Hi! Me again. Like it would be someone new, unless a hacker stole my account, and also liked to write stories. Sorry, I get sidetracked easily. I havan't updated for so long because I went to Bever Cross camp for a week. And when I came back, I couldn't get any inspiration for this story. I finally have some, but I wanted to put this up now for all you patient and loyal readers. This is only half of what I originally intended this chapter to cover, but I wanted some time to work a couple things out. Does anyone know what the heck sort of creature Kilala or Kirara or however you want to say it is? Please tell. Sooner I know, sooner next chapter comes out, dong ma?(sorry, chinese for 'got it?' Go watch Firefly. Friday at seven on sci-fi channel.)
See you at the end of the chapter!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It was lunchtime, and everyone was glad to take a break. While the students filed in and waited for their meal, they chatted about their classes. Hermione attracted many stares. Ron was glaring daggers at almost anyone who so much as looked at her. Draco did more than his share of staring, although not in an unkind or taunting manner. Ron glared extra viciously at him.
The new teachers were also chatting about their day. Shippo looked a little guilty and depressed, and kept glancing at Hermione every now and them. While everyone's attention was distracted, a food delivery person snuck up from the kitchens and entered theGreatHall unoticed. He pulled out the slip of paper thata man in the long furs had given him. The man in long furs had told him to make sure the teachers were there, then read the slip of paper in the Great Hall. The food delivery person was no fool, and realized that it was a spell, but the man in long furs was paying him good money to do this. It also helped that his four year old daugter was, unknown to her, being held hostage to be killed if he did not do his job. And he had no doubt that the man in long furs would kill her, with a smile on his face, even though he had never seen the man's face, covered by a mask. He slowly unfolded the paper, and softly read the incantation on it.
"What once was acting, now becomes real,
Only trueness of heart and pure intent break the seal."
His job done, he hastend to leave while trying to shove the paper back in his pocket. Unbeknownst to him, it fluttered out of his pocket and stuck to the bottom of a student's shoe.
Over at the Gryffindor table, Hermione was getting severely annoyed by all the oogling at her. The next one to turn around and stare at me when they think I can't see, gets a dagger thrown at them, she thought. Wait a second, I don't even own any daggers, much less carry any with me. I wish that these stray thoughts would go away, they must be the side effects of suddenly becoming kitsune. Why couldn't I have gotten a happier, cheerier personality, more like Shippo. She shuddered at the thought. Ok, so maybe not exactly like him, but I could do without the homicidal urges and kleptomania.
"Hello! Earth to Hermione! You've been silent the whole meal, and not touched any of your food. What's wrong?" Ron asked, intruding on her thoughts. He said it with genuine concern. She just glared at him.
"I mean aside from the obvious." He elaborated.
"Not anything to worry about." She replied with a nonchalant air.
"Yes there is. You're always chatting about this book, or that new spell, or some other lecture about 'for our own good', or something like that. You're never this quiet, unless we're not speaking to each other from some argument or other. I don't want to be on not-speaking terms." Ron sais with genuine concern. "I haven't done something to offend you, have I? You aren't still mad that I was looking at your notes?" He asked. He wanted to help her, but he had to know the problem first.
"No, of course not." She conforted him, not feeling half as confident and secure as she sounded. "I just need some time to think.This is a new predicament. I've never heard or read of anything remotely like this happening before. I need to figure out what's going on, that's all. I'll be fine, I assure you." That explination seemed to apease him, and he resumed glaring at what included most of the room. Hermione drifted back into her own thoughts. Harry, who had watched them without a word, still felt slightly uneasy, but he ignored it. He also had the feeling that something important was going on in the room, that he couldn't see or hear. He ignored that feeling also, passing it off as the effect of nearly the whole room staring at them.
Kagome started feeling sort of ill shortly after she started eating, so she excused herself to the infirmary. That left Sango, Miroku, and even Shippo giving death glares across her empty seat to Sesshomaru, who was acting like the whole room of peolpe, including his fellow teachers, didn't even exsist. Shippo felt sickly shortly after, and he also went to the infirmary. That left Sango and Miroku, who had by now decided to ignore Sesshomaru. Personally, Sesshomaru did not feel well himself, but he would never show weakness in front of his students or his half-brother's friends, so he steeled himself and kept eating and acting like normal.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Inside the infirmary, Kagome was attempting not to look at Inuyasha, laying peacefully on the bed. If I didn't know better, I'd think he's just sleeping, she mused. Of course, he never sleeps so well in feudal japan, always on alert for an attack. Her stomach felt a little better now, but she was laying on a bed untill her next class. Who knew it was so demanding to be a teacher, she thought.
Soon Shippo came in, not quite as bouncy as usual. He gave Inuyasha a pointed and angry stare, but no one saw. When he ws noticed, some of his injued students gave him glares, but he was just cheery back to them.
When it was time to go, Shippo left first, again giving Inuyasha a glare that would have sent him chasing after the little kitsune, had he seen it. When he was gone, Kagome walked by. She circumvented the room, and took the route out that kept her the farthest from Inuyasha. She muttered something under her breath as she left, and she could hear the satasfyingthud of a bed hitting the floor behind her. Then she laughed in a cold and altogether uncharacteristic way. What she had said was 'Baka inu. Osuwari.' Or, to put it in english, 'Stupid dog. Sit.' When she was out in the hallway, she stopped laughing, and looked around, as if wondering what had caused her to laugh. She hurried to get to her next class on time.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"So, what class are we going to next?" Ron asked.
"Honest, can't you even learn your own shedual? We have Potions, then Care of Magical Creatures." Hermione answered in a lecturing tone.
"Speaking of Potions, where has the teacher gone? That Kagome girl?" Harry commented.
"She left a few minutes ago. She looked like she didn't feel well." Hermione responded.
"Are you just keeping tabs on everyone now, queen?" Ron asked sarcasticly.
"Of course." She replied in just as mocking a tone.
"The great Hermione understood a joke? The world is ending!" Ron exclaimed, in mock horror. Harry finally just tuned them out, as they bantered the rest of lunchtime. Although he did notice one more strange thing before lunch was over. Draco kept giving jealous stares at Ron, when he thought no one was looking. Harry wondered was Ron could possibly have, or be doing, that would make Draco jealous.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Potions. I hope this teacher is less biased than Snape." Harry said, attempting to make serious, coherent conversation with his friends.
"Anyone, anyone at all would be less biased him. You would know that most of all, Harry." Ron said.
"Even... Sesshomaru?" Harry challenged, instantly regreting it. Hermione made a jerking motion, but quickly settled again. That settles it, Ron thought, I'm not speaking to him for the rest of the day. Maybe he'll figure out what's not a good thing to say, by then. Hermione startled them both by speaking, in a cool, collected voice.
"Sesshomaru. He is not biased. He is just evil. He made no favorites. He was just as... unforgiving to Draco as he was to me." She explained.
"Well, yes. Of course. But I would say that you got it much worse than him." Ron replied, with a small amount of malice in his voice at the end, as he ushered Hermione up the hall, away from Harry.
I wonder how long she's been on a first-name basis with Malfoy, Harry thought, as he entered the classroom. The only seat left was clear across the room from Ron and Hermione, next to Neville. Harry could see Hermione mumble an invisibility incantation, and her ears and tail temporarily disapeared from sight. But not before Kagome, who was feeling quite herself by now, noticed. She must be the young prodigy that Dumbledore spoke of, whom had a mishap in Shippo's class today, Kagome mused. I doubt most students know even partial invisibility spells, or else they'd run around causeing all sorts of trouble. But Dumbledore spoke of her as part of a trio. The one next to her must be another, maybe Ron, maybe Harry. She wondered who, and where, the third was. Oh well, time to start class.
"Hello. My name is Kagome, in case any of you have forgot. I, obviously, teach potions. We will start off with a meditation exercise, then a get to know each other exercise, then a trust exercise. We won't even begin concocting potions untill tommorow. We will begin all classes with a meditation exercise. Oh! And one more thing. Most potions we make will be team efforts, or with partners That's why you need to get to know each other well, and trust each other." While Kagome paused, students chattered about her. They murmrered about how she went roundabout to the actual teachings of potions. They also murmered of how her cheery, but down to earth personality was a polor opposite of Snape's. Some evenwent so far as to saythat they might actually enjoy potions for the first time in years, or ever.
"We'll begin our meditation. See the round stones on the desks in front of you? Close your eyes and concentrate onyour stone. Then put up your hands, like this," she said, while raising her hands into a vertical position, "And envision the stone floating up between your hands. It doesn't matter at all if the stone actually rises, all that is important is the mental vision of it there. When it is there, you should be able to 'see' it radiating a light, bright and clear. Just try to relax and keep the vision of it there, and clear your mind of other thoughts. I will be meditating with you. You will not be graded on this. I will tell you when to stop. Any questions? No? Then begin when you please." She finished.
She had come up with this meditatin herself. She used it to calm down, and to focus on the fact that there was still good, still purity in at least some of the jewel of four souls. As the students around her started to close their eyes and slip off into a meditative trance, or pretend to in some cases, she wondered if any otheres would be able to do what only one person in her whole day of classes had been able to do. Actually raise the stone, with no wand magic (for some had tried that to impress her) and make it emit a light, albiet a slightly pale one, but a pure one none the less.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sorry for the semi-cliffie. I needed somewhere to end it, or I would have worked clear into the morning. If you don't count 1:30 as the morning already. I promice that I will have more for you soon. Please review with any questions, comments, concerns, predictions, or sugestions you have. Thanks for reading.
Bye-Bye!
-Kit