Chapter Text
Ch. 18 New Classes and the DADA professor
The next day classes had begun. The first thing at breakfast that had happened was that McGonagall had handed them their timetable. It was Thursday, and the first class was Charms, followed by Ancient Runes. After lunch, they had DADA and History. For Ron, it was a free period after charms. Hermione hid her timetable as soon as she got it- Weird.
In charms class, they revised everything they learned in the last academic year. It was done the previous year too. After Charms, they headed to Ancient Runes. The teacher was a young lady who looked barely 25. He took a seat beside Susan, who was sitting alone. There were a couple of Ravenclaws in the class at the time, and Hermione had gone to the bathroom. After the bell rang, and everyone was in the class, the professor started, "Good Afternoon class, My name is Bethesda Babbling. I will teach you Ancient Runes till at least the end of your fifth year. Then, if you qualify and choose to study my subject further, we will be together till you graduate. I have a mastery of this subject and am teaching for 4 years already at Hogwarts. This is my fifth. In all these years, not a single student has failed in this class. I would like it if you keep it that way. Now, let us all introduce ourselves!" She finished with a cheerful smile. The class only learned what the subject was about and the dangers one may face while practicing. She also told them where all the subject was applicable. Nothing much, but it was a really good introduction.
After lunch, they went together to the DADA class. Harry wanted to see how this new professor was. For the last two years, the professors for the subject were useless. He knew Lupin did know a bit about the subject, as he had produced a fully corporeal Patronus and knew to combat the effects of a Dementor by eating chocolate.
Once the bell rang, the professor entered.Lupin smiled vaguely and placed his tatty old briefcase on the teacher's desk. He was as shabby as ever but looked healthier than he had on the train, as though he had had a few square meals. "Good afternoon," he said. "Would you please put all your books back in your bags? Today will be a practical lesson. You will need only your wands."
A few curious looks were exchanged as the class put away their books. They had never had a practical Defense Against the Dark Arts class before unless you counted the memorable class last year when their old teacher had brought a cageful of pixies to class and set them loose. "Right then," said Professor Lupin, when everyone was ready. "If you'd follow me."
They went to the staff room after a brief encounter with peeves. Snape was his usual self and bullied Neville before leaving. He knew that he could not bully Harry as he was the best DADA student along with Potions too now, not that the dour potions master would ever admit it.
The class was about Boggarts. The class had various fears. Parvati's was a mummy, Neville's was Snape. How bad of a bully Snape was if a student Boggart turned into him? Neville made him wear his grandmother's clothing, sending the class into laughter.
"Excellent! Ron, you next!" Ron leaped forward.
Crack! Quite a few people screamed. A giant spider, six feet tall and covered in hair, was advancing on Ron, clicking its pincers menacingly. For a moment, Harry thought Ron had frozen.
Then — "Riddikulus!" bellowed Ron, and the spider's legs vanished; it rolled over and over; Lavender Brown squealed and ran out of its way and it came to a halt at Harry's feet. He raised his wand, ready, but —
"Here!" shouted Professor Lupin suddenly, hurrying forward.
Crack! The legless spider had vanished. For a second, everyone looked wildly around to see where it was. Then they saw a silvery-white orb hanging in the air in front of Lupin, who said, "Riddikulus!" almost lazily.
Crack! "Forward, Neville, and finish him off!" said Lupin as the Boggart landed on the floor like a co*ckroach. Crack! Snape was back. This time Neville charged forward-looking determined.
"Riddikulus!" he shouted, and they had a split second's view of Snape in his lacy dress before Neville let out a great "Ha!" of laughter, and the Boggart exploded, burst into a thousand tiny wisps of smoke, and was gone.
"Excellent!" cried Professor Lupin as the class broke into applause. "Excellent, Neville. Well done, everyone… Let me see… five points to Gryffindor for every person to tackle the Boggart — ten for Neville because he did it twice… and five each to Hermione and Harry."
"But I didn't do anything," said Harry with narrowed eyes. He was irritated that the professor did not let him face Boggart.
"You and Hermione answered my questions correctly at the start of the class, Harry," Lupin said lightly. "Very well, everyone, an excellent lesson. Homework, kindly read the chapter on Boggarts and summarize it for me… to be handed in on Monday. That will be all."
Yet Harry stayed back. "Professor Lupin." Lupin turned. "Yes, Harry?"
"Why didn't you let me face the Boggart?" He asked, making his eyes glow faintly.
Remus Lupin looked at the boy who once called him unca' Moony. He was standing tall, looking so much like James without glasses and having Lily's eyes. He also noted that he had high cheekbones of his grandmother, Dorea Potter. His emerald eyes were glowing like Charlus Potter when he was irritated. The previous day, he had seen Harry form a corporeal Patronus! A fully corporeal Patronus at 13! He was so proud. He wanted to tell Harry that he and James were friends but could not muster the courage to do so. "I did not want Lord Voldemort appearing in my class if there was a chance that you remembered him in your subconscious." He answered Harry's question. The boy looked at him with a scrutinizing stare before nodding. Harry thanked him for the class and left.
As for the rest of his classes, Arithmancy and COMC, they were interesting, to say at the very least.
Professor Vector was the Arithmancy teacher. She was a 30-year-old lady with a strict no-nonsense type of attitude. Harry was strongly reminded of Professor McGonagall. Her class only had 19 students because of the difficulty of the subject. But it was nigh essential to understand the inner workings of several spells, especially hexes, jinxes, and curses. After OWL level, from their sixth year, they would learn to combine two spells to make a new one. Making, a completely new spell, was extremely difficult. The best people did was combine two spells to make a new one or tweak the spell. These were documented at the ministry for every student, at least the ones presented. Several went unrecorded, straight into family grimoires. Several times people made the same spells like a stunner which would stun as well as put the victim in a full body bind. This was one of the most frequent combinations. He had Daphne and Susan in the class as well as Runes. Well, Hermione too, but that was beside the point as she was taking every class.
The Care of Magical creatures class was taken by none other than Hagrid. He was an enthusiastic teacher, to say at the very least. For the first class, they had been shown a Hippogriff. First, Harry had successfully ridden one, named Buckbeak. Then, the class gained confidence and came forward. The blonde ponce Malfoy had insulted the proud bird. The Hippogriff had reared back and struck him with its sharp claws. Malfoy had cried like a baby. A couple of days later, he left the hospital wing still acting like he was grievously injured and had suffered severely.
He had loudly proclaimed that Hagrid would be fired and the Hippogriff would be executed as his Father would ensure it at the Gryffindor table. Harry had said, " Oh, Malfoy, he won't. I bet on it. You were the one who insulted the Hippogriff, an action only a severely intellectually malnourished moron would do. You are a fool, Malfoy, and I assure you the Hippogriff and the Professor won't suffer due to your imbecile nature." It had sent the whole great hall into Peals of laughter as the word spread.
Malfoy had replied with the best comeback he had, "My Father would hear about this. And the beast would be executed, mark my words. My Father wouldn't let this matter down." He had turned on his heel and marched out of the Great Hall. Harry had proceeded to write a letter to Lucius stating that Hagrid was his friend, and taking action against them for something moronic his son had done would harm Harry and his friend. He also suggested that he should publicly reprimand his son and tell Draco how he had disgraced the Malfoy name.
The next day, a howler had arrived during breakfast at the Slytherin table for Draco.
" DRACO MALFOY, you, have brought disgrace to the name house Malfoy. You insulted a Hippogriff, something no sane wizard would do, that too, despite the instructions from the professor. I will not go to court and justify your moronic actions to satisfy your useless tantrums. I publicly apologize for my son's behavior to the professor." Malfoy senior's voice had sounded loud enough for the hall to hear. Draco went red in the face in anger and embarrassment and fled. Harry was smirking at the boy. Soon, Draco lost all support he had in the Slytherin House due to his Father's money, except, of course, his boyfriends. Or so Daphne told him in their first dueling session in which she had got her cute arse handed to her. Harry had used only verbal spells. He had toyed with her for some minutes by just dodging her spells, before firing off a Stunner, a body bind, and disarming hex. The girl had evaded the Stunner but fell straight into the other two.
It was Tuesday. Harry came back from his Ancient Runes to attend Transfiguration. He was a bit late as he had stayed behind to ask the professor questions about an equation. The whole class was sitting. As soon as he entered, the entire class looked at him as if they were going to attend his funeral. Harry raised an eyebrow before taking a seat with Ron just as McGonagall entered the class.
The lecture was about Animagi and it was an interesting one. Harry wanted the ability to turn into an animal. Thinking the possibilities, Harry's eyes widened. The next time when Voldemort confronted him, how badass would it be if Harry jumped on him and turned into an Elephant! Not even Voldemort could survive that. He was quickly disappointed as they could not change into an animal of their will because they had a definite inner animal, which was strictly non-magical.
McGonagall transformed herself in front of their eyes into a tabby cat with spectacle markings around her eyes. "Really, what has got into you all today?" said Professor McGonagall, turning back into herself with a faint pop, and staring around at them all. "Not that it matters, but that's the first time my transformation's not got applause from a class." Everybody's heads turned toward Harry again, but nobody spoke.
Then Hermione raised her hand. "Please, Professor, we've just had our first Divination class, and we were reading the tea leaves, and —"
"Ah, of course," said Professor McGonagall, suddenly frowning. "There is no need to say anymore, Miss Granger. Tell me, which of you will be dying this year?" Everyone stared at her.
"Harry." She said finally. Harry raised an eyebrow. 'So that's why everyone looked at me like it was my Funeral.' He thought to himself. Salazar had told him that the current divination teacher was a fraud and predicted the death of a student every year since last years. None had come true yet.
"I see," said Professor McGonagall, fixing Harry with her beady eyes. "Then you should know, Potter, that Sybill Trelawney has predicted the death of one student a year since she arrived at this school. None of them has died yet. Seeing death omens is her favorite way of greeting a new class. If it were not for the fact that I never speak ill of my colleagues —" Professor McGonagall broke off, and they saw that her nostrils had gone white.
She went on, more calmly, "Divination is one of the most imprecise branches of magic. I shall not conceal from you that I have very little patience with it. True Seers are very rare, and Professor Trelawney…" She stopped again, and then said, in a very matter-of-fact tone, "You look in excellent health to me, Potter, so you will excuse me if I don't let you off homework today. I assure you that if you die, you need not hand it in."
"Don't worry, Professor McGonagall, even if I die, I will make sure that my ghost completes Transfiguration homework. I can't have you saying that Harry Potter died without handing in his homework, can I?" He said cheekily. The woman was a fraud, both in the Founder's and McGonagall's words. He did not need to worry.
Everyone laughed. Soon the bell rang, and they all headed for lunch.
It was 23rd September, the September Equinox, more than three weeks since the classes had started. He was at the top of his classes at Hogwarts now. Snape was still biased and sneered at him whenever he made a perfect Potion but couldn't do anything. He felt good about it. He was also a little worried about Hermione. She was hiding something from him. He did not push it as he had several secrets and understood the need to keep something close to his chest.
Currently, he was in the Chamber of secrets Drawing runes in the ritual chamber. A bunch of ingredients lay in a corner of the room for the ritual. The Ritual was going to be the most difficult one he had done so far. A total of ninety-one Runes had to be drawn, and Twenty-one different ingredients were needed. He had started preparing at eleven itself, an hour before the ritual had to start.
The ritual was an extremely beneficial one. It would improve his balance, speed, and reflexes. Along with these attributes being majorly benefitted, he would also get a minor increase in his strength, dexterity, pain threshold, and flexibility. Of course, he would still have to train to become better. Rituals were an opportunity for improvement. It was not like once he had done the ritual he could sit back and rest. He would still have to work out to maintain these benefits, or else it will become useless.
Once he had finished it, Salazar and Helga checked it out. Helga said, "It is perfect. You have memorized the chant, right?" Harry nodded. "Good. Remove your clothing and magical items and wait for noon. As soon as The clock strikes 12, start the chant." Salazar said. Harry gave him a salute and obeyed. As soon as the clock struck noon, he started chanting. The runes glowed as usual. Then the pain started. It felt like his nerve endings were burning. After what seemed like an eternity but was only three minutes, the pain lessened but was still there. It was painful and exceedingly uncomfortable. After thirty-six minutes, it completely stopped. Harry had bared the discomfort and the pain for more than half-hour. His body was sore. It felt like the first day he had worked out under Salazar and Helga, only twice worse. He immediately took a pain relief potion, wore his clothes, and went to bed. He would go back in time afterward to attend his classes by the time turner.
