Very Superstitious (OPEN)

[parvati patil macmillan]

Late February, 2025

Parvati had heard no shortage of stories about the increase in Boggart encounters. It wasn't just at Hogwarts, where she had had a few students come to her, frightened by what they had seen. At least those fears were only reflected in the forms that the Boggarts had taken on; they weren't actually dangerous. In the moment, however, she understood that that was no less unsettling to be face to face with one's worst fear imaginable.

The past few days, it seemed, there had been a Boggart encountered somewhere in the castle every few hours, with no apparent rhyme or reason as to when or where they might show up, other than that they typically inhabited confined spaces or hid in the shadows. Like the rest of the Hogwarts staff, Parvati had been doing what she could to minimize the distractions that the Boggarts were causing. It was difficult for her colleagues to have to take time out of their lessons to remind the students that what they might encounter wasn't real and that they had a charm at their disposal.

Walking along one of the corridors on the first floor, Parvati tried to get the image of her sons' "deaths"—and their subsequent jumping back to life, unharmed—out of her head again. The first time it happened had been jarring, but she had been alerted that there might have been a Boggart present by the scratching noise that had been coming from one of the broom cupboards and had been able to prepare herself ahead of time for what she was going to see; she hadn't just stumbled upon one.

A scream coming from not far away told her that someone else in the castle hadn't been as lucky.

[Deleted]

Chase staggered back, clutching his chest hard. Though he tried not to be the type to scream, the fear in the moment had scared him out of his wits. A large dog was towering in front of him, eyes seeming to reflect malice and a desire to tear him limb from limb. There was a cinnamon-colored Jack Russell Terrier dangling in the large dog's mouth. It didn't register immediately that this couldn't be the real deal, as he had been fixated on the fear in the moment. Tears were streaking his face and he clenched his fists tightly.

He didn't quite know that it might just be a boggart. His first thought in the moment was that a large dog had somehow gotten in the castle and that it was going to kill him just like it had killed his dog. That it was hunting him to do this. He scrambled for his wand in case he had to do something to repel the dog, unaware of what it really was, looking around. Was someone nearby?

Maybe a teacher was nearby? Yeah, a teacher was probably nearby. Or a classmate. "HELP!" He cried out.

[parvati patil macmillan]

Late February, 2025

At the sound of someone's screaming, Parvati rushed to the source as quickly as she could.

"HELP!"

She drew her wand as she continued walking, hoping that whoever it was was near enough to her that they had heard her footsteps, at least—footsteps which got more rapid as she moved. Her strength was back to what it had been prior to what had happened with the dragons in Hogsmeade, and she was grateful for that small miracle. Even most adults couldn't think clearly with a Boggart around, and she hoped that that was all it was.

Following along in the direction of the cry for help, she came across its source in no time. A Ravenclaw boy who Parvati recognized as one of the students who had transferred to Hogwarts from Ilvermorny was standing opposite a large dog, which looked as though it was preparing to maul him. Stopping the dog from that, however, was a smaller dog—what looked like a terrier—that was already being held in the larger dog's mouth.

Whether or not the larger dog was going to eat the smaller one, Parvati wasn't going to find out, and she looked to the boy. "Stand back," she urged him gently, seeing the expression on his face and the fists into which his hands were balled. "It's only a Boggart." Unless they had an escaped Animagus on their hands, it was only a Boggart, and it wouldn't take too much to get rid of it.

@chasehunter