Chapter Three: Art of Defense
All the students went into the Great Hall. Harry found that most of the younger students were sitting at the tables, waiting for the feast to begin; Harry felt the same way. He was very hungry, despite his huge breakfast.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione took their seats and talked amongst themselves.
"I wonder who the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher is," Ron said.
"Hey, maybe it's that man over there," Hermione nodded in the direction where a man who looked like he was in his mid-forties. He had brown wavy hair and looked as if he hadn't shaved in days.
"Probably," Ron said. "I've never seen him before."
The Great Hall became completely silent as the timid first years began to walk slowly to the front of the hall, waiting to be sorted into their houses. Harry waited patiently as the Sorting Hat sorted Briynn Adams all the way to Taylor Wallen.
The students began to talk, when the Sorting Ceremony was over.
Professor Dumbledore stood up. The Great Hall became pin drop silent.
"Welcome first years! And welcome back former students!" Dumbledore said. "I know that you are all hungry, so I'm just going to say a few words; twenty-five to be exact. The new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher will be Professor Kidge."
The man with the wavy brown hair stood up, while the Hall clapped without interest. They had a Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher every ever, since Harry's first year.
"Also, once again, Mr. Flinch has reminded "
The Great sighed with annoyance.
" Oh well, you know! Dig in!" Dumbledore continued.
The Hall started to laugh as the plates and goblets filled up with food and drinks. Harry and Ron ate like pigs. Hermione on the other hand wasn't eating at all.
"What's wrong?" Ron asked. "Don't tell me it's the spew stuff again."
"It's S.P.E.W! And no, it's not about that. I've wondering about this Professor Kidge, you know, how he's like."
"I'd like to know too," Ron said stuffing himself with chicken. "Letss jusst hope that hess better than Umbridde." Chicken flew out of his mouth. Hermione looked disgusted as Harry laughed. He swallowed his food. "We'll find out sooner or later."
It was sooner.
After the feast, the students had all headed to their dormitories and had fallen fast asleep. The morning had come much too quickly.
Harry and Ron, while Seamus, Dean, and Neville were getting ready, were still laying on bed wishing the sun would go down. They had went to woken up early the day before, and went to sleep way too late.
"You guys better get up!" Seamus said throwing a pillow at Harry; he groaned.
"Come on, guys!" Dean said.
"Okay! Okay!" Ron said slightly getting up.
Seamus, Dean, and Neville left the dormitory, giving up ever trying to wake up Harry and Ron.
Harry and Ron still laid on bed for another five minutes.
"Ron, Ron, RON!" Harry throw a pillow at him.
"WHAT?"Ron growled.
"We have to get up," Harry said.
"How about another five minutes?" Ron answered.
"How about you lazy bums get your butts out of bed?" a high pitched voice said. Harry nearly fell off his four-poster bed.
"Hermione! What are you doing here?" Harry said rubbing his eyes and putting on his glasses, so he could see her.
"The real question is, what are you two still doing in bed?" Hermione said throwing them their robes. "Come on, get up! Guess who we have first? Professor Kidge! Now we can see what kind of teacher he is."
"Tell me again, why the founders of Hogwarts let girls come in the boys' dormitories?" Ron picked up his robes that Hermione had thrown to him.
"Hurry up, you guys! I'll be in the Great Hall," Hermione said heading toward the door. "What would you do without me?"
"We would get more sleep," muttered Ron.
Harry and Ron joined Hermione in the Great Hall ten minutes later.
"Who do we have with Kidge?" Ron asked as they sat down at the table.
"Slytherin," Hermione said looking disgusted.
Ron and Harry sighed. They turned around to look at the Slytherin table.
"Draco better not give us any problems, or I'll kick in the "
"Ron!" Hermione rolled her eyes.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione waited for the mail to come; Harry didn't get anything. Ron received a letter from Mrs. Weasley reminding him to wear clean underwear. Hermione got the Daily Prophet.
"Your still subscribing to the pile of rubbish?" Harry asked. He wasn't fond of the newspaper.
"Well, you'll never know what these people write, if you don't read it, even if it is a bunch of lies," she flipped the pages of the Daily Prophet.
Harry looked over the Hufflepuff table. "Hey, what is everyone gathering around for?" People had started to get up and head toward the bulletin board.
"Dunno," Hermione said also looking over to the bulletin board. "Lets go Ron?"
Ron wasn't looking over the Hufflepuff table, but was looking at the Ravenclaw table.
"Ron! Ron! Ronald Weasley!" Hermione said.
Ron sprang back to life, and quickly changed the subject.
"So..er...lets go see what everybody's talking about," he mumbled.
The Great Hall became very loud now. People were murmuring loudly about something. Harry caught a few words about what they were talking about. "Hogsmeade, Dance, September 19th"
"Looks like there's a dance of some kind," Harry said.
A loud crowd had formed in front of the bulletin board. Harry, Ron, and Hermione joined the crowd to see that everyone was talking about. A parchment hung on the wall.
All 6th yea students are invited to celebrate the excellence done
in the O.W.L.S at a Congratulation's dance on September 19th
at Hogsmeade's Three Broomsticks. As this dance is for the
excellence of the students, rule breaking will not be tolerated.
Please dress appropriately and be accompanied by partners.
Professor McGonagall
Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
"September 19th!" Hermione squealed. "That's my Birthday!"
"We have to be accompanied be dance partner?" Harry said remembering his forth year when he asked Cho Chang to the Yule Ball. It didn't work out, the way Harry planned. "This brings back bad memories."
Harry looked at Ron for his opinion , but Ron was in his weird trance again. He was, again, staring at someone.
"Ron, who are you looking at?" Harry looked at the direction Ron was.
He was staring at a very pretty girl with soft blonde hair, and green eyes. Harry had seen her before, her name was Amilynn Tronyer.
"Well," Hermione said briskly, "what are you waiting for?" She seemed to have figured everything out.
"W-what do you mean?" Ron said as he came back to the real world.
"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure it out," she said as they headed back to the Gryffindor table.
Ron looked uneasy. "Er..." he said, "I-I don't know what your talking about."
Hermione raised her eyebrow and smiled. "Her name is Amilynn Tronyer, but I think you already know that."
"Er... I " Ron stammered.
"Go ask to the dance!" Hermione said grinning.
Ron looked at Amilynn. He shook his head. "Naw, she'd never go with me," he said bemused.
So this was why Ron was acting so peculiar, Harry thought as he grinned. He always had the idea that Ron fancied Hermione before...
"Oh, come on! What can go wrong?" Hermione asked; she was really serious about this.
Another thing that was different with her this year, was that she was very calm and didn't care for the rules too much. Sure, she still had the top marks of the whole 6th year, but she much more flexible.
"No way," Ron said. His ears were really pink.
Harry joined the conversation. "It's not that bad," he stated. Harry grabbed an apple and took a big bite.
"Yow know Rown," Harry tried to say as bits of apple came out of his mouth. Hermione rolled her eyes. Harry swallowed quickly. "What I'm saying is that you should just...just take a risk. What do have to lose?"
"My dignity," Ron said.
"Oh come on!" Hermione grabbed Ron's arm and started going to Ravenclaw table.
"Hermione! No!" Ron said trying to pull back, but Harry was exerting force on his back. "No! Come on, you guys! STOP!" Ron struggled. "OKAY, OKAY! Fine, just stop pushing!"
Harry and Hermione let go of him. Ron looked at them as if they were mad. "Er... I...er....can't "
Ron made a feeble attempt to leave, but Harry grabbed a handful of his robes. "Just go! If you need help I'll come!" he said.
"Oh yeah, just what I need, my best friend coming in the middle to save my butt." Ron said. He slowly walked toward the Ravenclaw table.
Harry and Hermione returned to the Gryffindor table and watched Ron with interest. They couldn't hear anything, but they could definitely see what was going on.
Ron was making stupid hand movements and his red face was glowing like a fire. Amilynn looked at Ron with a questioning look.
"He's doing great," Harry said unconvincingly. "He can do this, he's been through worse and he's dead, isn't he?"
Hermione nodded. Harry got up.
"Wait here, I'm going to help Ron, if he hasn't messed up too badly," Harry sighed to Hermione and causally walked up to the Ravenclaw table. He could here Ron babbling something about cheese.
He walked up to him. Ron, obviously, looked relived to have Harry by his side.
"Hey, Amilynn," Harry said.
"Hi, Harry," she replied, "er... I was just ...talking to your friend." She glanced our to Ron.
"Yeah, er...Ron would like to ask you something. Right, Ron?"
"Er...the... I just er... I need to....er....I well, you are don't have...er....just "
Harry rubbed his eyes, he didn't have time for this; class was going to start any minute. The Great Hall was now completely empty except for Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Amilynn.
"Amilynn, Ron wants you to be his dance partner for the Congratulation Dance," Harry blurted out.
Harry looked at Ron, wondering if he would be mad at him for asking Amilynn for him, but his face showed a sign of thankfulness.
Amilynn smiled weakly, and looked at Ron.
"Really, Ron? You want to take me to the dance?" she asked.
Ron nodded. Amilynn bit her lip as she smiled.
"Of course, I'd go with you," she replied. She smiled, again.
"Okay," Ron managed to say. He voice had a daze of confusion.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione sprinted to the North Tower for Defense Against the Dark Arts. All of the students were already sitting down, eager to find out how this Professor Kidge was like.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione took their seats, they too, waiting for their new teacher to arrive.
Professor Kidge strolled into the room minutes later. The class stared at him. He stared back. There was a long silence.
"So, aren't we going to do anything?" Draco Malfoy sneered,
"I'm glad you asked me that, Mr..." Professor Kidge said.
"Malfoy, Draco Malfoy."
"Malfoy," Professor Kidge repeated. "Before I answer your question, I would just like to say, that I might be the teacher, but I don't know what you are thinking. If you have a question, you should ask it. I also will probably ask you the same question you asked me again. I do it just to see how much you already know about the question you asked."
The class stared baffled.
"So Mr. Malfoy," Professor Kidge continued, obviously not seeing the befuddled faces of the class, "What do you think we are going to do in this class?"
Malfoy shrugged. "Learn stuff," he said. The Slytherins giggled.
"What kind of stuff?" Professor Kidge said. The class now knew what he was talking about, when he said that he would simply ask the same question back.
Malfoy shrugged again.
"Who can tell me what kind of stuff we might learn?" Professor Kidge asked. Hermione's hand raised. "Yes, Miss..."
"Hermione Granger, sir. And I think that we will learn how to defend ourselves from the dark and evil."
"What kind of dark and evil?" Professor Kidge asked back.
"Er...well...er..." Hermione stammered.
"Voldemort," Harry said automatically. He wasn't even paying attention to Hermione and or Professor Kidge. He was doodling on his parchment, and he blurted out the Dark Lord's name without knowing it.
Many gasps filled the classroom. Neville almost fell out of his seat, and Lavender Brown and Parvati Patel let out a high squeal.
Harry looked up at Professor Kidge, wondering how he would react to this.
"Thank you, Mr...Potter," Professor Kidge said smiling, "couldn't have said it better myself."
Professor Kidge walked around his desk and started pacing in between the students' desks.
"As you all know by now, Voldemort "
More gasps and squeals.
"There's no need to fear the name, its only a name," Professor Kidge continued, "Voldemort is back. Dark Power might rise once again. I'm not going to hide it from you. You all have a right to know. Professor Dumbledore seems to think that it is in the right mind to teach you intense defense spells. And I completely agree with him. That's why this semester, we are going to learn defense spells."
Harry couldn't help but smile; they had finally gotten a Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher who didn't have any problems.
"Wow!" Malfoy loudly said sarcastically. "I would have never guessed!"
The Slytherins laughed.
"Very funny, Mr. Malfoy," Professor Kidge said, smiling. "But I don't mean feeble defense spells, but strong, powerful ones."
The class slumped into their seats, this was of no interest to them.
"Lets start with my favorite one...er lets have...Mr. Potter come and help me out."
Harry sighed to himself and got up. He walked in front of the room.
"Okay, Potter, now this isn't going to hurt too much," Professor Kidge said
Harry could see that his classmates had instantly awoken with pleasure. He could the Slytherins faces wishing they had a camera.
"Now, Harry when I cast a spell on you, all you have to do is perform an Angrisa spell. In this spell, you to enunciate Zambona Angrisan," Professor Kidge said. "Okay? Easy enough? Lets try then."
The students leaned forward in their seats, waiting for Harry to get hurt. Professor Kidge got up and walked toward Harry.
"Wand, up and ready?" Professor Kidge asked.
Harry nodded and raised his wand.
"One, two, three...Expelliaromus!"
"Zambona Angrisan!" Harry cried at the same time.
The spell didn't seem to be working. First, Harry's wand flew out of thrown hand and then he was thrown across the room.
The Slytherins howled with laughter; Draco Malfoy the loudest of them all.
Harry quickly got up; this was very humiliating.
"Lets try it again," Professor Kidge acted like he hadn't seen one of his students fly over the room. "One, two, three...Expelliaromus!"
"Zambona Angrisan!"
Once again, Harry was pitched over the room, and the Slytherins celebrated like it was New Years Day.
The laughter zoomed though Harry's head. He could imagine the look on Draco Malfoy's face, when he couldn't repel the spell.
"Once more," Professor Kidge said, "this time, lets have a volunteer to go against Potter. Er...yes...Mr. Malfoy."
Draco Malfoy made his way to the front of the classroom, with the cold smile drawn on his face.
"Really embarrassing, Potter. Getting your butt kicked by an old man," he said quietly, "this is going to be a piece of cake."
Harry clenched his teeth, and his grip on his wand became more tighter.
He was angry.
"One, two, three!" Professor Kidge said.
"Expelliaromus!"
"Zambona Angrisan!"
A bright blue jet of light came out of Harry's wand. The light zapped in the air hitting Malfoy's chest. He flew into the air and was dropped harshly on the hard floor.
The Slytherins gaped at the groaning Draco Malfoy, who was lying on the ground.
Professor Kidge smiled. "Good job, Potter."
The class looked around for an explanation. Once again the class was silent, except for Draco Malfoy, who was still lying on the ground, waiting for Professor Kidge to speak.
When no one did, Hermione raised her hand once more.
"Er...Professor, why is it that Harry couldn't block the spell before?"
Harry wished she hadn't brought up the subject. He was trying to forget it, but he was impressed how nicely he had beat Malfoy.
"I'm glad you asked me that, Miss Granger, I was beginning to think that the class didn't need an explanation." He got up off his desk and walked in front of the class. "The Angrisa spell is a complicated spell. I know that Potter here can conjure a Patronus, am I right?"
Harry nodded.
"To produce a Patronus, you need strength and happiness. An Angrisa is the complete opposite; you need weakness and sadness Now Mr. Potter is certainly not weak at all, as we all already know, but when his classmates began to laugh, anger rose beneath him, am I right?"
Harry nodded again.
"And when Potter was thrown across the room, he became weaker."
The class stared at Professor Kidge.
"Now you might be wondering what an Angrisa does. As you can see Mr. Malfoy was thrown across the room, but it's not that easy. You need to have strength in your anger, you still need to be weak, but you need to have strong anger."
The class gaped at him.
"It was pretty easy for Potter to overthrow Malfoy, but it won't be that easy in a real duel..."
All the students went into the Great Hall. Harry found that most of the younger students were sitting at the tables, waiting for the feast to begin; Harry felt the same way. He was very hungry, despite his huge breakfast.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione took their seats and talked amongst themselves.
"I wonder who the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher is," Ron said.
"Hey, maybe it's that man over there," Hermione nodded in the direction where a man who looked like he was in his mid-forties. He had brown wavy hair and looked as if he hadn't shaved in days.
"Probably," Ron said. "I've never seen him before."
The Great Hall became completely silent as the timid first years began to walk slowly to the front of the hall, waiting to be sorted into their houses. Harry waited patiently as the Sorting Hat sorted Briynn Adams all the way to Taylor Wallen.
The students began to talk, when the Sorting Ceremony was over.
Professor Dumbledore stood up. The Great Hall became pin drop silent.
"Welcome first years! And welcome back former students!" Dumbledore said. "I know that you are all hungry, so I'm just going to say a few words; twenty-five to be exact. The new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher will be Professor Kidge."
The man with the wavy brown hair stood up, while the Hall clapped without interest. They had a Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher every ever, since Harry's first year.
"Also, once again, Mr. Flinch has reminded "
The Great sighed with annoyance.
" Oh well, you know! Dig in!" Dumbledore continued.
The Hall started to laugh as the plates and goblets filled up with food and drinks. Harry and Ron ate like pigs. Hermione on the other hand wasn't eating at all.
"What's wrong?" Ron asked. "Don't tell me it's the spew stuff again."
"It's S.P.E.W! And no, it's not about that. I've wondering about this Professor Kidge, you know, how he's like."
"I'd like to know too," Ron said stuffing himself with chicken. "Letss jusst hope that hess better than Umbridde." Chicken flew out of his mouth. Hermione looked disgusted as Harry laughed. He swallowed his food. "We'll find out sooner or later."
It was sooner.
After the feast, the students had all headed to their dormitories and had fallen fast asleep. The morning had come much too quickly.
Harry and Ron, while Seamus, Dean, and Neville were getting ready, were still laying on bed wishing the sun would go down. They had went to woken up early the day before, and went to sleep way too late.
"You guys better get up!" Seamus said throwing a pillow at Harry; he groaned.
"Come on, guys!" Dean said.
"Okay! Okay!" Ron said slightly getting up.
Seamus, Dean, and Neville left the dormitory, giving up ever trying to wake up Harry and Ron.
Harry and Ron still laid on bed for another five minutes.
"Ron, Ron, RON!" Harry throw a pillow at him.
"WHAT?"Ron growled.
"We have to get up," Harry said.
"How about another five minutes?" Ron answered.
"How about you lazy bums get your butts out of bed?" a high pitched voice said. Harry nearly fell off his four-poster bed.
"Hermione! What are you doing here?" Harry said rubbing his eyes and putting on his glasses, so he could see her.
"The real question is, what are you two still doing in bed?" Hermione said throwing them their robes. "Come on, get up! Guess who we have first? Professor Kidge! Now we can see what kind of teacher he is."
"Tell me again, why the founders of Hogwarts let girls come in the boys' dormitories?" Ron picked up his robes that Hermione had thrown to him.
"Hurry up, you guys! I'll be in the Great Hall," Hermione said heading toward the door. "What would you do without me?"
"We would get more sleep," muttered Ron.
Harry and Ron joined Hermione in the Great Hall ten minutes later.
"Who do we have with Kidge?" Ron asked as they sat down at the table.
"Slytherin," Hermione said looking disgusted.
Ron and Harry sighed. They turned around to look at the Slytherin table.
"Draco better not give us any problems, or I'll kick in the "
"Ron!" Hermione rolled her eyes.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione waited for the mail to come; Harry didn't get anything. Ron received a letter from Mrs. Weasley reminding him to wear clean underwear. Hermione got the Daily Prophet.
"Your still subscribing to the pile of rubbish?" Harry asked. He wasn't fond of the newspaper.
"Well, you'll never know what these people write, if you don't read it, even if it is a bunch of lies," she flipped the pages of the Daily Prophet.
Harry looked over the Hufflepuff table. "Hey, what is everyone gathering around for?" People had started to get up and head toward the bulletin board.
"Dunno," Hermione said also looking over to the bulletin board. "Lets go Ron?"
Ron wasn't looking over the Hufflepuff table, but was looking at the Ravenclaw table.
"Ron! Ron! Ronald Weasley!" Hermione said.
Ron sprang back to life, and quickly changed the subject.
"So..er...lets go see what everybody's talking about," he mumbled.
The Great Hall became very loud now. People were murmuring loudly about something. Harry caught a few words about what they were talking about. "Hogsmeade, Dance, September 19th"
"Looks like there's a dance of some kind," Harry said.
A loud crowd had formed in front of the bulletin board. Harry, Ron, and Hermione joined the crowd to see that everyone was talking about. A parchment hung on the wall.
All 6th yea students are invited to celebrate the excellence done
in the O.W.L.S at a Congratulation's dance on September 19th
at Hogsmeade's Three Broomsticks. As this dance is for the
excellence of the students, rule breaking will not be tolerated.
Please dress appropriately and be accompanied by partners.
Professor McGonagall
Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
"September 19th!" Hermione squealed. "That's my Birthday!"
"We have to be accompanied be dance partner?" Harry said remembering his forth year when he asked Cho Chang to the Yule Ball. It didn't work out, the way Harry planned. "This brings back bad memories."
Harry looked at Ron for his opinion , but Ron was in his weird trance again. He was, again, staring at someone.
"Ron, who are you looking at?" Harry looked at the direction Ron was.
He was staring at a very pretty girl with soft blonde hair, and green eyes. Harry had seen her before, her name was Amilynn Tronyer.
"Well," Hermione said briskly, "what are you waiting for?" She seemed to have figured everything out.
"W-what do you mean?" Ron said as he came back to the real world.
"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure it out," she said as they headed back to the Gryffindor table.
Ron looked uneasy. "Er..." he said, "I-I don't know what your talking about."
Hermione raised her eyebrow and smiled. "Her name is Amilynn Tronyer, but I think you already know that."
"Er... I " Ron stammered.
"Go ask to the dance!" Hermione said grinning.
Ron looked at Amilynn. He shook his head. "Naw, she'd never go with me," he said bemused.
So this was why Ron was acting so peculiar, Harry thought as he grinned. He always had the idea that Ron fancied Hermione before...
"Oh, come on! What can go wrong?" Hermione asked; she was really serious about this.
Another thing that was different with her this year, was that she was very calm and didn't care for the rules too much. Sure, she still had the top marks of the whole 6th year, but she much more flexible.
"No way," Ron said. His ears were really pink.
Harry joined the conversation. "It's not that bad," he stated. Harry grabbed an apple and took a big bite.
"Yow know Rown," Harry tried to say as bits of apple came out of his mouth. Hermione rolled her eyes. Harry swallowed quickly. "What I'm saying is that you should just...just take a risk. What do have to lose?"
"My dignity," Ron said.
"Oh come on!" Hermione grabbed Ron's arm and started going to Ravenclaw table.
"Hermione! No!" Ron said trying to pull back, but Harry was exerting force on his back. "No! Come on, you guys! STOP!" Ron struggled. "OKAY, OKAY! Fine, just stop pushing!"
Harry and Hermione let go of him. Ron looked at them as if they were mad. "Er... I...er....can't "
Ron made a feeble attempt to leave, but Harry grabbed a handful of his robes. "Just go! If you need help I'll come!" he said.
"Oh yeah, just what I need, my best friend coming in the middle to save my butt." Ron said. He slowly walked toward the Ravenclaw table.
Harry and Hermione returned to the Gryffindor table and watched Ron with interest. They couldn't hear anything, but they could definitely see what was going on.
Ron was making stupid hand movements and his red face was glowing like a fire. Amilynn looked at Ron with a questioning look.
"He's doing great," Harry said unconvincingly. "He can do this, he's been through worse and he's dead, isn't he?"
Hermione nodded. Harry got up.
"Wait here, I'm going to help Ron, if he hasn't messed up too badly," Harry sighed to Hermione and causally walked up to the Ravenclaw table. He could here Ron babbling something about cheese.
He walked up to him. Ron, obviously, looked relived to have Harry by his side.
"Hey, Amilynn," Harry said.
"Hi, Harry," she replied, "er... I was just ...talking to your friend." She glanced our to Ron.
"Yeah, er...Ron would like to ask you something. Right, Ron?"
"Er...the... I just er... I need to....er....I well, you are don't have...er....just "
Harry rubbed his eyes, he didn't have time for this; class was going to start any minute. The Great Hall was now completely empty except for Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Amilynn.
"Amilynn, Ron wants you to be his dance partner for the Congratulation Dance," Harry blurted out.
Harry looked at Ron, wondering if he would be mad at him for asking Amilynn for him, but his face showed a sign of thankfulness.
Amilynn smiled weakly, and looked at Ron.
"Really, Ron? You want to take me to the dance?" she asked.
Ron nodded. Amilynn bit her lip as she smiled.
"Of course, I'd go with you," she replied. She smiled, again.
"Okay," Ron managed to say. He voice had a daze of confusion.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione sprinted to the North Tower for Defense Against the Dark Arts. All of the students were already sitting down, eager to find out how this Professor Kidge was like.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione took their seats, they too, waiting for their new teacher to arrive.
Professor Kidge strolled into the room minutes later. The class stared at him. He stared back. There was a long silence.
"So, aren't we going to do anything?" Draco Malfoy sneered,
"I'm glad you asked me that, Mr..." Professor Kidge said.
"Malfoy, Draco Malfoy."
"Malfoy," Professor Kidge repeated. "Before I answer your question, I would just like to say, that I might be the teacher, but I don't know what you are thinking. If you have a question, you should ask it. I also will probably ask you the same question you asked me again. I do it just to see how much you already know about the question you asked."
The class stared baffled.
"So Mr. Malfoy," Professor Kidge continued, obviously not seeing the befuddled faces of the class, "What do you think we are going to do in this class?"
Malfoy shrugged. "Learn stuff," he said. The Slytherins giggled.
"What kind of stuff?" Professor Kidge said. The class now knew what he was talking about, when he said that he would simply ask the same question back.
Malfoy shrugged again.
"Who can tell me what kind of stuff we might learn?" Professor Kidge asked. Hermione's hand raised. "Yes, Miss..."
"Hermione Granger, sir. And I think that we will learn how to defend ourselves from the dark and evil."
"What kind of dark and evil?" Professor Kidge asked back.
"Er...well...er..." Hermione stammered.
"Voldemort," Harry said automatically. He wasn't even paying attention to Hermione and or Professor Kidge. He was doodling on his parchment, and he blurted out the Dark Lord's name without knowing it.
Many gasps filled the classroom. Neville almost fell out of his seat, and Lavender Brown and Parvati Patel let out a high squeal.
Harry looked up at Professor Kidge, wondering how he would react to this.
"Thank you, Mr...Potter," Professor Kidge said smiling, "couldn't have said it better myself."
Professor Kidge walked around his desk and started pacing in between the students' desks.
"As you all know by now, Voldemort "
More gasps and squeals.
"There's no need to fear the name, its only a name," Professor Kidge continued, "Voldemort is back. Dark Power might rise once again. I'm not going to hide it from you. You all have a right to know. Professor Dumbledore seems to think that it is in the right mind to teach you intense defense spells. And I completely agree with him. That's why this semester, we are going to learn defense spells."
Harry couldn't help but smile; they had finally gotten a Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher who didn't have any problems.
"Wow!" Malfoy loudly said sarcastically. "I would have never guessed!"
The Slytherins laughed.
"Very funny, Mr. Malfoy," Professor Kidge said, smiling. "But I don't mean feeble defense spells, but strong, powerful ones."
The class slumped into their seats, this was of no interest to them.
"Lets start with my favorite one...er lets have...Mr. Potter come and help me out."
Harry sighed to himself and got up. He walked in front of the room.
"Okay, Potter, now this isn't going to hurt too much," Professor Kidge said
Harry could see that his classmates had instantly awoken with pleasure. He could the Slytherins faces wishing they had a camera.
"Now, Harry when I cast a spell on you, all you have to do is perform an Angrisa spell. In this spell, you to enunciate Zambona Angrisan," Professor Kidge said. "Okay? Easy enough? Lets try then."
The students leaned forward in their seats, waiting for Harry to get hurt. Professor Kidge got up and walked toward Harry.
"Wand, up and ready?" Professor Kidge asked.
Harry nodded and raised his wand.
"One, two, three...Expelliaromus!"
"Zambona Angrisan!" Harry cried at the same time.
The spell didn't seem to be working. First, Harry's wand flew out of thrown hand and then he was thrown across the room.
The Slytherins howled with laughter; Draco Malfoy the loudest of them all.
Harry quickly got up; this was very humiliating.
"Lets try it again," Professor Kidge acted like he hadn't seen one of his students fly over the room. "One, two, three...Expelliaromus!"
"Zambona Angrisan!"
Once again, Harry was pitched over the room, and the Slytherins celebrated like it was New Years Day.
The laughter zoomed though Harry's head. He could imagine the look on Draco Malfoy's face, when he couldn't repel the spell.
"Once more," Professor Kidge said, "this time, lets have a volunteer to go against Potter. Er...yes...Mr. Malfoy."
Draco Malfoy made his way to the front of the classroom, with the cold smile drawn on his face.
"Really embarrassing, Potter. Getting your butt kicked by an old man," he said quietly, "this is going to be a piece of cake."
Harry clenched his teeth, and his grip on his wand became more tighter.
He was angry.
"One, two, three!" Professor Kidge said.
"Expelliaromus!"
"Zambona Angrisan!"
A bright blue jet of light came out of Harry's wand. The light zapped in the air hitting Malfoy's chest. He flew into the air and was dropped harshly on the hard floor.
The Slytherins gaped at the groaning Draco Malfoy, who was lying on the ground.
Professor Kidge smiled. "Good job, Potter."
The class looked around for an explanation. Once again the class was silent, except for Draco Malfoy, who was still lying on the ground, waiting for Professor Kidge to speak.
When no one did, Hermione raised her hand once more.
"Er...Professor, why is it that Harry couldn't block the spell before?"
Harry wished she hadn't brought up the subject. He was trying to forget it, but he was impressed how nicely he had beat Malfoy.
"I'm glad you asked me that, Miss Granger, I was beginning to think that the class didn't need an explanation." He got up off his desk and walked in front of the class. "The Angrisa spell is a complicated spell. I know that Potter here can conjure a Patronus, am I right?"
Harry nodded.
"To produce a Patronus, you need strength and happiness. An Angrisa is the complete opposite; you need weakness and sadness Now Mr. Potter is certainly not weak at all, as we all already know, but when his classmates began to laugh, anger rose beneath him, am I right?"
Harry nodded again.
"And when Potter was thrown across the room, he became weaker."
The class stared at Professor Kidge.
"Now you might be wondering what an Angrisa does. As you can see Mr. Malfoy was thrown across the room, but it's not that easy. You need to have strength in your anger, you still need to be weak, but you need to have strong anger."
The class gaped at him.
"It was pretty easy for Potter to overthrow Malfoy, but it won't be that easy in a real duel..."