Chapter Eight

Rae immediately started to the back of the room, but stopped when she saw that it wasn't Dumbledore who was wiping chalk dust from his fingers. The young man didn't seem to have passed thirty, and looked around at her, his blue eyes seeming to burn into hers. He smiled, but it wasn't the kind that you wanted from a teacher on the first day in their class. Breaking eye contact, she glanced in Sirius's direction. He, too, hadn't moved any from where he entered.

"Tardiness will not be tolerated in my class." His voice was of a dark sort. Quiet; almost menacing. His eyes seemed to have followed Rae's, for now Sirius was on the receiving end of that intense gaze.

"I don't believe I know your names," he said, changing the subject.

Rae was quite aware that he was looking at her, as were the rest of the class. Her ears were burning, as she felt her cheeks would be doing soon. She swallowed a bout of saliva. "Orion. Rae Orion."

"Very well, Miss Orion." He turned to Sirius, and Rae took her chance to sit down while he wasn't looking at her.

"Did I say you could sit down yet, Miss Orion?" He was looking at her again. She was growing, by the second, to despise the way he looked at her.

Rae stood up again, in the process catching a malicious grin from Denise.

"Answer me, Miss Orion." He seemed to taunt her.

"No." She said it barely above a whisper.

"No, what?" He egged her on. Rae's temper began to rise again.

"No, Professor." She shut her eyes, and opened them, glancing upwards. Blood pounded inside her head, and somehow increased the tension of the situation.

"Good, girl." He almost seemed to sneer. Maybe it was just inside her head.

"Now – your name would be?" It was Sirius's turn.

"Sirius Black."

Black eyes locked onto blue. Fearless. The tactic was simple – make him look away first. He did.

"Miss Orion and Mr. Black. The two of you will receive a detention for being late to my class."

"Detention?" Rae looked at him. "With Black?"

"Yes."

Disgust filled her as she looked at him. Who had Black been calling arrogant? He was the arrogant one, always strutting about with his little group like he owned the place. Purebloods, she thought. They're all the same.

Sirius stole a glance at Rae. Her features were not at all peaceful. They were stressed – possibly with the situation at hand. He wasn't. Detention was nothing to him anymore. In the beginning, sure – but not these days. He, although followed closely by James, held the school record for most detentions.

"I want both of you back here at nine o'clock, tomorrow night." The man looked back to Rae from Sirius. "Is that understood?"

They each nodded before sitting down.

"Now," he said, addressing the entire class. "My name is Blaise Jackyl. You will address me as Professor Jackyl. Since your last Potions teacher has, er, gone missing, Professor Dumbledore has asked that I replace her for the remainder of the year."

Sirius had been scribbling on a piece of paper slowly, trying not to draw attention with the scratching of his quill. He blew lightly on the paper to dry the ink before crumpling it up and passing it to Peter, who passed it to James, who smoothed it out on his lap so as to read it.

This is really going to mess with our plans for Friday night. Shall we move them to Saturday night, or just early that morning?

James pulled out his own quill and penned a response beneath the question.

I guess that depends on what this guy is going to have you do. If it's going to tire you out too bad, maybe we should wait until Saturday night.

James, too, blew on the ink and crumpled it up before passing it through Peter to get to Sirius. He looked up at their new professor, who's speech appeared to be over. Hopefully, this guy wouldn't have Sirius doing anything too strenuous. He would need his strength for the prank they had planned for late Friday night.

Lily was looking at the new professor with doubt. His looks had quite a bit going for him. Thick platinum hair brushed his shoulders, and fierce blue eyes gazed out at the class before him. His complexion reminded her of the Slytherin, Denise Malfoy. Lily pulled her eyes from his pale skin, and over to Olivia. Only then did she realize how very dark skinned her best friend was.

Olivia raised herself from her stretched out position across the desk to look at Lily. Determining her expression was rather difficult. Olivia hid her emotions well when other people were around her. Only from experience could Lily even begin to decode it. Pity.

After a moment of staring at each other, the red head and the brunette turned back to the front of the class, the better to hear what the new professor was saying.

Pity, she thought. Yeah, I pity him for being related to that wench.

The class seemed to pass with extreme sluggishness. About two rolls of parchment's worth of notes were taken, most of them on how one's behavior reflected their grades and the like. When the bell rang, Olivia had trouble containing her joy as she and Lily exited the dungeon.

"Thank you, God!" she yelled upon contact with the stairs. "I thought we'd be trapped in Satan's Lair forever!"

Lily laughed and gave her overexcited friend a high-five. "Seriously! Did that guy talk enough? I mean – I think we already knew just about everything we wrote down-"

"You mean you actually wrote down all of it?" Olivia dropped back down, somewhat, to her normal self.

"Didn't you?" Lily's spirit deflated slightly.

"Of course not. It's not like he's going to check it or anything," she shrugged.

"Olivia! You slept through the last twenty minutes of class! How would you know?"

Olivia looked at her skeptically. "Are you trying to put me on a guilt trip?"

Lily widened her eyes, pretending to be offended. "What? Me? Put you on a guilt trip?"

Olivia just looked at her, obviously reading everything in Lily's over expressive emerald eyes.

"Okay – fine. You caught me." Lily rolled her eyes, but a grin crept onto her face. Olivia grinned back and burst out laughing, as did her friend.

A/N: Terribly sorry for the wait, dears! That is, the few of you who actually seem to care (coughVanessacoughMelissacough). Many troubles with the computers, but don't worry. I'll try not to be so long next time.