Title: Looking for Magic in All the Right Places

Chapter Seven: Acquainted With the Night

Genre: Humour, Romance, and my response to the WIKTT 'Summer School Challenge.' To see complete rules, go to 'When I Kissed the Teacher' Files Challenge Files, (Closed Challenges).

Rating: PG-13

Warning: Occasional poetry!

Disclaimer: Please see Chapter One. Some chapters have Author's Notes for acknowledgements when needed.

Chapter Seven: Acquainted With the Night

'Looks like it might be a good turn-out,' remarked Harry as he, Ron, Dean, and Neville settled themselves in the mattress-enforced DADA classroom.

'Good thing most of us have to be here anyway,' said Dean, and moved over amiably when Padma scooted in beside him. The giggling Parvati-and-Lavender rumour brigade claimed the table behind them. Draco and his contingent slouched into the room, looking impossibly bored, and took up their usual places far from the Gryffindor/Ravenclaw group.

'Where's Hermione?' said Padma. The young men pretended not to hear her.

There was nothing wrong with her twin's ears. 'I'm sure once Professor Snape shows up, Hermione won't be far behind,' Parvati offered.

'Or vice-versa,' added Lavender.

After a few moments Lupin arrived, escorting the evening's two Muggle judges. Maxine Jones, resplendent in a swirling full-length scarlet dress, commanded instant attention--including the jealous glances of several young women heartily sick of their own fusty robes. Sean McCourt drew his own share of surprised stares; he looked uncharacteristically natty in a dark grey jacket and maroon tie. Lupin directed the two judges to a small table on which, instead of parchments and quills, sat two neat stacks of Muggle note cards and several pens and pencils.

Snape's arrival caused at least a dozen heads to turn, including Ron's and Harry's. The former Potions Master paused just inside the classroom doors, sweeping every student in the room with his usual look of thinly veiled disgust. Then he stood aside to let Dumbledore enter the room. The Headmaster, smiling and nodding, looked tired, but his benevolent presence couldn't have contrasted more with Snape's. The two senior faculty members walked down the shallow steps to sit behind McGonagall and Lupin.

'So,' said Neville, leaning back to grin at Parvati and Lavender. 'Does this mean Snape's having an affair with Dumbledore?' Dean and Padma sniggered.

'Ha ha,' was all Lavender could manage.

It was several more minutes before Hermione arrived, alone and barely on time. Without looking left or right or greeting anyone, she sailed past the Gryffindor/Ravenclaw group and seated herself at the only remaining empty table: right behind Dumbledore and Snape. Dumbledore turned to give her a friendly nod. Snape stared straight ahead.

'Harry,' Ron whispered.

'Yeah?'

'Have you thought about apologising to 'Mione about the sex-starved thing?'

'Have you apologised for the cow thing?'

'Well . . . maybe we could apologise at the same time.'

'Maybe.'

Ron sighed.

Lupin now stood, commanding silence, and launched into a brief speech welcoming contestants and guests to the DADA Invocation Slam. 'And just a quick review of the rules,' he continued. 'In the first round, all pairs first named by our Headmaster take turns reciting. Winners compete with winners in the next round, and runners-up compete with runners-up. Whoever loses that second round is out of the contest. On Thursday evening, we'll have semi-final and final rounds, ending with six contestants battling it out for first, second, and third place. Clear? Good.

'Now: about penalties. Going over the judges' time limit will automatically mean you lose that round. Invoking any of the Unforgivable Curses, even if they may no longer be effective, will result in disqualification from the slam and a possible failing mark in DADA. Again, is that clear?' There were nods. 'Excellent. Headmaster, I believe you have something to add?'

Dumbledore rose and turned to face the students. 'Our two distinguished guests'--he nodded at Jones and McCourt--'are the best qualified among us to judge our efforts. However, in the event they cannot agree, I have volunteered to serve as final arbiter.'

'And now,' said Lupin with a grin, 'let the revels begin.'

=============

Hours later, in the middle of the night, Hermione rose from her mattress, wrapped herself in a blanket, and picked her way through soft sounds of breathing to the common-room door. It had taken hours for the other young women to stop chatting excitedly and, one by one, fall asleep. Now Hermione moved out into the corridor, toward her favourite spot to sit during nights she couldn't sleepÑa stone window-seat where she could curl up, contemplate the night sky, and think.

Over and over again, her excellent memory re-played the first rounds of the Slam and her well-honed imagination looped around the question of what would happen on Thursday.

First things first. She had won her first round against Draco . . . but just barely. Told to take the offensive position, she'd fixed the Slytherin ringleader and suspected Voldemort toady with an uncompromising glare and delivered her invocation against the Dark One with a passion that surprised even her. Glancing at Snape, she'd caught respectfully raised eyebrows before the customary sour frown closed his face again.

But Draco, unfazed, had delivered a defence so subtle in its innuendo about her and Snape, yet so well-disciplined by Slam rules, that her first thought was--the bugger had help!

'Darkness undoes Woman; therein she'll find
Perilous spells that soon unseat her mind.
Her basest, hot desires rise to spoil
A wizard's subtle potion. She will roil,
Consuming purest Magick with a tongue
That licked the bloody Mark by Darkness stung.'

And that was just the first stanza.

It was hideously well crafted, Hermione admitted, fighting back tears of humiliation. By the end of Draco's poem, Snape's face had frozen into the profound stillness she recognised as a sign of pure fury. Even Parvati and Lavender were pale and wide-eyed.

What made the whole thing even more ghastly was the fact that afterwards, Jones and McCourt had argued furiously under their breaths and had emerged unable to determine a winner. Dumbledore had awarded the round to Hermione on the thin basis that her effort had been more invocational in structure.

However, Draco's insult had at least put Harry's thoughtless 'sex-starved little swot' comment back into perspective for Hermione. At that point, she would have been happy to run into Harry's arms and hug him in front of everybody. Instead, she settled back behind her table and tried to calm herself enough to listen to the other competitors.

McGonagall was pitted, if that was the right word, against Neville--and much to Neville's stunned surprise, the judges had awarded the round to him. Hermione, grinning, clapped as hard as anyone as the former Transformations professor nodded to her young rival and shook his hand. As expected, Parvati and Lavender joined the ranks of runners-up, whilst Padma--her brain honed by months of exposure to her boyfriend's poetic angst--took down Dean. Ron, up against Lupin, explained to the puzzled judges that his poem--'O I have slipped the surly bonds of earth/and dodged through bludgers seeking golden wings . . .'-- was meant to invoke the magic of a great Quidditch match. He good-naturedly accepted a hands-down verdict declaring as the winner Lupin's powerfully delivered 'The Thought- Wolf.'

Finally, Snape and Harry rose to their feet and moved down to the centre of the room, not looking at each other.

'Professor Snape, you've drawn the offensive position. Any time you're ready,' said McCourt.

The room fell quiet as all eyes focused on Snape. It seemed to Hermione that he took his time, letting the silence clothe him with power. When he began to speak, his voice, though barely above a whisper, carried throughout the entire room:

'I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have been Marked with pain--and cursed by fate.
I have outwalked the furthest spark of light.

I have walked through blackest realms of hate.
I have withstood the Dark One's breath of fire
And guarded with my life the wizards' gate.

I have stood still, not breathing, as the dire
Sounds of choking, interrupted cries
Ripped my soul's tight-warded walls entire.

And you presume to know where evil lies?
Such arrogance, to think you've reached the height
Of power--that realm confounds the wise.
For you the time won't come; you have no right.
You've not been one acquainted with the night.'

Though Snape's voice was still quiet when he finished, the room rang as if he were shouting. No one moved or breathed until Jones broke the silence, her rich voice subdued.

'Harry. Your defence.'

Harry had turned deathly pale during Snape's invocation, but he turned without hesitation to face the professor whom he believed had faithfully loathed him for seven years.

'When I consider how my light shines dim
My years in this dark world and wide yet few,
And my one talent, wielding death for you,
Lodged with me useless--I know my heart grows grim.
To serve the Light seems vain, a foolish whim.
Chaos wins, the Dark debt will accrue,
And every breath I take is payment due.'

At the moment the last cadences of Harry's steady voice faded, Hermione felt power crawling over her skin even as tears streaked her face. Snape, his face white and his eyes burning, took his wand out and pointed it at a blank note card that had drifted to the floor. His robes shifted as if a wind were stirring.

'Wingardium Leviosa.'

The note card stirred, fluttered . . . and lifted slowly off the floor. Jones and McCourt drew back, their eyes wide. The note card rose until it reached the height of the judges' table.

Suddenly the crackling sense of power vanished. The note card fell to the floor.

Silence. Then--

'Did you see that?'

'Did that really happen?'

'Is magic coming back?'

Elation rolled into the room like thunder. Through the din of hysterical laughter and voices crying out in surprise, through the scrum of bodies crowding around Snape and Harry, Hermione--alone at her table, wiping tears of shock and delight from her cheeks--saw Dumbledore conferring with Jones and McCourt.

'All three judges have reached a unanimous decision,' Dumbledore called out as soon as he felt reasonably sure his voice would carry through the din. 'Both Severus Snape and Harry Potter shall go forward into the semi-final rounds on Thursday evening.'

Now, alone on the cold window-seat, watching the stars wheel above her in the night, Hermione found herself believing--for the first time since Voldemort's death--that magic could return to Hogwarts.

A cold breath of air sent shivers down her back and she heard a faint sound behind her. Slowly, Hermione turned her head.

Staring at her, wrapped in darkness, was Severus Snape.

=============

Author's Notes:

--Draco's 'Darkness undoes Woman' is loosely adapted from a much more disturbing poem, 'Nature's Cook,' by Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle (1624? - 1674).

--The quote from Ron's Quidditch poem borrows from the first two lines of 'High Flight' by Royal Canadian Air Force pilot John Gillespie Magee (1922 - 1941).

--The title of Lupin's poem pays homage to 'The Thought-Fox' by the British poet Ted Hughes (1930 - 1998).

--Snape's invocation closely follows the footsteps of Robert Frost's 'Acquainted with the Night.' Also see notes for Chapter Five.

--Harry's defence takes its inspiration from 'When I Consider How My Light Is Spent' by John Milton (1608 - 1674).