Post by Her Evil Muffiness to you!! on Feb 18, 2006 7:50:32 GMT 2
Chapter 8
Magical Classes
Just after Jiara, Hilary and Aaron had finished eating their breakfasts, Scott and Brett walked into the Great Hall looking harassed.
“Where have you guys been?” said Aaron as the other two sat down.
“We were trying to find you!” said Brett exasperatedly, “then we got lost because, unlike you, we’ve never been here before.” Brett was looking angry.
“Well we’re sorry,” said Jiara quickly, “it’s just, I had to go to the hospital wing and when I could go again we just came straight here to have breakfast.”
“Humph,” mumbled Brett, “You still could have come up and told us.” They all ate breakfast in silence.
After breakfast they went for a wander around the school grounds. Aaron, particularly, seemed to know a lot about the grounds and showed them were everything was. They went back in for lunch and then sat by the lake and talked the rest of the day.
Sunday dawned bright and Jiara was up early again. She lay in bed and stared up at the canopy, thinking until she heard the Hilary and the other girls she shared the dorm with, Katie Bell, Angelina Johnson and Adeline Rowans.
Hilary and Jiara meet the boys in the common room before going down to breakfast.
“How about we go visit Hagrid this morning?” suggested Aaron when Scott asked what they should do. Jiara grinned.
“Are you sure we’re allowed?” she asked. Aaron nodded.
“I don’t see why not.”
“Fine, let’s do that then,” said Hilary and they all left the Great Hall and walked down the steps.
It was quite pleasant in Hagrid’s little hut by the Forbidden Forest. It only had one room that acted as bedroom, kitchen and dining but it was cosy and Hagrid was very friendly, even when they delicately declined his offer of staying for lunch; Aaron had warned them that his cooking wasn’t always safe.
Jiara had plenty of fun for the rest of Sunday. She and Hilary enjoyed themselves watching the boys beat each other up. The game abruptly ended, however when Aaron winded Brett after a particularly fierce tackle.
The next day was their first day of lessons in magic. Jiara was very excited when she got her timetable.
“We’ve got Transfiguration first up,” she said looking at the Monday slot, “then Defence Against the Dark Arts, then after lunch Charms and Potions.”
“Well, we’d better get moving if we want to leave a bit of time to get lost,” said Scott standing up. The others did the same and followed Aaron out of the Great Hall.
“Well, lead the way, big fella,” said Brett, slapping Aaron on the back, “you of all of us should know the best way to get to Transfiguration.”
It took a while, but eventually, with the help of some of the older students, they got to the Transfiguration classroom. Everyone else was already lined up and waiting for the teacher. The boys groaned slightly when they saw their teacher, Professor McGonagall.
“Well we were bound to have her for one of our lessons you know.” Jiara snapped as Professor McGonagall unlocked the door and ushered them in.
“Yeah but it would have been better if we hadn’t had her for our first lesson ever!” replied Aaron, pretending to be angry with Jiara.
“Well, I’m just thankful we don’t have Potions first, everyone talks about that teacher as some sort of devil.” At Jiara’s words, the rest of her friends shuddered; they had also heard the terrible rumours about the Potions master. He was the head of Slytherin house and he favoured them considerably. At that they had to cut off their conversation.
“Good morning Gryffindor first years, I am, as you know, Professor McGonagall and I am your Transfiguration teacher, as well as your head of house.” Professor McGonagall stared around the apprehensive class; Jiara sensed that she wasn’t the type of person you would want to make angry. “You will find that Transfiguration will be one of the most complex subjects that you will learn here.”
Professor McGonagall took out her wand and transfigured her desk into a pig and back again. Instantly, the whole class clapped and whooped and wanted to start work straight away.
“It will be some time before you will be able to do things like that. You will start small and simple and work your way up.” She then waved her wand and each student suddenly had a match each lying on their desks.
“I want you all to turn the match on your desk into a needle using the guide in your copies of The Standard Book of Spells page 4.” They spent the rest of the lesson trying to transfigure the matches into needles. By the end of the lesson only Aaron, Jiara and Hilary had anything that looked remotely like needles.
“Good work you three,” said Professor McGonagall as she collected the half needles, “ten points each to Gryffindor.”
The bell went to tell them that they had to change classes and they all got up and left.
“Well, personally, I found that lesson quite enjoyable.” said Jiara as the group got up to go to their next lesson, Defence Against the Dark Arts. The lesson was slightly dull compared to their experience at Transfiguration. Their teacher, Professor Hallow, was very boring and he only taught notes.
After this lesson, they all went to lunch.
“We’ve got Charms now,” said Jiara as they got up to leave.
“Do you think you know the way to the Charms classroom Aaron?” asked Hilary, “it’s in the third corridor on the fourth floor.” Aaron nodded and led the way up one of the staircases to the second floor, then on another even more rickety one that seemed to go up forever.
“This is a bit of a shortcut my dad showed me once,” he said. Sure enough, when they reached the top they ended up right in front of the Charms door.
The teacher for Charms was a squat old wizard called Professor Flitwick. He was so short, in fact, that he had to stand on a pile of books just to see over his desk. Like Professor McGonagall, Professor Flitwick started off his lesson with a small lecture and a demonstration. But, instead of turning his desk into a pig, he made it fly around the room. As with Transfiguration, they were all eager to begin. But, they were asked to start small.
Professor Flitwick started to teach them the proper words and wrist movements for a levitation spell. After five minutes of doing this, he then gave each of them a feather and they got to work on trying to make it levitate. Jiara grasped the concept perfectly and after only three attempts made her feather speed around the room. It seemed apparent, that Jiara was one of the smartest in her grade, just as her mother and father. The only ones that were at her level were Aaron and a girl called Angelina Johnson, who were then closely followed by Brett and Hilary.
Next was Potions. None of the group was looking forward to this lesson at all. When they got to the dungeon in which the lesson was they saw that they had this lesson with the Slytherins.
“Oh no,” Brett groaned under his breath, “This is even worse, do we have to be with the slithering snakes?”
The Potions master was even worse than they had heard or even imagined. His name was Professor Snape and he, like Professor McGonagall, had some sort of gift to keep the class completely silent as he talked. He was tall and thin with pallid skin and had greasy black hair that fell around his face like a curtain that went down to his shoulders.
He started the lesson by giving them a sort of quick quiz to see how well they had read their books. One by one he pointed to each of the students and asked them a question. After he had asked the question, Jiara’s hand would shoot into the air, hoping that he would ask her if the person he asked got it wrong. And that was exactly what he did, if the person got the answer wrong, he would turn to Jiara with a creepy kind of smile and ask her what the correct answer was. But, if someone else had their hand up and Jiara didn’t, which wasn’t often, he would ignore them and answer the question himself.
Jiara thought this was extremely odd. He was supposed to favour the Slytherins, not Gryffindors. After Snape had finished with his questionnaire, he said, “I shall give Gryffindor 10 points for Miss Potter’s wonderful performance.” He then waved his wand carelessly and the instructions for a simple potion appeared on the board.
Finally, the bell rang for them to leave. Jiara and the rest were quite happy to go; Professor Snape was sort of freaking them out.
“Well, that was the most, er, different lesson I’ve ever had,” remarked Jiara as they walked up the stairs.
“Yeah,” said Brett, “did you see the way he treated you? I would rather him be rotten to us, it would be more bearable to see him sneer at us rather than try to smile kindly.” Jiara shuddered; she couldn’t get the picture of Snape smiling at her out of her head.
“Oh, oh, I’ve got it,” said Hilary with a look of mock excitement as they walked up the marble staircase to drop their bags off before going to dinner, “Maybe, oh shut up Aaron, maybe you remind him of someone he used to like.”
Jiara smiled. That was an interesting thought. It gave her something to think about during dinner that night.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Magical Classes
Just after Jiara, Hilary and Aaron had finished eating their breakfasts, Scott and Brett walked into the Great Hall looking harassed.
“Where have you guys been?” said Aaron as the other two sat down.
“We were trying to find you!” said Brett exasperatedly, “then we got lost because, unlike you, we’ve never been here before.” Brett was looking angry.
“Well we’re sorry,” said Jiara quickly, “it’s just, I had to go to the hospital wing and when I could go again we just came straight here to have breakfast.”
“Humph,” mumbled Brett, “You still could have come up and told us.” They all ate breakfast in silence.
After breakfast they went for a wander around the school grounds. Aaron, particularly, seemed to know a lot about the grounds and showed them were everything was. They went back in for lunch and then sat by the lake and talked the rest of the day.
Sunday dawned bright and Jiara was up early again. She lay in bed and stared up at the canopy, thinking until she heard the Hilary and the other girls she shared the dorm with, Katie Bell, Angelina Johnson and Adeline Rowans.
Hilary and Jiara meet the boys in the common room before going down to breakfast.
“How about we go visit Hagrid this morning?” suggested Aaron when Scott asked what they should do. Jiara grinned.
“Are you sure we’re allowed?” she asked. Aaron nodded.
“I don’t see why not.”
“Fine, let’s do that then,” said Hilary and they all left the Great Hall and walked down the steps.
It was quite pleasant in Hagrid’s little hut by the Forbidden Forest. It only had one room that acted as bedroom, kitchen and dining but it was cosy and Hagrid was very friendly, even when they delicately declined his offer of staying for lunch; Aaron had warned them that his cooking wasn’t always safe.
Jiara had plenty of fun for the rest of Sunday. She and Hilary enjoyed themselves watching the boys beat each other up. The game abruptly ended, however when Aaron winded Brett after a particularly fierce tackle.
The next day was their first day of lessons in magic. Jiara was very excited when she got her timetable.
“We’ve got Transfiguration first up,” she said looking at the Monday slot, “then Defence Against the Dark Arts, then after lunch Charms and Potions.”
“Well, we’d better get moving if we want to leave a bit of time to get lost,” said Scott standing up. The others did the same and followed Aaron out of the Great Hall.
“Well, lead the way, big fella,” said Brett, slapping Aaron on the back, “you of all of us should know the best way to get to Transfiguration.”
It took a while, but eventually, with the help of some of the older students, they got to the Transfiguration classroom. Everyone else was already lined up and waiting for the teacher. The boys groaned slightly when they saw their teacher, Professor McGonagall.
“Well we were bound to have her for one of our lessons you know.” Jiara snapped as Professor McGonagall unlocked the door and ushered them in.
“Yeah but it would have been better if we hadn’t had her for our first lesson ever!” replied Aaron, pretending to be angry with Jiara.
“Well, I’m just thankful we don’t have Potions first, everyone talks about that teacher as some sort of devil.” At Jiara’s words, the rest of her friends shuddered; they had also heard the terrible rumours about the Potions master. He was the head of Slytherin house and he favoured them considerably. At that they had to cut off their conversation.
“Good morning Gryffindor first years, I am, as you know, Professor McGonagall and I am your Transfiguration teacher, as well as your head of house.” Professor McGonagall stared around the apprehensive class; Jiara sensed that she wasn’t the type of person you would want to make angry. “You will find that Transfiguration will be one of the most complex subjects that you will learn here.”
Professor McGonagall took out her wand and transfigured her desk into a pig and back again. Instantly, the whole class clapped and whooped and wanted to start work straight away.
“It will be some time before you will be able to do things like that. You will start small and simple and work your way up.” She then waved her wand and each student suddenly had a match each lying on their desks.
“I want you all to turn the match on your desk into a needle using the guide in your copies of The Standard Book of Spells page 4.” They spent the rest of the lesson trying to transfigure the matches into needles. By the end of the lesson only Aaron, Jiara and Hilary had anything that looked remotely like needles.
“Good work you three,” said Professor McGonagall as she collected the half needles, “ten points each to Gryffindor.”
The bell went to tell them that they had to change classes and they all got up and left.
“Well, personally, I found that lesson quite enjoyable.” said Jiara as the group got up to go to their next lesson, Defence Against the Dark Arts. The lesson was slightly dull compared to their experience at Transfiguration. Their teacher, Professor Hallow, was very boring and he only taught notes.
After this lesson, they all went to lunch.
“We’ve got Charms now,” said Jiara as they got up to leave.
“Do you think you know the way to the Charms classroom Aaron?” asked Hilary, “it’s in the third corridor on the fourth floor.” Aaron nodded and led the way up one of the staircases to the second floor, then on another even more rickety one that seemed to go up forever.
“This is a bit of a shortcut my dad showed me once,” he said. Sure enough, when they reached the top they ended up right in front of the Charms door.
The teacher for Charms was a squat old wizard called Professor Flitwick. He was so short, in fact, that he had to stand on a pile of books just to see over his desk. Like Professor McGonagall, Professor Flitwick started off his lesson with a small lecture and a demonstration. But, instead of turning his desk into a pig, he made it fly around the room. As with Transfiguration, they were all eager to begin. But, they were asked to start small.
Professor Flitwick started to teach them the proper words and wrist movements for a levitation spell. After five minutes of doing this, he then gave each of them a feather and they got to work on trying to make it levitate. Jiara grasped the concept perfectly and after only three attempts made her feather speed around the room. It seemed apparent, that Jiara was one of the smartest in her grade, just as her mother and father. The only ones that were at her level were Aaron and a girl called Angelina Johnson, who were then closely followed by Brett and Hilary.
Next was Potions. None of the group was looking forward to this lesson at all. When they got to the dungeon in which the lesson was they saw that they had this lesson with the Slytherins.
“Oh no,” Brett groaned under his breath, “This is even worse, do we have to be with the slithering snakes?”
The Potions master was even worse than they had heard or even imagined. His name was Professor Snape and he, like Professor McGonagall, had some sort of gift to keep the class completely silent as he talked. He was tall and thin with pallid skin and had greasy black hair that fell around his face like a curtain that went down to his shoulders.
He started the lesson by giving them a sort of quick quiz to see how well they had read their books. One by one he pointed to each of the students and asked them a question. After he had asked the question, Jiara’s hand would shoot into the air, hoping that he would ask her if the person he asked got it wrong. And that was exactly what he did, if the person got the answer wrong, he would turn to Jiara with a creepy kind of smile and ask her what the correct answer was. But, if someone else had their hand up and Jiara didn’t, which wasn’t often, he would ignore them and answer the question himself.
Jiara thought this was extremely odd. He was supposed to favour the Slytherins, not Gryffindors. After Snape had finished with his questionnaire, he said, “I shall give Gryffindor 10 points for Miss Potter’s wonderful performance.” He then waved his wand carelessly and the instructions for a simple potion appeared on the board.
Finally, the bell rang for them to leave. Jiara and the rest were quite happy to go; Professor Snape was sort of freaking them out.
“Well, that was the most, er, different lesson I’ve ever had,” remarked Jiara as they walked up the stairs.
“Yeah,” said Brett, “did you see the way he treated you? I would rather him be rotten to us, it would be more bearable to see him sneer at us rather than try to smile kindly.” Jiara shuddered; she couldn’t get the picture of Snape smiling at her out of her head.
“Oh, oh, I’ve got it,” said Hilary with a look of mock excitement as they walked up the marble staircase to drop their bags off before going to dinner, “Maybe, oh shut up Aaron, maybe you remind him of someone he used to like.”
Jiara smiled. That was an interesting thought. It gave her something to think about during dinner that night.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*