Welcome to Gaia! ::

Aire’s daydreaming-doodling was interrupted by a knock and she jumped in her seat, hoping it wasn’t Madame Umber getting upset she’d accidentally made a fort again out of her study materials. (At least this time it was at a desk instead of on top of the bookshelf?)

”Uhh, sure.” she nodded, checking to make sure the book she was referencing for her drawing wasn’t A Guide to Medieval Sorcery. Unfortunately it was. She handed the book over with a shrug, deciding it was probably a good time to...maybe stop sketching and actually study.

The guest to Fort Aindrias was Lochi Bardsdale: a Ravenclaw her year. She recognized him mostly because she always got the impression he thought her overt pranks were hilarious. Sometimes he’d grin when she parkoured over a nearby wall. She remembered once pointing out to him how she had swapped all the quills around in some class, and he had seemed intrigued? He hadn’t tattled on her anyway.

Lochi also apparently carried around chocolate. Aire nibbled happily as she idly traced over a line of her sketch--just one last line before she started to work!-- and answered immediately with the first thing that came to mind: “Are there brown gemstones? I was thinking brown algae, but it doesn’t seem particularly flattering to compare someone’s eyes to algae. But like...clear, brown, really pretty brown….”

She trailed off with a blush on her face and her pencil slowed. “Uhh I mean... that the roof eave of Grimmauld Place doesn’t really match the surrounding roofs which means it or the surrounding townhouses were remodeled sometime.”

Aire hadn’t expected Lochi to know an actual gemstone--much less pull out a book! She took the proffered book--did he normally walk around with a gemstone guide or was that just luck?--, and began examining the pictures.

”Tourmaline is pretty,” she said, scrutinizing the pictures. ”I didn’t know diamonds could be brown. Wasn’t that a song?” She flipped her sketchbook to a fresh page and jotted down these gem names and random thoughts--

Diamonds are forever
But can we even be together?
Smoky quartz, tigers eye
A blush, a scowl, a sigh
Eyes of tourmaline….”

Aire wasn’t quite sure how to finish, but it was fine, since Lochi was now pointing out some things about the Grimmauld Place remodel and saying she knew about architecture. Did she? ”I-I don’t know, I just draw things,” she murmured, trying to remember something else about the industrial age besides...what the building looked like. Industrial meant….factories right?

”And jump over them,” she agreed with a grin when Lochi said he thought it was mighty neat how she skip-hopped the stairs and stuff. ”It’s not that hard! It’s a mental game really. You have to just go for it without a doubt. ...If you’d like, there’s a perfect spot by Sir Cadogan’s painting to practice wall-jumping, but you have to be careful not to let him catch you.”

Did she just...stumble upon the school’s biggest shiny rock nerd? See, things like this were why Aire couldn’t not believe in gods and magical forces beyond what they learned in class. Of all people in the school to bump into! She took the microscope and book confusedly, not sure what to do with the contraption. "Do you just...carry diamonds in your pocket?" That was a perfect crime prank just waiting to happen!

”The...math behind architecture?” Sure Aireknew something about how there was lots of numbers behind buildings, but she hadn’t really figured it out yet. ”Math is...clear,” Aire agreed. Math didn’t change that much. She would rather run around planning her next prank, but she didn’t dislike math. (Arithmancy made more sense than Divination anyhow.)

”The one on the seventh floor,” Aire confirmed. ”Sir Whinygan--err, Cadogan.” Lochi then volunteered to help calculate movements to help her do new jump movements. ”Wait, really? I’ve been struggling to do this one by...I think it’s the Ravenclaw tower anyways.”

She sketched a corner of what was indeed Ravenclaw tower and the surrounding battlements, detailing how she had been planning to climb the tower. She was about to explain the details of the proposed jump and how she couldn't quite get enough height when she remembered she only had a few hours before detention. Probably not tonight, especially if she planned to get any studying done. Oh yeah, studying!

Aire held up one of the gems Lochi pulled out and squinted at it. Yeah, he really did just carry around a bunch of gems. She momentarily remembered that gems were worth money. She wondered how much money he just had...dusting the bottom of his bag. ”Hey can I borrow some of these? This uh...sapphire” she asked, holding up what was definitely not a sapphire. Her brain was whirling with possibilities: A pile of knuts (or maybe just nuts), a few transfiguration spells, and she was sure she could give someone a surprise. ”Just for reference. Like this. Transfiguro.” She pointed her wand at her eraser, turning it into a rough approximation of a...brown looking stone. It wasn’t very good, but that was because she still had to study this gem. And gem book. She’d have to try her experiments on Lochi himself first.

Lochi mentioned exams but then he got back to talking about architecture instead of whatever subject he meant to. History probably, given the book. Oh well! That’s what detention was for right? Studying?

”Oh yeah, because different angles and materials can support different weights,” Aire nodded, grinning with a surprised expression when Lochi explained. She understood the rough principle, but hadn’t figured out that kind of math. Had he? ”But also just building things, you want them to be even and fit together well.”

She took his picture of the cat house with its older and younger residents. ”I didn’t know you had a cat. Or a brother,” she noted. He looked quite a few years younger. ”How old’s your brother?”

Lochi confirmed that she had the right tower at least, and wondered if he ought to be telling her whether he should be telling her those things. He seemed to be concerned about her safety during these and she tried to reassure him with a carefree ”Oh it’s okay, it’s not that much of a gap. I just can’t get enough height,” she started before remembering she had a learned a better way of allaying people’s fears: ”I mean, Don’t worry, I keep my broom nearby whenever I’m practicing outside,”

There that should be okay. She sketched out a few other details, explaining her intended path. ”My original plan was to approach from this side, but I can’t get enough height to stick the landing on the ledge. There are better ledges on the other side, but nowhere to get to them of course.”