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Good morning, Ms. Parsley, and welcome to St. Mungo’s Mental Elf Hospital Trust. Perhaps you’d like to tell us a bit about yourself?
“My name is Citrina Parsley and as you know, I’m applying for the post of Witch in Chief. I always wanted to work in the Elf Service – my father was a Healer and my mother was a Fizz-Tickle Therapist – so after doing my degree at Hogwets College of Bitchcraft and Bollockry, I applied to Nollege College, to do a course in Wizmanagement (Healery). In the holidays, I got myself an internship in the Department of Stealth. Well, the Department of Stealth and Total Obscurity, it was, then, and after that I had two years on the Ministry of Tragic’s MsManagement training programme.
“Then I spent five years Pottering around various projects while wearing a badge that I had Charmed to display a variety of fancy-sounding titles, before skipping overseas to hone my msmanagment skills somewhere nice and remote. Here, I had overladyship and msmanagement of all magical and non-magical operations within the coven: goading two dozen disciplines to deliver enchanting sorceries for pea-Knuts. My work saw a vast increase in the numbers of victims of magical misfortunes arriving at our door, so I arranged for the construction of a monstrous maze to manage patient flows and stymie new arrivals. I also planned new buildings and worked with the stoneraisers, the Chief Wizard and Healers to plan the new Almshouse (including futurology and service transmogrification) for the agreed amount of Galleons.
When I came back, I did a year as a Sorcery consultant – working with all the top Adminwizards of the Almshouses and Covens in my area to source saucers – and then I landed a plum role at St. Werburgh & St. Walstan’s, redisorganising the entire establishment of what were acknowledged as the most disorganised dungeons in the country. By means of Polyjuice Potion, I impersonated the Chief Wizard both internally and externally during this period. I led and managed all the magical disciplines, properties and accoutrements, plus conjuring, transmogrification, sorcery development and Paracelcian msmanagement. I created a new management clique in each area, to control conveyance and transmogrification through staff capacitation alongside implicit imponderables.
“My next move was to community magimedicine – providing the vanguardium leviosa for thousands in the magical community and msmanaging millions of Galleons. I stuck that for over three years until a better opportunity came up in the Hufflepuff Herbology Foundation Trust, which in turn led to me to the position of Witch-in-Chief at Slytherin Fountain Elf Trust, where I’ve been for the last five years.”
Thank you for that. Is there anything else you would like to tell us?
“I was awarded Witch Weekly’s Most Charming Coiffure of the Year.”
You’ve brought your academic certificates with you but we’re having a little trouble with this Gothick printing on the Hogwets diploma – does it say your degree was in Healing?
“No.”
Oh. Definitely not Potioneering – is it Herbalism?
“No.”
Could you help us out a little, here, Ms. Parsley?
“Leylines.”
Leylines? Leylines. Well, that’s, er, certainly an unusual route into the Healing sphere. With a Healer father and a Fizz-Tickle therapist mother, it might have been expected that you would have studied Healing or a related discipline yourself, rather than geomancy?
“Well, of course you’re a Healer, aren’t you Doctor Flssstfckmnst? I know all about you, He Who Cannot Be Pronounced. Just like my father, all, ‘You’ll never amount to anything, Citrina, if you don’t get straight O grades. Can’t study Healing with E’s, you know. They may call them Exceeds Expectations but I call them not good Enough.’ Even when he didn’t say it, I knew he meant it.”
Would you like a tissue, Ms. Parsley? Well, if Healing wasn’t for you, did you not consider one of the auxiliary professions? Herbologism, say, or Potioneering or Fizz-Tickle Therapy like your mother?
“What, and have Dad snarking at me the way he did at my Mum? No thanks. Anyway, I showed him. So what if I only got A’s? My grades were Acceptable rather than Outstanding, but who wants to be an outlier? My degree may be in leylines, but I’ve had literally hundreds of Healers working for me, and if I felt like it, I could make ’em widdle their drawers with fear; I had the power to hire, fire, or petrify. Haha! How do you like them apples, Dr. Daddio? And once I’m Witch in Chief here, you’ll say, How High?, Mr. Boring Chairman, when I say Jump, or I’ll turn you into a frog!”
Fascinating. Tell me, Ms. Parsley, do you really think you are here for a job? Don’t you remember you were brought here suffering from self-induced Delusionaria Grandiosa and this is your admission interview?
“I’m admitting nothing. And I’m not staying here if I’m not going to be in charge!”
Come, come, Ms. Parsley, you’ll find your time here will be much easier if you just resign yourself to undergoing treatment.
“I’m not resigning.”
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Who By Fire 