Chapter 15: Choosing a Path
The first option was to study with an apothecary, who would teach what would later be known as herbology, potions, and a bit of medi-magic. The second, and related field, was to become an herbalist, or gardener, who studied herbology and the growing of plants for food. While the first field required some level of magic to master, the second did not, as long as one had help with the fiercer magical plants.
Defense training could include studies of animals, which was similar to the modern Care of Magical Creatures and Defense Against the Dark Arts, or it could include battle magic, which was more similar to transfiguration, paired with Defense and dueling.
These four fields were common, and those who studied them were able to make practical contributions to the village and school. Slightly more esoteric were those who studied runes and other languages, which could range from mundane languages to ancient magical cultures to the tongues of animals. With the large number of exotic people and animals brought to the town by Slytherin and the others, there were often teachers available in the mundane languages, and those with experience speaking to animals.
Then there were the completely academic fields, as Helena explained. Astrology was the forebearer of the modern divination and astronomy, and was partly taught by the centaurs. Scholars would record and study history, and sometimes branched into minstrel studies, or performance. This was the precursor to history and arithmancy studies at the modern Hogwarts. Finally, Alchemy was for those interested in studying advanced magics and potions.
When Hermione asked, Helena explained that at this time, transfiguration and charms were largely incorporated into their relevant fields, instead of being their own classes. Though, she pointed out, Battle Magic did include a lot of transfiguration, and one who specialized in scholarship could make a point to study transfiguration or charms as their specialty.
After a few weeks of courses, Hermione chose to study in depth with a Master Scholar, a teacher of Runes, and a Master alchemist. Neville immediately latched on to the master herbalist and apothecary, though at Helena's urging he also spoke to several of the language teachers. Harry stuck with his creature studies with Slytherin, and also spoke to the language teachers. Helena had said that he likely had more language abilities, and he wanted to discover them! He also chose to study with Charlus the surgeon, reasoning that if he had an inclination for healing magic he should learn more about it too.
All told, the lands of the four founders supported over a thousand people and almost as many Elves and other sentient beings, with most of them based at the castle and village. With that many folk around, and with them studying under different teachers, Harry was afraid that he wouldn't see Hermione and Neville very often. However, they did study and work together weekly, and they almost always ate breakfast and dinner together, usually with Helena or one of the founders.
And there were times for fun, besides the studying. No classes were held on the seventh day of the week, which was a day off of work for everyone but the cooks. There was a week-long harvest festival around the fall equinox, and similar festivals for the winter and summer solstices and spring equinox. There were also other, shorter festivals to celebrate important days, including the founding of Hogwarts.
Aside from the festivals there were plenty of ways to relax. They played plenty of games and activities, with the students, teachers, and villagers all joining in. Harry and the others learned to play bowls and skittles, both of which Hermione compared to modern bowling, but played outside. There were also matches of stoolball, gameball, and shinty, which Hermione compared to cricket, football, and hockey, respectively. Having never played any Muggle games before, Harry and Neville simply had to take her word for it. There were even races, through the grassy grounds during the warmer months, and through the snow and across the ice during the winter. Having never been allowed to play sport while living with the Dursleys, Harry threw himself into all of them eagerly.
Then there were the combat based events - tournaments in jousting, archery, blades, quarter-staves, wands, and wrestling. At first Harry just watched these, but as he learned more from Sir Nicholas and the other Knights, he eventually took part in the tournaments. With all of the unaccustomed activity outdoors, Harry grew almost a foot, becoming strong, tanned, and toned.
Before they knew it, several months had flown by, and Harry, Neville, and Hermione were about to celebrate the anniversary of their first year in the past. Hermione asked about the limits of their travel, but Helena had merely smiled and replied that they would stay as long as they needed to.
Another year passed, and Harry went on quests with Slytherin to bring back a herd of unicorns to the forest, and with Neville and Hufflepuff to acquire a variant of magical blackberry bush that would fruit year-round. He traveled with Friar Lawrence for a few months, tracing down reports of magical children and inviting them back to Hogwarts, all while learning everything the Friar knew about his metamorphmagus abilities. By the end of the year, Harry was able to change his appearance at will.
By the end of their third year, Harry had learned the healing magics and culture of Elves and merfolk, successfully mastered the languages of elvish and mermish, and finally during a trek to the Danish Kingdom, identified his ability to speak to dolphins and whales in Cetaceatongue. In his fourth year, Harry learned the healing magics and cultures of the goblins and centaurs, mastered the goblin language, and discovered the ability of dragons and wyverns to understand, though not speak, parseltongue. Slytherin reasoned that the snake language and draconic language were close enough for general understanding, in the way that one who spoke French could understand some Spanish, though of course there would always be difficulties in translation.
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