Chapter 6
The Flying Menace
There was a flash of green light. A boy's body fell to the ground in a heap. The face-less figure pointed its wand at Matt. Another flash of light, and Matt was in the Gryffindor common room, in one of the plush chairs. He glanced around. The room was deserted. The fireplace had a fire, which was casting weird shadows about the place. A head was in the fireplace. It was the head of the boy Matt had just seen killed. A noise, and a boy, older then Matt, tall and pale, with blonde hair and black eyes, brandishing a wand. He raised the wand. Another flash of green light.
Matt woke on the bed in the dormitory, cold sweat poring over him. He had just had a very strange dream, and was trying to comprehend everything before most of it slipped away. There was a boy he thought. Was he dead? And who was the older boy? I've never seen him before. Think! He pushed his hand against his forehead. The dream was leaving him so quickly. A moment later he couldn't even remember the face of boy who died. He gave up trying to remember it, and fell back to the bed.
"I had a very strange dream." Matt told Lara. He was in the Great Hall having breakfast. "What?" Lara asked. Matt laughed. "That's the problem, I can't remember. All I know is that someone died in my dream." He shrugged. "Maybe I'll remember it later." He placed some eggs onto his plate and was about to put some bacon on when something hit him in the forehead. "Oww!" He looked to see what it was, and found an envelope. He looked to see where it had come from, and saw about a hundred or so owls overhead, dropping letters to their owners. The owl that had dropped this letter Matt had never seen before. Matt opened the letter and read:
Dear Matthew,
Hope your trip to England went well. Your father and I have missed you so much. One of the Professors at your school sent us this owl so we could keep in contact with you, although I do have worries about it flying over the ocean. I hope your classes went well. Please tell me how they went.
The school has been asking us questions on why you were pulled out, and your friends are wondering where you've gone. I hope you'll write them and tell them, because you should really consider how they feel if you've found new friends and forgot about them, and I'm running out of excuses for why you aren't here.
Hope you have a fun school year. Write back!
Love,
Mom
Matt put the letter into his pants pocket under his robes. His friends. He had completely forgot about them. Matt scribbled a note to his mother on a spare piece of parchment from his bag, and attached it to the owl the first letter had came on. The owl took flight, and left the Great Hall. "Letter from your Mum?" Lara asked. "Yeah." Matt went back to his breakfast. "What are our classes?" Lara handed him a schedule. Matt scanned it.
Transfiguration was the first class Matt went to. He was interested in this class mostly because, as Lara had told him, it dealt with turning something into something else. But upon entering the transfiguration classroom, Matt realized it would be some time before Matt could transform anything. Prof. Dumbledore, the same aged old wizard Matt saw at the Great Hall and on the plane, taught the class. In his class, it seemed that he was fragile, moving slowly but still looking at them with fondness. Their first project was turning a needle to a match, and Lara was the only one who could even make a difference to her needle.
Herbology was boring to Matt. Their first day was spent learning basic heals using certain plants. Lara was doing well in Herbology as well. Every question Prof. Tentel, the Herbology teacher, asked a question Lara seemed to have an answer. The whole class spent the Herbology lesson scribbling notes on parchment.
Again in charms Lara proved herself to be above the class. Prof. Napton was praising her from the beginning of the class. And, Matt thought, It would probably been better had Lara not have done everything correctly. The first charms they had to do were Mobility charms, which moved an object a foot or so. They were each given a leaf, and, not to Matt's surprise, Lara was the first one to make hers move. Lara then helped Matt, but was only able to move his leaf a couple inches.
"What purpose do 'Mobility Charms' serve anyway?" Matt asked, angrily. Prof. Napton had gotten frustrated with Matt because he had problems with the charm. "There to give us practice in casting charms" Lara answered. They were walking to lunch after they had finished with charms. Lara had escaped without homework. Matt and the rest of the class were not as fortunate. "Hey, Matt!" Chris yelled down the corridor. Chris walked over to them. "Have you gone to potions yet?" Chris asked them. "No." responded Lara. "We haven't got Potions until Friday. Why?" Chris looked uncomfortable that Lara had responded, and it took him quite a while to say "I've got potions next. Some of the other Ravenclaws say that the Potions teacher favors only his own house, Slytherin. He won't got that easy on us." Lara looked puzzled. "Prof. Snape can't still be the teacher of potions. He was here when my Dad went, and that was over 20 years ago." Chris shrugged. "Well, see ya later Matt" and Chris left to his other Ravenclaw friends. "That's really getting annoying" Lara said as Matt and herself entered the Great Hall and sat down at the Gryffindor table. "I tried to tell him not to do something like that when ever he saw you." Matt said. "Oh well. I bet the reason you got out of homework was because you're Harry Potter's daughter." Lara gave a weak smile, and then began piling food onto her plate.
After lunch Matt and Lara were walking to the History of Magic classroom when a small man with horrible black eyes crossed their path. He was floating cross-legged in front of them. "Lost?" The creature asked, a horrible smile spreading across his face. "Uh, no, we aren't" Matt said, uncomfortable. His smile didn't waver. "Wouldn't want. Horrible things happen to students who get lost" and he sped away strait up through the ceiling. Matt looked at Lara, and surprised to see worry on her face. "I think that was Peeves" Lara said. "My Dad said he's a poltergeist, far different from the normal ghosts of Hogwarts. He plays practical jokes on whoever he comes by." Matt and Lara began to walk forward again, but Matt fell forward onto his face. Lara came and helped him up. Peeves had tied his show laces together.
History of Magic turned out to be a bore. Prof. Binns, teacher of the class, was a ghost. James told Matt that he died one day, and just got up as usual, leaving his body behind. By a half-hour into his class most of the students had fallen asleep.
Peeves wasn't much help after Matts first encounter with him. Not only was he true to his reputation of being a Flying Menace, but also he seemed to favor Matt. More then twice a day Matt had several "accidents" happen, everything from tying his shoe laces together to Having his bag spilt open and everything go everywhere. So was the case on Friday. Matt and Lara were on their way to Double Potion Class (two hours of potions with the Slytherin house) when Matt's bag split open. Lara helped Matt pick up his things while Peeves sped way laughing. By the time they had gathered all Matt's stuff, they were late for Potions.
Potions took place in the dungeons of Hogwarts. It was much colder down there and Matt was hoping that the Potions classroom was warmer. "Ahhh, Mr. O'Brian, Ms. Potter. So kind of you to join us" said a cruel voice as they entered the Potions classroom. The Slytherins laughed. "I'm sorry Professor it was Peeves he…" Lara began to explain. "Silence! Take your seats." Snape said. Matt and Lara took seats. "And five points from Gryffindor." "Points?" Matt whispered to Lara. Lara put her finger to her lips and looked at Snape.
The lesson did not improve from there. Snape seemed to dislike the Gryffindors for some reason. The only Slytherin Snape didn't favor was Robert Young. Rob was the only one who didn't laugh at Snapes tormenting of the Gryffindor students. Snape was constantly craning over the Gryffindors, as thou desperate to find an excuse to take away more points, whatever purpose they served. The Slytherins went unchecked. As the Gryffindors were constantly working on their basic wound healing potion, the Slytherins were trying tossing things at the Gryffindors, and when Arnold Kimin threw a dried blood worm at the Slytherins, it resulted in a detention.
"Can you believe him!?" James MacDougal said angrily as they left the potions. "What has he got against us? I'm sure he knew the Slytherins were tossing Unicorn Radish at me." "What are points for?" Matt asked Lara. "Points go toward the house cups. The one house with the most points wins the contest. My Dad says Snape always did take points off him for no good reasons. My Mum had me study all my school books early so that I could win extra points for Gryffindor."
Matt and Lara went to the Great Hall for dinner. Chris joined them. "Hey, Chris! What's up?" Matt asked as he came to their table. "You're the first to greet me like that in a while. All my Ravenclaw friends are British. They don't use American slang." He waved to Lara. "Hey, Lara." "Talking to me, are you?" She asked. Chris looked slightly embarrassed. "Well, I'd like to say I'm sorry, for how I was earlier." "You were acting like an idiot. But its okay. I've your reactions all day. Tea?" She handed Chris a cup. Chris shook his head. "No, Thanks. So, did you meet Snape? Horrible, isn't he?"