ebtwisty9: Yes, I have plans for the new girl that DON'T ENVOLVE A MARY SUE! Sorry, just had to state that. Don't feel bad about correcting me; I know I'm not perfect. I even updated today just because I saw that you were going to India! I hope you have fun!
Evergreen Scepter: Well, I trust you so I think I'll go with what you said. No money out of Gringotts, but classified as an adult- thanks!
truthflame: Thank a lot! I am not sure exactly what I am going to do with dear Celia, she was kinda a last thought...
"What a day this is going to be." Ron muttered between eggs as he glared at his schedule.
"Potions with Slytherin, Double Defense Against the Dark Arts with Ravenclaw, and then to end the day we have Mr. Binns with Slytherin again." Harry read off his schedule.
"Well maybe Defense Against the Dark Arts won't be so bad." Ron said hopefully.
"What do you think Hermione?" Harry asked is friend who had been very quiet.
She blinked. "Sorry, just thinking."
"About the song again?" Ron whispered.
"Song?" Harry asked.
"The Sorting Hart song." She replied quietly.
"It was bloody creepy." Ron added.
"Yeah, but it gave one like that last year." Harry said slowly.
She shook her head. "It has never said beware before. I don't like that hat giving us warnings. It knows to much."
Harry shrugged. "Well there is no use worrying about it now."
"And what about that stranger on the train?" Ron asked.
Hermione sighed. "Harry's right. We should stop worrying about it.
§
"As you all know you-know-who has returned." Snape began his class in a chillingly cold voice.
The sixth-years were immediately tense in their seats down in the dim dungeon.
"No one can be trusted at this time. The closest of friends can be a spy for him." He hissed and strode around the room, glaring at students.
"So as I teach you the sophisticated art of potions, remember that. Anyone can slip a drop of toxin into your drink, or a truth pill into your food." He walked back up in front of the class and brought down his sheet of directions for all to see.
"We will be making a very powerful truth potion today, and if anyone makes a mistake I will be feeding them their own potion!" He snapped with a meaningful eye at Harry.
Harry knew that his potion would have a mistake in it, even if it didn't really. Much had changed since he came here last year; but Snape hadn't.
Harry stirred the potion, counting each stoke and adding each ingredient as carefully as he could.
Neville was sitting next to Hermione, quickly stirring his potion which had turned to a sickly shade of yellow, instead of the metallic black needed.
Hermione's potion, of course, was a clear black with infinite depth. She stirred hers and muttered to Neville.
Snape began to progress down to rows, starting at the back of Slytherin.
He commented on how good their potions looked until he came to Celia's.
"And you would be the new addition to Hogwarts." He said smoothly.
She looked up to him with calm, blue eyes. "Yes sir."
Snape piered down into her cauldron. "50 points to Slytherin. Miss Magnatine has an excellent truth cerium, considering that it is her first year her." He added with a slightly suspicious look.
"I am learning from an excellent teacher." Her voice was silky and proper; yet devoid of any emotion.
Snape gave a sharp nod and then continued down to the Gryffindor line.
He came to Neville's, which, thanks to Hermione, had begun to turn darker; but was still a dark golden color.
Snape gave a thin smile and looked cruelly down to a shaking boy.
He pulled out a beaker and scooped up a small glass of the liquid, holding it out to Neville.
"Drink." He commanded silkily.
Neville shook fiercely as he grabbed the beaker, tilting it up to his lips as everyone in the still room watched.
"No!" Someone suddenly shouted, making Neville drop the glass, shattering all over the floor.
Hermione was standing up in her set, a light in her eyes.
"You can't do that! You have no idea what that potion will do to him, and you can't put him in danger for your own stupid pride!"
A dark cloak fell over the dungeon.
Snape stared at Hermione, dumbfounded for a moment. Then a cruel, twisting smile formed on his lips.
"Very well then Ms. Granger. Since I do not know the full effect of the concoction Longbottom's blundering has made I will not make him drink it." He paused to give Neville a shriveling stare. "But as I know exactly the effect of your own potion." He pointed to the glassy black liquid by her. "Then I shall give you a taste of your own potion." He grabbed another beaker and filled it with the shining liquid.
"Drink."
Hermione's eyes were wide with fear, but she bravely took the beaker in her hands and took a trembling breath.
"You blood toad! Don't make her drink that you monster just so people won't see you as the sniveling…" Ron had stood up fiercely, glaring at Snape as he shouted on.
"useless, pathetic…"
Hermione held the beaker in her hand as Snape stormed over to Ron, disbelief in his eyes.
"overdressed, snot-nosed little.."
"100 points from Gryffindor." Snape hissed between the shouts.
"excuse for a human being, much less a horrible example of a…"
"Ten detentions Mr. Weasely!" Snape shouted.
"wizard! You are a filthy scumbag you deserves to be thrown with the lot of Death Eaters and rot with them in Azkaban!"
Smack!
Ron fell to the floor, his nose bleeding profusely from where Snape had hit him to the ground.
The Professor was shaking with rage as he hissed down to Ron.
"You will not talk to me like that! I am your teacher!" He grabbed him by the collar of his robe; pulling him up, inches away from his own greasy face.
"Never, never compare me to them." He hissed.
Harry had enough. He was about to stand up and knock Snape down when he felt a firm pressure on his shoulder. Hermione was standing beside him, her face pale as she shook her head.
"Don't get yourself into this too." She whispered hoarsely.
Harry opened his mouth to protest when Snape threw Ron back to the ground and turned around to face all the other students.
"Failures for all Gryffindor today; for not stopping this insolent uprising." He was livid. "Class dismissed,"
Ron, was helped out of the room by Harry and Hermione, and the Gryffindors cheered for him, not caring about the loss of points or grade.
"That was brilliant!" Seamus said,
"You were great!" Neville chimed in.
As they walked down the hall they quieted, not knowing what to expect from the new teacher.
"Ron we should really take you to the Hospital Wing." Hermione said softly.
He shook his head. "No, that bloody git is not making me go to the hospital wing!"
"You were great Ron." Harry said with a smile.
"Yeah, well he had it coming, trying to shove that potion down your throat!" He muttered.
After a pause Hermione spoke, "Thank you, Ron."
He blushed but looked away and Harry smiled at his two friends.
§
The Defense Against the Dark Arts room had gone through many changes. In Quarrel's year it was filled with books and a big black cauldron. In Lockhart's year it was pasted with smiling pictures of his head. In Lupin's time it was filled with some interesting creature. While Professor Moody's fake was teacher it had an assortment of magical objects. When the toad Umbridge inhabited the room it had silky frills and cute kittens.
Now it had gone through a new change. The walls had been painted into one giant mirage of a golden sunset with scarlet phoenixes dancing across the sky, and a fiery orange sun setting over an endless sky. Fire flitted around the air and danced onto the wings of various birds, each one a little different.
"It is gorgeous!" Parvarti said as she walked into the golden room.
Magical fire lined the ceiling, filling the room with light.
Harry looked around in amazement. The long rectangular tables had been replaced with lighter wood, circular tables that looked like dull gold in the firelight. The white marble was flecked with dark red stone. The room looked and felt like a wild magic.
"Well, now if you are all done admiring the room you would please take to your seats." A silky and smoothly bold voice reached them.
Everyone sat down, still staring around at the walls.
A woman came into view, a playful smile dancing on her lips.
"I am Professor Kryeen."
Professor Kryeen was quite young, looking to be in her mid-twenties. She was medium-height, slender and leggy, but with a fit and strong appearance. Her skin was lightly tan and smooth forming over lean muscle, and her face was gently pointed, with high cheekbones and full scarlet lips. The hair was multi-colored from a dark blood-red to a pale golden blonde, and every shade in between. It twisted and curved messily down to mid-back, so it looked like tongues of fire were reaching to the floor. Her eyes were daringly hooded, and the color was a pure, brilliant gold that shimmered with life.
She was wearing a pair of black pants with a black belt that had golden symbols engraved on it, and a white shirt with sleeved that angled at the wrists and golden carvings on the bottom that matched the belt. The familiar dark red cloak hung over her shoulder, its hood undone. A single necklace dangled from a golden chain, containing a long, red feather and two shorter chains fell from it that held three black stones and the other three white stones, leaving the feather in the middle.
No one could speak for a moment. Whatever they had prepared for, none had expected to see a young, attractive woman with fiery hair to teach them.
"Your bleeding." Professor Kryeen nodded to Ron. "Tell me is Potions always that dangerous?"
Everyone laughed, feeling the silence shatter.
"It was Snape!" Seamus shouted, and the whole story was re-accounted for the benefit of the teacher and the Ravenclaw students.
"Well we are brave aren't we." She said with a bold glance at Ron, who was basking in the glory.
Hermione's jaw fell open. She had not expected a teacher to admire this.
"Oh, now where are my manners. Tell me how old are you all?"
"Sixteen." Came voices from the class.
"Sixteen." She mused. "Well I suppose I am not much older then you am I? Then I see no reason for formality titles unless someone can object?"
No one did.
"Good, then you may call me Professor Blair. I like my first name much more then my last."
Everyone was stunned at the new teacher.
"Now, I would like to tell you how I am going to conduct my class." She began again. "Firstly, I would like you all to know that I will never condemn any opinion you voice in my class on any matter, even myself." She flashed a rash smile.
"I want to teach you to be open-minded and to question all you here. In order to do that I myself must be open-minded. So you may ask any question and say any comment, provided that it does not leave this room. Fair?"
Everyone nodded numbly.
"Now then, as you all know, Voldemort has returned."
A gasp went up in the class and a Ravenclaw student whispered, "I beg your pardon, Professor. You said we could say anything and I-.. well you said his name!"
She eyed him coolly. "Well he-who-must-not-be-named does have a name, and it is Voldemort."
Almost everyone in the room flinched.
" How many of you hate Voldemort?" She asked suddenly.
An audible cry went up.
"Then if you hate him you want to fight against him, yes." Blair asked.
They all nodded, confused.
"How can you fight against something when you cannot even say his name?" She asked, looking around for an answer.
Everyone looked down, almost.
"Fear of the name only increases fear of the thing itself." Hermione said suddenly, finding her voice.
Blair turned to her. "And may I ask a name?"
"Hermione, Hermione Granger." She replied cautiously
"You are very bright Hermione, or do you prefer Ms. Granger?" Blair said with a sparkle in her eyes.
Hermione blushed. "Hermione is fine."
Blair nodded appreciatively. "Hermione is quite right. Fear of the name only increases fear of the thing itself, and there is only one thing in the world we need to be afraid of."
"What?" Neville asked shyly.
She turned and looked him straight in the eyes. "Fear."
§
So what does everyone think of Professor Blair Kryeen? Love her, hate her? Review and tell me what you think. My only message to you is that even though she seems very bold and open, she is going to be a very complex character with a lot of secrets…