a loud sigh implying her impatience as her partner went to perform the spell a second time perhaps bored with the Gryffindor girl.Oh no, you don't.Elena drew her wand swiftly as soon as she saw the girl's hand rise and traced the motion recalling the hand gestures and uttered the words perhaps a bit too strongly but that was reinforced by her malice for this rude girl she had the unforunate fate to be a partner with."STE-lee-us...Steleus!"Repeating the incancation once more really slowly which caused her partner to stop for a second confused why Elena was repeating the spell so slowly but then the Gryffindor put it all together in one word repeating the spell almost too forcefully and the aftereffect was quite satisfying, an explosion of sneezes from the other girl that carried on for a satisfactory amount of time.I enjoyed that.SHe thought to herself smirking slightly.

Professor Edit: Stopping at yet another Gryffindor-Slytherin duo, Zahid observed as they took their turns trying the spell. He noted the annoyance of the green-tied one at her partner's caution. Giving an imperceptible shake of his head at that reaction, he instead congratulated the cautious one. "Good work, Miss Jangleton."

Steleus learned

“STÉ-lee-us”, she mumbled.
“STÉ-lee-us, STÉ-lee-us!”, this time a bit louder and more assertively. Amber was proud to admit that with every ‘extracurricular’ class that she had attended until now, her confidence had grown more and more. This school really was doing her good!
She repeated the incantation a few more times until she was familiar with the way her tongue twisted and the word formed in her mouth.
Her next step was to practise the wand movement. This was the first time that she needed to use a real gesture - instead of just  simply pointing her wand at the target - which made this lesson even more exciting.
“Downwards and then outwards towards the target”, she recited to herself, over and over again, while moving her wand in the correct motion. After a few tries she felt comfortable with the gesture, as well.
Now she just needed to find a partner...
Her gaze fell upon the Hufflepuff boy who was standing to her right and seemed to be a bit lost. Amber turned towards him with a kind smile on her lips and asked: “Hey, do you maybe want to be partners?”
The boy’s freckled face lit up and he shyly nodded in agreement.
They rapidly found themselves a free space in the crowd of students and positioned themselves opposite of each other.
“You start”, the young boy squeaked.
Amber smiled slightly and took a deep breath while raising her wand.
“Steleus”, she said and flicked her wand downwards before quickly pushing it outwards in the direction of her practice partner. The freckled boy started sneezing the second the last syllable had left her mouth.
The young girl immediately felt sorry for what she had done and quickly ran over to the tables with the tissue boxes. While still in motion, she grabbed a handful of handkerchiefs, turned on the spot and sprinted back.
Pantingly, she stretched out her hand, which was holding the tissues, towards him.
“Here you go”, she said and gasped for air. It had been a long time since she had last done sports.
The boy only managed to force out a stammered “th - tha - thank - you” which was ceaselessly interrupted by sneezes.

Professor Edit: Zahid was quite surprised as a Ravenclaw suddenly ran past him - for a moment he was worried something might have happened, but then he noticed that she had only gone for one of the tissue boxes to grab some for her partner.

Now this was behaviour he'd like to see more of in class so he smiled at the two, "Very well done, Miss Wood."

Steleus learned

Thora shifted in her seat as the History of Magic Professor introduced the first year's activity for that class. A hex...the redhead thought in wonder. Born completely Muggle, the young girl found learning any kind of spell or magic amazing. She hung back as the professor asked for a volunteer. No way was Thora about to embarrass herself in front of the class. She watched as the professor firmly said, "Steleus", and flicked his wand downwards and towards his target, a hulking Ravenclaw boy. The rest of the instruction time seemed the fly by, and soon enough, Thora found herself in the midst of ensuing chaos. "STELEUS!" the young girl could hear several people practicing, flicking their wands and practicing the pronunciation.

Self-consciously, Thora began muttering, "STÉ-lee-us! No, STEE-lee-us, wait no, it's  STÉ-lee-us!  STÉ-lee-us,  STÉ-lee-us,  STÉ-lee-us,  STÉ-lee-us," Thora tried to remember the pronunciation by repeating it. She hoped she wouldn't forget and make an utter fool of herself. Now the wand movement... thought Thora. "Downward and out towards your target..." muttered the young girl, trying to remember. The Slytherin first year flicked her wand downwards and out to the right, using a spot on the floor as her target. Then to the left. Thora grinned, glad she was finally doing it. Her confidence mounted as she flicked her wand and "Steleus" rolled over her tongue. But now, individual practice time was over. Time to find a partner... Thora grimaced as she looked around. Most other first years had already paired up, so Thora looked around, a frown creasing on her face, trying to find a fellow student without a pair. Her face visibly brightened as she saw a Ravenclaw girl (NPC) with long, brown hair. Thora waved the Ravenclaw over.
"Um, do you want to start?" the Ravenclaw asked before Thora could even a say word.
"Sure," answered Thora. She took a deep breath. "Steleus," she said firmly. And...nothing happened, to the young Slytherin's dismay. Ok, deep breath, she thought. The redhead flicked her wand downwards and towards the Ravenclaw across from her. "Steleus," her voice echoed what Thora thought in her head--STÉ-lee-us. 
The effect was instantaneous. The Ravenclaw girl doubled over suddenly, sneezing violently. Thora's mouth gaped open as she watched the other girl sway on her feet, about to collapse.
"Oh--oh, I'm so sorry," Thora immediately felt horrible for the other girl. Leaning across a desk, Thora grabbed a generous handful of tissues and handed them to the Ravenclaw. But once the girl recovered, it would be Thora's turn...

Professor Edit: Observing the next pair, Zahid was gladdened to see that there were more students concerned for their partners (and providing them with tissues). Nodding toward Thora as her partner was sneezing, he gave a "Good work, Miss Larkston."

Steleus learned