*Pat* *pat* *pat* *pat*
'Mphm' she muttered sleepily. A slow stretch alerted her to a slight ache in her stomach and the back of her leg but it was a slow steady ache, almost adding to the blissful feeling spread through her.
*Pat* *pat* *pat* *pat*
Slowly she roused her senses and curiousity got the better of her and she opened her eyes.
The scream she let out was piercing, the great yellow eyes that were an inch from hers looked at her disdainfully before the huge tricolour cat hopped off the bed. Elayne pushed herself onto her elbows to follow the cat with aggravated eyes. 'Yeah yeah I'm up okay.' She muttered at Havelock before he gave a great feline grin and jumped out of her bedroom window. With a groan she fell back into her bed and slowly accounted her numerous aches and pains. She had gone out for a drink after being reamed out by MacGonagol, in fact, it had been several drinks. She was never good with people who considered themselves above her, the whole thing had read like a bizarre little play. Elayne had gotten all the blame, MacGonagol hadn't seemed to have the ability to chastise Snape.
*
Ron and Harry sat at the Gryffindor table with most of the fifth year surrounding them.
'I don't believe two teachers would be fighting each other.' Hermione told the pair of them.
'It wasn't just a fight Hermione.' Ron told them. 'It was bloody brilliant.' His face was flushed, they had managed to spell it out to most of the Gryffindor common room this morning. It had slowly gotten through to the other tables, the entire great hall was abuzz with the news.
'We have defence against the dark arts this morning. Potions after that, you'll see.' Harry told them and then looked up. Professor Strachan had just walked into the room. 'That's the first time she's been up for breakfast since she got here.' He said, she strolled down the centre of the hall, which was quite a feat in steel toed army boots. She didn't seem that different to normal, she was even wearing a t-shirt stating across the chest 'nosy little bastard aren't you?' The only difference in her appearance was the black eye she sported with a grin.
*
Elayne yawned and checked her timetable once again. Oh joy another shot at the fifth year Gryffindors. Pity she didn't have a gun really. The teachers had been watching her, apparently the news of her battle with Snape had spread like lightening. She was waiting to be pulled up in front of Dumbledore. She had been expecting Snape to turn up for breakfast, she was not sure that anyone else had noticed they were too busy looking at her black eye. She hadn't removed it, something about black eyes always made her keep them, she considered them a learning curve. This one represented the lesson, never underestimate skinny ex dark wizards without wands. The old goat had moved faster and adapted quicker than she had thought. 'Elayne.' The deep rumbling voice broke her out of her reverie.
'Hagrid?' She stared at him blankly and then grinned. 'You got it?' She asked. And he smiled at her tapping the side of his nose.
'Sure you can handle it? I dun like the idea of exposing the children to it.' He told her and she shrugged.
'I owe you a drink.' The wide grin split her face and she turned with an enthusiastic mini dance and strolled off to her classroom.
She flung the doors to her classroom open wide and walked in with a jaunty step until the applause started. She blinked and faltered. She made a quick judgement and strode to the front and sat on her desk. She waited until they had quieted down and tilted her head.
'What was that for?' She asked and suddenly there was silence. 'If someone doesn't tell me I'm going to start picking on people.' Her eyes crossed the classroom, always look for the guilty people or rather the people who look the most innocent. She checked her seating plan, one of these days these brats were going to have to become more than just random faces. 'Weasley, Ron.' The red head's eyes went wide.
'Me miss?' He asked. Elayne nodded. 'We were told that you and Snape had a fight.' Elayne's face remained stationary.
'And if Professor Snape and myself decide to do some sparring training what is it to the school?' Ron stared at her and bit his lip, his entire body was in the 'I am very guilty' posture and his eyes held the 'please give me a kicking' expression, or at least the expression she had always interpreted as that. She raised her voice and addressed the rest of the class. 'Professor Snape and myself are magic users that know intimately how useless magic can prove and seek to better ourselves against opponents that know will not kill us. Something you are going to learn today.' She was incredibly certain she wanted to continue with her lesson now.
She slid off the desk and wandered behind it, scooping a plastic carrier bag off the floor. It settled on the table with a heavy thunk, she put her hand inside and lifted something out of it. 'Five housepoints to the first person that can tell me what this is.' There was utter silence. 'And here's me thinking that this was a bright class.' There was one hand.
'It's a bit of rock miss.' Neville told her.
She nodded with a grin. 'First lesson of the day, simple questions are not nessecerily trick questions. In fact, this bit of rock, is actually a lump of granite, high density with a high specific gravity this means it has, what those of us in the know like to call, a high thwacking capacity. It's less likely to snap than your wands. So I'd like you to exchange your wands now.' They stared at her. 'Is this class a bit slow of thinking today? Now!'
They wandered up in a line and Elayne soon had a rather large pile of nicely expensive wands. 'Okay, now children, follow me.' She stalked up the middle of the classroom with a bounce, which very few can combine effectively, and out of the door. They stared at her and started to file nervously after her.
*
Elayne smiled at all of them as she stepped across to the large crate. The grin on her face was enough to make even the bravest Gryffindor uncomfortable. With a delicate motion of her wand she made the solid walls of the crate fall to the grass. The Gryffindors blinked at the creature as the creature blinked back at them. Proffessor Strachen ran her hand across the head of the great leathery beast and it gave a calm, shuddery growl. Elayne's eyes flicked to them and danced. They stepped back involuntarily.
'You can always tell when she's planning something.' Hermione whispered to Harry and Ron.
'What you mean by the way she's breathing and all?' Ron asked her.
'Does anyone know what this creature is?' Elayne's voice carried across the field. For once Hermione's hand stayed firmly down, she did learn... not fast but she did. 'No-one? Very well this creature is an Erumpent. It can weigh up to a tonne, it's horn is known to be able to peirce any metal and the poison within it will make whatever it is injected into explode.' The nervous shifting from foot to foot began. 'It is resistant to most charms and curses, so even if you had your wand I doubt you'd know anything that would stop it.' She turned her back on the Erumpent and walked away ten paces.
And she smiled.
'I want you to take your rocks and throw them as hard as you can at the Erumpent.' They stared at her in silence as the expectant look on her face took them in. STrangely it was Ron that broke the silence.
'Are you cracked?' He asked in shocked surprise, whether it was surprise that he had yelled at her or surprise at what she intended was anyone's guess. 'That thing is bloody dangerous!' Her face changed imperceptably.
'Are you questioning your teacher Ron?' His face went slightly anxious. 'Are you letting your fear guide you away from what the person in charge of you has instructed you to do?' Her head tilted at him and a delicate sneer lit her face. It was a perfect Snape look, one that they couldn't know she had been practicing in front of the mirror every evening. 'What are you most afraid of? The erumpent or me?' Ron swallowed, unsure of being able to give an answer he could trust not to land him in hot water. Unfortunately, Elayne happened to be one of those people that it was better to say something rather than nothing. 'Ron, you are to be excluded from the remainder of this test, this will be reflected in your marks. You are to stay with me.'
They stared at her for a moment and Hermione put up her hand. 'You never said this was a test.'
'The dark arts do not announce their tests, neither do I. Mind how you go now.' She took hold of Ron by the scruff of his neck and dragged him away twenty paces. 'Throw your damned rocks.' She shouted.
Ron winced as the shower of rocks fell on the suddenly perturbed Erumpent. 'They aren't very good shots are they?' Elayne observed to him.
'Miss?!?' He asked alarmed and flinched as the creature began it's bellowing run into his classmates, all of whom made a mad cap dive to the sides.
'I mean not one tried to smack it between it's eyes.' Elayne told him and he shook his head in shock. The children scattered in terrified disorder and Elayne nodded with a grin as some picked up rudimentary weapons. She also frowned as Neville made his moose braying run for the entrance to hogwarts. With a quick spell from the teacher he bounced dazedly off the wall.
She began shouting in a jovial manner some encouragement, such as 'you can run faster than that!' and, perhaps Ron's favourite, 'You just aren't even trying now are you?' Ron's widening eyes began to take over his face.
She frowned as Seamus began stood in front of a tree and began yelling. 'Come and get me you hefty great pansy. I'll take ya on me own!' The Erumpent charged for the boy and ducked as the erumpent's horn got embedded in the tree.
'Duck and cover!' Elayne yelled at them as they began celebrating. They watched in morbid fascination as the tree turned a virulent shade of purple and exploded. There was silence for a moment and Elayne picked herself up off the ground. There was a very stunned Erumpent and seamus stands in the remains of the ex tree. She grabbed her wand and pointed it at the creature. 'Optica felcia.' She commanded and it's eyes went even more unfocused... if that was even possible. 'You all failed.'
'That test was unfair!' Harry said crossing the field to face her. Elayne smirked.
'Granted...but that's life for you kid. Come to think of it, you all failed apart from Ron. His initial questioning of my desicion indictates a sense of self preservation I find admirable. 50 House points Ron, well done.' He stared at his class mates, aware that his success where they suffered wasn't going to win him any favours.
'That test was overly dangerous!' Hermione said. 'We could have been killed! What could we possibly have learned?' Elayne flicked her eyebrow in amusement.
'I would have thought that was obvious.' She said. 'Think for yourself. Do not trust that the person in charge of you isn't actually after your personal destruction. You never know when fate might catch up with you.' She grinned maliciously. 'An army of automatons is the most scary prospect in all my years of fighting the dark arts.' She laughed and dismissed the class.
*
'Did you set and erumpent on all the fifth year Gryffindors?' Elayne looked up from her copy of fantastic beats and where to find them into MacGonagall's irate face.
'Of course not.' She said dismissively and MacGonagall's face soothed a little. 'I didn't set it on all of them, I didn't set it on Ron Weasley.' She grinned.
'You could have killed one of them!' Elayne shrugged.
'Consider it natural selection then.' She looked back to her book.
'Are you even aware how close you came to exploding your students?' Elayne shrugged again. 'What would you have done if you did?' Elayne looked up and pondered for a moment.
'Caught it on videotape and sent it into Ripley's believe it or not?' Obviously not the answer MacGonagall had been expecting, her face darkened.
'Are you trying to get fired?' Elayne's face brightened.
'Could I?' She asked.
'You could get sent to Azkhaban for negligence.' Elayne raised her eyebrow.
'Yay me.' Her face was bright. 'But let's be honest. They're going to be facing stressful situations anyway. I'd much rather face an erumpent than do my N.E.W.Ts again. Your tests are artificial, are they still turning teapots into tortoises?' MacGonagall stared at her for a moment muttering how she was going to be tellking Dumbledore. Elayne rolled her eyes. 'That's right tell mummy on me!' She said mto her retreating back.
'I see you are growing your circle of friends daily.' She sighed and rubbed her face.
'Look I had a pretty good day today, if it's not important could you go anway and get involved in some auto erotic asphyxiation?' Snape sat across from her with an amused smirk.
'Much as I appreiciate the mutual wish of strangulation we shall have to desist for the time being.' She gave an exagerrated sigh.
'Well if we're always going to put off the simple pleasures in life at least give me a valid reason.' He leant back in his chair and a suddenly grave look came onto his face.
'We leave for Newcastle tonight, we're off to start on our task.' She looked at him with a frown, she's had bad experiences chasing a vampire through Geordie-land before. 'But first... I have to put you under the imperitus curse.' Elayne's shrugged.
'Whatever you wish my master.' She told him and his face went strange. 'Just getting in practice. Well if there is no changing it I guess I might as well get it over with.'
