The dark figure strode down the old Hogwarts hallways, purpose flashing in
her sharp grey eyes. As she strode up to the portrait and silently mouthed the
secret password, she flung herself through the hidden door with ever increasing
impatience. Her black cape billowed out behind her, as she broke into a run
up the Gryffindor staircases. Her white knuckled hands drew out the concealed
dagger, reflecting the ghostly moonlight from the open windows.
She raised her blade, poised to strike.
'DYAAAGHHHH'... Ron sat bolt upright in bed, breaking into a cold sweat.
'Harry... geez, Harry wake up!' He shouted across the room to his sleeping friend.
"hmm.. huh? what?' Harry said in a dazed sleepy voice.
'Harry, someone's here! I saw them... Harry! with a knife!'
'mmm... Ron... your just dreaming again. Go back to sleep.' said Harry, as he
rolled over facing the other direction, leaving Ron to scowl at the darkness
alone.
Ron lay back into his soft pillows, eyes still scanning the room for the woman with the knife. He lay there, listening to Neville snoring softly for an hour before his eye slowly shut, and he drifted back to sleep.
It was near dawn when the women withdrew from the shadows closest to the door.
Silently, she stalked out of the room, and down to the student common room.
There, she scribbled a note, and fixing it to the fireplace hearth with her
knife:
" Beware! The silent assassin is here "
With one final glance around the room, she left, sweeping her long dark gowns out of the room.
Harry was woken early by the noisy commotion from the common room, below. Pulling
on his dressing gown, he went to investigate. Professor McGongall issuing demands
of silence to the group, while attempting to talk sternly to the Weasley Twins,
Fred and George.
"Well, Miss, we just walked past, you know... going to breakfast... , and
the note was there!" Fred grinned.
Down at breakfast, the main hall was awash with hushed conversations, as the rumour filtered through to the rest of the school. Fred and George were sitting in the middle of a crowd, giving embellished renditions of the circumstances. "And that old bat, McGongall wouldn't even let us keep the awesome dagger, either!"
Question about a mysterious assassin dominated conversations throughout the rest of the day. Hermione and Harry were both concerned, and sick of Ron telling them: "I told you so!". They'd been back at Hogwarts for a week, and every night, Ron had been having similar dreams of a shadowy figure breaking into the boys tower. "See! I knew something was fishy! I just knew it!" Harry rolled his eyes and pretended to concentrate on the 'History of Goblin Warfare' book that was sitting in front of him. "Hermione, you believe me, right?" Ron said, exasperated with Harry's lack of interest.
The new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher had not yet arrived at Hogwarts, and Hagrid was still abroad with Madam Maxime, so they had wandered up to the Library to finish off their History essays. Hermione, who had finished hers, had begun helping Ron with his. "Ron, when will you learn that 1 sentence does not count as a paragraph?" She tutted him, changing the topic tactfully. Ron sighed, and began to reorganise his sentence structure. "One whole parchment on this garbage? He's kidding himself."
Later on that afternoon, as Harry was preparing his Fletberry Flange for a
potions exercise, Hermione began to wonder about the mysterious intruder. "Well,
what if this person wants Harry dead?"
"Hermione!" amazed Ron, "you never cease to be a fountain of
optimism"
"Well, he'll just have to take a ticket and wait in line then!' Laughed
Harry.
"No, you two, I'm serious. He got past the Fat Lady fairly easily... He
probably knows the password..."
Neville, who had been listening in, shuddered visibly.
"Oh, come off it... he probably used floo powder or apparated " Ron
said winking to Harry.
"Can't you remember?" stammered Hermione
"YOU CANT APPARATE INSIDE HOGWART GROUNDS" she said, joined by Harry
and Ron in chorus. Snape, who had been reading something at his desk, looked
up at them and shot them an evil glare.
"Potter? Is that a points deduction I'm hearing?". Grinning to each
other, trying desperately not to laugh, the trio managed to finish the class
in silence, oddly without losing any points at all.
When the school was seated for dinner, Dumbledore called them all to quiet.
"Now, I'm sure you've all enjoyed your spare time, but I'd like to tell
you that the Defence teacher has finally arrived." A general groan murmured
through the halls.
"I'd like to introduce you to Professor Elaria Gordie. She's been working
with the Ministry of Magic, and has arrived here this afternoon. I hope you
all make her welcome." The young witch sitting beside Professor Snape nodded
at Dumbledore, and blushed slightly as a half hearted applause broke out.
"Ooh, she looks like she's younger than Percy!" whispered Ron.
"Well, anyway. I think she looks nice. I wonder what she's been doing with
the Ministry? " added Hermione, as they all glanced up to the main table,
to see Professor Gordie and Professor Snape deep in conversation.
"Lets hope she's nothing like Snape then!" grimaced Harry.
The next night, Fred and George were talking excitedly about their first Defence Class as thought they had just been in the midst of a great battle. "She's nice enough, yeah. But really, I dunno, weird I guess." Explained George after being quizzed by Hermione. "Could be the type of person to give a snap-exam" Laughed Fred, as he watched Hermione's face flush white. Harry's own stomach did a kind of flip-flop. Hermione soon hurried off, muttering something about preparation, and study. Harry was eager to meet the new professor, as he was curious to see if she'd last longer than a year. Their last Defence teacher had been imprisoned in his own trunk for 8 months, and hadn't taught them anything all.
Sooner than he had hoped, Harry bumped into Professor Gordie. He was trying
to catch up to Ron, who had sped off to Divination, when he almost flattened
the new teacher. "Oh, goodness, Miss! I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to, I
mean, I didn't see you at all!" Harry stammered, as he helped her pick
up her books that had been scattered all over the hall floor. She didn't say
anything, but nodded politely, and smiled as he gave her books back. Racing
to class, he noted that she definitely wasn't like Snape. He would have given
Harry a detention, and taken 20 points to boot.