The next day, early in the morning, was the first Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson with new teacher Gilderoy Lockhart. Leo took a dislike to him from the start; as he said to Marisa, "A man who spends that much time looking after his hair is clearly not the best teacher." (She replied, teasingly, "By that logic Professor Snape is the best teacher ever!)
Professor Lockhart was, it turned out, a completely useless teacher. He began by handing out a "little quiz" which was thirty minutes long, contained fifty-four questions and was all about him, questions ranging from "What is Gilderoy Lockhart's favourite colour?" to "How many times has Gilderoy Lockhart won Witch Weekly's Most Charming Smile Award?"
Marisa, disguising her horror and shock, answered as fully as she could. She hated Lockhart immediately, but was determined to disguise her hatred. It would be a good exercise.
Half an hour later, the class turned their test papers in and sat in silence while Lockhart marked them.
Then he stood up. "Some of you really need to read Gadding with Ghouls again – I mentioned there that my favourite colour is lilac, and I stated in Voyages with Vampires that my ideal birthday gift would be harmony between all magical and non-magical people. No-one got all questions correct, but the highest scorer, with forty-five out of fifty-four, is Marisa King. Congratulations, Marisa!"
She nodded, managing a plausible fakery of shyness and embarrassment and disguising the horrible sick feeling in her stomach.
"Now," said Lockhart, "I thought I'd give you all a little bit of practical experience, so I've brought some creatures along for you." He gestured dramatically to the cage on the desk, covered by a cloth, and pulled it off with a flourish. Inside were fiercely chattering, squabbling… blue things, each a few inches high and talking in a shrill, high-pitched voice.
"Yes," said Lockhart, "freshly caught Cornish pixies!"
Leo rolled his eyes.
"Let's see what you make of them, then!" said Lockhart, and opened the cage.
Instantly chaos spread throughout the classroom. A group of pixies flew towards Pansy Parkinson, who screeched almost as annoyingly as the pixies themselves, and tried to lift her up into the air. She offered barely any resistance, allowing one of them to seize her wand.
One or two flew towards Leo, who said "Nope," and drew his wand. He hesitated for a moment, trying to work out the best spell to use on them, and then settled on the Freezing Charm.
It worked surprisingly well, so he began using the Charm on as many pixies as he could. Soon others picked up on what he was doing and before long all of Leo's friends were Freezing the pixies and returning them to the cage. By the time the bell rang, all of the pixies had been cleared up and Leo and Marisa exited, very relieved.