Finished Where words fail, music speaks PV

Even for a boy as tough as Valentin, he’d had his fill of being cold. It was time to be inside in a nice, cozy room, closer to where others could help if a certain someone still wanted to get rid of him. For Christmas Val had received a wake-up call, and unable to look his quidditch co-captain in the eyes today, the white seeker sought out his oldest personal sanctuary: music.

Valentin had specific musical passages to study – whole books and scroll after scroll he recovered from his father’s estate. More than ever he felt the urgency to progress in studying his ancestors’ music in the pursuit of a certain kind of immortality, yes, but today he just wanted to feel alright again.

The sound of a violin greeted the seeker as he pressed his way into Durmstrang’s rehearsal room, tones lively and agile from not just practice, but a clear love of the music itself. The notes carried soul in a way Valentin rarely heard despite having spent a greater part of his youth performing at piano competitions, and so impressed was he that Valentin could have just stood at the doorway as to not interrupt. Yet, the music itself carried such spirit that he couldn’t stop his legs from running him over to the piano. He needed this. He needed to be with someone else in this sacred space.

Valentin hadn’t fully sat down before his fingers leapt onto the keys of Durmstrang’s grand piano, laying down a backing arrangement to lift the girl’s violin into sublime focus. The music flooded Val’s every sense as he felt his nerve endings crackle into new life. Blood pumping in matching tempo as his fine white arm hairs raised on end, there might as well have been electricity in the air. He wanted to soar on the passages of their harmonies, high enough to climb above the rainclouds of his life. Yet, once the melody ran out, the silence rang through him like a church bell across a graveyard. It was then that Valentin understood that if he didn’t get to work on his music soon, death would befall him before he could ever resurrect his ancestor’s songs. It might even be Val’s fault if his friends died without his help, for as frequently as he dragged them into the danger the Hell-Chaser so readily embraced.

The seeker’s long, pale fingers slid from the keys as he stared into the piano’s raised fall board without breathing a word. He was afraid to even turn around, lest he drag the mystery violinist into his affairs, but here he had gone again – running straight into the situation without heeding the risk to others. I don’t even need to be cursed to hurt people, even though all I want is to raise them higher… Valya’s silver-amethyst eyes began to water, but he bit his lip. He didn’t even know who the violinist was – how could he just start crying right now?

^{•Date• 10 January 2023
•Location• Durmstrang, music practice room}

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• • • •Finnish •Swedish •Russian •English • • •

•Word Count• 786 •| Valentin Schnell @Aida Mòrsgor-Ama Ellwood |•

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And just like that Maila was swept up by the music. The notes were flowing through her as if it was everything she knew and had always known. Nothing was in the way of her feelings flowing freely. Due to her eyes being closed, Maila did not notice that someone else had entered the room and even if she had, she wouldn't have stopped playing. Nothing was going to to ruin this moment of feeling free and in love with the Violin in her hands. Neither did she notice that the white haired boy sat down at Durmstrang's grand piano. Only when he started to play and let the tones of the piano flow into the tones of her violin. Her eyes opened to see the Hexwizard champion of Durmstrang. Of course she knew who he was, the question was who didn't know who Valentin Schnell was? Everyone knew their champion and seeker of the quidditch team. However, Maila still did not stop playing. Not when she thought about what he was doing here, well it was obvious what he was doing, and not when she thought about what had moved the tall boy to join in on her little heart felt session. Her gaze was directed to him as they played in unity. Valentin Schnell was sitting about three meters away from her, to Maila's left. It would have only taken her a couple steps to stand right next to him but instead of doing that, she closed her eyes again and just listened to every note they played together. It was as if the music touched every single cell in her body. It was like this every time she played. Always. Like an explosion of everything that was build up, like the rain pouring against the windows, like a cracking fire, like wind blowing the hair out of ones face and hitting you with such great force that you have to take a couple steps back. It was the feeling of being free.

And then the music stopped. Just like that. And with the music stopping, Maila slowly came back to her sense's. There was such a great silence in the room, you could have heard a feather landing on the ground. Her arms slowly fell to her sides, the violin still in her hands. She watched the older boy, trying to figure out if he was going to say something or do something. After staring at him for a bit, she turned away and grimaced at the wall on her other side. Maila's eyebrows were pulled together and her expression clearly showed that she was thinking about what to do. Or say. She could just walk out like he had walked in. Or she could start playing again. When she turned around to say hi, her lips hovered on the 'H', no sound leaving her mouth. Oh. Oh goodness. Valentin Schnell was sitting in the same room with her and he was tearing up. Like about-to-cry-tearing-up. She bit her lip closing her mouth again, much as he bit his own lip. „You know,” she said in a soft-ish voice, walking closer to Valentin, „In Finnland we say,” her hand softly laid on the boys shoulder. Goodness, he was tall. „Muutamat hädän hetket opettavat ihmiselle viisautta enemmän, kuin vuosikymmenien tasaiset olot.” a soothing smile spread across her lips. „That means 'A few moments of distress teach a person more wisdom than decades of stable circumstances.'” her violin was dangling in her right hand, close to her leg. „I'm sure whatever you are going through will turn for the better. Or maybe it won't.” Maila's eyes went wide as she realized what he had said. „Uh, sorry, didn't mean that, surely everything will turn for the better. - In life it’s generally wise to trust that everything will turn out well. - This is also a Finnish saying.” she scratched the back of her neck with two fingers, careful to not let the violin get tangled in her hair. Then she realized that her hand had been laying on this boys shoulder, who she had never talked to, for way to long. She slowly took it away and smiled awkwardly. „Hi by the way. I'm Maila.” then she stretched out her hand to him, so he could shake it. An awkward, short, yet nice laugh left her lips. It would be his choice whether he'd take her hand or leave it where it was. After that interaction, Maila remembered something. „Do you need a tissue? I have this.” she took out a white silk-like tissue, which she had gotten from her grandmother for Christmas. Oh goodness, this was a little awkward.

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Valentin rose from the piano bench and, as he turned, his amethyst stare locked onto Maila. Although his lips parted as if to speak, the intensity of his gaze said it all. More. A thunderstorm’s worth of tears welled in his eyes as if to fall with even the slightest breath.

Maila bit her lip in mirror image of the seeker, but pressed forward. „You know…” The captain stood, frozen, holding his breath as he hung on her every word. As she put her gentle hand on his shoulder, the tears in his eyes wobbled but did not fall. „In Finnland we say, ‘Muutamat hädän hetket opettavat ihmiselle viisautta enemmän, kuin vuosikymmenien tasaiset olot.’ That means 'A few moments of distress teach a person more wisdom than decades of stable circumstances.'” Valentin’s fingers curled and uncurled with enjoyment of the foreign words with all too familiar a meaning. Language was a music all its own. „I'm sure whatever you are going through will turn for the better. Or maybe it won't.” Although the girl’s eyes widened with realization at what she’d said, even as she began to backpedal a faint smile warmed Valentin’s face. „Uh, sorry, didn't mean that, surely everything will turn for the better. - In life it’s generally wise to trust that everything will turn out well. - This is also a Finnish saying.” He waved his hand low at his hip to dismiss any need to sugarcoat the words. The Hell-Chaser hated to be spared even one iota of someone’s purest truth.

As Maila took her hand away with an awkward grin, the captain’s face cooled back into the smoothness of a marble statue’s. „Hi by the way. I'm Maila.” Her hand extended again to shake his, and with such speed that it was as if he’d begun moving at the same time, his long-fingered seeking hand wrapped around hers. Without gloves and in rolled-up sleeves, Valya’s upturned right arm bore an unusual silver scar that branched like lightning as it ran from his palm up past his elbow. The seeker’s eyes brightened, and it became clear that physical contact made him glow like a touch lamp. Maila then reached for a silky tissue to offer him, but his left hand waved it away despite the gratitude in his gaze.

“Hello, Maila. I’m Valentin.”

The champion simply stood for a moment, enjoying the delicate peace of the moment. Then, at last, the alabaster boy released a long sigh and turned to walk towards a low wooden rack in the corner. Grasping a pear-shaped 11-stringed instrument made of night-black wenge and spruce wood with mother-of-pearl sound holes, Valentin returned to the piano bench to sit facing Maila.

Reducio

With the dark clouds in Valya’s eyes still heavy with water, he breathed in the silence before he began to pluck his Turkish oud and sing.

The seeker’s eyes closed in a fine spray of salt water like breath from the sea, and as he poured his pain and wonder and longing into the music, an enchanting gravity tugged at Maila. The mysterious phrasing of the music called out to her, pulling structures into orbit like unseen magic revolving heavenly bodies across the void of space. In tones evoking the beguiling of a veela, Valya’s voice resonated with mercury-smooth timbre, at times rising up as if to find a place among the firmament but then struggling back into contorted, aching spirals. Like a broken-winged dragon, like a comet trying to escape the downward pull of a star but never quite reaching escape velocity, Valentin’s voice soared over the landscape formed from the vibrations of the oud’s strings. Again and again the musical passages circled back to center in a quiet wail, and visions flashed through his mind of his black-haired friend, Mikael, struggling against the crashing waves that would drown him. Cutting with the light of his lament, Valya felt they were indeed the same.

Would Maila join in?

^{•Date• 10 January 2023
•Location• Durmstrang, music practice room}

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• • • •Finnish •Swedish •Russian •English • • •

•Word Count• 464 •| Valentin Schnell @Aida Mòrsgor-Ama Ellwood|•

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Although there seemed to be a great storm of emotions in the seeker's eyes, he smiled. Maila's heart thundered in her chest. She was unsure of what to do in a situation like this. Her words came out in a way that only showed exactly this feeling and although her words had felt like a bad way to make the older boy feel better in any way she could, he seemed to not have minded her truthfulness. He had come here with such silence that Maila felt as if he had just needed to play with someone. To feel the music rushing through his veins as a distraction to what was happening in the world and to the heavy feelings that he might felt, that were weighting him down and drowning him beneath the waves of all the strong emotions one could feel, whether they were bad or good ones. And perhaps Maila had needed it too. Someone to share her joy in the tones of music with and silence in between. There was a great power in silence and yet sometimes the power of it was too much and had to be broken. When she introduced herself, the boys hand wrapped around her own one, that she had extended in a certain longing for another friend. Valentin introduced himself and all she could really do was smile as her mind raced with possible things to say. For all she knew, maybe silence was the better option in this scenario. And there was silence for a little, until Valentin went and picked up another instrument. Maila had seen it before. It was a turkish oud. When he returned, he sat down on the piano bench again. The oud was a beautiful instrument both in sound and looks. He still had a deep feeling shimmering in his eyes and as he started playing and singing, Maila unintentionally held her breath. Her lips parted slightly as she listened to the deep emotions coming from the boy. He seemed to be one with the instrument. The air filled up with a magnetic feeling that would almost drown her in an overwhelming sense of feelings. Goosebumps spread over her arms and she had the urge to pull her sleeves down. Maila's dark eyes lingered on the boy for a few more seconds before she lifted her violin up and brought her bow at the ready. Taking a shaky breath, she would fall into the notes, joining Valentin with the sounds of her Violin. She closed her eyes as to better understand what he was feeling and saying as they played in a perfect harmony. Her heart seemed to beat in the rhythm of the music and she almost felt as if her feet were lifting from the ground.

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When words failed, for those who answered the call, there was music. Valentin’s song preserved meaning with its lyrics, like a book protecting its fragment of humanity’s wisdom, but it was the power of his melody that channeled what even the silver-tongued seeker couldn’t convey in spoken language. Within the crackling might of the soundscape thrashed a vulnerable wish that Valentin laid bare without self-mercy. While the champion’s voice echoed with bold resonance, within the nuance of the sounds’ journey, Maila came to understand that he still carried a pure fragility that could be destroyed as easily as a child. Even if she hadn’t understood a word, the melody still carried all the humility and aching of a prayer.

Maila’s violin joined in, hugging the contours and vectors of the musical trajectory, and Valentin could feel her trying to understand. This connection, the attempt to harmonize and combine, was the same as he strove for during her own piece moments earlier. Without even having to talk, they could know each other and cease from having to be separate… if but for a short window of time. This was the seeker's fundamental longing, as he played out in every game of quidditch when trying to unify his team into a single living being and transcend the limits of the mortal coil. Soaring through the heavens and over the earth and sea was not unlike being carried by music, when the self could finally dissolve into the elements and feel as one with it all. This same urge ran through Valentin's whole life, a current taking whatever shape it had to because of the need to find its way. Pouring his life into learning and leadership and music and meditation, however, still had not bridged the gap Valentin yearned to cross... and for all his effort, a seemingly immovable dilemma kept him from living out his calling. A face haunted him in his dreams, reflecting off of dark water along with the streamers of a meteor shower, but never appeared above the lake's surface. Grasping through the surface only ever seemed to soak him with all the frigid blackness of space, and yet, his heart never forgot and continued to return there time and time again. Perhaps Maila would find such feeling within Valya's musical phrasing.

When silence came to overtake the air once more, Valentin looked up at Maila with gratitude in his amethyst eyes. Yet, they seemed to still plead with her. His tears had not yet fallen, as if something were holding them shackled to their curving lenses. The boy’s lips twisted, as if asking her to stay. Please, more. Please. There was still something in him he was burning to resolve – a conflict, a question, a wound – but how could he ask one whom he’d only just met? To try to talk at the pace of conversation, of trying to get to know each other, felt so slow to Valentin that the chance of receiving an answer could dry up faster than he could even ask. In the realm of music, however, perhaps the speed of one’s spirit was as good as a ray of light. The white seeker began to play again on the night-black oud, accompanied by his silky tenor singing as if reaching out. For too long, Valya had hidden away his pain and wishing and truth, turning him as cold and breakable as an ice sculpture. Both in warning and in desperation, Valentin cried through the music to be set free.

@Beatrice Dupont / Maila Aurora Laine

^{•Date• 10 January 2023
•Location• Durmstrang, music practice room}

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• • • •Finnish •Swedish •Russian •English • • •

•Word Count• 811 •| Valentin Schnell @Aida Mòrsgor-Ama Ellwood|•

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Maila felt her heart beat in the rhythm of the music, pushing blood through her body in a strong sense, leaving her fingers tingly and her head light. It was as though the music swallowed her whole. The most beautiful feeling of all. She would never understand how someone could not feel drawn to the notes flowing through the air and ones body, pushing out even the most hidden of feelings just because of this sound reaching ones ears. When the last notes twisted in the empty room, Maila took some time until she could open her eyes. Her arms fell to her sides, careful to not hit her precious instrument onto the ground. When her eyes fell on the tall and white haired seeker, he was looking at her. If he allowed it, her eyes would lock on his, studying the emotions inside those amethyst colored storm clouds of his. Tears were threatening to fall over the edge like rain barely hanging on to their water filled clouds before they couldn't hold on any longer. Only that Valentin was not at this breaking point just yet. Maila bit her bottom lip wondering if she could say anything to help his situation even just a little. But silence was the better choice. His gaze was almost pleading, gratitude of their harmony mixed within. And questions. Questions Maila would not have an answer to. She took a deep breath, her chest rising and falling again, signalling reassurence and calmness. Like one of those anxiety videos her mother had played for her on their shared laptop when Maila was two days before a competition. This was something else though. This was raw emotion, pure hurt and confusion. His deep feelings almost brought tears to Maila's own eyes while playing, almost like she could understand what he was going through. Almost like she could with her twin. But with music. Once Valentin started to play again, Maila stood there for a couple moments, the hairs on her arms rising with deep bone chilling notes and his voice that seemed so ethereal. There was no doubt in the fact that Valentin was quite talented in a lot of things, singing and playing the oud not last. Maila would only join in at certain moments, barely audible. His emotions were so raw that she was scared to disturb them.

A great load of feelings seemed to float in the room even after the music had stopped once again. A thousand songs would rush through Maila's mind. One specifically that she felt Valentin would enjoy. One that her mother had sung for her since Maila was four years old. Not About Angels. She had always exchange the lyrics for her, singing this whenever Maila feared she had failed at something. Instead of "Don't give me up" she had always sung "Don't give up" and Maila had cried in her arms, whether it was a scraped knee or a failed competition. This song may have a different meaning but for Maila it was about showing that you are present. It was about being there for one another and realizing that you are not a failure. It was about realizing you are loved. And as she gently lifted up her Violin once again, Maila would think about those feelings. Her body started moving on its own, like a routined dance, only that she wasn't actually moving a lot of her body. She was standing still. Taking a deep breath, the notes would start leaving the strings of her violin and echoing throughout the room.

Her dark eyes lingered on the seeker for a few moments before she lowered them. Her voice gently pulled into the music, intervening with the cords of her most prized possession. She would sing the lyrics her mother had made up, mixed with the real ones but her voice was barely audible, afraid to ruin her violins sound. Perhaps Valentin could find what she was trying to knit into the air. Perhaps he would feel as though a blanket of protection and compassion would fold around him or perhaps he would feel a rain of energy and the love of a stranger trying to give some strength. Maila hoped he would pick up her feelings in this as much as she was able to pick up his. Perhaps he would even join in. When silence touched the air once more, Maila looked at her shoes instead of anywhere else. She would stare at the red color, controlling her own breathing before she was able to look back up. Her arms had fallen to her sides again but her body had tensed. She was not used to sharing music in this way. So raw and pure. So rare. And as a small smile formed on Maila's lips, she would radiate warmth and comfort without even realizing it.

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^{•Date• 10 January 2023
•Location• Durmstrang, music practice room}

• • • • •

• • • •Finnish •Swedish •Russian •English • • •

•Word Count• 353 •| Valentin Schnell @Aida Mòrsgor-Ama Ellwood|•

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Maila's eyes remained closed throughout the entirety of her play. She felt as though she was sharing so much of her own fears and catching Valentin's all at once. Her eyes felt glued shut. Glued with the power of music. Only as the last musical notes echoed through the room, she allowed herself to open her eyes again but she could not yet look at the white haired seeker. Her heart was beating so fast, the adrenaline of sharing so much of her just with a piece of music, soaring throughout her whole body. The air seemed electric with emotion, a storm of unspoken words filling the oxygen they were breathing. Unspeakable words. Unspeakable with no need to be spoken, just to be understood. Yes, an understanding presence that they could find in each other's music. In each other's playing and the desperate feeling of wanting to understand. Where their words failed, music spoke.

Almost inaudible crying let Maila look up as all chaos in her mind disappeared. Weeping. Gasping. Quiet Cries. Maila's features softened as her eyes locked onto the older boy. Her breath almost got stuck in her throat and her eyebrows furrowed with an overwhelming sense of emotion. The need to comfort this boy. The need to ask and understand. The need to help with what seemed so broken. A soft cluttering sound could be heard, coming from Maila putting her Violin back in her case, never taking her eyes off of the boy. She wasn't entirely sure what she was doing until she was doing it. Her legs carried her over to Valentin, quietly and almost as if she was trying to not disturb him. She sat down on the piano bench beside him, gently, quietly. And then she laid her hand on one of his and ever so gently snuck an arm around his back. Her touch was incredibly light and she was trying not to get too close to the seeker, not knowing if this was even okay for him. „It's going to be okay.” she told him, not even knowing what was wrong to begin with.

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Valentin felt the movement of air around him, eyes squeezed shut through the tears, as Maila came to hold the weeping champion. While the violinist had only just met the White Seeker of Durmstrang and had little reason to know it, few had such an enduring need for physical contact as Valentin. With his gasping mouth open as if to finally explain, all the boy could emit was a hissing cry from the back of his tight throat. How was he supposed to tell the near-stranger that he was afraid he would never be good enough for someone, that he would be alone for the rest of his life and never able to bridge the gap between people, especially after their music had momentarily destroyed the walls between them? It felt like it would have been a denial of the very real unity they had just shared, simply to admit his fears. Unable to resolve the dilemma, all Valya could do was cry into Maila’s shoulder.

When the seeker’s tear ducts had run dry, he still felt no satiation, no solution, but there was a glow of catharsis beginning to pulse in his chest again. At least they had shared this moment in time and created a brief glimpse of what unity could be. He would remember this day.