[Moscow] Problems have solutions (Varya)

Ever since she had got the book from Niska in London a few months ago, Alla was even more obsessed than ever with her Necromancy experiments. The young witch spent much time on them, as much time as her work schedule allowed. Whenever her boss, the owner of the funeral parlour where she worked, was not there she even made experiments at her work place, trying to animate corpses. She was doing rather well by now but the experiments were exhausting and not exactly contributing to her health. The young witch was pale these days and thinner than she had been in the past years. The cuts, especially the one on her thumb, were barely healing properly anymore even though she sealed them with magic. However, her progress when it came to Necromancy blinded the girl and she was barely aware of the fact that her body needed rest.

Whenever she reached her limits, the Durmstrang graduate just tried even harder to succeed with what she was trying. She had been delighted when she had managed to animate two corpses at once the other day but the exhaustion afterwards had been a problem. Apparently the author of the Necromancy book knew about these unpleasant side effects as he suggested various means to strengthen oneself. Unicorn blood was one of these means. While it sounded like it would help very well and quick, Alla was not sure she wanted to go this far. There had to be other ways, she'd just have to find them.

Happy to have the afternoon off work, the Russian wanted to go to a shop for dark magic that was in a narrow street in wizarding Moscow. However, the shopkeeper did not want to show her the special items he was hiding on the first floor, saying that she was not old enough to delve too deep into such branches of magic as Necromancy. After a heated discussion, Alla went into a bar on the other side of the road, feeling offended and angry. There had to be a way to get in there. If not in the ordinary way then she had to find a creative solution. She was not going to give up so easily anyway.

Her eyes lit up when the young witch finally had the perfect idea. There were many pigeons on the street - what if she tried Necromantic possession on one of them and then made the pigeon fly through the open window of the shop? She should be able to see through the animal and maybe it could even steal a piece from there even if just as a revenge on the shop owner?

She left the shop and pulled out her wand to summon one of the birds. She used one of the runes she carried in the pocket of her robes and cut her finger and the pigeon's foot to get a drop of blood from each of them. Then she held the rune in her fist and spoke an ancient incantation she had tried many times before but with only limited success.

Swaying slightly, Alla delved into the pigeon's conscience, feeling a slight resistance from the bird. Subduing the animal, Alla forced it to take off the ground and tried to steer it. However, not knowing what it took to fly she interfered with its movements. The bird's resistance grew stronger again and both struggled. The bird was fluttering uncontrollably through the air while Alla stumbled across the street. Then the bird missed the open window by an arm-length and hit the house front heavily, falling lifelessly onto the ground. As the connection broke, the girl collapsed in the middle of the street. After being unconscious for a few seconds, she slowly drifted back into a perceiving state, hearing footsteps and voices not far away from her. She opened her eyes and tried to sit up, but as she did she felt nausea overcome her.

Finally. It wasn't that Varvara Stepanovna didn't love her job, but oh, blessed Baba Yaga, was it nice to not be working for once. She had just finished a brief stay in rural (rural even by their standards) Mongolia, dealing with a wild yak fungus that was causing people to levitate a few inches off the ground when they were infected with it. She, as well as a handful of other healers and one poor Ministry official who had to deal with the muggle-relations aspect, had been quite successful in ridding everyone of the fungus and all their resulting trauma. And as usual, a job well done deserved a strong drink and a new pair of shoes.

Unfortunately, the former Drakonya Krov also had to tend to her errands. She was running low on quite a few necessary potion ingredients and in an effort to shake things up a bit, she decided to visit Moscow instead of staying in the East or going to far west. Paris might have had better shoes, but Moscow had better Russians. After spending a couple hours perusing the shops and stocking up on the necessities, Varya ducked down a narrow side street to look for some less legal but just as necessary ingredients. But before she even had the opportunity to find a fun new poison that just screamed her name, the healer nearly got knocked out of the way as a younger woman stumbled across the street. Someone had clearly been having an enjoyable afternoon.

Varya watched the girl as she stumbled the rest of her way across the street, shaking her head at the thought of how some people just couldn't handle their alcohol. Amateurs. Mere seconds after the Russian had scoffed at the drunkard, the drunkard had collapsed. Varya didn't need her medical knowledge to know that fainting was never a good thing. People were already crowding around the spot where she fell, but none of them looked like they would be very helpful in this situation.

"Out of my way," the woman ordered, pushing aside an elderly witch and not feeling bad about it. "I'm a healer," she added, almost as an afterthought. A damn good one, too, Varya thought to herself as she drew up to the girl on the ground. She knelt down with a sigh, thinking about just how dirty her new coat was getting. "Lay back down," Varya said in her soft, proper-bedside-manner voice that was quite different than her regular voice as she saw the sure signs of nausea. Before she could lay her head back on the ground, the older woman conjured up a plushy pillow for her, placing it under her head.

It was then she got a good look at that stumbling mess. The former professor didn't remember all her students, but she definitely remembered a former tsaritsa who didn't do poorly in Melioration and had a penchant for necromancy. "You're not drunk, Alla Artyomovna," she mused, looking over the girl, "and you weren't cursed." Varya considered her options for a minute, finally settling on a tried and true remedy. "Here," she said, holding out one of the small vials of potion the witch kept in her bag, "for your nausea." She stood up and straightened out her coat, taking care to pat the dirt off her knees. "The quicker you take it, the quicker you can get up, get out of the street, and stop embarrassing yourself." Varya outstretched her arm, offering her gloved hand to Alla in an effort to speed up the recovery.

While there were people surrounding her, nobody seemed to be getting close or willing to help her. She heard an old woman say something about her being drunk. Little did she know... A man made some salacious comment, but Alla was in no state to respond to it.

When a familiar voice told her to lay back down, Alla obliged at once and closed her eyes. After all, her sight was fading in and out anyway. She felt pretty sure that she wouldn't be able to get up now. Recognising the voice as one of her former professor's, Alla felt relieved. Collapsing in a narrow street full of dark magic shops was not ideal and she knew that. While the young witch was not really afraid of anything, she did not feel in a fit state to defend herself anyway. It was good to know that there was someone here who probably would not do her any harm. Varvara Stepanovna had always been a decent professor, not one who was just out to harm her students or who only accepted Drakonya Krov students.

The former tsaritza heard Varvara's musings but was unable to say anything just yet. Besides she wasn't sure she really wanted to confide in her what had happened. With a trembling hand, she took the vial from her former professor, hesitating only briefly before swallowing its content. Things couldn't really get worse anyway, could they? The nausea was almost instantly gone and Alla felt more confident at once. Yet when she took her saviour's hand and let her help her get to her feet again, Alla felt dizzy again. Her legs felt like jelly now and she was bathed in cold sweat from the exertion of getting up. Nevertheless the young witch wanted to get out of the street and tried her best to stay on her feet.

"Thank you, Varvara Stepanovna" Alla finally muttered weakly, feeling only slightly embarrassed now as she was way too busy focusing on not collapsing yet again.

Suddenly the young Necromancer became quite nervous though. Where was the rune she had just used? Where was the pigeon? Was a part of her still trapped in the lifeless creature? How would it feel if it was? If even possible, the Russian paled even more and couldn't help but lean onto Varvara to steady herself.

"How do I know if... if I'm... if umm... a part of me is... gone?" She had a hard time to concentrate and her head was aching more and more the longer she was standing. Alla wasn't sure if her question made any sense and if Varvara Stepanovna could figure out what she was actually talking about. However, right now she felt unable to clarify what she was talking about.

As Alla got to her feet, Varya was able to take a better look at her. Head to toe, she looked quite pale and clammy, even considering the January air.  This woman needed more help than her initial potion, that much was for sure. She nodded in recognition of Alla’s thanks. She was a healer, it was her job, after all. Plus Varya wasn’t a 100% terrible person. 85% maximum.

She was getting ready to suggest that Alla seek further treatment when Alla leaned against her. Varya instinctually threw an arm around her in an effort to help keep her upright. “A part of you?” she repeated, not sure what Alla was asking about. It would have been a bit more obvious if she was missing any limbs and wouldn’t be functioning quite as properly with missing internal organs.  Mind? Soul? True they were in a fairly dark neighborhood, but what the hell was Alla getting up to in the middle of the street?

No matter what she was doing, Varya was now more intrigued with the young witch’s activities than her getting urgent medical attention. As long as she was still speaking in complete sentences and didn’t nod off, she had time to spare. “If you want help, girl, you’re going to have to be more specific,” she stated, furrowing her brow at her former student.

But on second thought, Varya probably ought to interrogate her while sitting down. “Inside,” Varya said, motioning to the bar that had been her final destination. “Warm up, calm down, and start talking.” She led Alla towards the door, guiding her while her arm was still around her. Varya was sure Alla was in no position to argue right now.

Once inside the bar, the older witch motioned to a nearby table, indicating that Alla should take a seat. Varya was at the bar in three steps, and no more than two minutes later was she back at the table, vodka in hand for herself and a mug of hot ginger tea for her newly acquired patient. She shed her coat and gloves as she sat, eyeing the girl. “I did technically administer help to you so there is some level of confidentiality here now,” she said, using her I’m-a-healer-and-I’m-here-to-help voice once again.

Be more specific... Alla understood that Varvara needed more to work with than a cryptic sentence but she had a hard time getting her thoughts together properly let alone articulate herself clearly. The young witch was relieved that her former professor steadied her as she had no faith in her legs to carry her without any support. However, she wasn't sure she wanted to get away from this place without the rune and the pigeon. While she tried to focus enough to voice these thoughts, Varya already led her into the bar in which Alla had been before her experiment.

While she was still thinking about protesting, the Klyk Vampira graduate was glad to take a seat and lean back. She closed her eyes as the world around her seemed to be spinning anyway. In her current state the girl did not even notice that the older witch left her for a brief moment. She only became aware of that when Varvara returned with drinks.

She looked at the other woman, thinking about whether or not she could really confide in her. Although the thought was not pleasant, Alla realised that she needed Varvara's help and that she would not get it if she didn't tell her the whole story. Still hesitating a bit, Alla took a sip from the mug. Her hands were trembling slightly and so she had to try hard not to spill any of the hot beverage.

"Thank you for the tea," she muttered as she put the mug back down on the table. She wondered briefly if Varvara remembered her passion for Necromancy and the fact that she had kept an animated skeleton as her servant already back in her school days. If she did not remember these things then she would have to do a lot more explaining than she was prepared to do. Besides she did not like the thought of admitting that Necromantic possession was something that did not work well for her. She could animate lifeless bodies or skeletons quite easily by now. However, Necromantic possession had already brought her a long stay in the hospital wing in her seventh year at Durmstrang.

"I've been experimenting with... Necromantic possession," she said in a barely audible voice. "I'm not sure if..." her voice trailed off. She really wasn't sure if she had lost a part of her mind in the pigeon's mind. What if the pigeon was dead after the crash into the wall? Would she get the part of herself back? The young witch rubbed her forehead. "I should go outside and find the pigeon and the rune..." Nervously she glanced around and then stood up. However, her sight faded out again at once and Alla sank back onto the chair with a sigh.

Varya nodded once more as Alla thanked her for the tea. It was definitely an easier option to give her than any other potions before she knew what was actually wrong with her. She drank half her glass of vodka in one gulp, bracing herself for what she hoped would be quite an enthralling explanation. And after hearing what Alla had to say, Varya went ahead and finished the glass.

"Necromantic," Varya repeated quietly, setting her glass aside and pausing before adding the word, "possession." Even Varya, who thought she knew quite a bit about everything, had to admit that this subject was most decidedly not her specialty. She could just as well figure out the gist of what necromantic possession entailed, but was still very fuzzy on the details. She remembered that Alla had excelled with necromancy at Durmstrang, but Varya was never sure exactly how far Anton Petrovich progressed with his teachings. Apparently he had done enough to inspire his students to continue on?

Varya refocused her attention on Alla as she spoke again. She pursed her lips as she suggested going outside to find the pigeon - a pigeon, seriously? - and the rune but her look quickly evolved into a smirk as Alla sank down into her chair. The Russian leaned into the table, getting closer to Alla so that she could still be heard with a lowered voice. "You thought," she began slowly, "that the best place for your... experiment, did you call it? That the best place for it would be in the middle of a crowded street?" Varya narrowed her eyes. "You were right about one thing though," she continued, "you need to find that bird and the rune."

Leaning back in her chair, Varya pulled her bag towards her and rummaged around inside it. Her hand found a few vials and she pulled them all out, spreading them out on the table between its two occupants. Two red potions, one dark purple, and a clear one. Varya slid the clear one towards Alla before stowing the others back in her back. "That will help the dizzyness and lightheadedness, but it tastes dreadful so you'll want to add it to your tea." She sat back in her chair once again, keeping her eyes on Alla.

Necromantic possession. Varya repeated the phrase to herself as she looked over Alla and thinking about what this experiment had caused. Surely there was a way to prevent the nausea and pain? But if Alla hadn't bothered to consider the consequences of her experiment in a crowded area, Varya wouldn't be surprised if she had considered any ameliorating methods.

Alla was aware that most people rather studied the more common branches of magic than Necromancy. It was a dark branch of magic although the young woman didn't see herself as a dark witch. Yes, she was animating skeletons and corpses but did it make her a dark witch when she had a skeleton as a servant as opposed to a house elf? Even though she did not really feel in a fit state to discuss what she had done, the Russian girl felt the need to try anyway. Especially after Varvara asked if she thought that the middle of the street was a good place for experiments.

"Well," the young witch started, feeling a little awkward. "Actually it was not really an experiment. I mean, I've  tried possession so many times before in secluded places... This was different. It was not really an experiment. I was trying to... use the bird to get in somewhere..." her voice trailed off and she looked down. This felt rather embarrassing and yet she did not have enough energy to really care much.

Yes, she needed to find the bird and the rune but that was easier said than done. Alla observed how her former professor rummaged in her bag and retrieved some vials. It was not like her to trust so very easily but Alla felt rather certain that Varya was not going to poison her. Therefore, she did as the older witch told her and put the content of the two offered vials into her tea. The tea's colour changed instantly and Alla looked at it for a moment before taking a first sip. There was no denying that it tasted quite dreadfully, especially in combination with the ginger tea. However, getting rid of this dizziness sounded perfect and, therefore, the girl drank the content of the mug and shuddered. "That was pretty awful," she said with a slight smile.

"The last time I felt this horrible - or actually even worse - after trying Necromantic possession was in my school days," Alla said thoughtfully. "Later I've tried only on small mammals... That was easier and worked well. I got into the pigeon's conscience alright... but then I kind of lost it when I tried to steer it through the air..." The young witch shrugged and got to her feet. "I think, I'll go and get the rune and the bird..."

Although she still felt a little weak and shaky, Alla was relieved to realise that her sight was not fading out and the world did not spin anymore. She was even confident enough not to steady herself anywhere. Her movements were slow though and she was still sweating more than was normal from just this little exertion. However, moments later she was out in the street and looked around. She noticed that Varvara had followed her but she barely thought about it.

What if someone had taken the rune? What if the bird had flown away? What if the bird had died? What if someone had already taken the cadaver away?

She found the rune quickly when she went to the spot where she had collapsed earlier. Bowing down to pick it up, Alla felt slightly dizzy again but she tried not to let it show. Clenching the cold rune tightly, the young Necromancer searched feverishly for the bird. She had not seen where it had fallen down because she had passed out when the pigeon had collided with the wall.

"Where is this damn bird?" she whispered, her voice trembling. She was panicking and suddenly felt like laying or at least sitting down. Her legs were shaking and she blinked a few times to hide that tears might soon water her eyes. Maybe a part of her own conscience was forever trapped in this bird that she had not found at once...

So, it wasn’t so much an experiment as much as the girl had just not been successful in her attempts at her possession. Varvara Stepanovna definitely understood not admitting this upfront - she would have done the same thing. Still, Alla was lucky that Varya had been there at all; this wouldn’t have been the best part of Moscow to be passed out on the streets because one had meddled with some dark magic. Varya simply narrowed her eyes at her companion as she listened to Alla explain herself. She was trying to get in somewhere. Most likely somewhere on the street, she reasoned with herself, as she had picked a pigeon to do her dirty work. What was she going to do with the pigeon once it got to its destination? Poop on everything? Varya doubted that it would have been able to do much else. But these were all questions for later, after the rune and bird were recovered.

Varya managed a slight smile at Alla’s discomfort from drinking the tea. “Better than dying, though, I’ve heard,” she offered, referring to the taste of the potion. Alla had been more unsuccessful with this while in school, which must have been over a year ago, as she wasn’t her student during the previous school term, Varya’s last at Durmstrang. “I’m guessing you hadn’t tried any bats? Mammals that fly?” she asked, reasoning with herself that a good step between mammal and bird would be a flying mammal, if only to learn the mechanics of flying. But Varya was no expert, by any means. If only there was a potion to achieve the same results, Varya would be all over that.

The healer instinctively stood as Alla got to her feet, ready to throw out her arms and catch her should she fall, even though Varya was very confident in her potions and their abilities to get the healing job done. She nodded, both in reply to Alla deciding to go fetch her misplaced supplies and at her being able to stay standing without using her as support. She followed her out the door, trailing her slowly. Mainly, Varya wanted to make sure she didn’t try to get away before they had finished their conversation and Varya was satisfied she had prodded her for enough information. But also, Varya wanted to make sure that if Alla passed out again, she would be the one to revive her. There’s no nonsense going down on one of her students on her watch.

Varya didn’t move much farther than the door, preferring to observe rather than be of any help. She crossed her arms in front of her as she watched Alla wonder back to the spot of ground she had recently graced with her presence and kneel down to scoop something up. The rune, Varya assumed; a bird should have been a bit more obvious. Alla didn’t seem to be moving any farther than she already had. Could she not find the pigeon? Varya finally moved towards her, scowling as she did so. She hadn’t bothered to put her coat or gloves back on and was remiss to move away from the warmth emanating from the bar every time a patron opened to door to go through.

“Where were you trying to make the bird go?” Varya inquired, looking up and down the street. People weren’t stopping to stare at anything or crowding around any spot in particular; it wasn’t that uncommon for birds to die after flying into exceptionally clean windows so any bird victim shouldn’t be drawing much attention. She moved towards the shop that Alla indicated, searching the ground as she did so. Varya didn’t have to go too far or search for too long; the ground wasn’t covered with a plethora of dead birds. Upon finding one, the witch conjured a just-big-enough box around it and bent down to pick it up. She brought it back to the younger witch and held it out to her. “Can you determine if this is the right one?” This was definitely not how Varya thought her day would go when she woke up this morning, her waving around a dead bird and discussing necromancy. Moscow was strange.

Dying... as an aspiring Necromancer Alla thought a lot about death and dying. Death didn't scare her but dying somehow did. While she had felt really awful moments ago, the young witch was oblivious to the danger of her Necromantic experiments.

"Bats? No, I haven't tried it on them. In fact, I've started with bugs in class and tried human possession once." The way she looked away after confessing this hopefully made clear enough that at least right now she was not going to tell more. She had tried human possession at a time when she had not been ready for it and it had taken her weeks to recover properly and she assumed that without the help of Anton Petrovych she might not have fully recovered at all.


Hesitating only briefly, Alla gestured at the shop window to which she had tried to direct the bird. Now her idea seemed foolish but she could not turn back time so she shrugged it off. Still trying to resist the urge to sit down right where she was standing, Alla watched how Varya walked towards the shop and looked for the pigeon.

Alla felt her heart sink as Varya showed her a dead bird moments later. She wanted to speak but her voice did not obey so she just nodded, her eyes clearly showing how shocked she was to see her bird dead. She stared at it for a moment longer than she took the box from Varya with trembling hands.

"We should go inside again," she said in a toneless voice. "I... " she didn't know what she wanted to say. However, she wanted to sit and she wanted to find a way to figure out if some part of her was trapped inside the dead bird. Would she feel if it was gone or would it not show in any way?

They went back inside and sat down at their table again. Alla didn't care if it was appropriate to put a dead pigeon on the table. She just kept staring at it absentmindedly. Anton Petrovych would have known how to help but they weren't really in touch anymore these days and she was not going to ask anyone for help, anyone except Varya who was already helping her anyway.

The fact that Alla had tried human possession before both intrigued and worried the healer. After seeing the consequences of a failed pigeon possession, she could only imagine what had happened if she had failed with the human. And as Alla didn't continue on about it and boast a little (as in smart person would do in this situation, if only to save face), Varya assumed that experiment had backfired more than a little bit.

Once the pair was back inside the warmth of their pub, Varya sat in her chair, back straight, hands folded in her lap. Her eyes narrowed as she watched Alla, silently passing the time until she could stand it no more. Shifting her gaze from Alla to the pigeon and then back to Alla, "I'm going to make sure it is most undoubtedly dead," she said as she pulled the box towards her. It made a soft scratching noise against the table as she did so. She frowned, picking up her wand in the hand that didn't have a hold of the box.

The pigeon was laying belly up and from what Varya could tell, it was gone. It wasn't visibly breathing and there wasn't so much as an idea of a twitch in a feather. Still, she was, for some reason not fully known to herself, taking some responsibility for this situation. Varya pressed the tip of her wand to where she thought the bird's heart was located and spoke an incantation she had used many times before on various humans and that she could only hope worked on birds. If alive, white smoke would appear where wand met bird; if dead, black smoke.

A thin wisp of black smoke trailed up and dissipated about a meter above their heads. Varya pulled her wand back and slid the box back towards Alla. "Dead." Dead, yes, but wasn't Alla's first question after she had pulled her up off the street how Alla would know if a part her was gone? That question a bit more complicated, more than black and white, and it was a question for which Varya didn't have an answer.

She was, however, excellent with potions. And she was, after all, trying to get her Platinum Cauldron in the Potioneers Guild. Maybe there was something here that she could use for her benefit? But if Alla was going to be willing to accept her offer to help, it needed to seem extremely genuine. Or mostly genuine.

"It's your turn to buy the drinks." It wasn't a question.

Dead.

The fact that the pigeon was dead was not surprising but that didn't make it any less worrying. Alla stared at the black smoke that emerged between want tip and bird and felt like she couldn't breathe anymore. She felt strangely constricted. She wanted to scream but couldn't make a sound. What if a part of her still remained in the lifeless bird? There were ways of getting it out of there, of course. However, that required a lot more energy than Alla could muster right now and perhaps also more expertise. The young witch tried to console herself with the fact that things would have been worse if they hadn't been able to find the bird, but that was not really helping. She rubbed her aching forehead, wondering what she could do now.

Drinks... Yes, drinks sounded like a plan. Alla nodded and got to her feet to order them something. She made her way to the bar, feeling tired and exhausted. While another cup of tea would have been the best plan in her current condition, the blonde wanted something stronger now. She felt tense and just wanted to benumb herself although that wasn't usually her way of dealing with problems. She ordered another vodka for Varya and after considering her options for a moment, she decided to take one herself too. Returning with the two drinks, she hoped that Varvara would not criticise her choice of drink and sank onto her chair again.

The young woman still felt rather feeble and was glad to sit again. Her expression was blank and instead of staring at the dead bird, the girl now looked at her drink lost in thought. Necromantic possession caused her more trouble than it was worth and yet it intrigued her so much. No other Necromantic magic was as tempting as possession and none seemed to be as dangerous for the young Necromancer. She was only two years out of school now though - how was she to expect to succeed with such complex magic? She had to give it some time, practise even harder than before. If she couldn't do it yet, she wasn't advanced enough and if she wasn't advanced enough she had to work on perfecting her skills.

"If there's some part of my consciousness trapped inside the bird there are ways to get it out of there," the girl mused in a low voice. "I'd need to animate it and if there's something left in there and if it's not yet... dead... then I should be able to retrieve it... maybe..." As she spoke she felt less sure about it. Especially considering that she was not in fit state now. She was subconsciously playing with her glass of vodka, moving it an inch back and forth but not lifting it to her mouth yet. The young woman was torn. On the one hand she wanted to get drunk, to forget about this horrible day, on the other hand she needed to focus and try to figure out if that bird was just a dead pigeon or a dead pigeon with a bit of Alla trapped inside.

"I should give it a try," she said more to herself than to Varya and glanced around. The barkeeper did not seem overly interested in his guests so maybe he wouldn't mind or even notice if she animated the pigeon right here at the bar.

Varya noticed the signs of a headache right away. As Alla stood up to go fetch the next round of drinks, Varya bent over her bag, once again fishing out the vials of potions she had squirreled away. She needed to remember to organize this damn bag when she got home, she realized, as it took her more than a normal amount of time to find everything she was looking for. She lined up the two red potions and the dark purple one from before on the table and added an additional green and a gold one. She looked up as she finished nudging the vials into a straight line, in time to watch Alla return with the drinks and was pleased to see that she hadn’t decided to go with another cup of tea. That meant she wasn’t queasy again, which was good because Varya had nothing left on her to help with nausea.

She didn’t wait for Alla to drink before she raised her own glass and nodded slightly to Alla before moving the glass to her lips and taking a large sip. It definitely wasn’t the vodka that Varya preferred, but it would get the job done. Setting the glass off to the side, Varya drew Alla’s attention to her lineup of potions. She pointed to the gold one first and worked her way down the line, indicating each as she spoke. “This is for headache, green for menstrual cramps, purple for gas, and these last two are for hangovers. Take what you want.” She was willing to part with all of these; Varya kept a large supply of each at her home in Vladivostok. Plus, she was going to make Alla take the headache and hangover potions at the very least.

It didn’t seem like Alla was talking to Varya, but she listened nonetheless, interested. The intricacies of this pigeon possession were fascinating, but Varya was still sure that this was one risky branch of magic she did not want to pursue herself. But, if she did develop some sort of potion to.. counter side effects of possession? Make sure every piece of the possessor stays in tact? She wasn’t sure what it would be exactly. But once she figured it out, maybe she wouldn’t need to test it on herself after all, like so many potioneers ended up having to do.

“It works better if you drink it, Alla.” Varya dropped her patronymic, hoping that Alla would really understand that Varya wanted to help, even if it was for her own gain in the long run. Swishing the vodka around in her glass wouldn’t help anyone with anything. But it did seem to give Alla the idea to reanimate the pigeon. In the bar. At the table. Naturally.

Varya nodded anyway, even though she wasn’t completely sure this was the best idea. But who was she to argue? At least Alla would have a healer on standby this time and Varya hadn’t heard that she wanted to try possession again. Just to retrieve what was left, if anything was actually left. What she was going to do with it if she found it, Varya hadn’t a clue. “You should try,” Varya said, looking on curiously. “Tell me what I can do to help."

Menstrual cramps? Really? Alla frowned slightly. While she was really grateful for Varya's help earlier, she now felt a little bewildered. Why was the older witch offering her potions for menstrual cramps or hangovers? She decided to just offer a little smile and reached out for the one for headaches. "Thank you, I'll take some of this but I don't really need anything else." Grateful she took a sip of the potion. Since it was only fighting the symptoms and not the actual problem, she felt pretty certain that it would only bring relief for a short time before the headache would come back. Probably as well as the other symptoms she had felt because of the failed possession. Experience told her that it took not only potions but also some time to recover from something like that.

"Huh? Oh yes, of course," the young witch muttered but still hesitated to drink her vodka. If she wanted to try animating the pigeon, she'd have to focus well. Admittedly animating dead creatures was far easier than possessing living beings. She already successfully kept Burmin as her dead servant for years, after all. There was no risk of struggling with animating a pigeon when she could make a human skeleton do shores like a servant.

The encouragement Varya gave was not much but it was enough to make Alla more determined and confident enough to try. "There's not really anything you could help me with. What I'm going to do now is actually pretty basic..." Her voice trailed off and the girl thought about her first animation try when she had still been a Durmstrang student. She had been so excited when she had managed to animate a dead animal... and it had immediately instilled the wish in her to try animating a skeleton which was a little harder because it was not in one piece but there were many little bones that had to be animated together.

Alla pulled a little dagger out of her bag and pricked a finger with it. As blood emerged from the wound, the young witch looked at it intrigued. She painted a red circle on the table and made some signs in and outside the circle. Then the young witch took the bird and put it into the middle of the circle. Holding her hand over the pigeon, Alla moved her fingers and soon it stirred. She could move it around easily now. "Hmm," she made, looking at the bird intensely. "I thought I'd be able to see if there's... something trapped in it but... I can't." Just as she wanted to continue sharing her thoughts, the barkeeper approached their table, looking rather mad.

Oh, it was going to be basic necromancy. Thank goodness it wasn’t going to be anything hard… Varya restrained herself from scowling at the necromancer seated across from her. The former Melioration professor was most assuredly biased towards her own, much more practical subject. She watched as Alla pulled out a knife and drew her own blood, her face still not showing any emotions one way or the other. Varya was unfamiliar with the procedure required to reanimate a dead animal and was not thrilled with all the blood being spread around the table top. Given the look of the bar, there’s no way that it was a clean surface, let alone a sterile one.

Her eyes widened a bit as the bird stirred and it started moving around, apparently controlled by Alla. “Maybe,” Varya thought aloud, “you can’t see anything because there isn’t anything to see. It could be possible that there’s no part of you in the pigeon.” That was one sentence Varya never thought she would say. Perhaps there was something, but perhaps there wasn’t. If Alla couldn’t find out, then could some other, more experienced necromancer find out? Alla must know of someone who could assist her better than Varya was.

Her attentions were needed elsewhere as she noticed the barkeeper coming towards them, looking quite surly. Varya stood up to intercept him, placing herself between the table and the man. “Relax, relax, we found an injured bird and are nursing it back to health,” she made up on the spot, giving the barkeep a look in the eye. When he made mention of the blood, she merely shrugged. “Spilt potion, that’s all. I’m a marvel with cleaning spells so don’t worry at all.” She smiled, even as the man narrowed his eyes at her. “We’ll have two more vodkas,” she said, pulling out more money than was necessary from her bag and handing it over, her hand lingering in his as she smiled again. “Thank you.”

She stayed standing and blocking the table from view until he had returned with the vodka, at which point turned around, sat back down, and drank one of the glasses dry. “This is all extremely unhygienic, Alla. I don’t know how you haven’t come down with an infection yet.” Varya’s eyes surveyed the table, noting the blood smears. Her gaze moved from the blood to the pigeon to Alla. “How often do you bleed yourself?” she asked. Depending on her answer, Varya would be able to come up with a few different suggestions for the benefit of her health. Ironically enough, a necromancer wasn’t any good if they were dead.

"Maybe you're right," was all that Alla could reply before the barkeeper was too close to ignore him anymore. The young witch did not feel up to a fight with him, though she felt tempted to let the pigeon attack him. That would be quite fun. Probably she'd be a lot better controlling the bird even in the air now than before when it had still been alive and fought against the possession.

Fortunately Varvara reacted more quickly and more a lot more reasonably than Alla would have done. A little smile appeared on the aspiring Necromancer's face as she listened to the older witch's words. She was quite cool! The idea of nursing an injured pigeon back to health was almost too amusing to keep a relatively straight face though. Who would ever try to nurse a pigeon back to health? They were like flying rats. They were not really welcome in the city but the barkeeper seemed to buy the nonsense anyway. Well, he wouldn't be a barkeeper here if he was a very bright chap anyway.

While Alla observed how the barkeeper went to get them new drinks, she finally grabbed the glass of vodka that was standing in front of her in a little puddle of her own blood. Swallowing the entire content of the glass at once, the girl finally noticed that the finger she had cut was still bleeding. This happened occasionally... she got so immersed in her experiments and projects that she forgot about dealing with her wounds which meant that the cuts did not always heal without leaving scars. Not that she minded a scar more or less. What was a little less easy to ignore were the blood stains on her clothes though. Although once discovered she could remove them magically.

Alla had just demonstrated Necromantic animation of a dead bird and all Varvara had to say about it was that it was unhygienic? Really? Didn't she value the skill? Wasn't she impressed with the bird that had been fluttering through the air over their table? Alla never gave infections much thought but now that the healer spoke about it, the girl realised that a slight infection might have been the reason why she had felt unwell after she had done some Necromantic experiments. In fact she might even be suffering from an infection these days as she felt a little feeble. However, she was not going to admit any of that.

"Well, to be honest, I cut myself quite regularly for the purpose of getting blood for the experiments and other things I do... For most things I need my own blood. There's no way around it." She let the bird circle their heads once more before letting it land in the box again.