Chapter 2: Wonder
'Look what we've got today,' Ron groaned, dropping his spoon and staring down at his time table. 'Defence against the Dark Arts, Wonder, Hope, Memories, Dreams and Fun. Umbridge, North, Bunnymund, Tooth, Sandy and that Jack kid all in one day.' Harry stared down at his hardly touch plate of kippers. He had suddenly lost his appetite. 'Come on,' Hermione said, 'Give them a chance.' Ron snorted in disbelief.
It turned out that Professor Umbridge had found a competing place with Snape and Trelawney as Harry's least favourite teacher. When Harry had spoken out against her that Voldemort had returned she put him in a week's worth of detentions. 'What do you think North's gonna be like?" Ron asked as they descended the marble stairs into the entrance hall and turned towards the dungeons. 'I don't know, but he can't be worse than Umbridge,' Harry growled.
The class lined up outside of dungeon ten. There were nervous mutterings. Professor North was as yet, an unknown quantity. Harry heard a muttering. 'Do you honestly think this North man is capable of teaching us?' came Malfoy's drawling voice, 'He looks like like he should be in St Mungo's dementia ward.' 'Malfoy, can't you at least give him a chance before you put him down?' Hermione said frowning at him. 'I won't be told what to do by a filthy mudblood like you,' Malfoy snarled. Ron took a step towards Malfoy, but Harry and Hermione grabbed him which was lucky as the door swung open at that moment.
Several of the girls screamed. It wasn't professor North; it was a massive, hairy, chestnut-coloured yeti. 'WORRBBLEEOWWWRRBB!' it roared. It cracked it's knuckles and stepped forwards. The yeti was suddenly pushed aside and North was standing there holding two, very large swords. 'Oh, is you all. Is all right Phil, they with me,' North said to the yeti who grumbled something in yetish and went back inside. 'Well, what you waiting for? In,' North continued, gesturing.
The cavernous dungeon beyond was nothing like potions class. It was brightly lit and decorated like a christmas tree had exploded in there. There were hundreds of desks and at them were yetis building toys. At others yetis were painting the toys. At still others the toys were being packaged into gift boxes. Harry felt something brush against his legs. Down by his feet was a little pointy headed elf. It offered a plate of cookies to him. 'Um, no thanks,' Harry said hesitantly.
'Do these yetis get fair treatment, like sick-leave and pensions and things?' Hermione asked. 'Are you now thinking of setting up S.P.A.Y? Society for the Promotion of Adopting Yetis?' Ron said smirking. Hermione glared at him. 'Of course they get fair treatment. I am kind and considerate person. I DON'T LIKE IT, PAINT IT RED!' North said as they walked past a yeti painting a blue robot. 'WHAT THA'?!' the yeti roared. Next to the yeti was a massive stack of blue robots. 'AWW!' the yeti roared in anger and smacked it's head down onto the desk. Hermione looked a little scandalized.
'I thought the elves made the toys,' Dean joked, looking at the construction work of the yetis. 'We just let them believe that,' Professor North whispered to him. Harry looked to his left. There was a small elf covered with christmas tree lights and another holding a plug. The second elf plugged the lights in and the first elf suddenly began hovering just above the ground on a carpet of static as the lights switched on. It's eyes were wide and gently smoking and it was smiling in a dazed fashion. Harry stared. 'Very nice,' North said giving a huge, false smile. 'Keep up good work.'
'STEP IT UP EVERYBODY!' North shouted across the dungeon. 'ONLY FOUR MONTH UNTIL CHRISTMAS!' One of the Yetis operating a forklift truck carrying a massive stack of presents roared something in response.
'Here we are,' North said as they approached a side door. He opened it. The walls of the room inside were made of ice and wooden shelves were attached to them. At the far end was an enchanted window, like the one's in the ministry only this one was overlooking a vast snow-field. Dotting the stone floor were massive blocks of ice. At the frost desk was what looked like a miniature toy racing track carved from ice. Lying haphazardly on the desk were small toys built from ice; trains, teddy bears, ponies, dolls, even one or two broomsticks. In the corner of the room beside the fireplace was a massive christmas tree.
'Take seat,' Professor North called to them. Harry, Ron and Hermione took seats at the table beside the Christmas tree. Once everyone was seated, Professor North picked up a small plate. 'Fruit cake anyone?' he offered. There were murmurings of "No thanks," and Professor North threw the cake into a corner of the room where the plate smashed and several elves immediately fell upon the food. 'Now...' North said cracking his knuckles 'time to down to tacks of brass.'
The door behind them slammed shut and locked itself. North stood in front of the class and he seemed to grow to fill the entire room. Several of the girls let out terrified squeaks. 'WHO ARE YOU ALL?' North roared so loudly that the entire room seemed to shake. Many of the students screamed at this and Malfoy was among them. 'WHAT IS YOUR CENTER?!' North commanded. There was a stunned, slightly fearful silence at this. 'P-Professor,' Hermione said nervously 'Um... what exactly is a center?' North turned to face her. 'If Man-in-Moon chose you to be witches and wizards, you must have something very special inside.' Harry was wondering who "The Man in the Moon" was when Malfoy cut in. 'We do; it's called magic, though some of us...' he glanced at Hermione, 'Aren't really up to...' He broke off as North's face turned to him. At what Malfoy had just said, North seemed to be trembling with rage. Malfoy fell silent and looked at his feet.
North turned back to Hermione then walked over to a shelf and took down a russian doll. 'Here,' He said, tossing it over to Hermione. The whole class stood on their feet to look. An image of North was carved on the front. He looked rather intimidating with a frown on his face and clutching two very large swords. 'This is how you see me, no?' North said tapping the doll. 'Very big, very intimidating.' Harry looked at the doll and back at North. He was right about that.
'However...' North continued, with a small smile crossing his face 'If you get to know me a little...' He opened the doll. Inside was another carving of North, but this one looked much more jolly. This North was smiling and holding a mug and several elves were clustered around his feet. 'You're jolly?' Harry suggested. Several Slytherins sniggered, but North smiled. 'Exactly,' he said which shut the Slytherins up.
'But not just jolly.' He continued and opened the second doll. Inside the jolly shell was a carving of North holding his cloak across his face and a rather sneaky look in his eyes. 'I am also mysterious.'
This doll opened and the one beneath it was smiling widely with a wild look in it's eyes. This North was brandishing it's swords. It looked slightly scary. 'And I am fearless' North said.
The doll inside this one was holding a small deer foal. A gentle smile was on North's face on this one and a tear was gently sliding down his cheek. Parvati and Lavender went 'Aww.' 'And caring,' North said, ignoring the girls. 'And at my center...'
The whole class took a breath as Hermione opened the last doll.
Harry raised an eyebrow. The final layer was a small wooden baby with big blue eyes and it was wrapped in a red blanket. 'Well?' North said looking at them all. 'A tiny wooden baby.' Malfoy said unimpressed. North glared at him and said 'Look closer. What do you see?' Harry didn't have a clue so he took a wild stab in the dark and said 'You have big eyes?' The Slytherins actually laughed at this and Harry felt himself blush with embarrassment.
'YES!' North yelled clapping his hands. The Slytherins were silenced again. 'Big eyes,' he said clutching Harry's shoulders. 'Because they are full... of wonder.' It suddenly made sense. 'My eyes have always seen the wonder in everything.' A small toy broomstick on North's desk came to life and began to fly around the room. 'I see lights in the trees and magic in the air. Wonder is what I put into the world and what I protect.' He looked at them as the Christmas tree burst into life.
'And this wonder is what I want you to put into the world.' 'How?' Neville asked. 'Like so,' North said, snatching up an ice block and slamming it down onto his desk. He kicked a small gramophone which began to play fast-paced russian music. North took out a chainsaw and Harry and several others backed away on their seats. The chainsaw whirred into life and cut straight through the ice block. 'Bom, bom, bom, bom, bom, bom, ZUN!' North hummed along with the music. He then took out a small pickaxe and began to chip away at the ice. After a while he swapped it for a miniature chisel and began to cut out finer detail. After this, he took out another tiny chisling device with a tip so fine Harry couldn't see it, and began to carve incredibly fine detail into the ice. He then blew ice-dust off the thing and showed it to the class.
It was a tiny ice train. Several students clapped. North smiled. 'Watch,' he said and placed it on the racing track. The train moved off of it's own accord, small puffs of steam blowing from the spout. More applause. The train suddenly flew off of a ramp and for a moment, Harry thought that it was going to smash into the ground, but suddenly the train grew rockets and began to fly around the room. Many students cheered at this.
North laughed as the train soared past the door... which was suddenly flung open and smashed the train to oblivion. There were several gasps of dismay and North let out a wail. The yeti in the door looked very embarrassed with a slight hint of fear mixed in.
'How many times...' North said with his face in his hands, 'Have I told you...' His face turned red and everyone backed away from him. 'TO KNOCK!' he bellowed so loudly that several decorations fell off the tree and smashed on the ground. The yeti rumbled something and held out a clipboard. North sighed, stepped forwards and wrote something on it. 'And put in extra order for teddy bear stuffing, we're nearly out,' he said, a little calmer. The yeti nodded and virtually fled the room.
North turned and clapped his hands. A team of yetis marched into the room and placed ice-blocks and a selection of tools on the tables. Harry stared at his and at Ron who also seemed clueless as to what to do. 'Carve whatever you like,' North said sitting down at his desk and beginning work on another toy. All of the students were impressed by North's work and couldn't wait to get started, but it soon became apparent that it wasn't going to be easy.
Harry tried to carve a miniature snitch and he did manage to get a rough shape, but then his chisel slipped and cut the wing off. Ron was having worse luck. He had tried to make a broomstick, but it seemed that he was unable to carve anything out in a straight line and he kept snapping the ice into fragments as it seemed he was too heavy handed with the tools. Neville kept having to ask for a replacement as he was so nervous around the tools that he kept smashing his ice-block. Hermione had probably done the best. She had attempted to carved a miniature version of her wand and she had managed to get most of the rougher details, but when she tried to put finer details into the wand she ended up cutting off the top three inches.
The bell rang and Harry jumped. He had completely forgotten that he was in the castle and was convinced he was actually at the North pole. North looked up from the miniature model of Hogwarts he was crafting and said 'Shostakovich! Is it that time already?' He rose to his feet. 'Well off with you' he said waving his hands, 'And help yourself to cookies,' he continued gesturing to a large plate, stacked high with the biscuits. Many students, Ron in the lead, converged on the plate and began to grab as many as they could. North laughed. 'Leave some for me,' he roared with laughter.
During break, Harry, Ron and Hermione stood in the freezing courtyard discussing the lesson. 'O've we g't n'xt?' Ron asked with his mouth bulging with cookies. Hermione frowned at Ron and took out her time-table. 'Hope classes with Professor Bunnymund,' she said.