The next day, too embarrassed to tell my friends what happened, I tried to act as if nothing had happened, but as soon as Anna saw me in our charm class, she asked, "Where is your ring?"

Shooting her an incredulously look, I asked, "What are you a bloodhound or something?"

Anna's face reddened, and she said, "You always have the ring on. I don't think I seen you over the last year without it. What happened?"

When I finished telling her what Michael had done, her eyes narrowed, and she hissed furiously, "He did what, how dare he do that to your house ring, He needs to pay for what he did."

Trying to calm her down, I said, "Don't do anything, I plan to get him back myself."

A rebellious look crossed her face, and she quickly changed the subject, "How are you going to get your ring back?"

Narrowing my eyes at her deflection, I replied, "I'm gonna hang back, to speak with Professor Flitwick after class to see if there is a spell that can help me retrieve my ring."

The class flew by, and when everyone shuffled out of class, I hung back. Once the room was emptied, Professor Flitwick kindly asked, "Can I help you with something Mr. Fawley?"

Shooting Professor Flitwick a sheepish expression, I said, "Professor Flitwick, I seemed to have misplaced my ring, and I know there is a summoning charm, that can help wizard locate objects. I was wondering if you could teach me how to cast it?"

Professor Flitwick set his quill down and looked me in the eyes. After meeting my gaze for a moment, his eyes softened and asked, "Mr. Fawley, do you need any help? I know it can be hard to believe, but we teacher do keep our ears to the ground, and there have been some interesting rumors going around."

Trying to keep my expression smooth, not wanting to give anything away, I quickly replied, "I'm fine, it's just it was an old family ring and I want to find it."

Professor Flitwick sighed, as if he knew what I was going to say before I said it. He went on, "Well normally we don't teach the summoning spell, until your second year. Right now most of the spell we teach in the first year have a small mental component to them, it's more important to get the incantation and wand movement right. With the summing spell, there is a bigger mental component, and if you don't get it right, it doesn't matter if you say the incantation correct or not."

I sighed, thinking that this was his way of turning me down. Interrupting my thoughts, Professor Flitwick interrupted with his eyes twinkling, "But, considering that you have been picking up the first year charms so quickly, We can give it a go, why don't you come by my office at 7 tomorrow evening, and we give it a go. But be prepared, moving on to these more difficult spells, will be more challenging than what you have been learning so far."

My eyes lit up and I said, "Thank you, Professor Flitwick." Grabbing my bag I headed out for my next class. Outside the door waiting for me was Anna, as we made our way through the castle. We spotted Ray talking with a girl on the third floor, Anna's eyes glittered dangerously, pulling out her wand and before I could stop her she pointed it towards Ray and shouted "Defluxio."

As soon as the spell hit Ray, a loud gurgling could be heard coming from Ray's stomach. A moment later, an explosive sound came from Ray's behind as he shit himself uncontrollably. With fecal matter, running down his legs and onto the ground, a foul smell filled the air. The girl he was talking ran off with a disgusted look on her face.

I gulped when I saw the vindictive look on Anna's face. I immediately created a new rule in my mind, never piss Anna off ever, no matter what. Hesitantly I said, "That seemed a little excessive."

Glaring at the direction Ray ran off in, she gnashed her teeth and she responded, "He deserved it, no one does that to you and gets away with it."

Ah, I had my own guardian angel, it was kinda adorable, in a creepy serial killer kind of way. By the end of the day, half the school was aware of what Anna did. Most of the third-year Gryffindors were glaring at her at dinner. Although Michael was giving her a wary look, after all, who wants to be the target of a spell that makes you explode with uncontrollable diarrhea.

After dinner, I headed to the room of requirement, I was hoping to find something that would help me if I got caught off guard again. When I made it inside, I began thinking that I needed a way to be able to draw my wand in a hurry, rather than trying to get it out a pocket in my robe.

On the table, a few options appeared before me, the first option was a wand holster designed to be worn on a belt, interesting, but not want I was looking for. Tossing the wand holster aside and grabbing the next option, it was a left-handed arm strap holster. The wand was to be hooked in backwards, with the handle of my wand near my left hand and the tip up by my elbow. Better, but still not what I was hoping for. Picking up the final option, I recognized that it was what I was looking for, it was a hidden dueling gauntlet.

Sliding the leather forearm armband onto my right arm. Once I got it on, I located the wand holder on the bottom. Snapping my wand into the holder, I twisted my wrist backwards and my wand shot forward, with the handle in reach of my hand. Admiring the dueling gauntlet, I thought it looked eerily similar to the hidden blade weapon from Assasin Creed. Satisfied with my find, and now confidant my wand was only a small wrist movement away, I headed back to my dorm.

The next evening in Professor Flitwick's office, Professor Flitwick began lecturing, "The summoning spell is designed to summon objects to your hand. The incantation is Accio, plus whatever you're trying to summon."

Demonstration the spell Professor Flitwick pointed his wand across his office and chanted "Accio book." A book flew off of the shelf on the other side of the room and shot towards Professor Flitwick.

After catching the book in his hand, he set it on his desk and said, "This spell while difficult is extremely useful. Now, remember, it's isn't about saying the words so much as concentrating on what you're trying to summon. If you don't have the proper concentration, all the proper chanting in the world isn't going to make the spell work. This spell is about 90 percent mental effort and 10 percent spellwork. It's best to begin practicing the spell with an object you can see. It makes it easier when you can visually see what you're trying to summon. The farther away an object is, the harder it will be to summon."

I started having flashbacks when I was younger and trying to summon a red quaffle across my room. Considering I had decent success summoning the quaffle when I was younger and didn't have a wand. I was confident that this time around, it would be easier to manage, now that I had a wand to help me. Curious I asked, "Is there a limit to how far away an object you can summon can be."

Shrugging, Professor Flitwick said, "Yes, the farther away something is, the more mentally draining the spell will be. If you can't provide the mental energy to summon something far away, the spell won't work. For instance, trying to summon something from London from here wouldn't work, it would take too much energy. Now let's start off with something easy try to summon that book over there on the shelf to your hands."

Pointing my wand at the book, I focused all of my mental energy on the book of the shelve. Once I believed I had achieved the necessary concentration, I chanted "Accio book." The book shook slightly indicating that it almost worked. Annoyed at the failure, I demanded again "Accio book!" This time the book shot over into my hand.

Grinning in success, I turned to see Professor Flitwick's jaw wide open in shock. After a moment he recovered and quietly said, "Mr. Fawley, I have to admit, I'm impressed, I thought even with your prodigious magical talent it would take a bit longer. I find myself looking forward to seeing just how capable of a wizard you're going to turn out to be."

After a bit more practice, Professor Flitwick said, "Alright, obviously summoning objects inside a room is too easy for yours. All you need to do is continue practicing on your own, on objects out of sight, once you get that down, practice on objects further and further away. Keep me informed of your progress."

Over the next few days, I continued with my practice, At first, I was confident that I would pick up summoning objects I couldn't see with no problem, but I discovered it was vastly more difficult. It took me about a week to confidently believe, that I had mastered the summoning charm.

On the evening I was confident I had mastered the charm, I opened our dorm room window, and deeply concentrating on my ring, I chanted, "Accio Ring." After five minutes, I concluded that it didn't work. Annoyed I went back to practicing the spell over and over. A few nights later, I tried again when I was confident that I had mastered the spell.

Unfortunately, my ring never appeared, confused I went back to Professor Flitwick to explain my issue. Stoking his white beard, he replied, "There are a few things to consider, the most obvious is that you are lacking in mental concentration and that's why it isn't working."

Shaking my head, I replied, "Watch this, I threw a rock, carved with my name into the great lake earlier." Walking over to his window I opened it and chanted "Accio rock." About three minutes later I heard a whistling sound as the rock sped through the air. Catching the stone I showed Professor Flitwick the rock with my name on it.

Professor Flitwick visually impressed, and said, "Well, I would have to say that you do appear to have mastered the spell, Well then, next up to consider, is that its too far away to summon, but considering you lost it here I dought that is the case. Unfortunately, with those two ideas discarded, it leaves us with some less pleasant theories to consider. First, it may be that the ring no longer exists how you remember it if it was damaged or destroyed the spell wouldn't work."

Seeing my face go pale, he quickly moved on. "The other possibility is that it is being magically prevented from being summoned."

Confused I asked, "Is that even possible?"

Nodding his head up and down, he answered, "Oh yes, off the top of my head I can think of a dozen or so ways to prevent something from being summoned. I could probably come up with more if I gave the thought more consideration."

Seeing my crestfallen face, Professor Flitwick tried to cheer me up, "Well, there is a method to determine if whatever you seek is still intact. It can even point you in the direction you need to go to find it. There are a few drawbacks though, it doesn't lead you right to the object more like in the general direction. It's called the seeking spell, the incantation is "Requiro Fortitudo." Similar to the summoning spell, this spell requires a great deal of mental concentration. There is no wand movement, just balance your wand in the palm of your hand, concentrate and say the incantation."

We spent the rest of the even practicing the spell, it was a little more difficult to cast because I was having trouble properly concentrating on my ring. Knowing that it was somewhere deep in the forest, where it was either destroyed or being magically contained somehow was distracting.

Either option was discouraging, I couldn't wait till Christmas, so I could go home, and speak with Anton at the tower, maybe he created a spare ring. Sighing and banishing the wishful thought. There is no way a wizard as paranoid as Anton would create a duplicate ring.

I spent the rest of the week, practicing the spell, and by the end of the week, I felt I had a good grasp on the spell. Every time I cast the spell, my wand spun in my hand with the tip of the wand pointing at the Forbidden Forest.

Looking at the ancient forest nervously, I knew from the books that it was full of monsters and creatures, not to mention the centaurs who disliked wizards in general. Shaking off the temptation of charging straight in towards my ring. Going deep into the forest would require careful thought and deliberation, not some foolhardy plan that could end up getting me killed. After all, I was not some character in a book, this was real life. If anything over the past couple of weeks had taught me anything, it was if you do something stupid, expect there to be consequences.