Author's Note: Apologies for the slow update. I was hoping to get this out sooner, but life has been a bit hectic coming up to christmas and I was struggling with motivation a bit.
Enjoy.
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Chapter 8b: The First Lessons 2
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The Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom was certainly magnificent, although a strong aroma of garlic hung heavy in the air. Long arched windows lined one side of the room, overlooking a vast vista of the Hogwarts grounds. Hanging from the high ceilings was a spectacular iron chandelier and, even more impressive, the skeleton of gigantic dragon. The cold stone walls were outfitted with majestic tapestries of various spells and creatures, most of which Harry couldn't fathom. In stark contrast to the wonder of the room, a rather mundane set of desks were orderly arranged in neat rows on the floor. A teacher's desk and blackboard sat in front of the students desks. Harry thought it looked a bit like one of the classrooms at his old school, only in the middle of a castle. The Gryffindor students entered and found their desks. There were plenty of spares. Their timetable suggested that all of their other classes would be taken with the students from another house, but for some reason Defence Against the Dark Arts classes were held separately.
"G..Good Morning C..Class." Professor Quirrell spoke as he descended a spiral staircase behind the teacher's desk and took a seat.
A strange scent seemed to follow the professor as he arrived, several other students were wrinkling their noses as the smell threatened to overpower them. Harry found that it was all he could concentrate on, and it took quite a few minutes before he was desensitized enough to notice that Quirrell was still talking.
"D..Defense Against the D..Dark Arts is an extremely im..important subject. H..Hopefully you never f..face the D..Dark Arts, b..but you never kn..know. Are th..there any qu..questions?"
"What's with the turban?" Dean Thomas asked, drawing a lengthy silence from Quirrell.
"...It….was a g..gift. F..From an african prince. I...got rid of a z..zombie for him. T..Troublesome creature, p..put up quite the f..fight."
The thought of zombies actually existing should have worried Harry, but he found himself more excited than anything else. Would he be learning how to take down zombies as well? Seamus Finnigan was evidently wondering the same thing, as he eagerly asked Quirrell how he defeated it.
"H..How I beat it?" Quirrell blushed. "...A s..storm….lightning. Now everyone turn to page thirteen of your b..books, and we'll g..get started with the l..lesson."
Harry felt a bit disappointed by the vagueness of Quirrell's answer, and his disappointment grew when he discovered what they'd be learning about that day. He had expected to be learning spells, or at the very least see a demonstration of some. Instead Quirrell read aloud the description of an insect like creature called a Doxy, while they followed along in their own textbooks. It was very dull. The Doxies didn't even seem that magical, or Dark. They were basically just slightly venomous bugs. After Quirrell finished reading he assigned them all some questions and busied himself at his desk while they answered them.
"This isn't exactly what I expected." Harry admitted to a bored looking Ron, sitting beside him.
"Yeah, I thought we'd be learning Jinxes or Hexes, or at least some protective spells." Ron sighed. "Mind you, Doxies can be nasty little pests. We had a bunch of them in the attic a few years back. Little buggers hurt when they latch on. I wouldn't call them Dark Creatures though. I thought that was like Werewolves and Vampires."
Werewolves, Vampires and Zombies - that was more like it. He hoped they would be learning about some more interesting things soon, but he resigned himself to answering the Doxy questions anyway. It was tedious work, made even worse by the fact that he cut himself on the rough paper of the textbook halfway through, small red dots adorning his parchment as he worked. Holly sniggered from her spot near a window, the warm morning light washing over her. She had always had more patience for this sort of work than him. Harry just found it pointless. He wanted to be learning magic, really learning, not copying down useless facts about a nearly harmless insect.
Things didn't get much better after lunch, when they headed for History of Magic. They arrived at the first-floor classroom to find a ghostly figure already lecturing with his back turned to an empty classroom. The Gryffindors and the Ravenclaws, who were sharing this class, filed into the classroom without the ghost noticing and found seats. Harry was interested to see how a ghost - who turned out to be Professor Binns - would teach. Quite badly, Harry decided after just a few minutes. Binns droned on in a dreadfully monotonous voice, churning out dates and names that they frantically tried to scribble down. It was torture.
"Did you catch that last name, mate?" Ron asked Harry.
"Emetic the Eaten wasn't it? No that's not right." Harry replied, crossing out the name.
"Good enough for me. This is a nightmare." Ron sighed heavily and shook his head. "How is anyone supposed to remember this stuff?"
Harry didn't know. His brief conversation with Ron had caused him to miss several more of Professor Binns' historic facts and he now had no idea what the ghost was talking about. He threw down his quill in frustration.
"It's not that bad." Holly said, still trying to keep up with Binns' relentless lecturing.
While Harry was glad his sister was enjoying the class, he couldn't for the life of him understand why. Try as he might to take in what Binns was saying, nothing seemed to stick. Seamus and Dean already appeared to have fallen asleep. Even one of the Ravenclaws at the back was dozing. Harry found himself nodding off several times as Binns' flat drone made concentration impossible. Daphne also bemoaned the class, threatening to walk out at one point.
Time seemed to crawl along slower and slower, the ghost prattling on dispassionately while Harry tried futilely to take notes. Mercifully, after what felt like three days of boredom, the bell finally rang - signalling the end of class. Harry and the other students packed up their things and made for the door as Professor Binns continued on with his lecture, unaware that time was up. Sighs of relief echoed throughout the hallway as they left the book-lined lecture hall. Even the Ravenclaw students, who were meant to enjoy this sort of thing, were happy to leave.
That afternoon was spent in the library attempting to finish their homework, which was every bit as tedious as the classes that day. After dinner, Harry and the other Gryffindors headed back to the dorms. Harry lay awake in bed, reflecting on the day. He couldn't help but feel disappointed. Certainly this was better than living with the Dursleys, loads better, but he couldn't help feeling that it was a little...boring. For such a magical place the classes had been decidedly unmagical. He shut his eyes, hoping that the other classes would be more like what he was expecting.
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A/N: To be honest I'm not really happy with this chapter. I rewrote it about 5 times and nothing seemed to feel right. In the end I just wanted to finish it and move on. Hopefully the next ones will come out more easily. Feel free to let me know how terrible it was.
