Chapter 20
Working hard, or hardily working?
The next few days went by with out anything interesting happening. Ginny avoided Harry whenever he tried to talk to her. Also, Snape had gone (Harry suspects spying on Voldemort), and Hagrid has gone up to the North with Madame Maxime to get some Giants on our side.
"C'mon lets go," Ron said as he stuffed his breakfast into his mouth.
"Since when have you been excited about going to potions?" Harry asked
"Oh he just wants to see Fleur," Hermionie giggled
"Do not!" Ron protested, and then became very red in the face. Just then, all of the owls came swooping into the dining Hall with mail. Hedwig flew towards Harry with his Quidditch magazine in her talons.
"Look Ron got a letter from his dad!" Hermionie said with glee as she read over Ron's shoulders.
"What does it say?" Harry asked as he put his magazine in his bag so he could read it later.
"Lets see. Blah, Blah, Blah, hope your doing okay. Er, lets see. Oh! It says that they've made a temporary jail at the ministry, with goblins, cave elves, and other creatures guarding it. And that there almost done with that potion to bring Wormtail to them using his blood. And a bunch of other stuff. It says my dad suspicious of Ms. Lestrange. He says she's secretive and she's not doing much work. Er, he says he doesn't know why Fudge hired her, because he says she doesn't do much work."
"Uh-oh," Hermionie said as she read the daily profit.
"Let me guess," Ron said slowly "The chest that held the Azkaban guards that have had the kiss put upon them has been open."
"How'd you guess?"
"Well I knew it would get worse."
"Don't know which member of the ministry helped opened it though."
Harry sighed and then said, "C'mon lets go to potion class, and hopefully Fleur doesn't like the Slytherin's." Once they stepped into the classroom, they had all of the Slytherin's smirk at them, and then Fleur smile at them. Many of the boys (even the Slytherin boys) were taken over by Fleur's charm and were staring at her.
"Hello, I am Fleur Delacour you may call me Fleur. Now is it correct you have already learned the hair potion?"
"Yes," the boys said dazily
"Good! Zo today wez will learn the 'Veela skin' potion. Now it can turnz wrinkly skin into to almost Veela skin! It involves a drop of vela blood that my grandmuzzer gave to me. Zo letz get going!" Harry started to chop up his griffin hide when Malfoy threw a chopped wiggle wart at the back of his head.
"Ow!" Harry said as he squirted some dragon blood at him. The surprising thing was Neville (who wasn't under the pressure of Snape) was doing extremely well with his potion. After they finished with most of their ingredients Fleur walked around with a glass dropper filled with ice blue liquid. "Veela blood" she told them, as she put a drop in each of the students potions. Once the ice blue liquid fell into their cauldron, the liquid inside bubbled, and steamed.
"Yez, yez tiz complete! Alright Mr. Malfoy may we test urz on urzelf?"
"Sure," Malfoy grumbled as he walked to the front of the class (he missed Snape being there). Malfoy dipped his hands into his ice blue liquid inside his cauldron and rubbed the liquid all over his face. The skin on Malfoy's face started to smoke and Draco let out an awful scream. After the smoke cleared the students broke out laughing as they saw Malfoy's face, which was full of wrinkles and baggy skin. His wrinkly gray baggy cheek skin hung down to his shoulders. Even Fleur laughed as Malfoy looked in the mirror. Fleur laughed as she asked Neville to ring up his potion.
"Neville!" Malfoy screamed outraged "I want my skin back to normal, I don't want it to fall off!"
"Don't inzult Neville! He haz done a good job!" Fleur grabbed a handful of Neville's potion and rubbed it on Malfoy's face (who was screaming that he'll sew Fleur).
"Twenty points to Gryffindor, for Neville'z fine potion, and minuz 10 points from Zlytherin for your outburst, rage and bad potion making!"
"What!" Malfoy screamed as his skin went back to normal "This is your fault! I'll sew you! Do you know who my father is! You did that on purpose! You poisoned me! You wrecked my potion! You tried to ruin my face! The only reason Dumbledore hired you is because you put your little Veela charm on him! That old hoot couldn't have hired you awful teacher if he didn't think you were "pretty"!"
"Don't insult Dumblydore!"
"Oh Dumblydore!" Malfoy mocked "Look at me I can't speak English, ze zat! Dumblydore! Hahah!"
"You!" Fleur snarled. Harry suddenly remembered what happened to the Veela's at the Quidditch world cup, because Fleur's part Veela could she turn into that monster with green wings, and throw fireballs? Harry suddenly got his answer. Little scaly green wings popped out from Fleur's shoulder blade, her skin turned green and scaly like a lizard, and her blue eyes turned bright yellow.
"You!" Fleur shouted (in he monster form) shouted as she pointed her finger at Malfoy. "Tu est petit diable! Tu est tres, tres bete garcon! Je detest tu!" Suddenly out of Fleur, monster bony green-scaled finger shot a tennis ball sized fireball! The fireball hit Malfoy right between the eyes and he went flying backwards. Fleur turned back to her regular form and cupped her hand to her mouth. Malfoy got up and screamed as he examined his burn.
"Oh no, oh no They'll fire me!" Fleur whispered to herself as she looked through the shelf for 2-degree burn solution. Malfoy had a fit and started screaming as Fleur tried to put the potion on his burn. Hermionie sighed and then shouted
"Hemidda!" A red light shot out of Hermionie's wand and his Malfoy in the back. Malfoy's fit went away, he calmed down, sat in a chair, and let Fleur put the potion on.
"Class dismissed!" Fleur called out still a little panicked. "Thank you," she said softly to Hermionie.
"Don't mention it. We'll make sure you don't get fired."
In Care of Magical Creature class, Grubby-Plank the frail old woman filled in for Hagrid.
"Oh good that old giants not here," Malfoy (who tried to tattle on Fleur, only he had no evidence. That burn was gone) sneered to his friends.
"Shut up Malfoy!" Pansy shouted, "Oh I hope their unicorns again! I loved them!"
"Today," Shouted Grubby-Plank in a frail voice "we will learn about Phoenix's the most magical and helpful, of all magic creatures!" Grubby- Plank took a silver whistle out of her pocket shaped like Phoenix with its wings out. She took in a breath and blew into it twice. Instead of a toot, as Harry expected, a melody came out of the whistle. It was a beautiful melody and after a while, a cawing noise joined in with the Melody. It was Fawkes.
"Ah, here she comes now!" Grubby-Plank shouted out in glee as Fawkes, as the red and gold Phoenix flew down onto a stand in front of her. "I must first tell you some background information about theses fabulous creatures. They are the only creatures that can live forever without the sorceress stone. Their tears have healing power and are used in most medical potions. Alright, lets get to the important things, now have any of you heard of the Gryffindor Phoenix's?"
"Yes," Hermionie said as she raised her hand high in the air.
"Fire away!"
"Thank-you. As you may or may not know, every great or powerful wizard has a Phoenix. Fawkes here in front of us was once Gordic's Gryffindor's Fawkes, look at the red and gold feathers. Fawkes went to another great wizard Albus Dumbledore. Helga Hufflepuff had a blue and silver phoenix who now belongs to a very powerful witch named Christy Clarkson, Salazar Slytherin had a black and green phoenix with blood thirsty-eyes." Hermionie paused for a moment "You-know-who now has that Phoenix. The first wizard to own a Phoenix was Merlin himself, he owned a yellow and Orange phoenix who is now out there somewhere without a master."
"Thank-you Hermionie, 10 points to Gryffindor! Anyway Phoenix's burst into flames as there reborn, it's there way of molting. For instance if you try to kill a Phoenix it would burst into flames, and be reborn. Now Phoenix's are very rare and it's not only hard to breed them, it's even harder to get two Phoenix's to meet, because they're so rare. Now we are proud to inform you that a Phoenix from the North has flew here and we are trying to get it to mate with Fawkes here." Grubby-Plank took out another whistle from her pocket; this one was clear through blue, and looks almost like ice. She blew into the whistle, and a fast rhythm came out. A second later a shrivel caw came in with the rhythm, and a Phoenix flew from the sky and landed on the perch next to Fawkes. This Phoenix had snow white feathers, all tangled together making it look like fur, and on the tip of the feathers was a shade of light blue. If Harry was mistaken, it looked almost like a northern ice Jemetas.
Fawkes rubbed her head against the new Phoenix's neck and then lightly crooned. Many students "ohhhed" and "ahhhed" as they saw the two birds.
Once they were in Transfiguration class, professor Mongonagal walked in with a large wooden crate.
"Snakes!" she said as she placed the box onto the table. "Been filling up the dungeons, for some reason or another. Now we are going to practice animal transfiguration, by turning these snakes into Christmas ornaments, for the holidays! Come up and take a snake please."
All of the students slowly walked up to the box and each pulled out a snake. Hermionie took a lime green snake with yellow eyes. Ron took a gigantic orange and yellow striped boa. As Harry grabbed a pitch-black snake with bloodthirsty eyes.
"Let me go!" the snake hissed to Harry
"What?" Harry said in parsletounge as he sat down
"Let me go, I have to go to him!"
"Go to who?"
"Voldemort! He's calling us?"
"Why?" Harry said. The snake squirmed even harder and then bit Harry right on the hand. "Ow!" Harry said as he dropped the biting serpent. The snake laughed as he slithered away.
"Tarantallegra!" Neville shouted at the snake that was getting away. The snake began to slither and do some odd dance routine.
"What is this!" the snake hissed and only Harry could hear "Let me go!" Harry laughed as the snake began to dance.
"Thanks Neville," Harry said as he pointed his wand at the dancing snake "Capino!" The snake curled into a ball and then turned into a circular Christmas Ornament. Ron began to gag as the boa started to wrap himself all around Ron.
"I'll kill you!" The snake hissed, "Let me go to him or I'll kill you!"
"Harry," Hermionie whispered to Harry as he helped Ron "What did the snake say?"
"They said they need to go to Voldemort, they say he's calling them."
"Not a good sign, he's close by."
During Charms class that day, they had to practice outside, in fear of flooding or burning down the castle. They have already learned to make fire and water and now they are learning to not be touched by fire or water. Seamus, who ended up being able to shoot fire exactly 43 feet, was the one who would shoot the fire, while the students practiced freezing charms. All of the students stood in a line and, conglacio! A small puff of turquoise blue light floated out of the students wand and grew until it wrapped itself around the students. For a few seconds it looked like the students were made of ice, but when Neville shot the fire out, the icy appearance went away. A large tickling sensation suddenly swept over the students and made them fall to the floor laughing, giving the appearance they were shrieking with pain. After Flitwick checked that all of the students had done the spell correctly, he and Hermionie cured the students who had not done the charm correctly and suffered from a few burns.
"Owww!" Neville screamed as he held up his finger that he claimed he burned.
"Neville that's a paper cut!" Hermionie hollered as he suspected his injury.
During the past few Defense Against the Dark Arts class they had been practicing the Shielding and the Patronus.
"All right students!" Mrs. Leonessa said as the students piled into her class "Today is a review day! Alright once I get the Dementor's I need you to show me your Patronus!" Mrs. Leonessa took one of the "new chess sets" out from under her desk. Ron moaned and insisted that he was the only one who doesn't have one. Just wait until he gets Harry's little Christmas present. She took the four bishops (who were Dementor's) and grew them 50 times their size.
"One! Two! Three!" Mrs. Leonessa shouted
"Expecto Patronum!" The class shouted as the room filled with silver light. Every nook and cranny's of the room was filled with silver mist, silver sparkles, and silver Patronum's. A few moments later, when the room emptied of silver, Mrs. Leonessa began to talk.
"Bravo! Excellent! Now the shield's of your choice!" she shouted in glee. The students shouted a number of spells, and the room filled with blasts of light and smoke. Mrs. Leonessa walked around the room and inspected each of the students shields. She inspected Hermionie's absorbing shield, which would protect Hermionie and absorb the spells shot at her. Mrs. Leonessa took out her wand and shot an "A+" into the air. Next, she inspected Ron's Circus Shield, that made bounced off the spells, and whenever the attacker stepped in front of the shield, they saw their reflection as it would in a fun house mirror. Next was Cho who did the golden shield, then Neville who made a metal crystal shield come in front of him, and last but not least Harry's shield. He had down a form of "reflectario" that made a liquid yellow and orange shield in him, and when a spell hit the shield, a dozen of the same will shoot back.
The next few days went by with out anything interesting happening. Ginny avoided Harry whenever he tried to talk to her. Also, Snape had gone (Harry suspects spying on Voldemort), and Hagrid has gone up to the North with Madame Maxime to get some Giants on our side.
"C'mon lets go," Ron said as he stuffed his breakfast into his mouth.
"Since when have you been excited about going to potions?" Harry asked
"Oh he just wants to see Fleur," Hermionie giggled
"Do not!" Ron protested, and then became very red in the face. Just then, all of the owls came swooping into the dining Hall with mail. Hedwig flew towards Harry with his Quidditch magazine in her talons.
"Look Ron got a letter from his dad!" Hermionie said with glee as she read over Ron's shoulders.
"What does it say?" Harry asked as he put his magazine in his bag so he could read it later.
"Lets see. Blah, Blah, Blah, hope your doing okay. Er, lets see. Oh! It says that they've made a temporary jail at the ministry, with goblins, cave elves, and other creatures guarding it. And that there almost done with that potion to bring Wormtail to them using his blood. And a bunch of other stuff. It says my dad suspicious of Ms. Lestrange. He says she's secretive and she's not doing much work. Er, he says he doesn't know why Fudge hired her, because he says she doesn't do much work."
"Uh-oh," Hermionie said as she read the daily profit.
"Let me guess," Ron said slowly "The chest that held the Azkaban guards that have had the kiss put upon them has been open."
"How'd you guess?"
"Well I knew it would get worse."
"Don't know which member of the ministry helped opened it though."
Harry sighed and then said, "C'mon lets go to potion class, and hopefully Fleur doesn't like the Slytherin's." Once they stepped into the classroom, they had all of the Slytherin's smirk at them, and then Fleur smile at them. Many of the boys (even the Slytherin boys) were taken over by Fleur's charm and were staring at her.
"Hello, I am Fleur Delacour you may call me Fleur. Now is it correct you have already learned the hair potion?"
"Yes," the boys said dazily
"Good! Zo today wez will learn the 'Veela skin' potion. Now it can turnz wrinkly skin into to almost Veela skin! It involves a drop of vela blood that my grandmuzzer gave to me. Zo letz get going!" Harry started to chop up his griffin hide when Malfoy threw a chopped wiggle wart at the back of his head.
"Ow!" Harry said as he squirted some dragon blood at him. The surprising thing was Neville (who wasn't under the pressure of Snape) was doing extremely well with his potion. After they finished with most of their ingredients Fleur walked around with a glass dropper filled with ice blue liquid. "Veela blood" she told them, as she put a drop in each of the students potions. Once the ice blue liquid fell into their cauldron, the liquid inside bubbled, and steamed.
"Yez, yez tiz complete! Alright Mr. Malfoy may we test urz on urzelf?"
"Sure," Malfoy grumbled as he walked to the front of the class (he missed Snape being there). Malfoy dipped his hands into his ice blue liquid inside his cauldron and rubbed the liquid all over his face. The skin on Malfoy's face started to smoke and Draco let out an awful scream. After the smoke cleared the students broke out laughing as they saw Malfoy's face, which was full of wrinkles and baggy skin. His wrinkly gray baggy cheek skin hung down to his shoulders. Even Fleur laughed as Malfoy looked in the mirror. Fleur laughed as she asked Neville to ring up his potion.
"Neville!" Malfoy screamed outraged "I want my skin back to normal, I don't want it to fall off!"
"Don't inzult Neville! He haz done a good job!" Fleur grabbed a handful of Neville's potion and rubbed it on Malfoy's face (who was screaming that he'll sew Fleur).
"Twenty points to Gryffindor, for Neville'z fine potion, and minuz 10 points from Zlytherin for your outburst, rage and bad potion making!"
"What!" Malfoy screamed as his skin went back to normal "This is your fault! I'll sew you! Do you know who my father is! You did that on purpose! You poisoned me! You wrecked my potion! You tried to ruin my face! The only reason Dumbledore hired you is because you put your little Veela charm on him! That old hoot couldn't have hired you awful teacher if he didn't think you were "pretty"!"
"Don't insult Dumblydore!"
"Oh Dumblydore!" Malfoy mocked "Look at me I can't speak English, ze zat! Dumblydore! Hahah!"
"You!" Fleur snarled. Harry suddenly remembered what happened to the Veela's at the Quidditch world cup, because Fleur's part Veela could she turn into that monster with green wings, and throw fireballs? Harry suddenly got his answer. Little scaly green wings popped out from Fleur's shoulder blade, her skin turned green and scaly like a lizard, and her blue eyes turned bright yellow.
"You!" Fleur shouted (in he monster form) shouted as she pointed her finger at Malfoy. "Tu est petit diable! Tu est tres, tres bete garcon! Je detest tu!" Suddenly out of Fleur, monster bony green-scaled finger shot a tennis ball sized fireball! The fireball hit Malfoy right between the eyes and he went flying backwards. Fleur turned back to her regular form and cupped her hand to her mouth. Malfoy got up and screamed as he examined his burn.
"Oh no, oh no They'll fire me!" Fleur whispered to herself as she looked through the shelf for 2-degree burn solution. Malfoy had a fit and started screaming as Fleur tried to put the potion on his burn. Hermionie sighed and then shouted
"Hemidda!" A red light shot out of Hermionie's wand and his Malfoy in the back. Malfoy's fit went away, he calmed down, sat in a chair, and let Fleur put the potion on.
"Class dismissed!" Fleur called out still a little panicked. "Thank you," she said softly to Hermionie.
"Don't mention it. We'll make sure you don't get fired."
In Care of Magical Creature class, Grubby-Plank the frail old woman filled in for Hagrid.
"Oh good that old giants not here," Malfoy (who tried to tattle on Fleur, only he had no evidence. That burn was gone) sneered to his friends.
"Shut up Malfoy!" Pansy shouted, "Oh I hope their unicorns again! I loved them!"
"Today," Shouted Grubby-Plank in a frail voice "we will learn about Phoenix's the most magical and helpful, of all magic creatures!" Grubby- Plank took a silver whistle out of her pocket shaped like Phoenix with its wings out. She took in a breath and blew into it twice. Instead of a toot, as Harry expected, a melody came out of the whistle. It was a beautiful melody and after a while, a cawing noise joined in with the Melody. It was Fawkes.
"Ah, here she comes now!" Grubby-Plank shouted out in glee as Fawkes, as the red and gold Phoenix flew down onto a stand in front of her. "I must first tell you some background information about theses fabulous creatures. They are the only creatures that can live forever without the sorceress stone. Their tears have healing power and are used in most medical potions. Alright, lets get to the important things, now have any of you heard of the Gryffindor Phoenix's?"
"Yes," Hermionie said as she raised her hand high in the air.
"Fire away!"
"Thank-you. As you may or may not know, every great or powerful wizard has a Phoenix. Fawkes here in front of us was once Gordic's Gryffindor's Fawkes, look at the red and gold feathers. Fawkes went to another great wizard Albus Dumbledore. Helga Hufflepuff had a blue and silver phoenix who now belongs to a very powerful witch named Christy Clarkson, Salazar Slytherin had a black and green phoenix with blood thirsty-eyes." Hermionie paused for a moment "You-know-who now has that Phoenix. The first wizard to own a Phoenix was Merlin himself, he owned a yellow and Orange phoenix who is now out there somewhere without a master."
"Thank-you Hermionie, 10 points to Gryffindor! Anyway Phoenix's burst into flames as there reborn, it's there way of molting. For instance if you try to kill a Phoenix it would burst into flames, and be reborn. Now Phoenix's are very rare and it's not only hard to breed them, it's even harder to get two Phoenix's to meet, because they're so rare. Now we are proud to inform you that a Phoenix from the North has flew here and we are trying to get it to mate with Fawkes here." Grubby-Plank took out another whistle from her pocket; this one was clear through blue, and looks almost like ice. She blew into the whistle, and a fast rhythm came out. A second later a shrivel caw came in with the rhythm, and a Phoenix flew from the sky and landed on the perch next to Fawkes. This Phoenix had snow white feathers, all tangled together making it look like fur, and on the tip of the feathers was a shade of light blue. If Harry was mistaken, it looked almost like a northern ice Jemetas.
Fawkes rubbed her head against the new Phoenix's neck and then lightly crooned. Many students "ohhhed" and "ahhhed" as they saw the two birds.
Once they were in Transfiguration class, professor Mongonagal walked in with a large wooden crate.
"Snakes!" she said as she placed the box onto the table. "Been filling up the dungeons, for some reason or another. Now we are going to practice animal transfiguration, by turning these snakes into Christmas ornaments, for the holidays! Come up and take a snake please."
All of the students slowly walked up to the box and each pulled out a snake. Hermionie took a lime green snake with yellow eyes. Ron took a gigantic orange and yellow striped boa. As Harry grabbed a pitch-black snake with bloodthirsty eyes.
"Let me go!" the snake hissed to Harry
"What?" Harry said in parsletounge as he sat down
"Let me go, I have to go to him!"
"Go to who?"
"Voldemort! He's calling us?"
"Why?" Harry said. The snake squirmed even harder and then bit Harry right on the hand. "Ow!" Harry said as he dropped the biting serpent. The snake laughed as he slithered away.
"Tarantallegra!" Neville shouted at the snake that was getting away. The snake began to slither and do some odd dance routine.
"What is this!" the snake hissed and only Harry could hear "Let me go!" Harry laughed as the snake began to dance.
"Thanks Neville," Harry said as he pointed his wand at the dancing snake "Capino!" The snake curled into a ball and then turned into a circular Christmas Ornament. Ron began to gag as the boa started to wrap himself all around Ron.
"I'll kill you!" The snake hissed, "Let me go to him or I'll kill you!"
"Harry," Hermionie whispered to Harry as he helped Ron "What did the snake say?"
"They said they need to go to Voldemort, they say he's calling them."
"Not a good sign, he's close by."
During Charms class that day, they had to practice outside, in fear of flooding or burning down the castle. They have already learned to make fire and water and now they are learning to not be touched by fire or water. Seamus, who ended up being able to shoot fire exactly 43 feet, was the one who would shoot the fire, while the students practiced freezing charms. All of the students stood in a line and, conglacio! A small puff of turquoise blue light floated out of the students wand and grew until it wrapped itself around the students. For a few seconds it looked like the students were made of ice, but when Neville shot the fire out, the icy appearance went away. A large tickling sensation suddenly swept over the students and made them fall to the floor laughing, giving the appearance they were shrieking with pain. After Flitwick checked that all of the students had done the spell correctly, he and Hermionie cured the students who had not done the charm correctly and suffered from a few burns.
"Owww!" Neville screamed as he held up his finger that he claimed he burned.
"Neville that's a paper cut!" Hermionie hollered as he suspected his injury.
During the past few Defense Against the Dark Arts class they had been practicing the Shielding and the Patronus.
"All right students!" Mrs. Leonessa said as the students piled into her class "Today is a review day! Alright once I get the Dementor's I need you to show me your Patronus!" Mrs. Leonessa took one of the "new chess sets" out from under her desk. Ron moaned and insisted that he was the only one who doesn't have one. Just wait until he gets Harry's little Christmas present. She took the four bishops (who were Dementor's) and grew them 50 times their size.
"One! Two! Three!" Mrs. Leonessa shouted
"Expecto Patronum!" The class shouted as the room filled with silver light. Every nook and cranny's of the room was filled with silver mist, silver sparkles, and silver Patronum's. A few moments later, when the room emptied of silver, Mrs. Leonessa began to talk.
"Bravo! Excellent! Now the shield's of your choice!" she shouted in glee. The students shouted a number of spells, and the room filled with blasts of light and smoke. Mrs. Leonessa walked around the room and inspected each of the students shields. She inspected Hermionie's absorbing shield, which would protect Hermionie and absorb the spells shot at her. Mrs. Leonessa took out her wand and shot an "A+" into the air. Next, she inspected Ron's Circus Shield, that made bounced off the spells, and whenever the attacker stepped in front of the shield, they saw their reflection as it would in a fun house mirror. Next was Cho who did the golden shield, then Neville who made a metal crystal shield come in front of him, and last but not least Harry's shield. He had down a form of "reflectario" that made a liquid yellow and orange shield in him, and when a spell hit the shield, a dozen of the same will shoot back.