Riley makes his usual check. First, scan for any major discrepancies (e.g. trails of suspicious substances, objects where the structure looks off, any foreign sensations or thoughts). Second, identify all of the places mals could hide. Third, look for the most competent person in the room- likely the student who got here early- enclaver, by the looks of it. She's already reading the textbook, but he should wait for everyone to arrive before making that call.

He finds a textbook on a desk near hers as soon as he looks for one, and so he sits there. Riley reads the preface, first, trying to get a sense of what the class will cover.

Julian does a quick scan of the room before diving for his textbook. Normally he'd be more thorough, of course, but he's just got one thing on his mind – please no middle high german, please no middle high german, please no middle high german – 

goddammit. 

Marcy is silently mouthing the words of the first poem, figuring out how everything is pronounced based on what makes the rhymes and stress patterns work. She's going to want a dictionary to build vocabulary later, but pronunciation is key to spells.

Theun's on his way in, talking quietly in German with someone from his last class. They put their bags on a pair of desks in a decent spot, then split the mal checking from there to the near wall.

He flips open the new textbook and scans the early poetry - a little older than he's fluent with, but he can get the meaning and pronunciation roughly right.

"Have you gone as far back as this, Falk? I'm solid on the 1500s forward for High, Low, and Dutch, 1200s not as well."

Falk shakes his head. "No, I didn't do much historical German, focused on the classical languages. Is it tricky?"

"There's a lot of vowel shifts, and shifts in how you split up your phrases and clauses. I found it easier than new languages, so I did a lot."

"Gottseidank," Julian sighs. "I was worried I'd be the only one who wasn't up on my historical German dialects." His German isn't exactly fluent, but he can make himself understood. 

Awesome, German speakers for immersion and to buy tutoring from. She eavesdrops shamelessly because she can't understand them nearly well enough for it to count as eavesdropping.

Julian is sure he's embarrassing himself in front of the actual German speakers but apparently this is what we're doing now, speaking German. Onward! The only way out is through! 

"Do we know if – " fuck, he's forgotten the word for lecture – "if this is a class where we talk or not?" 

"Looks set up for a lecture, but I'd bet we'll have discussions for some of these classes, studying poetry and never reciting it seems wrong."

"For the record," Marcy says cheerfully, "I don't speak German yet; obviously you guys should all keep speaking it but if you want me in particular to understand something try something else." And back to listening and learning how the language flows and where the word boundaries are.

In English and before he can stop himself – "Oh no." 

"I guess you're pretty good with languages, then, Marcy?", Theun replies, also in English.

Falk pulls a face, and turns away to hide it.

"I've got German. I'm willing to tutor anyone who doesn't have it, if we're at the stage of offering that."

"I'd love to buy some tutoring. I've got eight other languages if you're looking to be paid back in kind."

The muggleborn kid who's been sitting quietly (looking at a spellbook in German) this whole time chooses this moment to say, "I have the basics of German, mostly lacking in vocabulary, but I need more. And it's safer to study things in pairs."

"We could all do a study group this weekend."

On the one hand, tutoring an enclaver could be very valuable. On the other hand, offending an enclaver by tutoring badly in a language in which he's not fluent would be a disaster. And in-kind tutoring isn't a particularly good offer – oh. Study group. Hmmm. 

"Does your enclave's table have space?" 

"It's a mezzanine room, technically it's mine as well. I haven't visited yet, though, I don't know how many guests can fit beyond Boston and Philly."

"If we can't all six fit we can park in the reading room."

Ah, to be an enclaver. 

"I would definitely be up for a study group, wherever it ends up being."

The lecture starts up. It's in English except for when it's quoting the poetry or using German loanwords about poetic forms. Today they're learning about the mundane and magical purposes of German religious poetry, and the origins of the form, as exemplified by this poem, which their textbook has in the original and in three different translations with different deep inadequacies that make them magically useless.

Marcy takes diligent notes, especially on the loanwords. She wonders if you could write a book that started as English with some German loanwords, then the occasional sentence in German word order, then more German words, and by the end of the book it would be totally in German. It seems like the sort of thing that should work and be awesome but there's no time to think about that if she wants to write down all the key terms and concepts.

Julian thinks all these translations are deeply aesthetically objectionable and is sure he could do a better job. Maybe for extra credit. 

Theun spent about half his time with languages learning about the shared ancestral tree of English, Dutch, and German, so if it's doable for "doesn't know German" he is going to have it easy. This is fine, he'll get spells, but also boring, and his attention starts to drift.

But a few minutes later he realizes that this means he should take teaching notes - half the class is going to want tutoring. This is a sufficiently interesting challenge that he can focus on it more easily, but not so hard that he's stressed. Perfect.

Riley uses the Cornell Method of note-taking. He prepared this notebook for it last night, so now he's ready to go. While he's writing about German religious poetry (which is super interesting), Riley jots down notes about his classmates in the margin in shorthand-

-1500s +; High, Low, Dutch (HLD)

-Marcy: Wants tutoring

- 8 lang trade, M.

-Red, supply: Basic

-Room BosPhil, M./HLD

-it isn't the best class for someone going alchemy track, though. He wonders if he should have tried to switch out after all. At least he's meeting more enclavers.