Heat Waves (OPEN)

[kaylee māhealani mahi'ai]

July 2, 2026

Having started working as an assistant archivist at the museum should have been more exciting for Kaylee than it was, but knowing that she would be separated from the two eldest of her younger siblings while they went back to Ilvermorny was a disappointment. She tried to remind herself that that was a good thing that the three of them had made it out of Hogwarts unscathed, yet she couldn't help feeling cheated. Now it was her, her parents, and her youngest siblings together and an ocean away from the other two. Comparatively, it probably wasn't as bad as when they had had to take into consideration the distance between Britain and Hawaii. It was different, especially since Kaylee knew that Ilvermorny would be safer. She had never imagined anything like what had ended up happening to Hogwarts would happen, but it had.

It wasn't too hard to adjust to the way that those working above her wanted things done. She had more work experience than most kids who had graduated from Hogwarts, thanks to her part-time job at Honeydukes, so maybe that was part of it. Just being able to do what she had dreamed about doing for so long meant something to her, even if most of the work was tedious more than anything.

Unfortunately, it was incredibly awkward whenever she had to walk through the areas of the museum that were open to visitors, as Kaylee had found out. She had lost count of how many times she had had to redirect visitors who had gotten split up from their tour groups, though she knew it could have been worse. Sure enough, just as she had left to go on her lunch break, Kaylee opened one of the many doors marked as being for employees only and nearly walked right into a museum visitor.

"Sorry!" Kaylee squeaked immediately. No one needed to be standing that close to a door, but being apologetic and assuming that it was an accident was a lot better than getting angry over it.

OOC: OPEN!

[fae iona cloudbreaker]

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During the endless search for information on Merlin and Yrisle, somehow this location had eluded her and everyone that had been helping her in her research: Merlin’s Mystical Museum of Magic. Maybe it was because it almost seemed too simple, providing the same oversaturated information that textbooks did, or because it only used Merlin in its name because he was a well-known warlock. Fae didn’t actually know, because she also didn’t know what a museum was. According to one of the guardians that was now attached to her by the hip whenever she was on the mainland, this sort of establishment was relatively common. Most museums held rare art or touched on points in non-magical history. This specific one, ‘MMMM’, was home to magical artifacts and other objects of importance to the magical world, and dated back for centuries. Fae seriously doubted that she’d be able to abscond with an item that proved to be useful to her task at hand, but she could always ask. Assuming there was something of use here to begin with.

Dressed in her best mainlander disguise, which had been curated over the months with assistance from those she had met over here (because no one wore poofy, flowy dresses on the mainland), Fae and her guardian had joined a tour of the museum early that morning. There were a few strange looks as she had brought Merlin’s staff with her, though the attention was taken from her the second the tour guide stepped in and started their spiel. Her own attention span didn’t last long though and she quickly realized that she wanted more time at each section to read and understand what she was looking at. Only ten minutes into the guided tour, she had drifted towards the back and started walking at her own pace. Her guardian hadn’t noticed her disappearance either, having been too enamored by the telephone things all the kids in the group were using to take pictures. She understood the picture part, but not how that could also be a telephone. There were so many things to learn still, though that had to be for another day.

Strolling past a section that had some ancient looking wands, Fae paused, realizing that her guardian had finally broken from the group as well and was now peering over the tops of the groups’ heads trying to see her. Ducking behind the wall of the wand exhibit, she waited for a moment before peering out again from her hiding place. The group had turned around the corner and her guardian was nowhere to be seen, probably having been distracted by another camera. Before she could step out from cover to continue, she felt something bump into her and make an apologetic noise. Turning around, a girl was standing there, having come out of a door marked only for employees. “You are fine. I was just hiding from my guardian here,” Fae said cheerfully.

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[kaylee māhealani mahi'ai]

July 2, 2026

The visitor she'd bumped into, who was certainly older than she was, said that she was hiding from her… guardian? Kaylee was perplexed initially, and then she realized who the visitor was. No, she couldn't have been. Dumbstruck at whom she thought she was seeing and still flustered from having run into someone else at all, Kaylee blinked. She was definitely standing in front of the High Druid from Hy-Brasil. She had just run into the High Druid, and she knew that it was her because she'd seen her on the field trip there only a few months before. The rest of the Druids didn't look like her, Kaylee thought, even though holding the title didn't mean that the woman had come from a royal lineage or something of that nature. It was just sort of remarkable, really, that she would be walking around the museum and without anyone else… (Okay, that explained the "hiding from her guardian" part of it.)

But what was she doing there to need to be hiding from the person who was supposed to be providing her security? Trying to get a grip and lower her voice so that she wouldn't lead to the High Druid's being found out, Kaylee squeaked again as she brought her volume down to a half-whisper. "Can I help you find something?" She was only interacting with the Druids' leader. It was no big deal. She could be cool about it. She was totally relaxed. Everything was fine. It was a totally normal day at work.

fae iona cloudbreaker

[fae iona cloudbreaker]

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The employee that Fae had bumped into was offering her help in finding something, if she wanted it. Now that was certainly a proposition that she couldn’t turn down. Obviously having an infinite amount of time to read each placard, or to study every magical item would be a dream, but her guardian was literally just around the corner trying to spot where she’d snuck off to. Jumping back around the corner would absolutely mean the end of her wandering for the day. The guardians didn’t take that sort of thing lightly anymore. Not after what had happened at Hogwarts. Every trip to the mainland was treated like she was going to end up blown into smithereens. If that did happen – which she highly doubted it would – the effect on Hy-Brasil would be minimal at best. A new High Druid would be selected and the Council would train them just as they had done with her. That was part of the cycle. It would put an end to her own fun, of course, but acting like she was some sort of prized gem that needed to be guarded 24/7 from the uncouth mainlanders was preposterous. Acting like one of them was sort of fun, and more entertainment than she’d had over the last six years conducting all of her work from the island.

“Actually, you can,” Fae responded, pulling her head back around the corner as she watched her guardian’s gaze drift in her general direction of the hall. “This museum has material on Merlin, yes? I am extremely interested in learning more about him, but most of the books he is referenced in do not elaborate on his life work. I find it very…lacking.” Her grip tightened slightly on the staff as she pulled it closer to her. She wanted to see if there were other belongings of Merlin here as well, half hoping there would be a journal or writings that he left behind that could shed some light on the staff or his time on Hy-Brasil.

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[kaylee māhealani mahi'ai]

July 2, 2026

"Actually," replied the High Druid, "you can." She looked to be checking to see if her guardian remained within earshot. "This museum has material on Merlin, yes?" The way in which she asked it made it sound as though that were something that needed to be kept secret, like she had just asked how to do something incredibly Dark. "I am extremely interested in learning more about him, but most of the books he is referenced in do not elaborate on his life work. I find it very… lacking."

The museum literally had "Merlin" in its name, and he was one of the most famous wizards in history, especially in Britain. Yeah, they definitely had material on Merlin there, Kaylee thought. The whole museum was focused on magic; it wasn't dedicated to the guy, but there was plenty on him. One of the permanent collections even included some artifacts that were said to have belonged to Merlin himself centuries before, though Kaylee was almost certain that those were just reproductions of the real things. It seemed sort of unbelievable that anything would last in good condition for that long, even with magic.

"What kind of information are you looking for?" Kaylee asked, slightly confused but maintaining her "customer service" tone of voice in spite of—or perhaps because of—her confusion. She wasn't a tour guide, but she hoped that she could be of assistance or find somebody else who would be.

fae iona cloudbreaker

[fae iona cloudbreaker]

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Maybe her area of reference was a bit too broad? She refused to believe that a museum dedicated solely to Merlin wasn't one-hundred percent about him. Or at least she hadn't until starting the guided tour, in which she found out there were all sorts of magical items and mainland history to learn about here. While she knew she could spend days in here reading every placard if given the chance, keeping herself focused on the task at hand was more important. "I guess anything relating to Merlin," Fae responded. "I was originally under the impression that this entire building was about him," she continued, explaining out her train of thought. It helped, especially when speaking to mainlanders. "I have a keen interest in his history, as well as his research."

Telling the museum employee that she was in possession of the staff that once belonged to the famous warlock was absolutely not going to happen. Eventually that information would leak, probably from her Ministry sources since they could never help themselves (both druid and mainlanders alike), and she would have to be more cautious with the staff. Until then, she kept that knowledge to herself. No one second guessed that the leader of a magical community carried a staff around with her everywhere she went. It sort of just came with the position she held. As for the details she could give out? There were a few. "You see, there is a long standing rumor that Merlin once visited Hy-Brasil, and I want to confirm that. Mainland and muggle books only ever mention his more...popular exploits," Fae explained. Like the Round Table, and his dealings with King Arthur. That alone had two different versions, where the magical community typically focused on the members who were wizards, while the muggles liked the stories on gallantry and adventure. She merely wanted to find a thread leading into the whereabouts of anything useful. Whatever that ended up being. Stories on the Round Table didn't exactly do much for her at this point.

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[kaylee māhealani mahi'ai]

July 2, 2026

Specifically, said the High Druid, she was looking for information about Merlin, having been under the impression that the entire museum was about Merlin himself and not a museum of magical history more generally. Kaylee listened, though, as the High Druid explained herself, and she really hoped that there weren't camerapeople from Witch TV about to pop out from around a corner or something.

There was a rumor, continued the High Druid, that Merlin had once visited Hy-Brasil. She wanted to confirm that, but she couldn't find any sources in books to confirm that he had. If there were writings dating back to when Merlin was alive, Kaylee thought, then they probably wouldn't be on display to the public except under limited circumstances. This was the High Druid she was talking to, though. She couldn't just tell her no! At least, she couldn't tell her no completely… Kaylee knew that she definitely didn't have the training to go looking for something like that without supervision. She wasn't trying to get fired.

"One of the more senior archivists might know something about that?" Kaylee offered. "I, like, just started working here," she added, so that she wouldn't seem rude. "But I can check with somebody if that would help?" Somebody who had been working there for any length of time longer than she had would probably know what to do, because this wasn't just a member of the public. This was like being asked about materials by the Minister of Magic or the President of MACUSA, only… not. Could she slip a public figure through the employees-only areas of the museum? Was that allowed?

fae iona cloudbreaker

[fae iona cloudbreaker]

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So the girl was a brand new employee and wasn't completely sure if the things she was asking for were there? Fae tried not to show her disappointment, but when she specifically made the trip here to look at Merlin-anything, it definitely stung a bit. She leaned heavily onto the staff, rocking her feet back and forth as she tried to decide what the best course of action would be now. Speaking to an archivist, as the girl called them, would probably be what she needed the most, though she now realized that she probably should have sent an owl ahead of time. All of these mainland things were confusing at times, and setting appointments was still such a strange concept to her. "It is possible that they may be too busy to meet today, is it not?" she asked slowly as she fixed her posture and stood herself up again. This was quite the folly she had gotten herself into. Her guardian was going to be upset once they found her loitering around in the corner if she didn't end up in front of anything related to Merlin.

Then it struck her, like the glowing of a thousand firefly lights emerging from the grass at sunset. This girl was still an employee, and even if she was brand new, would still be able to direct her towards the Merlin section. Assuming there was one. And then she could just leave Fae there and fetch help from the archivists if one was available. "Could you walk me to the area dedicated to Merlin? I believe I saw that on the folded paper?" Fae asked, forgetting that it was called a pamphlet. Hy-Brasil didn't have those, and she especially hadn't needed one when she was the island tour guide. "And then you could follow up on my inquiry, if that would be alright with you?"

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[kaylee māhealani mahi'ai]

July 2, 2026

The High Druid asked if it were possible that someone in the know would be too busy to meet with her today. Kaylee didn't know how they would react to having the High Druid there to inquire about whether or not Merlin had been to Hy-Brasil ages ago, but she was a VIP, sort of. She didn't think that there would be any real problems there, but she also couldn't be sure of it.

"I—"

Kaylee stopped as the High Druid spoke. "Could you walk me to the area dedicated to Merlin?" she asked. "I believe I saw that on the folded paper?"

That was something that Kaylee knew she could do without encountering any hiccups. "Of course," she replied, still using her customer service voice.

"And then you could follow up on my inquiry, if that would be alright with you?"

"Yes, I can do that," Kaylee nodded. "Please follow me." She could at least give the High Druid some taste of what she was there in the hope of finding, and then she could check with someone else about what their procedures were regarding High Druids who came to the museum unannounced.

fae iona cloudbreaker

[fae iona cloudbreaker]

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"Excellent!" Fae beamed as the girl agreed that she would be able to lead the way to the Merlin exhibit. That was maybe the best news she'd heard all day and especially since the conversation with the museum employee started. Fae followed behind the girl, first peeking around the corner of the display she'd been behind to make sure her guardian had actually disappeared with the rest of the tour group. It looked like the coast was clear, and now that she had an official guide to where she wanted to go, it wasn't like she was lost or milling about on her own. Her guard couldn't be upset about that. Achieving her goal for the day needed a bit of creativity. Running away was apparently all she needed to do.

As they walked through the museum, Fae kept her eyes straight ahead so as to keep herself from getting distracted by the other displays. Even if she had stuck with the group, she would have been multiple hallways behind the guide, still trying to read up on each and every item and plaque. Focusing on her goal was more important now. "You know, I just realized that I did not introduce myself. That was extremely rude of me," Fae spoke up as she quickened her pace to match the girl's. " My name is Fae, High Druid of Hy-Brasil." The prospect of learning more about Merlin and the exhilaration of dipping out from her tour group had made her forget her introductions. The Council would have been so disappointed in that. All she could do was laugh at the thought of the looks on their faces. "Not that I want your archivists to feel required to speak to me today. The last thing I want to do is impose when I have shown up unannounced like this." She had a feeling that wouldn't deter them at all though. Historians and intellectuals always had a fascination with druids. Letting lore of them onto the island to study it was part of the progress she wanted to make during her time as High Druid. "How long have you worked here?" Fae added, hoping that a conversation would make the walk a little less stiff.

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[kaylee māhealani mahi'ai]

July 2, 2026

Kaylee began to lead the way to the exhibit on Merlin, part of the museum's permanent collection. The High Druid followed her, not speaking at first. She then spoke up, however, upon realizing that she hadn't introduced herself properly. "My name is Fae, High Druid of Hy-Brasil," she explained as the two of them began to walk in step.

While Kaylee appreciated that Fae was kind enough to introduce herself, she didn't think that many people would mistake her for the average witch in off the street. Kaylee turned her head slightly but kept moving, mostly looking ahead so that she wouldn't run into anyone or anything. "Kaylee Mahi'ai, Assistant Archivist." (Merlin, thought Kaylee, that still felt weird to say out loud.)

"Not that I want your archivists to feel required to speak to me today. The last thing I want to do is impose when I have shown up unannounced like this."

"No worries," Kaylee smiled. At least, there would be no worries for Fae. She was already trying to figure out what to tell her superiors so that she wouldn't sound as though she'd lost her mind.

"How long have you worked here?"

Not the type of person to come back with something snarky, Kaylee answered Fae honestly. "Oh, um, only since last month," she told her, still trying to work out how formal she needed to be with the High Druid. "I transferred from Ilvermorny, finished the seventh year at Hogwarts, and then started working here."

fae iona cloudbreaker

[fae iona cloudbreaker]

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"Pleasure to meet you, Kaylee Mahi'ai," Fae bowed her slightly to the girl, doing her best to mimic the pronunciation of her last name. Another one of her favorite parts about being on the mainland was the introduction of so many people from all over the world. Hy-Brasil was wonderful in its own right, but painfully boring when it came to interacting with the same people over and over again. There had always been very little room to spread one's wings. Now she could sort of do that. "First job then? Mine was very similar. I was the tour guide for Hy-Brasil for a number of years. Now I do this." Which made it sound like she ran around to every museum possible, asking about Merlin. While that sounded fun, in practice it was sort of hectic. The amount of time she had spent over the past year researching the warlock and Yrisle had been a commitment she had never expected to undertake, and on top of her normal duties, made her feel swamped at times. Counting her trip to this museum as a break, as some would view it, was absolutely not going to happen. This was all business.

"Ilvermorny is the American school, correct? I had a lovely conversation with one of your professors during the student trip to Hy-Brasil. I believe his name was...Clarence Corntassle? I do hope he faired well after what happened at Hogwarts..." And everyone she had met that was at the school, for that matter. Being High Druid meant she had priorities that were at a different level than others of her kind, both druid and mainlander. She didn't consider herself equal in terms of governing power to the Minister, yet still felt horrid when something occurred that she could not prevent herself. That was part of the reason why she wanted to sort out Yrisle and the barrier. Not only would it return the order of the world back to where it was before both of those happened, she knew it'd grant her selfish wish of being a force for good.

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[kaylee māhealani mahi'ai]

July 2, 2026

It was weird to be interacting with the High Druid at all, but it was even weirder that she seemed so… relaxed. She wasn't like a lot of the Ministry or MACUSA officials who only seemed to care about their jobs. Fae even told her that her job before becoming High Druid had been as a tour guide there. Kaylee didn't have the heart to explain to Fae that her job as an assistant archivist at the museum didn't normally require her to act as a tour guide; it was just that this was an outlier. It also wasn't technically her first job, since she had gotten permission to work at Honeydukes while at Hogwarts and had done so for about a year, but it was her first job in something that she had actually gone to school for.

Fae also checked that Ilvermorny was the American school, and Kaylee nodded. It was. The High Druid said that she had had a good conversation with a Clarence Corntassel, and she hoped that he had fared well after what had happened at Hogwarts. Kaylee's eyes lit up a little more at her mentioning Clarence. His class had been one of her favorites in school.

"Clarence!" Kaylee grinned. "I wrote to him a while ago, and I guess he went back to Massachusetts," she told Fae. It made sense, since he was never really a Hogwarts teacher, anyway; he had been offered the ability to continue teaching his usual subject because Ilvermorny hadn't been in session as usual. "He's going to be teaching again in the fall, though I don't think many people could imagine Ilvermorny without him. Like, he taught my parents, too, you know?"

fae iona cloudbreaker

[fae iona cloudbreaker]

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Fae had a feeling that Clarence was a favorite of the students. During the trip to Hy-Brasil, she had watched the interactions between all of the students and professors that had visited and felt like she had a fairly decent grasp on those that did their job because they loved it. Clarence was one of them, and it became even more evident as they discussed the similarities between druid and Native American magic. Hearing that he was fine and back home was a relief, though she didn’t know where Massachusetts was (a tiny thought in her brain said that it was where Ilvermorny was located, but she couldn’t recall or not if that was true). “I am glad to hear that. I could not bring myself to read through the names listed in the Daily Prophet…” She knew that her hair briefly darkened from the thought of those that had perished, the sense of it shifting from the straw color she liked to keep it at into a darker brown feeling like an itch on her scalp. That was how it always happened when her emotions took over momentarily. But just as quick as it flashed into existence, it left, and Fae smiled it away like always. That wasn’t a good way to go about it, but there was nothing she could do about it now. “He reminds me very much of the teachers on the island. I think that is what interests me the most about him.” A man wizened from years of teaching and learning. An educator in the fullest sense.

While she could stand here all day and have an excellent conversation with Kaylee Mahi'ai of Merlin’s Mystical Museum of Magic about Clarence and the other bits and pieces of knowledge she had on Ilvermorny, that would defeat her ultimate purpose of visiting: to learn about Merlin. The task she had set herself to was important, despite how she was chatting away with the younger girl. Getting to that part of the museum was integral to her research. “Could you lead me to the section on Merlin? I would like to have as much time to read before my guard catches on to my…disappearance,” she laughed lightly, taking another glance at the hallway to see if he was backtracking yet. Even if he did interrupt, she had the final say on everything. It wasn’t like someone was going to try and attack her in the middle of a museum full of magical artifacts anyways. That would be silly of them. One tap of Merlin’s staff on the ground and she’d have them wrapped up in ropes faster than they could draw their wand. The staff was no joke when it came to casting, and she often times felt like it had more of a conscience than most magical conduits did. Which was exactly why learning more about Merlin today was important.

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[kaylee māhealani mahi'ai]

July 2, 2026

While it was perhaps a little strange to be speaking with the High Druid about one of her former teachers from Ilvermorny, the conversation was one of those things that was also sort of a pleasant surprise at the same time. She wouldn't have imagined that the High Druid would have any connections to Ilvermorny at all, even in passing, but she had been proven wrong and reminded of what a small world it was.

Apart from that, though, Fae had a question for her: Could she lead her to the section of the museum that housed the information it had on Merlin? She had asked her about the same thing before they had gotten sidetracked in their conversation, after all.

"I would like to have as much time to read before my guard catches on to my… disappearance," Fae clarified.

That part sounded a bit ominous to Kaylee, but she understood what Fae had meant. "Sure. Sorry," she told her, motioning for Fae to follow her as she headed in that direction. "It's right this way…"

fae iona cloudbreaker
OOC: Feel free to do a slight time jump, or we'll be here forever. Haha.