Chapter 8
Potions, Shamans, and News
When Harry left Windrider's classroom, he went in search of Ron and Hermione. They weren't in the Great Hall, so Harry ate quickly. When he had finished, he went to the secluded corner of the courtyard that they favored. Sure enough, there they were, trying very hard not to be seen. Harry grinned and made a great show of coughing. Ron and Hermione quickly sprang apart, looking flushed and slightly embarrassed.
"Oh! Hi, Harry," said Hermione. "We were going to wait in the Great Hall, but--"
"But I had a couple of questions about Binns' lecture and wanted to check her notes." finished Ron.
Harry had a hard time resisting the impulse to ask exactly which notes Ron was checking, but merely grinned and nodded. He told them what Windrider had said to him about why he was at Hogwarts. When he got the the part where Windrider was worried if any of the students would go over to the Dark, Hermione's jaw dropped open.
"So that's why Lupin was worried. Windrider isn't going to teach us Defense, he's going to teach us ABOUT the Dark Arts. I've got to write my parents. I don't know if the library will have books on the Native shamans, I'll see if my parents can find some."
Ron had a different concern.
"Why did Dumbledore hire him? He's practically going to tell Malfoy how to become a Death Eater. And what about that homework? Using fear as a weapon. Not something for casual conversation, is it?"
They talked about this until it was time for Harry and Hermione to go to Potions. Hermione gave Ron a quick kiss and then she and Harry went to the dungeons. As they approached Snape's classroom, they saw a knot of Slytherins, including Malfoy. As they came within earshot Pansy Parkinson, a Slytherin with a face like a pug, raised her voice.
"...I mean look at her. The only reason he would go out with a Mudblood like her is because she probably has money."
Hermione whipped out her wand and made to start forward, but Harry held her back.
"No, Hermione," he hissed. "That's what she wants. Remember what Windrider said. Master yourself and you take away her power. Let her destry herself."
"How nobly said, Potter. However, Miss Granger was clearly wanting to start a fight. Five points from Gryffindor."
Snape stood in his doorway with his usual sneer on his face. Harry looked back at Snape calmly as the class went in. As Harry passed Snape, Snape gave Harry a little nod. Because of Snape's high requirements for his N.E.W.T. classes, there were only twelve students in the class. Harry and Hermione headed for the same table, but Snape spoke up.
"Potter, you will take this table here by yourself." Snape pointed to the table directly in front of his desk. "The rest of you will each take a table to yourself. Miss Granger, you will be in the very back of the classroom, away from 'Professor' Potter. A Hogwarts teacher does not need help."
The Slytherins chuckled among themselves. Watching Snape abuse Harry was their favorite form of entertainment. Sure enough, once the class were at their tables, Snape began the class by wondering out loud if Harry's O.W.L. examiner was either a fan, or suffering senility, or both, and it got worse from there. Through it all, Harry clenched his teeth, took deep breaths, and concentrated on the potion on the board. To his surprise, by keeping his anger in check and concentrating on his work, Harry was able to produce a Healing Draught which looked exactly like Snape described. He bottled his potion and handed it in. Snape took a look at it and merely grunted. As Harry turned to pack his things, Snape spoke up.
"Just a moment, Potter. You will need to stay after class to arrange the week of detention you received over the holiday."
"You must be really stupid to get detention over the holiday." Harry heard Malfoy's loud whisper as it carried across the dungeon. He spoke up. "What did Potter do to get detention over the holiday, Professor?"
"That is between Potter and myself, Mr. Malfoy. You may go."
Harry remained as the class left.
"I will see you immediately after dinner for your lesson. You will begin your detentions after the lesson. And rest assured, Potter, you will wish you had never done what you did after your detentions."
"I already do" muttered Harry to himself, too low for Snape to hear. "Professor," he continued, "I also have a meeting with Professor Windrider tonight."
"Very well. I will notify him you will see him after detention."
Harry nodded and left to go to dinner.
Harry ate quickly, wanting the evening to be over as quickly as possible. He enterd Snapes office determined to resist any mind invasion. As he enterd, he saw Snape putting Dumbledore's pensieve into a cabinet, locking it.
"No funny ideas for you this time, Potter. Let us begin. Legilimens!"
It was on him before he knew what was happening. Luna on the train. Boyhood teas with Mrs. Figg. Dudley lying on the ground, a dementor prising his arms apart. Sirius, falling backward through the Arch. Sirius falling again. And again. And again, like a film looping itself.
"NOOOOOO!"
Harry came to himself and found he was curled up on the floor screaming. He looked up at Snape, who had a small smile on his face, and in that moment hated him more than he ever hated anyone before in his life. Harry got to his feet, his face flushed with anger.
"Don't do that again."
"And what do you think the Dark Lord will do? Show you memories of your birthday party? He will use your memories for fun, to torture you. What do you think that Muggle is trying to teach you? Now, we will do this again, and this time I expect your mind to be more disciplined."
Harry glared at Snape and suddenly he was in his mind again, this time going right for Sirius. As soon as Harry saw Sirius' face, he took all his anger and hatred of Snape and pushed with his mind.
There was a huge crash. Harry blinked his eyes and saw that Snape had been hurled across the room into a shelf along the wall. There was shattered glass everywhere, with foul liquids and ghastly things which had been preserved in jars all over the floor. Snape slowly got to his feet.
"Much better. You recognized an assault, and forced it out. Your anger gave you more strength. However, I was still able to enter your mind. You must learn to clear your mind of everything, even emotion, or else what is there will be seen, no matter how brief the look. When someone looks into your mind, nothing must be there."
"And how am I supposed to do that? Sir." said Harry angrily. "You aren't making this easy."
"Of course it's not supposed to be easy" said Snape with exasperation. "Everyone keeps talking about how intelligent you are. Frankly, you have yet to demonstrate anything resembling intellect to me. Do you think it's easy lying to the Dark Lord's face?"
Snape took a deep breath.
"What we will do now is to practice so that I am unable to see your memories. Your mind must be absolutely clear and blank. You must be able to feel the intrusion, but do not dwell on it. Let it pass through you. I want you to look me in the eye and lie to the questions I will ask."
Harry took several deep breaths and tried to calm his emotions down. He looked up into Snape's eyes.
"What is your name?"
Harry felt Snape's eyes bore into his mind. Keeping it blank, he replied.
"Neville Longbottom"
"What house are you in?"
"Ravenclaw"
"Have you ever kissed a girl?"
Before he could suppress it, an image of Cho at Christmas came into his mind as he replied "No."
Snape sneered as Harry blushed crimson.
"Well, you managed the easy ones the first time. We will continue for the rest of the hour. The questions will not be so easy and it will be harder to lie to me. Perhaps I will even learn who stole the bicorn horn and boomslang skin from my stores. However, on the small chance that you do learn what I am teaching, you will be able to bring up false memories and images to confirm your lies."
Harry's pulse quickened as he tried to keep thoughts of Hermione out of his head. It was she who stole those items in their second year, when they made polyjuice potion to sneak into the Slytherin Common Room.
Keeping his face neutral and his mind as blank as he could make it, Harry continued to practice lying. When the hour was up, Snape gestured to the mess behind him.
"The first part of your detention tonight will be to clean that mess up. I am feeling generous so you may use magic. Now, as you know, or might not know, my skills are in great demand. For a price. There are several potions which are needed by the Ministry on a regular basis and I am the one with the best skills to prepare them. This week, however, you will. Be warned, Potter, these need to be up to Ministry standards. The slightest error could spell the difference between life and death. You will find a cauldron and tools in my office. I will prepare the list of ingredients and procedure. You will remain here until the potion is correctly made."
Harry went into Snape's office and found the cauldron, mortar, pestle, and the other tools on a small table. They were caked and encrusted with a foul slimy and hard grime.
"Oops. It looks like I forgot to clean them after the last potion. You can go ahead and clean them. No magic. You will also clean them when you are done. No magic."
Harry fumed for the next half hour cleaning the disgusting implements. When he was finished, he looked on the board and saw what he was to do. It was the most fiendishly difficult potion he had ever seen, with each of the twenty ingredients needing to be prepared in its own minutely exact way, with special temperature and stirring instructions for each of the thirty steps. As Harry proceeded to carefully gather the ingredients, Snape's voice drifted to him.
"And this is the easy one, Potter..."
******
Harry left Snape's dungeon three hours later totally exhausted. Although Snape didn't abuse him while he was making the potion, the standards he set for the quality of the potion were almost impossible to reach. Harry had to endure rejection after rejection while he was making the potion. He gradually, though, began to see exactly how much of a perfectionist Snape was concerning potions, and why that perfectionism was important. He started to see the small differences as he went through his attempts to make the potion. He was dreading, however, the rest of the week. Snape had said that the potion he just made was the easy one...he wondered if he would be able to make the Quidditch tryouts.
As he arrived at Windrider's office, he was surprised to see Luna coming out. Luna saw him and smiled.
"Hello, Harry. Do you need to see Professor Windrider too?"
"Yeah. I've got to arrange the lessons for all the first through fifth years." With a bit of a shock, he realized he would be teaching Luna.
"Well, that's all right then, it will be just like the DA. I'm already taking special lessons from Professor Windrider. Well, see you later, Harry, in Hogsmeade."
"Huh?" Harry was thrown off by Luna's remarks. Lessons with Widrider? And what was this about Hogsmeade?
"Well, you will be going first Hogsmeade weekend, and we'll have a drink at the Hog's Head." She said this so matter of factly Harry's head spun. All he could do was nod in agreement.
"Yeah, drinks at the Hog's Head"
Luna smiled serenely and drifted off. Harry watched her go for a moment in numbness. Did she just ask him out? Or did she tell him they were going out? With Luna you couldn't tell. He shook his head to regain his focus and knocked on Windrider's door. It opened and he went in and stopped in shock. Windrider was in the middle of his office, on some sort of hide, doing some kind of exercise routine, or was it a dance? As Harry watched him, he seemed to drift from being a human to being a bear, the images seeming to flicker back and forth. Harry cleared his throat, and Windrider stopped, looking fully human and solid, and turned to Harry.
"Ah, Harry. It's late, so let's make this quick so you can get some sleep and do your homework. Do you have your schedule with you?"
Harry nodded. Windrider invited him into the office and motioned for him to sit on the hide. As he did so, he looked around the office. He thought he had seen some odd decorations during the past five years he had seen this office, but these were definitely the most mixed set he had ever saw. One wall was dominated by a strange tapestry. It seemed to be mostly made up of multi colored squares seemingly spiraling inward to a black spot in the exact center. Harry felt his eyes, and part of himself, move along that spiral, being sucked into that black vortex. He quickly tore his eyes away from it and looked around at the rest of the office. Instead of the hideous kittens on plates Umbridge had last year, the shelves had various musical instruments on them. Harry saw several drums, flutes, a violin, and standing against one wall was what he recognized as a djeridu, an Australian instrument. Harry looked at the third wall and gasped. It was made to look like a rock wall, with crude hand paintings on it of animals and strange shapes. The fireplace was turned into a crude hearth, in which a fire was burning. The rest of the room was draped in hides and blankets. There was not a chair or a desk to be seen.
Windrider sat down opposite Harry and took his schedule.
"Hm. I think we can work around this and leave you plenty of time for homework and Quidditch. Are you okay with all the students in a year? That way you will only have to teach five classes a week. It works out well for me also, as I will be present to supervise. I know how the Slytherins will react."
Harry nodded. He was still a bit awed by Windrider's office.
"Now all that remains is to talk about what you will teach. Saturday, after breakfast, we will go to Hogsmeade to discuss that. I've arranged for a private room at the Hog's Head. The order has allies there and there you'll have your apparition lessons. Each week, we will go and talk about lessons for the upcoming week, except on Hogsmeade weekends. All set? Good. Now you have questions?"
"Well, Professor, when I cam in, I saw you doing something that made you look like a bear. Are you an Animagus?"
"No, I am not." Windrider said. "However, each person has a particular animal suited to his or her spirit nature. While Wizards can connect with that animal physically by becoming an Animagus, the shaman connects with it on a spiritual level. That animal acts as a guide. So, as you saw, I am a bear shaman. The dance brings me closer to that bear. What was your other question?"
Harry blushed. "Um, when I was coming to your office, I saw Luna. She said she was taking lessons?"
Windrider looked at him and smiled. Harry had the oddest feeling that Windrider knew everything about him.
"That girl," Windrider said, "is one of the most intelligent I have ever met. When the potential shaman is ready, the teacher appears."
"Luna?" said Harry in almost disbelief.
Windrider smiled. "She is more in tune with the shamanic world than many other shamans I have known. She has the potential for being a great force of change in this world. Listen to her closely, Harry. You will understand what I mean. Now, off to bed with you."
*********
Harry met Ron and Hermione for breakfast the next morning. He had been too tired to tell them about what happened last night, but he took the time to fill them in over bacon and eggs.
"You mean Snape's got you making his potions for him?"
Harry nodded. "And he said that they would get worse, and he was enjoying himself when he said it. I guess he thinks I don't have homework or need sleep. At least I'm getting better at Occlumency."
While he was talking, the mail came. Hermione received her usual Daily Prophet, plus this time her parents sent her a letter. Harry perused the Prophet while Hermione read the letter from her parents.
"Harry, Ron, listen to this." Hermione said. "Mum and Dad say that all of a sudden a lot of important people in the government are committing suicide. A couple of MPs, and some higher ups in the Home and Foreign Offices. Even the Prime Minister is looking more and more depressed. No one can figure out what's happening."
Harry looked up from the paper.
"That's not all. There's been all sorts of small incidents, according to the Prophet. It says that the Aurors are having to work overtime running all over the country following up. The Prophet is wondering why there were no new Aurors admitted in the last three years."
Ron snorted. "Fudge, of course. Since Wormtail escaped, we know what his mind was on. Serves him right, the stupid git."
"Ron, don't joke." replied Harry. "It says that the Ministry is drafting other Ministry workiers to assist the aurors. That means your dad and Percy."
Hermione looked up, her face full of worry.
"I think we need to talk to Dumbledore. These can't be coincidences. The aurors are spread too thin and the Muggle government is shaky. I think something terrible is going to happen."
Potions, Shamans, and News
When Harry left Windrider's classroom, he went in search of Ron and Hermione. They weren't in the Great Hall, so Harry ate quickly. When he had finished, he went to the secluded corner of the courtyard that they favored. Sure enough, there they were, trying very hard not to be seen. Harry grinned and made a great show of coughing. Ron and Hermione quickly sprang apart, looking flushed and slightly embarrassed.
"Oh! Hi, Harry," said Hermione. "We were going to wait in the Great Hall, but--"
"But I had a couple of questions about Binns' lecture and wanted to check her notes." finished Ron.
Harry had a hard time resisting the impulse to ask exactly which notes Ron was checking, but merely grinned and nodded. He told them what Windrider had said to him about why he was at Hogwarts. When he got the the part where Windrider was worried if any of the students would go over to the Dark, Hermione's jaw dropped open.
"So that's why Lupin was worried. Windrider isn't going to teach us Defense, he's going to teach us ABOUT the Dark Arts. I've got to write my parents. I don't know if the library will have books on the Native shamans, I'll see if my parents can find some."
Ron had a different concern.
"Why did Dumbledore hire him? He's practically going to tell Malfoy how to become a Death Eater. And what about that homework? Using fear as a weapon. Not something for casual conversation, is it?"
They talked about this until it was time for Harry and Hermione to go to Potions. Hermione gave Ron a quick kiss and then she and Harry went to the dungeons. As they approached Snape's classroom, they saw a knot of Slytherins, including Malfoy. As they came within earshot Pansy Parkinson, a Slytherin with a face like a pug, raised her voice.
"...I mean look at her. The only reason he would go out with a Mudblood like her is because she probably has money."
Hermione whipped out her wand and made to start forward, but Harry held her back.
"No, Hermione," he hissed. "That's what she wants. Remember what Windrider said. Master yourself and you take away her power. Let her destry herself."
"How nobly said, Potter. However, Miss Granger was clearly wanting to start a fight. Five points from Gryffindor."
Snape stood in his doorway with his usual sneer on his face. Harry looked back at Snape calmly as the class went in. As Harry passed Snape, Snape gave Harry a little nod. Because of Snape's high requirements for his N.E.W.T. classes, there were only twelve students in the class. Harry and Hermione headed for the same table, but Snape spoke up.
"Potter, you will take this table here by yourself." Snape pointed to the table directly in front of his desk. "The rest of you will each take a table to yourself. Miss Granger, you will be in the very back of the classroom, away from 'Professor' Potter. A Hogwarts teacher does not need help."
The Slytherins chuckled among themselves. Watching Snape abuse Harry was their favorite form of entertainment. Sure enough, once the class were at their tables, Snape began the class by wondering out loud if Harry's O.W.L. examiner was either a fan, or suffering senility, or both, and it got worse from there. Through it all, Harry clenched his teeth, took deep breaths, and concentrated on the potion on the board. To his surprise, by keeping his anger in check and concentrating on his work, Harry was able to produce a Healing Draught which looked exactly like Snape described. He bottled his potion and handed it in. Snape took a look at it and merely grunted. As Harry turned to pack his things, Snape spoke up.
"Just a moment, Potter. You will need to stay after class to arrange the week of detention you received over the holiday."
"You must be really stupid to get detention over the holiday." Harry heard Malfoy's loud whisper as it carried across the dungeon. He spoke up. "What did Potter do to get detention over the holiday, Professor?"
"That is between Potter and myself, Mr. Malfoy. You may go."
Harry remained as the class left.
"I will see you immediately after dinner for your lesson. You will begin your detentions after the lesson. And rest assured, Potter, you will wish you had never done what you did after your detentions."
"I already do" muttered Harry to himself, too low for Snape to hear. "Professor," he continued, "I also have a meeting with Professor Windrider tonight."
"Very well. I will notify him you will see him after detention."
Harry nodded and left to go to dinner.
Harry ate quickly, wanting the evening to be over as quickly as possible. He enterd Snapes office determined to resist any mind invasion. As he enterd, he saw Snape putting Dumbledore's pensieve into a cabinet, locking it.
"No funny ideas for you this time, Potter. Let us begin. Legilimens!"
It was on him before he knew what was happening. Luna on the train. Boyhood teas with Mrs. Figg. Dudley lying on the ground, a dementor prising his arms apart. Sirius, falling backward through the Arch. Sirius falling again. And again. And again, like a film looping itself.
"NOOOOOO!"
Harry came to himself and found he was curled up on the floor screaming. He looked up at Snape, who had a small smile on his face, and in that moment hated him more than he ever hated anyone before in his life. Harry got to his feet, his face flushed with anger.
"Don't do that again."
"And what do you think the Dark Lord will do? Show you memories of your birthday party? He will use your memories for fun, to torture you. What do you think that Muggle is trying to teach you? Now, we will do this again, and this time I expect your mind to be more disciplined."
Harry glared at Snape and suddenly he was in his mind again, this time going right for Sirius. As soon as Harry saw Sirius' face, he took all his anger and hatred of Snape and pushed with his mind.
There was a huge crash. Harry blinked his eyes and saw that Snape had been hurled across the room into a shelf along the wall. There was shattered glass everywhere, with foul liquids and ghastly things which had been preserved in jars all over the floor. Snape slowly got to his feet.
"Much better. You recognized an assault, and forced it out. Your anger gave you more strength. However, I was still able to enter your mind. You must learn to clear your mind of everything, even emotion, or else what is there will be seen, no matter how brief the look. When someone looks into your mind, nothing must be there."
"And how am I supposed to do that? Sir." said Harry angrily. "You aren't making this easy."
"Of course it's not supposed to be easy" said Snape with exasperation. "Everyone keeps talking about how intelligent you are. Frankly, you have yet to demonstrate anything resembling intellect to me. Do you think it's easy lying to the Dark Lord's face?"
Snape took a deep breath.
"What we will do now is to practice so that I am unable to see your memories. Your mind must be absolutely clear and blank. You must be able to feel the intrusion, but do not dwell on it. Let it pass through you. I want you to look me in the eye and lie to the questions I will ask."
Harry took several deep breaths and tried to calm his emotions down. He looked up into Snape's eyes.
"What is your name?"
Harry felt Snape's eyes bore into his mind. Keeping it blank, he replied.
"Neville Longbottom"
"What house are you in?"
"Ravenclaw"
"Have you ever kissed a girl?"
Before he could suppress it, an image of Cho at Christmas came into his mind as he replied "No."
Snape sneered as Harry blushed crimson.
"Well, you managed the easy ones the first time. We will continue for the rest of the hour. The questions will not be so easy and it will be harder to lie to me. Perhaps I will even learn who stole the bicorn horn and boomslang skin from my stores. However, on the small chance that you do learn what I am teaching, you will be able to bring up false memories and images to confirm your lies."
Harry's pulse quickened as he tried to keep thoughts of Hermione out of his head. It was she who stole those items in their second year, when they made polyjuice potion to sneak into the Slytherin Common Room.
Keeping his face neutral and his mind as blank as he could make it, Harry continued to practice lying. When the hour was up, Snape gestured to the mess behind him.
"The first part of your detention tonight will be to clean that mess up. I am feeling generous so you may use magic. Now, as you know, or might not know, my skills are in great demand. For a price. There are several potions which are needed by the Ministry on a regular basis and I am the one with the best skills to prepare them. This week, however, you will. Be warned, Potter, these need to be up to Ministry standards. The slightest error could spell the difference between life and death. You will find a cauldron and tools in my office. I will prepare the list of ingredients and procedure. You will remain here until the potion is correctly made."
Harry went into Snape's office and found the cauldron, mortar, pestle, and the other tools on a small table. They were caked and encrusted with a foul slimy and hard grime.
"Oops. It looks like I forgot to clean them after the last potion. You can go ahead and clean them. No magic. You will also clean them when you are done. No magic."
Harry fumed for the next half hour cleaning the disgusting implements. When he was finished, he looked on the board and saw what he was to do. It was the most fiendishly difficult potion he had ever seen, with each of the twenty ingredients needing to be prepared in its own minutely exact way, with special temperature and stirring instructions for each of the thirty steps. As Harry proceeded to carefully gather the ingredients, Snape's voice drifted to him.
"And this is the easy one, Potter..."
******
Harry left Snape's dungeon three hours later totally exhausted. Although Snape didn't abuse him while he was making the potion, the standards he set for the quality of the potion were almost impossible to reach. Harry had to endure rejection after rejection while he was making the potion. He gradually, though, began to see exactly how much of a perfectionist Snape was concerning potions, and why that perfectionism was important. He started to see the small differences as he went through his attempts to make the potion. He was dreading, however, the rest of the week. Snape had said that the potion he just made was the easy one...he wondered if he would be able to make the Quidditch tryouts.
As he arrived at Windrider's office, he was surprised to see Luna coming out. Luna saw him and smiled.
"Hello, Harry. Do you need to see Professor Windrider too?"
"Yeah. I've got to arrange the lessons for all the first through fifth years." With a bit of a shock, he realized he would be teaching Luna.
"Well, that's all right then, it will be just like the DA. I'm already taking special lessons from Professor Windrider. Well, see you later, Harry, in Hogsmeade."
"Huh?" Harry was thrown off by Luna's remarks. Lessons with Widrider? And what was this about Hogsmeade?
"Well, you will be going first Hogsmeade weekend, and we'll have a drink at the Hog's Head." She said this so matter of factly Harry's head spun. All he could do was nod in agreement.
"Yeah, drinks at the Hog's Head"
Luna smiled serenely and drifted off. Harry watched her go for a moment in numbness. Did she just ask him out? Or did she tell him they were going out? With Luna you couldn't tell. He shook his head to regain his focus and knocked on Windrider's door. It opened and he went in and stopped in shock. Windrider was in the middle of his office, on some sort of hide, doing some kind of exercise routine, or was it a dance? As Harry watched him, he seemed to drift from being a human to being a bear, the images seeming to flicker back and forth. Harry cleared his throat, and Windrider stopped, looking fully human and solid, and turned to Harry.
"Ah, Harry. It's late, so let's make this quick so you can get some sleep and do your homework. Do you have your schedule with you?"
Harry nodded. Windrider invited him into the office and motioned for him to sit on the hide. As he did so, he looked around the office. He thought he had seen some odd decorations during the past five years he had seen this office, but these were definitely the most mixed set he had ever saw. One wall was dominated by a strange tapestry. It seemed to be mostly made up of multi colored squares seemingly spiraling inward to a black spot in the exact center. Harry felt his eyes, and part of himself, move along that spiral, being sucked into that black vortex. He quickly tore his eyes away from it and looked around at the rest of the office. Instead of the hideous kittens on plates Umbridge had last year, the shelves had various musical instruments on them. Harry saw several drums, flutes, a violin, and standing against one wall was what he recognized as a djeridu, an Australian instrument. Harry looked at the third wall and gasped. It was made to look like a rock wall, with crude hand paintings on it of animals and strange shapes. The fireplace was turned into a crude hearth, in which a fire was burning. The rest of the room was draped in hides and blankets. There was not a chair or a desk to be seen.
Windrider sat down opposite Harry and took his schedule.
"Hm. I think we can work around this and leave you plenty of time for homework and Quidditch. Are you okay with all the students in a year? That way you will only have to teach five classes a week. It works out well for me also, as I will be present to supervise. I know how the Slytherins will react."
Harry nodded. He was still a bit awed by Windrider's office.
"Now all that remains is to talk about what you will teach. Saturday, after breakfast, we will go to Hogsmeade to discuss that. I've arranged for a private room at the Hog's Head. The order has allies there and there you'll have your apparition lessons. Each week, we will go and talk about lessons for the upcoming week, except on Hogsmeade weekends. All set? Good. Now you have questions?"
"Well, Professor, when I cam in, I saw you doing something that made you look like a bear. Are you an Animagus?"
"No, I am not." Windrider said. "However, each person has a particular animal suited to his or her spirit nature. While Wizards can connect with that animal physically by becoming an Animagus, the shaman connects with it on a spiritual level. That animal acts as a guide. So, as you saw, I am a bear shaman. The dance brings me closer to that bear. What was your other question?"
Harry blushed. "Um, when I was coming to your office, I saw Luna. She said she was taking lessons?"
Windrider looked at him and smiled. Harry had the oddest feeling that Windrider knew everything about him.
"That girl," Windrider said, "is one of the most intelligent I have ever met. When the potential shaman is ready, the teacher appears."
"Luna?" said Harry in almost disbelief.
Windrider smiled. "She is more in tune with the shamanic world than many other shamans I have known. She has the potential for being a great force of change in this world. Listen to her closely, Harry. You will understand what I mean. Now, off to bed with you."
*********
Harry met Ron and Hermione for breakfast the next morning. He had been too tired to tell them about what happened last night, but he took the time to fill them in over bacon and eggs.
"You mean Snape's got you making his potions for him?"
Harry nodded. "And he said that they would get worse, and he was enjoying himself when he said it. I guess he thinks I don't have homework or need sleep. At least I'm getting better at Occlumency."
While he was talking, the mail came. Hermione received her usual Daily Prophet, plus this time her parents sent her a letter. Harry perused the Prophet while Hermione read the letter from her parents.
"Harry, Ron, listen to this." Hermione said. "Mum and Dad say that all of a sudden a lot of important people in the government are committing suicide. A couple of MPs, and some higher ups in the Home and Foreign Offices. Even the Prime Minister is looking more and more depressed. No one can figure out what's happening."
Harry looked up from the paper.
"That's not all. There's been all sorts of small incidents, according to the Prophet. It says that the Aurors are having to work overtime running all over the country following up. The Prophet is wondering why there were no new Aurors admitted in the last three years."
Ron snorted. "Fudge, of course. Since Wormtail escaped, we know what his mind was on. Serves him right, the stupid git."
"Ron, don't joke." replied Harry. "It says that the Ministry is drafting other Ministry workiers to assist the aurors. That means your dad and Percy."
Hermione looked up, her face full of worry.
"I think we need to talk to Dumbledore. These can't be coincidences. The aurors are spread too thin and the Muggle government is shaky. I think something terrible is going to happen."
