siesta had been working in secret every night for the past month, trying to perfect her potion. the young maid, bestotted with saito, had decided to try a bold plan to win his affections. and soon, she would finish it. her love potion was nearly done, after a month of investigating and mixing. she'd been performing this potion-making secretly at night, in an empty classroom in the academy.

'all i need is one more ingredient and some way to get him to take it, and he'll fall in love with me!' she said to herself in her excitment.

of course, she knew very well this was vital. she'd read up into this potion. the base potions that had to be created and added to to make a love potion, without this final ingredient, could have dire consequences. she just hoped she could get the ingredient and the potion given to seito before anyone discovered it...

'what are you doing?' a voice asked. seista froze, and turned to see louise standing there.

'um, nothing. i'm just mixing up... some cleaning fluid?' she tried.

'i heard what you said earlier. that won't work.'

'how much did you hear?' seista asked, worried. to her surprise louise walked over and snatched the vail of potion.

'everything. and i'm going to destroy your potion now.' she said, holding up her wand.

'w-wait! you can't, it's danger-' she began, but louise tried to cast a spell on it.

the result was a large explosion. siesta was knocked out. her last sight before unconciousness was a cloud of thick grey smoke around where louise had been standing...



***

'oh... my head...' she groaned as she awoke.

seista looked at the damage. the mixing sets and much of the glass was cracked or smashed, and papers were scattered around. cleaning that up wouldn't be troublesome for her. what would be a problem would be louise. she stood there, staring in surprise at her now empty hand, eyes open in shock, mouth open in a yell. her wand had fallen from her grasp, and had rolled up against her foot. she had become a stone statue from head to toe.

'w-what happend?!' siesta cried out, and looked over the stone girl. every part of her was petrifed, turned to stone and not just encased.

siesta thought fast in her panic. she cleared up the mess, and with effort that surprised herself, she carefully dragged the heavy petrified girl away. somehow, she got her away unseen, and anyone who would look at the room where the accident had happened now wouldn't have a clue anything had ever gone wrong there... for now


***

she'd been so exhausted from carefully moving the heavy statue that she'd accidentally made, that as soon as she had the door locked she'd fallen down on her bed and into a deep sleep. rising the next morning but not truly awake, recollection of last night didn't come quickly. she also wasn't quite thinking straight when she walked into a human shape. she was soon awake after her scream, and face to face with last night's problem. louise was still a statue, and standing at the foot of her bed.

'that wasn't some crazy dream?!' siesta panicked. she'd just let out a scream, meaning someone might have heard, and might find the statuefied girl.

'okay... i need to move her at least. i nearly walked into her and smashed her.' siesta said to herself.

***

she'd settled on hiding her inside a closet, but a fear gnawed at her that this wouldn't last. someone would find what she had done, and she'd face the consequences. she decided to try to find some kind of cure in the books on potions she had obtained, but nothing even mentioned this kind of accident.

after exhausting herself trying to find the answer, with her tired limbs heavy and her mind clouded, she returned to her room, now certain she'd turned louise into stone permenantly.

'i've no choice. she's never going to turn back so i have to dispose of the evidence.' she thought out loud, and opened the closet door, grabbing the statue without the careful concern she had used before. by the time she truly realised what she was doing it was too late. louise hit the ground, smashed into pieces, and did so very loudly.

seista panicked again. she'd not only petrified louise but now she'd turned her into rubble! quickly, she started stuffing the parts into a bag, her mind making up a plan as it went along

'i'll hide them in the forest... deep in a dark part of the forest...' she told herself, unaware of two things. that even smashed, louise could have been magically restored if she'd simply owned up, and that the heaviness of her limbs wasn't just from tiredness...

***

she swore the smashed-up louise was even heavier and more exhuasting to move. it took her tired body a long time to even reach the forest, and even longer to find a suitably dark area, cut off from the dwindling rays of the setting sun. she threw the bag that held the smashed statue into a small pit, hearing it clink and rattle as it landed. it would soon be invisible below the leaves and no one would ever find out what she did...

...but what about saito? he was her familiar! if she was gone, what would happen to him? siesta fretted over this until the sun fell completely, only realising it was dark when something screeched in the forest.

'what was that?!' she cried out loud, then saw the blackness. she had to get back...

..but her legs wouldn't move.

she stared down, and saw with shock why. her skin was turning grey. her body felt stiffer than ever. she was turning to stone too.

'nooo!' she cried out in horror.

back in her room, the clothes she had worn last night were turning to stone too, the delayed reaction from having been less covered by the effects of the exploding potion taking affect. in the room she'd made the potion and where louise had destroyed it, the whole room was slowly transfroming to stone as well. siesta felt her throat tighten, only able to croak weak gasps as she tried to call desperately for help. but even if she could have been loud enough, she would never be heard so deep in the forest.

it took nearly an hour before it was done. siesta's last terrified thoughts before she lost conciousness were wondering if this was some kind of karmic retribution for what she had done.

***

the first sign of the accident was that they found the entire room transformed to stone.

'your class has gone too far this time. instead of leaving a mess in that room, they've turned the whole place to stone!' a maid complained. the teacher then admonished his class for this latest prank before restoring the room

a few days later, when others were searching for the two missing young women, they found the petrified uniform in siesta's room. no one linked the two incidents, for only the maid and teacher knew the nature of the ''prank''. no one searched deep in the forest where the only others who had answers lay.

standing still, the petrified siesta stood a few feet from a bag containing the smashed and petrified parts of an unfortunate louise. siesta's unpetrified clothing fluttered in the wind, the two statues hidden from sight, and no one knew what had happened to them both