Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of the characters, places, names, plots, historical incidents in the magical world, ghosts, objects or anything else that the genius J. K. Rowling has come up with. But do try not to steal my plot. Ask nicely and I might let you.
Harry Potter and the Light of Life
Chapter III: Delusional Dom
The only thing that happened before lunch the next day, was that Leia proved to be as bad in Charms as she had been in Transfiguration yesterday. But then again, she actually seemed to impress Snape in Potions, despite the fact that she was a Gryffindor. Her Blood-Replenishing potion looked exactly like the sample Snape had showed them and it had left even Hermione goggling at Leia as she delivered her sample. Not that Snape praised Leia in any way, but he didn't throw one dirty remark in her direction.
In Hagrid's first lesson with them in Care of Magical Creatures went very well. Hagrid had to everyone's relief managed to get his hands on a band of Crups. The crup was identical to a Jack Russell terrier, except for the cleaved tail. The only thing the sixth years had to do was walk their Crup around the lake, which to Harry and Ron seemed more like free time, than class. As they now only had one elected subject, Harry and Ron had both, of course, ditched Divination, and Hermione had, after much thinking, elected Arithmancy as her subject. And as with Advanced Potions, Harry and Ron had Care of Magical Creatures with the houses rest of the students from each house who also had elected the subject.
Even if they wondered for it a while when they walked, neither Harry, Dean or Ron had any idea what subject Leia was taking. But they found out when they met Neville and Seamus at dinner. They could tell anyone that would listen that Leia had one other thing she was brilliant at besides Potions: Divination.
According to Neville, it had all started with Professor Trelawney, starting the first lesson of the year with repeating the art of crystal ball gazing. Trelawney had been given her position back after Umbridge had left. Firenze had politely stepped aside, though he still lived in the castle.
At first Trelawney had predicted a few deaths, but none other than Parvati and Lavender had taken her seriously. But Leia, who had looked at Professor Trelawney with the same disgust as Hermione had done, had asked to at least have a go when Trelawney had declared her unable to attend the classes since Leia hadn't been there for the first two years.
"How would that be a problem?" interrupted Ron. "The old fraud never learned us anything." But the others told him to shut up, because they wanted to hear what Neville was saying.
"Well, Leia didn't seem put of by Trelawney's comment, you know, so she takes a deep breath, closes her eyes and when she opened them again, I could swear it wasn't Leia sitting there. Her eyes were clouded over. And then she says, in a voice I have never heard her speak in before something about the dark lord and his servant in captivity joining him. It was scary."
"Wait," said Seamus, "I wrote down exactly what she said. Here it is," he said as he unfolded the parchment he had found in his bag. "The dark lord's closest servant, with the look of an angel but who is not, will linger in captivity no more. The foulest force will attack their home and free the Dark Lord's second hand, whose heart is as dark as his master. Many will suffer for this deed, but none more than his single seed."
Harry gaped at Neville. That was a real prediction, if he'd ever heard one. Was Leia a Seer? It certainly seemed like some thought so. Harry could see Lavender and Parvati, who had never bothered with Leia before, interrogating her further down the table, and Leia seemed to be liking the attention just as much as he, Harry, would have liked a photo session with Gilderoy Lockhart.
"Trelawney didn't know what to do," continued Neville. "At first she didn't say anything, nobody said anything of course, we were all shocked. But after thinking, she did seem to believe that it was a real prediction. Asked Leia to stay behind after class and all. What if she is a true Seer?"
But Leia didn't seem to want to answer that question, for she hid in the Library the rest of the day with Hermione. But Harry couldn't help thinking about it as he played a game of chess with Ron. Could maybe Leia tell him what would happen with Voldemort? Could she tell him the future?
OOO
The next morning the sixth year Gryffindors were lined up outside the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, everyone exited. Harry had held a DA meeting last night, asking if the rest of the members were interested in him teaching them defence technique this year too. Most of them had been interested, so Hermione had suggested they made the decision after they knew how the new teacher was. Only the sixth years Ravenclaws had had Defence Against the Dark Arts yet, and after Luna's description he sounded much better than Umbridge.
"He's brilliant," Luna had said during the meeting." He's an Auror, you know, only a few years since he graduated from the Academy. And by the way, he is the most handsome teacher, ever." All the girls had laughed then, and Harry had blushed before he pulled himself together and made them quiet down.
Ron and Hermione had actually made it one day without arguing now, they seemed to be on better terms with each other now that they told each other everything. Even if it meant Ron telling Hermione at the moment that she shouldn't start drawing hearts around Professor Bloom's classes just yet.
"Luna isn't called Loony for nothing, that's all I am saying. If she calls him handsome, then I suspect he looks like a troll up close." Hermione blushed, but laughed along with Harry and Ron. The door to the classroom opened as the bell rang and they hurried inside, hoping to get good seats at the front.
"I hope he wears the same as he did on the Feast," Harry heard Parvati tell Lavender as he sat down next to Ron. Hermione was sitting with Leia, no doubt hoping she could help the girl who had so far proved useless in anything involving a wand.
A second later, when Professor Bloom walked in, Lavender and Parvati didn't look the least bit disappointed. The wizard who walked up to the black board was wearing the same blood red shirt and a pair of black leather pants. He did not look much like a troll. The small talk died down immediately.
"Ah, sixth years, good day!" he said. Some of the class answered back, the habit Umbridge had forced on them hadn't completely worn of yet. Though this man seemed nothing like Umbridge at all. Professor Bloom dropped his untidy stack of parchment (it would have had McGonagall see red) on the desk, and then sat himself on the desk, next to the parchment of course.
"As you all know," he stared at the class with a calm face, "the shadow that again threatens the wizarding world makes Defence Against the Dark Arts the far most important subject you will learn at Hogwarts. Headmaster Dumbledore therefore saw it fit to hire an Auror for the job, since we are trained to the perfection in just that, Defence and Attack against the Dark Arts. My name is Dominic Bloom and I will, obviously, be your teacher. I graduated from Auror training two years ago and Professor Dumbledore saw it fit that someone that had not forgotten all they had learned at the Academy to teach. Any questions so far? No? As some of you may have noticed, all of our lessons are double, so the first half hour of each lesson we will spend going through theory for a new spell or charm and the hour left will be spent practicing whatever spell we have just gone through. Now then, let's take the register. I was always late for classes..."
No one was late, they could have told him that, but Professor Bloom had to learn their names anyhow. He stopped at each name, taking a good look at the person. Lavender had smiled sweetly back. At both Libertine and Longbottom, Bloom seemed to stop for extra long. But after Patil, he stopped completely and looked straight up at Harry.
"Harry Potter," he said slowly, "it couldn't be anyone but you. Pleasure to meet you." Harry just nodded politely back.
When Professor Bloom reached Ron's name, he practically screamed it.
"Weasley! Is that you?" he said, pointing his quill at Ron.
"Yeah, why?" said Ron, sounding as he feared he had done something wrong.
"I went to Hogwarts with Bill, he is your brother right?"
"Yep," answered Ron, sounding relieved. No wonder Bloom had reminded Harry so much of Bill then.
"We were best friends," Bloom said, a sly smile forming on his face. "Just please don't tell me you look as lightly on the rules as the rest of your brothers, except Percy of course. I would really not like to find out how it is to teach a version of myself." The class laughed, as did Ron, but he blushed anyway. "I never understood how Dumbledore made Bill and Charlie Prefects and all that, and not me. They were always with me when I did my pranks. Not that we ever were caught, of course. And look, aren't you a Prefect as well? I be damned..." Professor Bloom laughed as he grinned at Ron, who was grinning back. Harry liked Professor Bloom more and more for each word he said.
The spell they were learning was the Blasting Curse and Harry proudly remembered how he had thought it to the members of the DA last spring. How surprised would Professor Bloom be when he found out that half the class could do the spell at the first try?
Not that the class was boring, for Harry and the others learned many new things as well. The theory Bloom lectured them was more advanced and much more clear than the pieces of information Harry and Hermione had found on the spell. When the half hour was spent and they packed away their parchment and quills and drew their wands, Professor Bloom cleared away the tables with a flick of his wand, and made a whole lot of pillows appear instead, a small stack was located behind each person.
When they had split up into pairs, Harry noticed that a peculiar thing had happened. All those that were in the DA stood on the same side of the room as him, while all the ones who didn't were on the other.
"Now," said Professor Bloom, "Any questions?" Matilda, a girl Harry rarely spoke to, raised her hand.
"Yes?" Matilda blushed, as Professor Bloom looked her way.
"What are the pillows for, Professor?" she wondered.
"To fall on, Matilda." At this Matilda seemed very interested in her toes, but Dom didn't seem to have noticed her embarrassment, for he continued speaking.
"You don't mind do you, me using your first names? So much less formal then. You can all call me Dom, that's what everyone does. Or Delusional Dom, as Bill named me after I took a bludger to the head during a Quidditch match, and afterwards imagined Snape river dancing on my bed." Then he blushed, as the class laughed, but he was soon laughing with them.
"Enough about that, wands at the ready everyone!" All those who were in the DA had been ready for ages already.
"At my call! Three, two, one, go!"
"Flatus!" the class shouted at the same time.
It seemed as if an invisible wall had hit those on the left side of the room and knocked them all backwards, no exceptions. They (including Leia, who had been paired up with Hermione), were all lying knocked out on their cushions. Harry looked up at Dom, who was sitting propped up on his desk, his eyebrows raised far into his hair.
"My, my," he said, jumping down from the desk, walking towards them. "Dumbledore of course told me all about his little 'Army', but I thought he might had been exaggerating just a little. And even though there has been some surprising students, like the group of sixth years Ravenclaws I thought yesterday, nothing has made me believe the rumours more than this," he said and waved his arm towards those who were knocked out. "But now, I truly see that you are better prepared than most full grown wizards sadly ever will be. The only thing I don't understand is why they didn't offer Harry my job!" Again the Professor smiled warmly. "I can tell you this however," he said, looking proudly at the eight Gryffindors, "that I will do everything in my power to help you. I can give you all the extra lessons or information you want, or help in any other way I can."
"You could always come to the next DA meeting," suggested Harry, earning him a smile from Dom.
"It would be my pleasure," said Dom. "Now, let's get on with teaching the rest of them how to blast properly. It would be best if you teamed up against each other, and them against someone in their own league. If not, I don't think they stand a chance!"
Harry was smile when he left the class was bigger than any he had worn in a very long time. With the aspect of not having any horrible teacher this year (apart form Snape), the year looked much brighter. The way things were going now; this seemed to become his calmest year at Hogwarts yet.
Seeing as Quidditch training hadn't started yet, (the tryout's were held next week), Harry and Ron went to the library with Hermione and Leia after dinner. So far, Leia had seemed like a nice enough person, though she was a really quiet. She was not shy, nor afraid to speak her mind, she mostly just didn't say much. She followed Hermione wherever she went, and Hermione seemed to finally have found the one who was willing to spend as much time on homework as herself. Leia seemed to be buried in a book at all times, but that was probably because of all the extra homework she had been given by McGonagall, Dom and Flitwick. But also perhaps because Hermione had advised her to go through all the books from the previous years, so that she wouldn't miss anything. As they were sitting in the library, Harry couldn't help to ask Leia some of the questions he had.
"Who taught you at the orphanage?" he asked, making her head pop up from the last year's Charms notes she had borrowed from Hermione.
"The nurse, Mrs. Spot. That's why I know all the Potions, Damien and I used to help her. She gave us her old school books. That's why me and Damien don't have to start in first year." But now it seemed that Ron and Hermione also had found the right time to ask some unanswered questions.
"Why didn't you come to Hogwarts when you were eleven?" wondered Ron. Leia looked slightly uncomfortable.
"Didn't have enough money," she said, drooling at her parchment, not meeting their gaze. "My parents didn't leave me with any money, not even an empty Gringott's vault. I've never owned as much as a Knut. Couldn't afford the books, much less a cauldron, three sets of robes and a wand."
"I understand," said Ron. "My family aren't flashing with Galleons either. You should see my dress robes! But how could you afford to start now then?"
"Professor Dumbledore. He said that all who wanted to be learned should be, so he bought all this stuff for me, and the same for Damien and Willow. They couldn't afford it either." To Harry and Ron's surprise Hermione, asked the question they had wondered most.
"Are you a Seer?" she asked. To their surprise, Leia seemed relieved to talk about that, rather than her economy.
"I don't know, but if you are talking about the thing that happened in Divination, that just happens sometimes. No one has ever called me a Seer before though, but after Professor Trelawney did it in class people have been all over me, asking me if they should break up with their boyfriends or girlfriends, if they would be caught if they sneaked out tonight and all sort of funny questions. But I could never pick what I would see."
"You have done it before?" asked Ron, not believing what he heard.
"Well, yes. Loads of times. Julie and Damien would sit up with me in the night, listening to what I said. I rarely remember what I say you see. They used to think I was faking it, but when we got so old we could read The Prophet, we saw that some of the things I had said came true, things were happening exactly like I had said. But I thought loads of people could do it before I came here. Mrs. Spot was more like McGonagall than Trelawney, if you catch what I am trying to say. She didn't have any books on the subject. But I don't know why I can do it. Just sort of happens."
"Sounds much like Harry not knowing he could speak Parseltongue," said Ron.
"Can you speak Parseltongue?" asked Leia, looking shocked on Harry. Harry nodded.
"I didn't know till our second year. But even before I knew I was a wizard, I egged a boa constrictor on my cousin." Leia was left shocked.
"Harry's cousin is mean," said Ron, "so you don't need to feel sorry for him."
"How long have you known you could See?" asked Hermione.
"Long as I can remember," said Leia, shrugging her shoulders.
"I thought you didn't believe in fortune telling, Hermione," said Ron. Hermione had up to that point not taken the rumours of Leia's Seeing abilities seriously.
"I don't believe in what Trelawney teaches," answered Hermione, "that is not the same as not believing in the art of Seeing. There have been many true Seers through the ages, Ron, I have read about them."
"But how did you find out you were a Parsel tongue, Harry?" asked Leia, looking as she found him far more interesting than herself. Harry had nearly forgotten she didn't know what had happened in any of the previous years. So he started telling her, about the Philosopher's Stone, Nicholas Flamel, Tom Riddle, the Basilisk, Sirius, the Triwizard Tournament, Voldemort's return and the events of last year, not failing to mention how horrible Umbridge had been. When he, along with the help of Hermione and Ron finally finished the story with the battle in the Department of Mysteries, it was nearly eight o'clock, so they hurried out of the library, not wanting to anger Madam Pince.
"Where did you get your wand?" Harry asked as they walk back to Gryffindor tower, remembering he had seen her with it before she had gotten her new things.
"I think it has been at the orphanage since it opened," Leia said as she fished the shabby looking wand out of her pocket. "I don't know who many who have used it, but it does seem that it has seen it better days, don't you think?"
She could have put it more correctly. The wand looked much like Ron's first wand, the one he had inherited from Charlie, just that it wasn't broken, but it seemed even more used and dull looking. It had grey hairs sticking out in the end.
"I think it's supposed to be unicorn's hair," Leia said, "but it isn't quite as bright as I thought unicorn hair to be."
As Harry, Ron and Hermione all had seen a unicorn, they could have told her that it looked more like Flitwick's beard than any unicorns tail, but none of them did, for they rather though she didn't need to know that. Wouldn't exactly be a self-esteem boost.
When Harry laid in his bed the following Friday night, his curtains closed and the lights turned of, all his room mates already sleeping, he couldn't help but smile. Today had been a great day. He hadn't fought with Malfoy once this week, which had to be some sort of a record, he had not been taken Potions of Snape the last few days and his scar hadn't twitched once today. But he hadn't forgotten the shadow of Lord Voldemort, far from it. But something Dumbledore had said during the summer made life easier for Harry. The headmaster had looked Harry hard in the eye and said with a smile:
"If you let him ruin your life Harry, he will. Fear is his weapon. But if you allow yourself to live as normal a life as you can have and not poison your mind with negativity, Lord Voldemort looses much of his power over you." And Harry had done just that, trying not to think too much about what would come. It would come soon enough anyway. Not that if was easy to not think about it, of course.
Dumbledore had actually spent much time with Harry this summer. During the two first weeks of the vacation, the two weeks he had spent at the Dursley's, Dumbledore had visited Harry every day, teaching him Occlumency himself. Dumbledore had been a much better teacher than Snape could ever be, and Harry soon had mastered the art. The clue he had found out was to keep his mind sorted out if. That may seem hard, seeing as he was Harry Potter, but Dumbledore had taught him a few tricks. If anything was bothering him, or if there was anything he needed to remember, he wrote it down on a piece of parchment before he went to bed and occluded his mind. All of Harry's troubles were currently lying on his bedside table.
But he couldn't help to feel sorry for Leia though; she was still as horrible with her wand work. Yesterday, she again had received unwanted attention from the rest of the class. The Daily Prophet's first page had been filled with a picture of Malfoy senior and the headline: 'Lucius Malfoy escapes with the help of You-Know-Who' The article filled them all in on how Voldemort had attacked Azkaban Fortress last night and freed his dearly beloved Death Eater. The ministry guards who had been placed there to look after the prisoners now that the Dementors were gone had suffered 'casualties'.
Harry himself had chocked on his juice when he had read it, his mind racing over the words Seamus had read to him days a few days ago. It all made sense. Leia was a true Seer. This was not overlooked by many and it caused Lavender and Parvati, who had left Leia alone after Hermione had told them off, to attack Leia with questions as she came down to breakfast.
"Are you a Seer?"
"Can you see whom I will marry?"
"Do you think you can transceiver some of your powers to me if I fix your hair?" Leia hadn't seemed to want her hair fixed, for it was still just plain black when Harry had last seen her.
Harry yawned as he cast Silencing Spells around his bed. Even if he didn't have his dreams about the Department of Mysteries or anything similar, he still had nightmares quite often. After waking up Ron with his screams nearly every night his first week at Number 12 Grimmauld Place, they had agreed that he would cast light silencing spells around his bed every night. He yawned again and a second later his mind was blank and he fell asleep, dreaming of memories too horrible for any sixteen year old boy.
A/N: The end of yet another chapter. Thanks are sent to my reviewer. If you would like to join her, you are more than welcome. All you have to do is to press the button down there in the corner. Not too hard is it?
