Charms Final – Practical

An idea began taking shape in the girl's mind at the thought of something to aid the pineapple. Well, you can't dance without a partner, she thought with a grin.

"Tarantellegre!"

Aiming her wand at the quill, the girl smirked as it jumped and started twirling. Casting the spell a second time at the fruit, she watched as it joined in. The pink quill and the pineapple twirled and moved around each other in a most hilarious display of motions, but one that could be passed off as a dance.

The pineapple even bent slightly as though bowing to the quill. The girl let out an involuntary giggle.

Alice smiled at her pineapple thinking about the dance movements and how to command the dance moves to it. She raised her wand watching the video she had created in her mind of the dance move the pineapple would dance she said the charm in a loud clear voice moving her wand in a rhytmic motion.

"Tarantellegre!", she watched as the pineapple pivoted backwards two steps and to the side as she stood facing the pineapple she held a finger at the top of the pineapple as the pineapple twirled gracefully before stopping she said the spell once more, "Tarantellegre!" The pineapple began flowing across the room on her table as she used the wand as a guide in the movements it twirled before dropping low close to the edge she held out her hand catching it in a final tango-like position spinning it back to its place on the middle of the cloth she had laid down. YES! I did it finally, I should owl Papa later and tell him thanks for the lessons of dancing on his toes.

Time was running, she had to get this, and fast. “Tarantellegre… why does that feel familiar…” she muttered to herself, writing down the spell so it was there for her to see. She thumped her forehead and grinned. It had been in one of the books she’d nicked from Mr Parkinson. It wasn’t a particularly nice way of using the spell that she’d read about, but she had read about it.

She hummed absently writing down the pronunciation so she wouldn’t screw it up. “Tuh-rahn-tuh-lehg-rah. Tuh-RAHN-tuh-LEHG-rah.” She said to herself firmly. She kept saying it over and over while her mind ran through the various dances her mother had made her learn. At least it was actually becoming useful.

She eyed the delicious fruit carefully. They only got the one. If she screwed it up, well, she was screwed. That wouldn’t do. She ripped a chunk of parchment off a roll and scrunched it into a vaguely elliptical shape, trying to mimic the pineapple as closely as possible. It sat, lopsided on the desk and she made a face. It really didn’t look much like the ball of juicy deliciousness next to it. Oh well.

“Tarantallegre.” The process of trying to make the ball of parchment dance took several attempts. This was not an easy charm. It took many attempts to get it right, but the ball of parchment eventually circled the desk in a vaguely dance-ish manner.

“Tarantallegre.” She finally managed to guide the parchment in a twirling, spiralling sort of dance, not dissimilar to the figure skating one of her friends at home had done. It definitely wasn’t as graceful as her figure skating, but Cat suspected that it would do.

Now for the real challenge. The pineapple. Cat raised her wand at the pineapple. “Tarantallegre.” The fruit shuddered and circled a bit. It was heavier than the scrunched up ball. Cat licked her lips and tried again. “Tarantallegre!” She liked charms. One measly little spell was not going to get in her way.

The pineapple began to dance the routine. Two simple circles, move a little forward, move a little back, a series of figure eights around the desk and a small hop at the end. The thud as it hit the desk was loud and Cat winced. She checked the pineapple, relieved that it hadn’t cracked.

Then she smiled. It had been shaky, but it had been a dance.

She checked the clock at the back of the room. There was still time enough to perfect it.

“Tarantallegre!”

Cat managed to get the fruit to dance the routine smoothly, though she had to moderate the jump a few times. It had made her quill bounce into the air briefly upon impact.

35 minutes to go. Still, Dimitri had not moved yet. He knew the dance, he knew the wand motions, he knew the pronunciation. For the first half of the class he had just sat there, studying the pineapple. The pineapple was the problem here, not the magic. He had turned a frog into a pepper shaker, after all, the magic must be fine. No, the problem here was the pineapple. It had no nervous system to manipulate, but he had pulled a table through the air in his duel with the Headmistress, and tables did not have wings. He was a wizard. The laws of physics did not apply to him, did they?

He leaned back slowly. No, it would not do to leave everything to the last minute. He would have to start now. He could picture the pineapple turning upside down, dancing on its spear like fronds. He could do this. Confidence was key.

He hefted his wand, fingers tracing along the wood. "Tarantallegre," he said softly, taking a slow breath. "You can dance." His brow furrowed, as he leaned closer, this time adding the wand motions. "Tarantallegre." He stared at the pineapple, scowling as it did nothing. "You will dance!"

Cass was one to look on the bright side, and the bright side was that out of any of the spells in the world- any- the spell that she was being graded on for the entire year wasn't Wingardium. So thank you Merlin, love Marling.


Oh great. Everyone seemed to be finished already. Samantha- done, of course. Dixie, finished just a moment before her. Yep. Everyone apart from Dimitri and another person behind her making a small racket behind her.
And Cass had still not progressed from the shaking like a leaf stage. She kept her eyes on the untouched pineapple. This could be the pass she needed to go to second year. So she had to take things seriously. Honestly, though- what dancing did she know?

She cracked her fingers. Right. What dance styles did she know? The flamenco was the most obvious- but Cass didn't want to risk Malfoy checking on the pineapple's execution, because knowing Malfoy he probably would. Flamenco was a no-no.

How about a waltz? Straight back, the leaf head upright, floating movements, easy.
It helped that Denson Patchit her favourite cousin was an avid waltzing fan, and took to making Cass dance with him.
Right, right.

“Tarantellegre”
A jet of light hit the pineapple. It swayed slightly, and with a pop! It became animated.
But it wasn't dancing.
And what was that noise?

It sounded like crying. Cass took a moment to ask herself is she was crying. Nope. The crying was coming from the pineapple.

And as it marched up to Cass' hand and held it and danced with it, Cass realised why it was crying- it needed a dance partner.
Of all the pineapples in the world, she'd get the lonely one.
“Shut up, you emo fruit.”

Still, there was no dancing. He could see around the room that many other students had their fruit dancing away, but he continued to have trouble with his own. It had lurched, once or twice, but nothing that could be considered dancing. Where was he going wrong? The incantation was right, the wand movement was right. What he really needed was to be able to focus on the pineapple, and the steps of the dance.

He closed his eyes once more, focusing on those separate parts of the spell. Pineapple. Dance. Bringing all of his willpower to bare, trying to bring the two together.

"Tarantellegre," he whispered, as he spend all his energy in trying to bring the inanimate fruit and the lively dance together. Once more, the pineapple twitched around on the table, but there was no dancing.

Right. There, right in front of her was a pineapple, an innocent pineapple! One thoughtless pineapple, with not a dancing bone or indeed, bone at all in its 'body'.

And she had to make it dance. Right.

It clicked.
Bradley! Her beautiful warty gorgeous little ugly toad- er, frog. He knew dance! But how was Cass supposed to make the pineapple actually dance- it didn't have arms or legs!
Not to mention a head.

At which point, Cass had an idea. The two back-up quills she had for her theory exam. She broke in half, and pushed them into the edges of the fruit, using the sturdier nib end for feet.

What else was she needing? Ah, yes. Music.
With her free hand, she tapped out a rhythm, starting out as her favourite Weird Sister's song, but developing into something else. Before long, she was humming along with an impromptu tune.

She pointed her wand at the pineapple, thinking what moves Bradley would show off. She stopped her tune to mumble, “Tarantellegre!”

What. What was this pineapple-quill cross breed doing?!
Oh my sweet apple crumble.

The pineapple was River dancing. Right. That was normal. Right. Swishing and hopping and kicking?

The zealous kicking- at least that was what it looked like to Cass came to a climax, hypnotising her to the spot. The pace and leg charge of each kick going slower and slower. Soon enough, Cass visualised chorus lines, streams of dancing pineapples, all synchronised Irish river dancers.

She ended her humming on a melancholic note, as the pineapple lay on the table, curling into itself.
Cue crying.

She grinned.

Tristyn flicked his wand lazily at the chalkboard and a list of students appeared.

Samantha Quill
Harmony Lupin
Indiana Lamperouge
Mary McNeely
Jasmeet Kaur
Reina Nox
Theresa Cotgrave
Alexandria Black
Alice Caelum
Hilary Ayres
Will Black
Dixie Evans
Cassopeia Marling

“The following students have managed to make their pineapple dance - or close enough – and may leave the class unless they wish to try some more. I will of course, not tell you how well you did. For those who have yet to join this happy group, you have 20 minutes to do so.”

Raven scowled at his fruit when he heard he only had twenty-five minutes left. As he glared at his pineapple, he tried to think of something, anything that could get the dang thing to dance. He scoured his mind then felt like laughing. It had been there this whole time. Biting his lip he eyed his pineapple. But would the thing move like he wanted it too? Pointing his wand muttered, "Tangellegra!”
Grinning broadly when the fronds moved he snickered. Well, Malfoy didn't say they had to be a dance you did with your feet. Glancing at Will he followed his lead and hummed under his breath.
The green appendages started to form the letters Y, then M, then C, and finally A.
As he hummed the YMCA, that he had despised his mother always singing, it was coming in handy. The pineapple tottered in beat as it tried to dance while Raven had it's leaves performing the letters on each chorus.

Twenty minutes. He had left it too late. The pineapple still was not dancing, and he was beginning to lose his cool. Time was ticking. The pineapple had to dance. Charms was essential to be an Auror. He was not going to let this pineapple beat him. His hands tightened on his wand, knuckles turning white. He was not going to fail!

He took a deep breath to steady himself, and let go of the wand. He leaned back in the chair, doing what he could to keep calm. His father had always told him that he was too quick to get worked up, and that he needed to stay calm. The tension was not helping the situation. He ran through a few little games in his head, just to distract him from the tension.

Once he had finally calmed himself, he hefted the wand once more. It was time to make the pineapple dance. He was Dimitri Krum, and one day he would be the most famous Auror the world had ever seen. No pineapple was going to stand in his way. "Tarantallegre!" This time, the pineapple did more than wiggle. It flipped up onto its fronds, and started to bob up and down, fronds kicking out with each bob. With a loud whoop, Dimitri punched his fist into the air. It was not brialliant, but it was unmistakable. His pineapple was doing the cossack dance.

"Mr. Krum, Mr. Drake, you have achieved the requirement for the assessment, you're free to leave," the wizard drawled at the two students, his eyes roving the clock once again. He wished he could pull out his book, it wasn't like he wouldn't catch them cheating even if he was blindfolded. But rules were rules.

With an inaudible sigh, Tristyn returned his attention to the rest of the students struggling with the charm.

Naty didn’t liked exams at all, and this wasn’t the exception, it wasn’t that she wasn’t good at charms, it was just the pressure that came along with the exam, so when she got to the classroom and took her seat, her hands were a little sweaty and she couldn’t stop moving her right foot up and down nervously.
She looked closely at the pineapple in front of her on top of her desk while she listened to prof. Malfoy give the instructions.
*make a pineapple dance?* she thought with alarm *it doesn’t even have anything that resembles feet or arms, or even a waist, how are we supposed to make something look like it’s dancing if it doesn’t have a waist?*
Once prof. Malfoy finished, the entire classroom was in complete silence while all the students looked wide eyed at the pineapples.
*Ok, I only have this pineapple, I can do this, it’s not that different from the other classes* she tried to give herself a pep talk.
Raising her wand and concentrating on the fruit, she said out loud “Tarantallegre” in an almost perfect latin, she smiled at the good pronunciation glad that she had a natural ability for languages, and waited for the pineapple to move; but nothing happened and Naty frowned.
*of course! What did I want to happen?* she thought; she had just realized that she wasn’t even concentrating on the right things, so she took a deep breath and made a small review in her head of the classes during the term and what she had done in all of them.
She made a list in her head, for prof. Malfoy had been clear about the no-talking policy *get the pronunciation right: check, get the wand movement: check, imagine what you want to happen: ok, not checked*
She then proceeded to remember dancing styles *waltz, too boring. Flamenco, nope, it has a lot of arm and feet movements and this pineapple didn’t have any beside, even with arms and feet it was way too difficult. Tango? Mmm maybe, it was a cool dance style and she could imagine the music just fine.* and then it hit her *salsa of course! Why didn’t I think of this before?*
She started picturing in her head a person swaying to the rhythm of a tropical kind of music, how her left foot moved a little bit to the left, and when that foot was firmly placed in the ground, she bends her right knee just a little to give the hip and waist a small break to the left, and the shoulders moving accordingly; this step didn’t took more than a second and then her left foot went back to the center and she repeated that move with the other side of her body; after that those steps were repeated constantly with the rhythm of ‘fruko y sus tesos’ on the background.
In that exact moment she aimed her wand at her pineapple and said “Tarantallegre”, she watched the fruit wiggle a little and move its crown vigorously but nothing else, it didn’t even move from its place.

Tristyn eyed the last of the students attempting the charm wearily. If he closed his eyes slightly, he could picture his office, and his easy chair. But for now, he had to watch the students attempt to make the pineapple dance due to the contract he'd signed before taking on the job. Was it really worth it?

His lazy gaze landed on one witch in particular who had already completed the given task.

Yes, it's worth it.

*again* she thought getting frustrated “Tarantallegre” she said a little more loud that she pretended but still concentrating on the salsa steps and the way you were supposed to move, this time beside the wiggling and the crown shake, the pineapple jumped two times to the left and two times to the right.

“ughhh” she said desperate and grit her teeth, seeing that that didn’t work too well and remembering that she had to be focused, she took a deep breath and calmed herself. After a few moments she looked again at the fruit.

*hmm, that wasn’t so much of a salsa dance mss. Pineapple* she thought, while tapping her wand on her cheek absently *what am I missing here?* she took a look around to see how her classmates were doing, some of them had already left, but that didn’t bother her, she wanted to get good grades and that meant to make the pineapple move as if it was dancing salsa with enthusiasm.

She looked long at the pineapple, figuring how to make it move, *think out of the box Naty, you can do this, how to make a pineapple dance* she kept the pep-talk, maybe if she positioned the pineapple differently it would look more human, or would have some of the human characteristics that she needed. She watched it with her head turned to her side, it had lots of small dark yellow protuberances that were slightly darker on the tips, and the leaves from the crown were long and of an interesting grey-ish green color, and then she saw it, if she turned the pineapple up-side down she could picture the crown as its feet and then seeing the pineapple dancing salsa wasn’t so weird.

So she put it up-side down trying to balance it so it wouldn’t fall to the side; when she was able to keep it still, she imagined the crown leaves part in two like if they were the pineapple’s feet, and that those feet were doing the steps she had pictured earlier, and tried again with the spell, she aimed at the pineapple with her wand and said “Tarantallegre”; now the pineapple was dancing, or at least its”feet” were doing the steps, but there was something amiss with that image, the body was too rigid, stiff and salsa was a rhythm you danced with your whole body *you see mss.
Pineapple, that’s the problem with most of the people, they think salsa is just doing some progressive steps, but it is so much deeper you have to dance with the music inside you and move you whole body accordingly* she thought, and then realized what she was doing “ok, talking to a pineapple is not sane, concentrate!” she muttered to herself.

That last talk with the pineapple was what gave her the clue of what she was missing, not only she had to imagine the steps, but she had to imagine the whole body dancing to it, so she imagined the body of the fruit to be flexible and soft, somewhat curvy and with that joined with the other specifications of the steps, and the form of the crown, along with the music still playing in her head she tried once more with decision; Naty aimed her wand at the pineapple and said “Tarantallegre”, she saw a flash of light hit the fruit and then the pineapple started wiggling, not like the first time but like it was adjusting its particles to take a curvy soft form, and its crown split again in two, and then it started to move the ‘feet’ with the steps she had imagined; Naty didn’t lose her concentration and kept her wand pointing at the pineapple and the image of it dancing in her head, watching it move swiftly its body and the leaves looked now like two actual feet instead of something deformed.

A huge smile spread on her face and she noticed that while she was concentrating so much, she could still hear the music in her head and the pineapple was actually dancing to that rhythm; at that moment she started moving from one side to the other on her chair following the pineapple in a little kid of victory dance.

The finals are officially closed, I will not be accepting any more of them. If this does no sit well with you, I suggest you work on being punctual in the future.