Chapter fourteen
DA Lessons
Over the course of the next month, the DA constantly met up in the room of requirement to learn and train. During one lesson, Harry decided to teach the group how to stun their opponent. The DA were standing on either side of the room, leaving enough space for Harry to explain the spell to them and for one-on-one training to take place in the middle of the room.
"Stunning is one of the most useful spells in your arsenal." Harry announced as he took his position a few metres away from the first student to practice: Nigel Wolpert. "it's sort of a wizard's bread and butter really. So um, come on then Nigel." He faced the young boy with a kind smile, "give me your best shot." Nigel took a deep breath and swung his wand at Harry whilst shouting
"Stupefy!" the spell sent Harry flying backwards before crashing to the ground, but it also caused poor Nigel to fall over.
"not bad at all, Nigel." Harry complimented as he got to his feet, "well done". Spyro and Cynder were watching these sessions from the side until they could assist the members when they needed help, but they would now and again make a bet on who they thought would cast Stupefy first in each one-on-one. By no surprise, Elora was able to cast the spell perfectly first time, she shared a smile with the dragons as she walked past. They had agreed in the Hospital Wing to keep her secret so as to avoid any complications for the girl.
They knew that Umbridge was onto them when Educational Decree Number 82 was announced to be that "all students will submit to questioning about suspected illicit activities" Cynder had stated that they only say half-truths that would mislead Umbridge just in case she was using truth serum on the students.
During another session, Harry was teaching the Dangling Jinx which would suspend the opponent in the air and everyone was doing well with this one. Neville had a tendency for taking a long time to learn spells, so Spyro assisted him with this one whilst Cynder watched the rest of the group, and chuckled when Harry helped Cho Chang, causing her to lose concentration and send her partner, poor Nigel, crashing to the ground.
Filch was always on the lookout for the DA, so Cynder and the Weasley twins decided it was best to have some fun with the grouchy caretaker. So they left him a heart shaped box of sweets in his office and even Spyro enjoyed peeping through a crack in the door and seeing him scoffing the sweets which unbeknownst to him were Fever Fudge, which was an experimental trick to get people out of lessons, but had a side effect of causing the user to get massive boils as well as a temperature. Spyro could just imagine a boil covered Filch trying to explain this to Umbridge.
Umbridge was also fighting back, as Educational Decree Number 98 stated that "those wishing to join the Inquisitorial Squad for extra credit may sign up in the High Inquisitor's office", as expected, Draco Malfoy and a whole group of Slytherins signed up for this in order to attempt to catch the DA. Not that they were getting dangerously close, but they were starting to close in on them.
During one practice session, as Harry weaved through the DA members and assisting where necessary, he give them all an inspirational speech,
"working hard is important, but there's something that matters even more: believing in yourself. Think of it this way, every great wizard in history started out as nothing more than what we are now: students. If they could do it, why not us?".
One of the sessions was about teaming up on a single individual and working together, the training dummy would be struck by one spell and will stumble over towards a random student who would strike it with another spell, this exercise was going well, and even Spyro and Cynder were joining in. Ginny was the one who ended the spell chain by shouting
"Reducto!" which reduced the dummy into dust, leaving the whole class flabbergasted.
There then was the last session before the Christmas break, the Room of Requirement had been filled with Christmas decorations and it even featured a tree decorated with candles. It was just as Harry was about to end the day's practice when Neville, who had been struggling with this spell since day one, pointed his wand at Parvati Patil, who was his partner in this session, and shouted,
"Expelliarmus!" and Parvati's wand flew out of her grip! This got the whole class's attention and amazed gasps echoed through the room. With everyone congratulating Neville for his accomplishment and Spyro, Cynder and Sparx were even applauding the boy, what a way to end the lesson!