It was only a month later that the three friends saw Thalia again. The kids hadn't been allowed to show up to any of the Order's reunions after the first one, and they had been so busy that they completely forgot about the woman's short intrusion into their lives. She only came back into their heads when they received their letters from Hogwarts. After the usual shopping session down Diagon Alley, the packing session at the Burrow and the "who-can-gather-up-all-of-his-stuff-quicker-than-the-others" competition with his friends, the time finally came for Harry to get to King's Cross and enter the Hogwart's Express. As he was dragging his heavy suitcase down the alley, searching for an unoccupied cabin, he saw her again. She was alone on her bench, staring outside at all the families gathered up on the platform. Her gaze was fixed upon a certain group, and Harry could see the melancholy and the sadness that filled her eyes. She seemed lost in her memories, and Harry was about to leave when Ron arrived, screaming: "Harry!" and laughing his head off for no apparent reason.
Thalia quickly turned her head, and she let out a small cry when she recognized them. "Oh God," she said, as a smile appeared on her face, "I hadn't seen you guys. Well I guess you'll have more use than I for a cabin." She looked behind Harry's shoulder, when Neville and Hermione were trying to peek into the windows of the door. She then got up, picked up the suitcase beside her and without another word she left. Harry's friends quickly entered the small compartment, as the corridors were already crowded, but Harry stayed outside for a while, staring at Thalia's back. She was walking down the aisle when she suddenly stopped, turned her head and smiled. But this wasn't one of the shy smiles she gave Harry. No, this time she truly looked happy. The door at her right oppened, and she started talking. A group of girls, suddenly came out of nowhere, walked in front of Harry, preventing him from seeing who Thalia was talking to. And with their high-pitched giggles, it was impossible to make out a word of her conversation.
But the group quickly left and Harry could finally distinguish a few of her words. "You know I'd love to, but I just can't. And by the way, keep acting as pretentious as your father and you'll understand why he never stood a chance with me." She paused for a moment, then laughed. Apparently her interlocutor was funny, and it seemed that he was an old friend. But how could a student be friends with a teacher? A scream from his cabin brought him back to reality, and he quickly joined his friends. The trip to school passed very quickly, and it was with surprise that the group discovered they had arrived. Rapidly gathering their luggage, they left, leaving Neville, who was looking for his wand, behind. Harry had kindly offered to help him look for it, and a few minutes later they were at the door. Harry was about to step out in the fresh air of the night when someone hit him on the shoulder, and left the train with a quick pace. Looking at his friend, he silently asked who was the impolite that had just pushed him over. Neville simply gestured towards the cabin in which Thalia had been invited a few hours ago. Shocked, Harry turned around, just in time to see Draco Malfoy disappear into the fog.
Quickly gathering his senses, Harry ran down the alley until he reached his friends waiting in line for one of the cabs. The invisible horses had an easy job that day: the sky was clear and the air was fresh, so quickly enough they were sitting in the small cubicle, their suitcases lying at their feet. Harry didn't wait a second to announce his discovery: "Did you guys realize Thalia has spent the entire trip with some students?"
"Well she didn't really have a choice…" added Ron. "We kind of kicked her out…"
"No of course, I know, but guess who she was talking with?"
"I don't know, Padmil? She probably fainted when she saw Thalia's stylish twist."
They all giggled. This summer they had spent a few hours with their fellow students at a Quidditch game, and that day had left good memories. Of course, at first, Hermione was quite reluctant to go. "It'll only be a stadium filled with drunken teenagers who will probably try impressing the crowd by performing a few spells that will end up blowing up the entire place!" she had said, rolling her eyes as she saw Ron pouring Fire Whiskey in Butter Bear bottles and then magically re-sealing them. Nevertheless, the boys had convinced her to come and it turned out she had been entirely wrong. Well, not entirely: it is true that Harry and Ron had not been the only ones who had brought more than generous amounts of alcohol with them, and saying that they had drank responsibly would have been false, but no one had been harmed and Hermione had had a good time. The only problem had been Padmil's new interest in fashion. She had passed the entire afternoon ragging about wizards' poor taste in clothing, and about the petition she intended on showing Dumbledore, that asked for the permission to wear their robes with a fashion twist. It was only when Hermione had signed the damn paper that she had left them in peace, and since that afternoon they had had a pleasure of inserting the expression fashion twist in every one of their sentences. Harry relaxed a little at the thought of that afternoon. Thought some memories were a little blurry ( why had he, Ron and Seamus spent about an hour looking for a maple tree? ) he had had a fun time in general, and he liked to know that all the houses had thought the same. Well, not all the houses. A few days ago it had seemed obvious that the Slytherins would not come even if invited, but now he was not so sure. Had they even been invited? He did not know. He wondered if there had ever been a day in the history of Hogwarts were all the houses had been united. Maybe. Some Slytherins were nice enough, when they were taken apart and brainwashed out of their idea of pure-blood supremacy. Maybe they had once been nice, but they had learned to keep away from the other houses. "We can't be considered as angels either," Harry bitterly thought to himself. "Maybe over the years they learned to stay away. Stay away… or get raped." These words stung him, and brought back to his memory the point of this discussion. "No," he said, pulling the others out of their memories. "No, she wasn't talking to Padmil. She was talking to Draco."
"Well of course," Hermione added.
"What?" the two boys exclaimed.
Hermione frowned. She looked around her. The other cabs were far behind, and therefore only Harry, Ron and her could hear this conversation. Neville had quickly changed cab when a cute Hufflepuff had invited him to join her with a large smile. Reassured, she continued. "You heard her that night: she said that her only friends were Death Eaters. She probably knew Malfoy's father."
"Yeah, I remember her referring to someone's father," Harry said, "realizing, just as Hermione had done minutes ago, that the whole thing made sense."
"As it is, she's probably good friends with Crabe and Goyle too," Ron added.
"This is ridiculous," Hermione said with a half-sly smile.
"What is?" the two boys asked. Once again, Hermione had understood everything within a few seconds and now the boys were patiently waiting for an explanation.
"Well Dumbledore said she had killed eight Death Eaters. Voldemort probably understood by now that she was on the other side – our side. How can she talk with a Death Eater's son like she was still one of them? I mean, what would have happened if she had killed Malefoy's father?"
The situation did seem slightly unbearable. As the three friends rummaged through their brains looking for a reasonable answer, the cab stopped and they dragged down their heavy suitcases to the entrance door. Their interrogations literally vanished when they saw Seamus and Dean running towards them, Dean shouting in a high pitched voice: "I feel this year will be a fashion twist!" As they did so, Harry saw Padmil frowning in a corner, looking at the boys with eyes filled with anger, and so he refused to laugh. He still through himself in the boys arms and quickly raced through the Great Hall with them.
"If Dumbledore doesn't shut up in five seconds," though Harry, "I will throw my glass at him." Luckily for the silverware, the Headmaster stopped talking about 3 and a half seconds later, and the plates immediately filled with food of all sorts. Without even looking at it, Harry took the first bowl he saw and dumped half of it's content in his own plate. By the time the fork reached his mouth, he had guessed he was eating shrimp. After filling his famished stomach, Harry slowed down his pace and started observing the teacher's table. All the usual figures were sitting at their respective places, and there was only one change: Thalia was sitting in the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher's chair. Of course, he had known for weeks that Thalia would be occupying this place, but it was not so for everyone. Harry saw two Ravenclaw's about the age of Fred and George whisper to each other, their eyes fixed on the woman, huge grins spread out on their features. He could guess their comments were probably more about the cleavage of her dress than anything else. Or maybe he was wrong: the students were now used to discovering each and every year a new teacher sitting between Snape and Flitwick, and it had became a ritual game to guess who that person was.
"As it is," Harry thought with a chuckle, "it's probably the first time in a life time that Snape is happy of sitting next to the DADA teacher." As he looked up, he realized he had guessed correctly. Snape's usual loathing eyes were now bright and shiny, and Harry saw his turn towards Thalia and address her a little smile. Only, as she turned back to talk to Flitwick, Harry saw her place her hand on his arm. His back immediately straightened, and he turned away from the horrifying scene. Forcing his mind to focus back on the Gryffondor table, he observed that Ron had probably been witness of the same scene. He was quite pale, and his eyes were wide. Harry could hear Snape's deep voice echoing in his mind : "You can take the ex off…" Ron finally swallowed the huge piece of bread that was occupying his mouth and, leaning forwards to make sure only Harry could hear him, he whispered: "f I see them kiss, I swear I will PermaGlue my feet in my cauldron and throw myself in the lake." Harry laughed and quickly started piling up deserts in his clean, golden plate.
Harry's first day seemed to predict that this year would be exactly as the previous years. Though he had talked to Hagrid with a great pleasure (he had not seen his friend this summer) he was as nervous as the others to discover what strange creature he would try to survive to this year. Hagrid's mysterious smile when he announced that everything would be fine proved to all that everything would go wrong, and so it did: both Gryffondor and Slytherin spent the entire hour running after what anyone with common sens would have called small wolves, but what Hagrid had presented as cute little dogs. Then, he left for his History of Magic class, and the sweet sleepiness that immediately invaded his entire body was a proof that this year Binns would teach the exact same way as he had done for the past 78. Plus, when the sharp edge of a quill was stuck between his ribs, he knew Hermione would be as demanding as usual. He was also welcomed in his Transfiguration class by the same severe but somewhat gentle smile of Mrs. MacGonagall. So as he stepped into the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, he already felt home.
Thalia was sitting on her desk and she was greeting everyone with a huge smile – Gryffindor like Slytherin. When alas everyone sat down, the left side of the room was shining with green and the right side was composed of one big mass of red. Thalia quickly stepped up to the front of the class and leaned over Seamus' desk. "First," she said, "I would like this entire row to stand up." Puzzled, Harry watched Ron and Hermione gather their stuff and get up, looking at each other with interrogation marks printed in their eyes. Harry saw, to his great displeasure, that Draco was laughing with the other Slytherins. He seemed to think that something funny was going to happen – funny for them of course. Harry sighed. It seemed as thought they would have to bear a carbon copy of Snape as a teacher. After all, she was just like him: an ancient Slytherin who had suffered because of the pride and arrogance of the Gryffondors. And she hated his father as bad as the potions master did. This thought shattered in Harry's mind when she smiled. "Thank you dears. Now you," she added, turning to the Slytherins this time, "will also get on your feet." An entire row lifted immediately, fear painted on their faces. They seemed to think that they would have to live what Malefoy had been describing to them seconds earlier. "Or maybe they know her," Harry thought, "and they're aware she's a cold-blooded murderer." She didn't look like one thought. She wasn't quite tall, and she was rather skinny. But the boy quickly glanced at the wand she wore tucked in her belt: he did not know how much misery it had caused, but he felt that the answer was big. "Alright now, switch." Most students seamed petrified, not understanding what she meant by switch, but Hermione had understood. Taking her books and bag with her, she crossed the room and sat on the chair in front of Malfoy. Everyone held their breath. She had just crossed a sacred line that had remained untouched for more than half a century.
"What is everyone waiting for?" Thalia asked with a smile. "I know Mrs. Granger is one of the smartest students of this school, but I didn't think this meant all the rest of you had the intelligence of a five year old." Harry quickly looked at Hermione: she didn't seem to know if she was supposed to take this comment as a compliment or as sarcasm. Finally, she simply remained silent. Thalia's shoulders fell a few centimeters. She looked at different students, who's eyes all immediately shifted to the ground. "You don't want to split up," she muttered to herself. Her voice was filled with disgust. "You are so proud of the ridiculous little sign on your chests that you don't want to stand beside someone wearing a different one. I…" She almost added something, then simply stopped talking. "I'm warning you, I am not starting this class until each and everyone of you is sitting on the bench I have assigned them, and don't think you can beat me on this point. I will literally levitate each and every one of you to your new places if…" As she said that, she put her hand to her waist and grabbed her wand. Harry was silently praying for all the others to move, and quickly. Strangely, he didn't like the idea of Thalia angrily waving a wand at him. But the students quickly realized that the only way of avoiding a quick fly through the class was of changing places, and they rapidly did so. "Good," the teacher said, "now everyone sitting in the first, third and fifth rows, you will switch place with the person sitting next to you." Once again, Harry simply sat still, as he saw every other student in the class shift. As they were doing so, he saw Thalia's strategy: now, every Slytherin student was surrounded by four Gryffondor students, who where all surrounded by four Slytherin students, and so on and so forth. In general, the class probably looked like a huge red and green chess board. "Alright. Now unless you want to be sitting like this throughout the entire year, you will make the effort of mixing up with the other house. I don't want you to become best friends, I just want to you at least pretend you don't want to kill yourselves. Now," she added, "Mrs. Juste, would you happen to be the daughter of Richard Juste?"
The class passed quickly. The first half-hour was dedicated to Thalia renewing with ancient friends – usually the parents of the students sitting before her. During that time, Harry realized she had many contacts: she knew at least three blood-relatives of every wizard in the class, even the Slytherins. "That's probably why Dumbledore wants her on our side," Harry thought. "She's like a huge database of every Death Eater that ever was." The second part of the class consisted in Thalia explaining how her classes would work. In general, they were quite unorthodox. Every class would be spent experimenting new phenomena and discovering new creatures – creatures she would of course bring here, in class. Every student would then have to write up their own notes for the exams. No homework would be given except this. Many students were relieved hearing Thalia utter these words, but Harry knew it was a poisonous gift. Only last year, he had accumulated more than half a meter high of notes in DADA classes. Writing all these from scrap was going to be hell. Finding Hermione in the mixed crowd, he gave her a smile.
She smiled back, then raised her hand. "Yes dear?" Thalia kindly asked. She had been extraordinarily nice to Hermione that day, probably trying to compensate for the fact that she knew absolutely nobody in her family. "How do we know we're not completely wrong in our notes?" the student asked. Harry heard Ron laugh. "Like Hermione could ever be wrong…" he thought, making eye contact with her. She darted her angry eyes on him, then focused herself back on Thalia. Harry understood. The question was for him. Hermione had been clear enough: this year, she would not lend any of her notes to the two boys. "This way, you will learn to be responsible!" she had said with exasperation the 45th time they had asked why. Harry and Ron had looked intensely at her, until she finally admitted. "Alright, Dumbledore asked me to… But you do need to be responsible!" she had quickly added at the sight of the guys' grins. Thalia seemed happy to hear that question. "Finally," she said, "a student preoccupied by her exams! Do you realize that you're the only student today that asked this question?"
Hermione kept silent, and Thalia went on. "Every Wednesday night, I will go into a common room to help you out with your notes. I will see the Slytherins every first week of the month and the Gryffondors every last week of the month." Harry wondered if Thalia had done on purpose to postpone their meeting to the furthest day she could. "Probably," he simply thought, as the bell rang. Two seconds later, Hermione was by his side. "Do you realize for the first time ever a teacher is ready to let us learn by ourselves!" she quickly said, a huge smile printed on her lips. "Oh, I just can't wait!" she added as Ron approached. They were about to leave the now empty room when Thalia called. "Harry?" she asked. The boy turned around and slowly walked down to her desk as his friends stayed timidly by the door. He was wondering what he could have done wrong. After all, Thalia had asked him to stay far away from her. Why would she want to talk to him? Maybe she thought he was sitting to close to her. "No," Harry thought, "I was at the back of the class. Maybe she expects me to skip each and every DADA class…" This was ridiculous, but he couldn't think of any thing else he had done wrong. "Do you usually act this way in class?" she asked when he finally reached her, not being able to walk any slower without simply stopping or going backwards. "What?" Harry asked.
"When you are in class, do you always act like this or were you trying to be polite and calm in order to make a good first impression?"
"No, I'm usually like this. Except when I'm sleeping…" he added, wondering why she was asking this weird question.
She didn't seem angry or mad, she just seemed curious. As he dived into his head searching for the memories of his previous years in Hogwarts, he realised he had not changed an ounce. Thalia laughed a little, then she quickly spoke. "Well if you're always this way I guess I'm going to have to tell Severus to give you a chance."