A/N: Thanks to everyone who's read to this point, and special thanks to "Draco Dormiens Nunquam Titillanimus" and "Hey I'm really Sirius" for reviewing recently.
Chapter 8
Andrew Himmel
The rest of Christmas break passed fairly uneventfully, and all too soon Chloe, Rose, Al, and Brittany were sharing a compartment in the Hogwarts Express as it made its way back toward the school. It was the unanimous consensus among Al, Chloe, and Rose that the best part of school starting up again was the fact that they now got to see Brittany again. For Brittany, in turn, the best part was seeing them.
The second best part of the new term beginning was the fact that the DA meetings were about to start up again.
Each Al, Chloe, Rose, and Brittany loved learning the new spells, and it was nice for Rose to be able to hang out with her friends somewhere other than the library or the now quite chilly grounds. Al especially appreciated the meetings since it was one of the few times when he saw his brother for any real extended period of time at Hogwarts. It wasn't like James avoided him or anything, but he wasn't one to spend much time in the library, and it turned out that people who didn't share a common room could often go days without having any communication aside from a passing nod.
The first Defense Club meeting of the year took place on the Saturday one week after the new term started. Since the club had met all of last term and therefore earned the trust of McGonagall and the other professors, they were now able to meet in an empty classroom without a professor present, instead of always meeting in the Great Hall like they had before. The room was usually used for Charms classes, so it was big enough for their purposes, which usually included dueling practice. They had cleared the floor and brought a few large dueling mats from a supply closet, and soon the 20 or so people who had become the regular members of the club had gathered in the room as well.
James began, "So, today we're going to learn a really interesting spell that I'm confident none of you have heard of before. It's a really obscure spell, which will make it useful if you're ever in a situation where you're actually dueling somebody. You see, some adult wizards are able to do something called 'Legilimancy', which allows them to predict what spell you would cast before you cast it. If you're about to use a spell that they've never heard of, though, it'll be much harder for them to prepare for it and try to come up with a counter-curse. Besides, this spell is kind of cool either way. See, it prevents your opponent from using any spells that would cause a person pain. So, if your opponent tried to use Cruciatus on you, nothing at all would happen. Mind you, it doesn't block the Killing Curse, because, as we all know, that's not something that can be countered by any kind of spell-work. Also, it won't stop you from being stunned or petrified because, although these curses are quite annoying to get hit with, they don't actually cause physical pain on their own. But any spell that does cause pain will be unable to be performed by the wand of the person that you cast the spell on. Everyone following this, so far?" James asked.
There were a few nods around the room, and a few people seemed particularly interested. It certainly wasn't a spell that Al had ever heard before, and Rose looked especially enthralled, which made sense since she was usually interested in learning new spells.
"The spell lasts for either 24 hours or until the caster lifts it, whichever comes first. But, for the first 24 hours, it's one of the few spells that can only be reversed by the original caster. The incantation is 'Facio Innocens.' So, we're going to practice this spell now. I want you to break into pairs, and each of you will duel, but you can only use expelliarmus, Facio innocens, and the spell "Contusio", which will give the victim a small bruise where you point your wand, and can be reversed with a simple 'finite incantatem.' It's not much use in battle, but it does hurt a little bit, and therefore should be perfect for this exercise, since it won't go through if the other person has successfully cast Facio innocens. Remember, though, don't be too discouraged if you don't get these two new spells on your first try... You're probably all still a bit rusty after Christmas break, and Facio Innocens is a bit tricky anyway. For most other spells, you can help focus your energy by thinking of something concrete, like your opponent's wand jumping across the room, but for this one, you just sort of have to focus on wanting your opponent not to be able to cause pain, which is much more abstract idea. Anyway... Enough of me lecturing, why don't you lot have at it, then? First one to hit their partner with Contusio wins, if you both hit each other with Facio Innocens, no one can win, so call it a draw."
Rose and Brittany paired up, as did Chloe and Al. They had found that these original match-ups that they had picked the first day of the DA actually worked out quite well. Rose and Brittany were usually a bit quicker than Chloe and Al at actually learning the spells, but Chloe and Al were a slightly better at dueling, as they were much more willing to dive and jump out of the ways of spells that would otherwise have hit them. It was helpful for them to practice against someone who had a similar style, although every couple meetings, they switched it up, just to get a taste of variety.
"So, ready to give this a go?" Al asked Chloe as they faced each other.
"Yeah. But, before we do... do you mind if we try not to aim for each other's faces for the Contuiso spell? I know your brother said it just gives a bruise, but i don't much fancy having any kind of a bruise at all inside my eye or something, even if it can be reversed with Finite Incantatem."
"Agreed," said Al quickly. He considered himself too chivalrous to aim for a girl's face in a practice duel, anyway. He supposed it'd be different if it were a real duel, but in a practice duel, especially one with Chloe, she really wouldn't have had to make the rule at all.
"Ok. Count of three to start, then?" asked Chloe. They started to count in unison, "One, two, three..."
"Expelliarmus!" said Al, knowing this was a spell he would get right on his first try, and hoping that it would give him a second to concentrate on one of the newer spells.
"Contusio!" yelled Chloe.
As they sent their spells, they each jumped out of the way to try to dodge each other's spells.
Al's Expelliarmus missed Chloe completely, while the beam of light from Chloe's wand hit Al in the ankle. He didn't feel a thing.
Chloe grinned, assuming that he had won, but Al aimed his wand at her and said, "Contusio!" He saw the weak beam of light from his own wand hit Chloe in the hand, but nothing happened.
Al rolled his eyes in frustration at his shoddy spell-work, which gave Chloe the chance to yell "Contusio!" again, this time hitting him below the knee. Al swore as he felt a dull pain, which he figured meant he was hit. He lifted up his robe, rolled up his pant leg a bit, and confirmed his suspicion, showing Chloe. "You won that round I guess. How'd you manage to pull off that spell on your second try?"
"Well... I was frustrated after not getting it the first time. Guess that made it easier to want to hurt you," said Chloe with a slight smile. "But only slightly! I'm sure I couldn't have pulled off Cruciatus... Probably couldn't have done any more than I just did, really. Didn't hurt bad, though, did it?"
"Hardly at all," confirmed Al, as he performed Finite Incantatem to make the spell disappear.
"Good. Well... should I do something to make you angry at me, so that you can cast the spell easier?" asked Chloe.
"Nah... I don't think I could ever get angry at you." He realized immediately after he said it how overly sentimental that sounded, and regretted it right away. He changed the subject as quickly as possible. "I'll just pretend your Scorpius or something. That kid gets on my nerves."
"Fair enough," said Chloe, opting to ignore Al's previous statement.
"Count to three?" asked Al.
"One, two, three..."
"Facio Innocens!" yelled Chloe.
Al led with "Expelliarmus!" again, this time keeping his feet planted to better his aim, and he aimed slightly to Chloe's left, since he knew from dueling her so often that this was the direction that she almost always jumped. The spell hit her as she jumped right into it, but he was hit by hers as well.
Chloe's wand flew a few feet behind her, and as she bent down to pick it up, Al sent "Contusio" her way, figuring that her first attempt at Facio Innocens probably hadn't really worked. It hit her, and Chloe swore, using a slightly worse word than he had when he lost his match. Al reflected that one of the biggest differences between the DA and an actual class was that, since Flitwick had stopped coming to supervise, no one said anything if they swore. Although Rose did tend to look severely disappointed if she heard Al or Chloe swear. Luckily, though, it was usually loud enough during the meetings, with almost two dozen people dueling, that people could usually only hear their own partners.
"So aren't you even going to try using 'Facio Innocens'?" asked a slightly annoyed-sounding Chloe. She really had a bit of a competitive streak, noted Al, although he figured that a strong competitive nature was a common attribute of Slytherin students. It was, in fact, one of the few characteristics that Chloe and Al actually shared with their housemates.
"Not if I can win so easily without it," said Al.
"A bit cocky, are we? Remember that we're one and one, will you?" asked Chloe.
"All right... Let's see who's leading after this one..."
"One... two... three..."
"Facio Innocens!" yelled Al, as Chloe fired an Expelliarmus. This time they each dodged each other's spell.
"Facio Innocens!" yelled Al again, as Chloe was still catching her balance.
"Contusio!" yelled Chloe, a fraction of a second after Al's spell hit her.
The streak of blue light hit Al in the chest, but he didn't feel anything.
"Oooh!" said Al, "did I get it, or did you not cast it right? Cast it again, will you, I want to see whether my spell worked. Do you want me to gloat a bit, so you get mad?"
"I'm already a bit irritable about the prospect that I might have lost, thanks," Chloe pointed out. "Contusio!" she said, hitting Al, who made no attempt to dodge, on his right hand. The spell made no mark.
"Yes!" said Al.
"You've still got to hit me, though, before you win," said Chloe, who added "Expelliarmus!" before Al had a chance to remember that she was right. The wand shot up in the air, and Chloe ran over to Al. Al was confused enough by trying to figure out what exactly she was up to that he had no time to dodge her when she physically pushed him out of the way and grabbed his wand before it hit the floor.
Chloe grinned and said, "Now you can't hit me either. It's a draw."
Al was almost irritated, but Chloe was grinning so wide that he couldn't even get properly irked about losing, but instead grinned with her. "That was clever, I admit," said Al. Chloe gave his wand back to him so that he could cast Finite Incantatem on her so that his spell would end and they could start over.
"Thanks. This one will be the tie-breaker, then?" asked Chloe.
"Right-o," agreed Al, and they counted to three again before starting.
About forty-five minutes later, each Chloe and Al had won a total of 10 duels, while Rose had beaten Brittany 12 to 10.
"All right, everyone," said James, after having called the club to order once again. "That was a great session. I stopped dueling a couple times to watch you, and I think everyone got had Facio Innocens pretty much down by halfway through. Now if any Slytherin punk-- no offense to our own Slytherins, of course," he said with a wink toward the corner of the room where Al, Chloe, and Brittany stood with Rose, "-- then you'll have a spell they haven't heard of up your sleeve. Too bad it wears off after 24 hours, though. All right, well... See you all next week, then." Al, Chloe, Rose, and Brittany walked over to James, Marty, and John as everyone else made their way to the door.
"Interesting new spell," commented Rose to James.
"Thanks, I thought so, too. Know who taught it to me?" James asked her.
"No, although I was wondering," she admitted.
"Your mother," said James. "Over Christmas break. I asked her if she knew any cool defensive spells I could teach the club. She seemed really excited that we'd started up the DA again... Almost as excited as my Dad was when I told him."
"Oh, yeah... I told her about it in my letters, of course, but I guess she was still excited to be able to help out with the spell-work," said Rose.
"Makes sense," said Al, nodding. Being excited to help her nephew learned sounded like typical Aunt Hermione. "I wonder where she learned the spell, though, I've never heard Dad mention it in any of his famous stories, so I don't think it's anything they used against Voldemort."
"She has kind of a hobby of looking up obscure spells. She's started passing some onto me as well... Guess she just thought I might as well learn this one from you. Which is well and good, in my opinion... You guys might not know it, but living with my Mom can be a bit tiresome sometimes... I mean, I like learning new spells as much as the next witch, but... I can't always be as excited about it as she is."
"I guess Uncle Ron passed along more genes to you than just the one for red hair after all, then," said James with a slight grin. Then, he glanced at his watch and looked at the others. "Hey, John and I have Quidditch practice in 10 minutes... You lot mind cleaning up alone tonight?"
"No problem," said Chloe, and the others nodded their agreement.
"You can go, too, if you want, we can handle it," said Rose, as Marty appeared to be hanging back as John and James left.
"You sure?" he asked.
"Yeah, no problem," confirmed Al.
"Well, I do have some Ancient Runes homework to do..." he said.
"Sounds tough," Brittany pointed out. "Good luck on that."
"Thanks," said Marty, with a smile, as he left the room.
"So, Al, do you find it as weird as I do that James asked my mother to teach him a new spell, or do I just not know him well enough to know how scholarly he actually is?" asked Rose, as they were getting the room back in order. They weren't using magic because they didn't know quite enough of that sort of magic yet for it to make the process any easier.
"No, I'm shocked as you are," said Al, shaking his head.
"Makes sense, though, doesn't it?" asked Chloe.
"Er... no, it doesn't," said Al. "That's what we were saying.
"Well, you said he's always been a bit of a prankster, too right? And he really likes being in the spotlight, right? He absolutely thrives on being cheered for at Quidditch games."
"Well, yes, that's true," agreed Al.
Rose caught on to where Chloe was going before Al did. "So, you're saying that he enjoys the DA because it gives him another chance to be in the spotlight."
"I'm not saying he's conceited or anything," said Chloe sincerely, seeming to think she had accidentally crossed a line.
"Oh, I don't think anyone was trying to hide that he's conceited," said Al with a grin. "But why would him liking the spotlight make him want to learn new spells?"
"Well, the better he is at leading this group, the more attention he gets," said Rose.
Chloe nodded in agreement.
"It's weird how different you and your brother are," Brittany pointed out. "I don't think I've ever noticed you trying to be the center of attention."
Al thought about this for a second. "Yeah, well... I don't think I can play that role any better than James can anyway. I suppose I'll have to be the quietly dignified one of the family."
"Well, it certainly won't be Lily!" said Rose with a grin.
"Oh, you're right about that," agreed Chloe with a similar grin. "I know that from spending two weeks with her!"
"I need to meet her," said Brittany. "She sounds fun."
"Oh, she is," agreed Al. "I'd bet you five galleons that she gets sorted into Gryffindor, though, so we won't get to see her as much as Rose will."
"Yeah... I think she'll be Gryffindor, too," agreed Rose. "'Course, I thought you would be, too, but..."
"You're not still bitter about that, are you?" asked Al, with a slightly apologetic smile.
"Only sometimes," said Rose.
By this time in the conversation, they had gotten the room in order. "You guys don't have your books with you, do you?" asked Rose.
"No, I think you're the only one who actually carries your books with you everywhere you go," teased Al. "You know, it'd save time if--" said Rose.
"Yeah, and wreak havoc on our posture, too," pointed out Chloe.
Rose groaned. "Fine, meet you in the library in 20 minutes? I've got to do that Potions essay."
"Yeah, me too," agreed Al.
"We'll be there," said Brittany.
Later that week, on Tuesday night, Al stayed awake in the common room a little later than Brittany and Chloe, putting the finishing touches on that same Potions essay, which was due the next day. He had just remembered something that he had completely forgotten to mention in the essay and was considering adding another paragraph to the essay to include it. He knew that Rose hadn't put it in hers, since she let him read her essay when she had finished it two days ago, and he decided that staying up an extra 10 minutes would be worth the prospect of finally getting a higher mark than her on something, even though he was the only one left in the Slytherin common room.
He had just bent his head over his parchment when he heard someone say, "Oy, Pothole!" He knew immediately that it was Malfoy, from the voice, the drawl, and the fact that the boy seemed to have made it his personal assignment to come up with as many stupid and vaguely insulting nicknames for Al as possible.
"What is it, Malfoy?" asked Al, deciding that he didn't have enough energy left to come up with a stupid nickname in return.
"I hear your girlfriend's been mouthing off to my girlfriend," said Scorpius.
Al wasn't sure whether he was more surprised to find out that Scorpius had a girlfriend, or that he himself apparently did.
"I don't have a girlfriend," said Al.
"Sure you do, that Mudblood Chloe," said Malfoy.
At this point, Al reached for his wand, which was on the table in front of him. If Malfoy was willing to start throwing words like 'Mudblood' around in front of Al, he was clearly looking for a fight, although Al had no idea why he would pick 11 o' clock on a Tuesday night to do it.
Scorpius raised his own hands, showing he didn't have a wand. "Can't we talk without trading hexes, like civilized gentlemen?" asked Malfoy with a tone of obviously false innocence.
"If you stop insulting my friends and get to whatever your point was, then sure," said Al, without letting go of his wand.
Scorpius rolled his eyes, although Al honestly couldn't figure out why. It wasn't like he had started this conversation. Scorpius said, "Anyway, Chloe's been harassing Megan, my girlfriend."
"Harassing?" asked Al, with unhidden skepticism. "I wasn't under the impression that Chloe even bothered talking to Megan."
"Are you calling Megan a liar?" asked Scorpius confrontationally.
"No, I'm calling you a liar. And a prat," added Al for good measure, getting up out of his chair, still clutching his wand. If Scorpius wanted a duel after all, Al was pretty sure that he could win. He was certain that Scorpius hadn't had as much practice as he had from being in the DA, and there was plenty of room in the common room to dodge and duck spells. He was almost sure that Scorpius wouldn't even be able to hit him. He was starting to get his energy back, too, and he figured adrenaline must have something to do with it. This might even be fun.
"You're not worth my time," said Scorpius, turning on his heel and walking away, toward the first year guys' room.
"A prat and a pansy, too, then?" asked Al from behind him, a bit disappointed that there wouldn't actually be a duel. But Scorpius was apparently unable to be baited, and simply gave Al the middle finger over his shoulder as he continued walking.
Al rolled his eyes and settled back down to continue working on his essay, setting his wand down on the table again.
Ten minutes later, just as he was adding on a quick conclusion paragraph, Al heard a slight creak that he thought came from somewhere in the common room. But he disregarded it. Slight, unexplained, noises happened all the time at Hogwarts. The only thought he spared to the noise as he continued toward the final sentence of the essay was that he hoped it wasn't the Bloody Baron coming down to the dungeons... The Bloody Baron was the only ghost at Hogwarts that mildly creeped Al out, and was in fact the second worst thing about being in Slytherin, aside from the fact that Malfoy was also there.
The next noise that Al heard was louder than a creak, as he heard a voice yell "Petrificus Totalus!" Al was frozen stiff as a board, lying half propped up on the chair that he had previously been sitting in, before he even had a chance to properly register that the voice belonged to Malfoy. He couldn't even see Malfoy through his eyes that had been frozen in a stare at the ceiling, but he heard Malfoy's voice again soon enough as he said, in a casual manner, "Furnunculus," and Al felt himself starting to develop painful boils.
Al was stunned that Malfoy had turned out to be much more despicable than he had ever imagined, and was wondering what else Malfoy might do to him as Al heard another noise.
He barely had time to register the hope that it wasn't another one of his roommates, none of whom seemed to like him overly much, come to curse him too, before he heard the voice of Andrew Himmel, the fifth year prefect who had introduced himself to Chloe and Al back at the welcome-feast.
"What in Merlin's name is going on here?" asked Andrew angrily, surveying the scene quickly, as he aimed a 'Finite Incantatem' at Al, which released him from the boils and the paralysis simultaneously.
As soon as he could move his eyes again, he noticed that Andrew's eyes were shifting back and forth between Al's wand sitting peacefully on the table, and Scorpius.
"You little bastard!" said Andrew, looking at Malfoy in shock. "You attacked your own housemate, while he was unarmed, in your own common-room?"
Scorpius seemed to know that it was useless to argue this point. If he tried to claim that he had disarmed Al, there was no way he could explain how the wand had just happened to land so neatly on the table, set right beside his potions book. "He provoked me! He was badmouthing my girlfriend!"
Al was now getting the feeling that Scorpius just wanted to mention as many times as possible that he had a girlfriend, but he still felt the need to defend himself, "I was not, I made it perfectly clear to Malfoy that I was only insulting him personally, not his supposed girlfriend."
Andrew smiled slightly at Al's joke and waved a hand dismissively. "You don't have to worry about me believing anyone who would sink so low as to attack an unarmed opponent without warning. They'd set up a duel. And even though I can't officially condone dueling, given that as a prefect I've got to encourage the rules, I can tell you that I would not be nearly so harsh in doling out punishment for dueling as I will be for this. But dueling clearly isn't what happened here, because from what I've been hearing about you from our teachers, there's no way that Scorpius here would have beat you in a fair duel."
Scorpius was wearing a look of utter indignation, and Al couldn't tell whether he was angrier about the promised punishment, or by the fact that Andrew had just insulted him. For his part, Al was a bit shocked that any of the professors would have talked to Andrew about him. But then again, he supposed that prefects were a lot closer with the professors than other students were, so it made sense that he would talk to them... And he supposed that he was now Slytherin house's most famous student, being the son of Harry Potter.
"What's my punishment going to be?" asked Malfoy.
"A week's detention with Filch seems appropriate," said Himmel.
It seemed appropriate to Al, too, and he was just starting to think how much he liked Himmel when he remembered what James had said about him not being someone who he should associate with.
After the next DA meeting, Al approached James. Brittany, Chloe, and Rose followed him.
"Hey, can we talk to you about something for a minute?" asked Al.
"Sure..." said James. "Mind helping me clean up?"
"No problem," said Al.
"All right," said James. "You guys can go ahead," he said to Marty and John." Once they had left, James turned back to Al. "This won't be long, though, will it? I got them to move Quidditch practices back by half an hour, but I still ought to leave not too long after we clean up."
"Yeah, it shouldn't take long," said Al. "I was just wondering... What's so bad about Andrew Himmel?"
James actually cringed when he heard the name, which made Al slightly more sure that James had not simply been joking around with him again when he said to avoid Himmel.
"I don't really want to talk about it," said James.
"What do you mean? I've got a right to know, especially if you want me to listen to you," said Al.
James looked legitimately concerned. "Wait, you have been, right? Listening to me, I mean... you haven't been hanging around with him or anything have you?"
Al quickly recounted the story of what had happened on Tuesday night, as the girls started moving the room's desks back into place. They had, of course, already heard the story, the day after it happened.
James frowned. "Sounds like he's trying extra hard to get chummy with you. If you haven't noticed, it's not a very Slytherin-esque trait to care about the finer points of chivalry in battle... Slytherin himself never would have thought twice about attacking a wandless opponent, nor would a lot of the more recent alumni of the house..." James hesitated for a minute, glancing over at the girls. "I suppose Brittany already knows about the cloak and the map, then?"
"Of course," said Al.
"Fine, then I guess I can tell you lot this story, but I don't want it repeated. I haven't even told Marty or John," he said.
"All right," agreed Al, and the girls nodded in agreement.
"The first night of school last year, I was making a late-night snack run under the invisibility cloak, 'cause I couldn't sleep. I noticed Himmel on the map, but I knew he wasn't a prefect, since he was a fourth year last year, so I figured he was just breaking the rules like me. I put the map away for a little bit, and accidentally wound up in the same corridor as him. I wasn't too worried about it, figured I could just pass by him if I stayed close to the corner, but for some reason I had to pick that moment to sneeze, and he heard me. I still wasn't too worried, 'cause he wasn't a professor or anything, so I just stayed still under the cloak, hoping he'd think it was just his imagination and walk away. I didn't want to give myself away if I didn't have to, because I didn't want anyone aside from Marty and John knowing about the cloak. But apparently he heard me, and I was too shocked to move at first when I saw him lift his wand. Then I was even more shocked when I heard him say 'Cruciatus.'"
"He what?!" asked Rose.
"That's an unforgivable curse!" said Brittany, in shock.
"Yeah, well, I don't mind saying that it felt pretty unforgivable, too. Although it wasn't quite as bad as Dad described it being for him when he got it put on him. I think it was less bad because, well... I think Andrew was just practicing it. I mean... He knew that someone was there, because he heard the sneeze, but he had no way of knowing who I was, so he couldn't properly want to hurt me, at least not as much as if he really knew and hated me. But how could someone only in fourth year even want to practice the Cruciatus? And how could anyone want to do it to a victim they couldn't even see?"
"But..." said Al, who was unsure whether to believe that James was telling the truth. "How did he know that you wouldn't tell on him?"
"I'd have had to admit that I was in the halls under an invisibility cloak after curfew. Besides, if he's the type of kid who gets made prefect, he's clearly on good terms with the professors. Why would they believe a second year who already had a reputation as a prankster over a fourth year? It's not like it even left any scars or anything. I had no proof."
There was silence for a moment. They had all stopped organizing the room, too enthralled by James' story.
"How long did he keep the curse on you?" asked Rose.
"Only about 5 seconds. Then he ran like hell, and so did I, because the pain had made me scream, and both of us were afraid that a professor would catch us out of bounds," said James.
Al said, "You're serious, aren't you?"
"Al," said James, seriously, "I know I've made up stories in the past, but this is real. It worries me that he seems to be trying to get on your good side, and I think he might be up to something. Just stay away from him as much as you can. The only type of kid who would use the Cruciatus curse nowadays is a would-be death-eater born too late. And... from now on, keep your wand in your pocket where you can reach it easier than if it's on the other end of a table. Sounds like the Slytherin common room's a more dangerous place than I thought."
A/N: Quick note: Facio Innocens, as you probably understood from the above text, is meant to allow the beam of light from the spell to go through, but if the spell is one that causes pain, like Contusio, it will have no effect on the victim. Just wanted to make sure that was clear. Please review!
