Welcome to another chapter of Bad Moon Rising in which we jump through September and cover what is important, this is something I'll be doing a lot in this book to cut down on chapters.
On with the show.
September.
The Month of September was a whirlwind of insanity for Harry Potter, the homework for each class seemed never-ending in the attempt to prepare the fifth-year students for the upcoming OWLs as they reviewed everything that they had learned over the last five years in one month, the only Professor that seemed to give them a break was Teacher, who, true to her word, assigned no more homework then the OWL guide reading and review. Though during her class she encouraged everyone to ask questions about something that they were stuck on and would go on to break that question into smaller questions that she would ask the class and then extrapolate on them as each was answered, breaking down complicated questions into easy to understand facts that when put together made the who picture.
After questions and the following lecture, they would move on to a bit of reading from The Art of the Duel and writing an outline of the chapter as they went before turning it in and moving on to putting what they learned into practice. Scáthach started with a showing of what spells she thought any good duelist should know, the Shield charm, Expelliarmus, the Stunning Spell, and the Shield Conjuration spell. Then she had set them up into single matches on a stage and would seemingly pick students out at random to duel one another, Harry never got to go one on one with anyone but was frequently called upon after a match to help break down why someone had won and the other had lost. When he had asked why he wasn't called onto the stage, Scáthach's answer was simple, "I'm not about to set a lion among kittens and expect the kittens to win, Greaca,"
This basically meant Harry, as a duelist, was far too advanced for any of the other students to fight against one on one and learn something other than humility and knowing when to retreat against a greater foe.
Scáthach's classes were engaging, in-depth, and fun, there was never a question that stumped her nor one she could help another student understand and by extension the rest of the class. She made sure everyone could cast the spells that they had learned over the years and did it quickly and efficiently, at the end of the month she had the class take a quick quiz on a mixture of what they learned in class and read from the prep book and not a single student got below an Exceeding Expectations, even Crabb and Goyle. Harry was surprised by just how much Scáthach knew about Wanded magic whereas when in Dún Scaith, she had openly admitted she knew nothing about it and could not help him learn Battle Magic thanks to that lack of knowledge, but now there wasn't a subject that she didn't know about, and Harry would learn why during their first training session.
September 7th, Hogwarts Dueling Arena, afternoon.
It started as it always did between Teacher and Student, with a fight, a clash of blood-red spears, and Battle Magic. They both had opened with conjured spears, Scáthach's aimed to debilitate and to make Harry bleed, his were to deflect the oncoming onslaught as Harry blitzed Scáthach as fast and as hard as he could, intent on landing a single hit on her. But all his Teacher did was smile softly as she blocked and parried each strike with her spear as the two began their dance of shadows and death sending sparks flying through the air and cracks like thunderbolts falling from the heavens as the two divine spears clashed. They would mix in Battle Magic and physical blows in the exchanges, Battle Magic when they had the distance, and sneak in blows with punches and kicks when either of them thought they could get away with it.
Ron, Hermione, and Scáthach's hound watched all of it from the sidelines and stands, Hermione's shouts of worry, Ron cheering him on, and the hound's excited barking echoed almost as loud as Harry and Scáthach's clashes.
The spare didn't end for a good twenty minutes, Harry had forced Scáthach to jump into the air to avoid ten spears made of compacted gunpowder that he had set off with Fleur's Ignis spell, Harry had thrown the Géa Bolg at her, causing her to twist in midair to avoid it, and as Harry jumped to meet her in midair, he had called his spear back to his hand from behind her. But Scáthach wouldn't fall for the same trick twice, so she lashed out with her spear to knock Harry's spear away without looking at it, opening herself up for an attack just for half a second, but for someone as fast as Harry was, half a second was a long time, and that was all Harry needed. He had reached into his jacket and grabbed the golden torc that was wrapped around his bicep and unleashed his new spear, Gáe Buidhe, Scáthach's eyes widened in shock right before Harry cut her throat, landing a mortal blow against his immortal teacher, opening her throat in a waterfall of golden ichor before both landed in a heap on the sand below.
Harry made sure not to land on the golden spear and lay on the ground breathing heavily from the fight, getting a moment or two for a breather before Scáthach popped up from position on the ground, her neck already healed, "And where did you get that from, Greaca?" Scáthach asks as she walks over to the downed Harry.
"Manannán," Harry says with a grunt as he rolled onto his back with a smile, looking at his Teacher who was looking down at him with a smile of her own, "Gave it to me as a gift when I freed him,"
Scáthach shakes her head as she plants her spear into the ground, "That man, I swear," she says with a smile.
"Not mad at him, are you?" Harry asks.
"There are many things I plan on doing to Manannán when I next see him, punishing him for giving you such a wonderful gift is not one of them Greaca," Scáthach says before offering Harry a hand to pull him to his feet as Ron and Hermione come running into the arena, "No, I think I will be rewarding him for that," she says as her smile turns dangerous and Harry becomes a little scared on what she meant by that.
Training with Scáthach expanded to Battle Magic and how to best use it as Scáthach showed him different spells with her wand(that was just the Géa Bolg shrunk down to wand size) when Harry had asked how she had figured out how to use a wand over just a single summer Scáthach smiled at him and said "The Castle you know as Hogwarts and I are one, what Hogwarts knows, I now know, and what I know, Hogwarts now knows," that single statement caused Hermione to gasp in shock before asking if Scáthach was the reason for the second-floor addition to the Library, to which Scáthach smiled at and nodded. The full contents of the original Library at Dún Scaith, which Scáthach had memorized, were now back in the castle.
The Battle Magic that McGonagall had taught to him a year ago was broken down, refined, and built back up under Scáthach as she pushed Harry to his absolute limits with what she showed him.
"Every grain of sand is a sword, every shard of stone, a shield, every mountain, a fortress, Your armor will never break, your quiver is endless, and your spear is always true," Scáthach told Harry and proceeded to show him how to do each one until Harry vomited on the ground do to his burning core before dragging him to his feet and making him do it again until he was left shaking and barely able to stand. Hermione was up in arms about how he ended up after each training session with Scáthach, or well, she would have been if it wasn't for the fact that Scáthach was running both Ron and Hermione into the ground as well.
Scáthach went over every spell Harry knew, from Charms to Curses, to Transfiguration, and Battle Magic and she ripped them apart, from casting times to the wand movements to how Harry had spoken the spells. Nothing escaped her ruthless pursuit to make Harry better, faster, and stronger even in magic, a flick became a twitch, a loop a tight small circle, a wave, or a swish became nothing more than a short line. Spoken words became short chants and Scáthach was quickly showing Harry silent casting, along with Hermione and Ron being dragged through the same thing, though they both were being trained in different things as well.
For Ron, he was made to do the one thing he hated the most, Reading. Though it wasn't anything about magic, but warfare, he was given a stack of books by Scáthach to read cover to cover starting with a book called "The Art of War" by some Ancient Chinese General as well as playing chess against Scáthach, who was cheating the whole time. After Ron would take the first piece, Scáthach would constantly switch out the pieces he took, Ron would take a pawn, then a rook, and then a knight but Scáthach would then put her rook back on the board and would do this constantly so she would never run out of pieces to play against Ron, the only two pieces she never switched out was the Queen or the King. Ron, however, wasn't allowed the same handicap and was frustrated at the uphill battle he had to go through, but ever the chess player Ron adapted and countered the best he could, and out of the twenty-eight games Scáthach and Ron played, Ron had only won three.
Hermione, in Harry's opinion, had it the worst. Scáthach made her cast every spell she knew in alphabetical order, causing her a splitting migraine, before doing it again in reverse. Like with Harry, Scáthach was focusing on her casting time, wand movements, and silent casting, but not teaching her any new spells but instead showing her how to chain her spells and how to mix them in odd and interesting ways, wards and curses, charms and transfiguration went hand and hand with one another, but so did curses and charms, and wards and transfiguration, throw in some Rune arrays and Hermione was beginning to add some interesting effects to her shield charms. Scáthach had explained to Hermione that there typically are two types of Wixen in magical arts, Generalist, and Specialist; Harry was a Specialist with Defensive magics and Battle Magic, while Hermione was a Generalist, not being beholden to any one specialty.
"Albus Dumbledore, Gellert Grindelwald, Tom Riddle, and Lily Potter, the four of the five most powerful Wixen of this era have all been Generalist, Miss Granger, and I dare say that one day soon, your name will be added to that list," Scáthach had told Hermione straight to her face, and shocked her by Scáthach absolute faith in her.
The first week of September.
The week had ended well enough with the tryouts for the Gryffindor Quidditch team with Ginny becoming the reserve for both the Chaser and Seeker positions while Ron on his new Nimbus 2000, suffering from a bit of nerves, had made Keeper much to his eternal joy and bragging. But over the weekend, something changed that borough a quiet sense of foreboding to the Halls of Hogwarts, Educational Decree Number 23 was passed by the Wizengamot naming Dolores Umbridge as High Inquisitor of Hogwarts giving her the power to evaluate and potentially sack any teacher not meeting her "Standards", whatever that meant and giving her power to expel any students not following the rules. The morning it was announced in the Prophet, Harry could see how unbearably smug Umbridge was at the high table as the rest of the staff had sent her glares when she wasn't looking, well, other than Dumbledore and Scáthach that is, neither of them looked worried in the slightest.
Umbridge didn't waste a moment of having her new power when Monday rolled around as Harry heard she had shown up during the seventh-year charms class to "evaluate" Professor Flitwick and had left in a huff being unable to find a single thing to mark him down for, and Harry had to agree, Flitwick was an amazing teacher that not many disliked, even the most diehard Slytherin Blood purest had a bad thing to say about the energetic and cheery teacher.
Umbridge showed up in Harry's divination class after lunch on the same day, subjecting Professor Trelawney and the class to a battery of questions, though she avoided Ron(who was still fuming over a letter from Percy) and Harry, he could still feel her eyes on him like she was waiting for him to do something akin to ranting and raving, odd really, though Harry did feel bad for Professor Trelawney for having to suffer Umbridge longer as the class was let out and the toad stayed behind.
Umbridge had also shown up during Harry's Transfiguration, Care for Magical Creatures, and Defensive Arts classes, and while it felt like the woman was stalking him, those two had to be the single greatest classes he ever had as Harry got to behold the sight of Professor McGonagall ruthlessly rip a part Umbridge in the politest way possible, showing Umbridge that the Matron of the House of Lion's wasn't about to take disrespect from anyone in her classroom, especially some Ministry Toad.
The weirdest thing that happened had to be during Care of Magical Creatures where Umbridge also finally found her excuse.
September 10th, Hogwarts grounds.
Harry's first class with Professor Grubbly-Plank had started normally enough with heading down Hagrid's hut and seeing Cú curled up in the pumpkin patch while it normally would be fang, Care was one of Harry's favorite classes other than Defense and has been since he signed up for it for his third year. Getting to interact with all kinds of magical animals was fun, some he could understand, giving him an advantage when they needed to find out what the animal wanted or need, and some he didn't whether it was just his love for animals or his mother's domain of wild animals and predators, Harry didn't know, nor did he rare. With Hagrid, you could always trust him to bring out something neat or new and fascinating and Harry was hoping Professor Grubbly-Plank would continue that trend, which she did, kinda.
What she showed them was a Unicorn, and as soon as she brought it out, with all the girls gasping and cooing, Harry knew, from the Hunt's growl in his mind, he wasn't going to have a good time.
With Umbridge standing off to the side, Professor Grubbly-Plank had told all the boys to stand back from the Unicorn for while the myth of Unicorns preferring virgins was just that, a myth, they did prefer females over males and the Professor wanted the Unicorn to be comfortable before any of the boys approached it, which was fine for Harry because he didn't want to get anywhere near the damn thing. Umbridge saw this as a good moment to start asking questions to the students standing back from the rest, it wasn't until she got to Malfoy and his goons and what they were saying that Harry felt the need to say something.
"Right horrible he is, couldn't even control a Hippogriff from mauling me, nearly lost my arm," Malfoy says about Hagrid just a few feet from Harry, "And Crabb here almost lost a few fingers to a Flubberworm last year thanks to his incompetence," He says and Harry could hear the smirk in his tone, causing Harry to turn around to face them.
"Malfoy, what are you talking about?" Harry asks, his face scrunched up in confusion, "Buckbeak didn't maul you, it was a scratch, not to mention that before Hagrid let us anywhere near the Hippogriffs he warned us not to insult them and respect them as the wild animals that they are, which you did neither, you're lucky that Hagrid was as big as he is or else he wouldn't have been able to control him as he did," Harry points out before turning back to the class while the Professor was going over commonly know facts about Unicorns with the girls with a shake of his head.
"Mister Potter, I would kindly ask you to mind your own business and call respectable students liars," Umbridge said before writing something down on her clipboard with a smirking Malfoy next to her, "If I want to hear your opinion, I will ask you," she says as Harry turns back to her with a confused look on his face.
"He just implied that Flubberworms had teeth-," Harry says as he raises his hand to point at Malfoy, "-Flubberworms, you know, the worm that mainly eats plant matter? They don't even have teeth!" Harry says, throwing his hands up in the air at the pure ridiculousness of the statement, "And you're calling me a liar?" He says pointing at himself before scoffing to himself and turning back around.
"That will be twenty points from Gryffindor for the blatant disrespect, Mister Potter," Umbridge says, no doubt glaring at Harry while Professor Grubbly-Plank was wrapping up telling the class about how Unicorns were sensitive to dark magic as creatures of light and life.
Harry rolls his eyes before raising his hand, "Yes, Mister Potter, do you have something to add about the magical properties of Unicorns?" Professor Grubbly-Plank asks, looking over at Harry.
"Yes Professor, I heard from somewhere that drinking Unicorn blood can save you from death, even if you are right at its door, but to do so is to live a half-life, a cursed life," Harry says, as he watches the Professor's brow raise at his words.
"Yes, Mister Potter you are correct, you won't get into the properties of Unicorn blood until your seventh-year potion class, rather dangerous to mess around with Unicorn blood, and then there is the ethical concern about slaying something so pure, but a good fact about the creature nonetheless, take ten points to Gryffindor, unless you have another question?" Professor Grubbly-Plank asks Harry as some of the girls look at him with grim faces for what he just said.
"They're also Fea? Or closely related to Fea, not sure which one," Harry says with a shrug.
"Correct again, Mister Potter," Professor Grubbly-Plank says with a nod of her head, "Professor Hagrid told me you were one of his best students, and I can see why, another ten points to Gryffindor," She says with a smile before turning back to the gathering of girls, "The Unicorn is an offspring of a creature called a Bicorn, a purely Fea creature that crosses the magical barrier that separates our world from the lands beyond called the Hedge, and will breed with a regular mare to produce a Unicorn at times," The Professor says before calling for the boys to move a little closer to the Unicorn.
Ron snorts a bit before covering it up with a cough realizing what Harry had done as said boy feels a heated glare at his back and he smirks.
The boys in the class formed a line to the Unicorn to meet it one by one so as not to overwhelm it, Harry had immediately taken the back the last in line with the hope the Unicorn would at least get tired of dealing with guys before Harry got to it, but sadly, his luck didn't hold out by it was his time to walk closer to it. Harry didn't get what was the big deal about Unicorns, while he was sure Bicorns would be more impressive, the Unicorn was willowy and agile looking, much like a racehorse, and its coat from hoof to about midbody was an off-white color that bloomed into imprints of ivy and other vines that wrapped around the purer white coat across the top with a silvery mane and tail and a single large horn that looked to be carved from opalescent ivory, but the most off-putting thing about the Unicorn was its eyes; they looked to be solid white like two pearls were shoved into its eye sockets.
Honestly, Harry hated it immediately.
And the feeling was mutual, because as soon as Harry took the final steps toward it to inspect it, maybe pet it, the damn thing tried to gore him. It didn't make a single sound of warning, no whiny, no huff, it didn't even look unsettled, it just took a single look at Harry and swung its head with its horn aimed at his throat. Harry cursed before leaning backward, grabbing Lavender Brown, and dragging her with him so she didn't headbutted by the overgrown My Little Pony before pushing her to the grown as he called on the Hunt, and the rest of the girls scream and scatter before the asshole with a horn swung back around to try and kill Harry again. Harry reaches out, grabs the beast by the horn, and grunts as something in his arm crack but stops the backswing from the Unicorn before with another grunt of effort he snaps the horn right off the head of the Unicorn and it lets out a pained whiny before it bucks itself up to try and crush Harry beneath hooves.
Harry jumps back as Professor Grubbly-Plank tries to calm the now hornless Unicorn as it charges at Harry, he tosses the horn away and flicks his wrist to summon his Willow Wand to his hand ignoring the slight pain in his arm and conjures a spiraling net of iron chains that wrap around the Uni-useless before the ends become spikes and anchor themselves in the ground before expanding to make sure they held the charging creature back as it begins to buck and kick to try and get the chains that held it fast off.
"You motherfucker!" Harry curses at it before putting his hand to his throat and pulling it back to see a small amount of blood on his hand, "This is why Thestrals are better!" Harry yells at the Unicorn as Professor Grubbly-Plank rushes over to him.
"Mister Potter, are you okay?" Professor Grubbly-Plank asks, slightly panicked at Harry's nod she lets out a sigh, "What in the name of the Witch-Father happened? I've never seen a Unicorn have such a violent reaction to a male," She asks as she tips Harry's head back to inspect the wound which was nothing more than a scratch that she quickly healed.
"I have no idea, all I did was walk up to it and it tried to gore me," Harry says as he slowly starts to cut the flow of the Hunt off from his mind.
"It's rather obvious to me," Umbridge says, almost making Harry groan, "Mister Potter here purposely upset the beast to get a violent reaction out of it," She says in a sickly sweet tone that set Harry's hackles to rise as he turns on Umbridge while the other Professor looked at her like she was an idiot.
"Oh, right, silly me wanting to get fucking gored by some dumb land Narwhal for the fun of it, are you being stupidly malicious or maliciously stupid right now?" Harry snaps angrily at the toad-like woman who smiles unnervingly at him.
"That will be two hundred points from Gryffindor and two weeks' worth of detention, Mister Potter," Umbrigde says brightly, "For speaking to your betters in such a way," she says with a small giggle.
"And that!" another voice called out as everyone turns to see Scáthach walking down the hill with an annoyed look on her face and Cú at her heels, "Will be three hundred points to Gryffindor for saving the life of one of your classmates and stopping a threat before it got out of hand without harming the creature, and belay those detentions," She says while walking up to Umbridge with a slight glare before stopping a foot from her.
"You can not just-" Umbridge begins to speak, her face quickly becoming red, but is swiftly cut off by Scáthach.
"Do you have eyes?" Scáthach asks, her face set with an angry frown that would have sent Harry running if it was directed towards him.
"E-Excuse me?" Umbridge asks, sounding offended.
"Your eyes, Dolores, do. They. Work?" Scáthach asks, slowly and forcefully to the shorter woman. Umbridge opens and closes her mouth as if she was trying to process the question through her anger at the question itself, "Because if they did work you would have seen that The Greaca pulled Miss Brown out of the way of the Unicorn's first swing and saving her from a skull fracture or worst as the Unicorn attack without provocation, I was at the top of the hill and even I saw that," Scáthach says as she looms over Umbridge.
"I-Its true, Professor Umbridge, if it wasn't for Harry the Unicorn would have put its horn right through my eye," Lavender says, still standing from the near-death experience and being hugged by both Hermione and Parvati who were supporting her. Umbridge glares at the girl before turning back to Scáthach with a scowl, which was honestly rather brave of her in Harry's opinion.
"The boy still shouldn't have mouthed off to a teacher as he did," Umbridge argued back.
To which Scáthach just raised a brow and asked, "What teacher?"
Mid-September.
Neither Umbridge nor Scáthach would budge on the opinion about whether or not Harry should get detention or not, so they brought it to the Headmaster, Dumbledore agreed that Harry shouldn't have talked to Umbridge like he did, but two weeks of detention was too harsh considering the circumstances and vetoed all but three days of detention, to which Scáthach, using her role as Harry's Master to put off the detentions for as long as possible for her role as his Master superseded any school authority over him and planned her training sessions for every night Umbridge tried to schedule detention with Harry until the beginning week of October.
Scáthach was showing Umbridge that her "authority" as High Inquisitor meant little to nothing when she was in the castle, and nothing said that more than what happened on a Monday afternoon halfway through September when Umbridge sat in on the newly named Defensive Arts class. Scáthach completely ignored Umbridge, who was sitting in a chair by the entrance, at the start of class as she quieted the class in her normal way by pressing a finger to her lips and everyone stopped talking before she started to collect the Homework from the week before and asking if everyone understood the material.
After answering the few questions that some of the students asked, they moved on to chapter six of The Art of the Dual where it was discussing when to push the advantage one gains in a duel when the Hem-Hem's started from a slightly panicked-looking Umbridge, to which, Scáthach had completely ignored and continued with the group reading, calling on students to read whole pages before pausing to go over the information.
"Excuse me, Professor Árd-G-" Umbridge said, red in the face before Scáthach turned on her and quickly cut her off.
"Dolores, much like Minerva, I do not allow people to talk when I am speaking in my Classroom if you wish to be heard you will raise your head like any other student in this class, or you will be ejected from it, do I make myself clear?" Scáthach says, sounding much like a teacher berating an entitled student, in a soft but dangerous tone as she spoke to the woman. Umbridge just looked at Scáthach in pure shock, probably thinking her position of power over Hogwarts meant something to Scáthach, which, in Harry's opinion, was laughable.
Scáthach had turned back to the class and picked right back up where she had left off, when Umbridge got over her shock before digging herself a deeper hole, "Now see, here! I will not be-" was as far as Umbridge got before Scáthach had raised her hand and made a dismissive gesture toward Umbridge and the castle answered.
The wall just behind Umbridge opened up into an arch before the floor under the chair that Umbridge shoot up, becoming a slant, causing Umbridge to tumble ass over tea kettle out of the room and into the corridor beyond before the arch snapped shut and the floor became leveled once more much to the shock of most the students in the room and the amusement of Harry. From the rattling of the doorknob a few moments later, Umbridge tried to force her way into the room, but if the Queen didn't want to be disturbed in her castle, she wasn't.
An hour and a half later, after class had been let out for the day, Umbridge was allowed back into the classroom in a rage, Harry, Ron, and Hermione stuck around because there was no way that Harry was going to miss what was about to happen.
"I will be writing my report tonight! And I will have your job for this!" Umbridge yelled, slamming her hands onto Scáthach's desk as the Witch-Queen was leaning back in her chair with a bored expression on her face, "Between the blatant disrespect you have shown me and my position, your favoritism toward unscrupulous students, and teaching children how to duel, I wouldn't be surprised if Cornelius showed up with the Aurors to have you removed from grounds!" she screamed, unknowingly, into the face of an uncaring Goddess.
Scáthach blinks twice, "Are you done?" She asked Umbridge who doesn't say anything else for several seconds, "Excellent," Scáthach says as she stands and straightens her dress as she does, "Let's make a few things clear first off if you ever speak to me that way again, the Aurors will have to come here with a mop and bucket to clean up what's left of you," She says while walking around her desk to loom over Umbridge as the atmosphere turns thick with malice, causing Umbridge to pale slightly, "Second off, I highly doubt you or whoever this Cornelius is can remove me from my post, my tenure here at Hogwarts is guaranteed for the next ten years by a binding magical contract, so if you wish to explain to the Circles of Ireland and the Circle of the Fianna just why one of their countryman and Highmasters was stripped of her magical core without talking to them first, then by all means, go get the Aurors," Scáthach says before leaning down to get into Umbridge's face, "I'll wait," she says with a smile that was all teeth.
Scáthach wasn't removed from her position as a Professor, nor did Umbridge come back to the Defensive Arts class again.
At the end of September, Ravenclaw Tower.
Sniffling and light sobs could be heard throughout the fourth-year girls' dorm, not that many of the occupants of the room would care seeing it was coming from the bunk decorated in stings of butterbeer corks and charmed paper chains of ever-changing colors, for the odd bunk belong to an odd girl who was currently cradling a wounded hand weeping with blood from the words "I must not tell stories" carved into it in her own handwriting.
"Meow?" came the soft voice of a black and white cat wearing a blue collar that crawled out from under the bed and through the mists.
"H-Hello-" The crying girl hiccups, "-Mister Kitty-What," She says, trying to sound joyful through the curse of the pain, "H-How was your tr-trip?" the blonde girl asks, never knowing where one of her only friends disappears too, but never asking either, for one shouldn't ask a King his business.
"Meow?" the cat asks, before leaping onto the bed with the blonde girl, who quickly picks it up and pulls it Into her lap, and begins to pet it, but the cat doesn't get any delight from the action, for it could sense the pain in its mortal.
"I-its n-nothing," she tries to brush off its inquisitive question, "J-Just something from a detention," the girl says, trying to keep her calm.
"Meow," The cat tries once more, more softly for its mortal, she was never this closed off, always open with her odd thoughts and ideas, always a bubble of joy.
"The new teacher, she, she didn't believe me when I told her why I didn't have any shoes, I even explained to her what Narguls was, but she, but she said they didn't exist, so I told her it was because she didn't have the right eyes and she, and she made me write lines with a quill from porci-goose, and-and, well…," The girl says, with tears in her eyes, she showed it the words carved into her hand and the cat's eyes narrow as an age-old rage begins to build within its breast, but there was a time that wasn't and places that will never be too expressed that rage, for now, his mortal needed it.
"Meow," it says before leaning forward and licking at the blood, putting it back into the place it should be and sealing the cuts before licking the scars away, it had made up its mind while doing this, his mortal needed a protector, but no Valiant knight in shining would do, for it would not do to protect its mortal while it was away on his own business, no, what his mortal needed, was a Hunter.
Harry Potter, October 7th, 9:39 pm
Harry clutched his hand in pain as white-hot rage shot through him like liquid fire as he walked back to Gryffindor Tower from the first of Umbridge's Detentions, it had started off with the bitch showing up late wearing the most garnish pink robes he had ever seen, before leading him into the class to write fucking lines, "Until the message sinks in," she had told when he had asked how many times before giving him a Black fucking Blood quill. Harry had thought it looked similar to the one he and Scáthach used to sign the apprenticeship contract back at the Ministry, and much to his fucking surprise it was the same gods damned kind and he had just spent the last two and a half fucking hours carving "I will know my place," into the back of his hand.
The few students in the Halls avoid Harry as he stalks through the corridors, his own anger and the Hunt rolling off him in waves. Harry could feel the Hunt, scratching at the door in his mind, begging to be let in so it could eat a fat juicy toad and Harry was half tempted to let it, but no, he had other ways of dealing with this. He was heading to Gryffindor Tower to use the last of his nectar to heal his fucking hand before heading to Scáthach and telling his teacher just what was happening in Umbridge's detentions, maybe write back to Sirius too, see if he couldn't talk to The Morrígan about taking over the Ministry sooner rather then later.
Harry growls out the password to the Fat Lady as soon as he reaches the portrait before walking through the secret entrance and the first thing he hears is someone calling out to him.
"Oi, Pot-Head, you good?" Delphini says from her spot on one of the couches with her legs kicked up on an ottoman, Harry's eyes travel up her legs that were wrapped in fishnet-like materials over cream-covered leggings for a moment, his pain momentarily forgotten as he swallows the lump in his throat. Delphini was a bit of an enigma to Harry, she had been something of a quiet companion the last few weeks to him, when the looks got too much, or he had enough of Ron and Hermione's bickering about the Twin's prank testing or OWL's. Delphini would just look over at him and it was like she knew it was getting too much for him and offered him an escape in a privacy ward of her creation, it worked like a one-way mirror on the inside so neither of them could see the people who were looking nor could they hear them speak other than their names, it was nice.
Delphini never asked a question, never spoke, the only sounds that came from her were the chewing of gum and the occasional turning of a page of whatever book she was reading while he would just sit with his eyes closed enjoying the scent of bubblegum that wafted around the girl.
"Y-Yeah, just…" Harry trails off with a sigh, not knowing why he was stammering over his words or why he was blushing, "Hurt my hand, that's all," Harry says quickly before swiftly moving across the common room with Delphini's soft concerned look burning into his back as he took the stairs two at a time.
Harry groans when he arrives at the landing for the fifth-year boys, he could already hear Ron and Hermione arguing just beyond the door, "I really don't need this right now," Harry thinks to himself as the aggravation begins to build again before he opens the door.
"-is going to snap, Hermione!" Ron says as he stands by Harry's bed with both of his hands on the side of his head, "Do you not understand that!?" he says, aggravation and worries thick in his tone of voice.
"Of course, I understand that, Ronald!" Hermione snaps right back at Ron, rage evident in her voice that borders on panic, "We need to get her to Madam Pomfrey or Professor Grubbly-Plank, and we need to do it before He gets back!" Hermione quickly says.
"She won't let go of the Letter Hermione! She won't even let me near her without trying to scratch my hands apart! How the bloody hell are we going to do that!" Ron says, his arms dropping to his side as he almost shouts at Hermione.
"We'll, we'll just have to stun her, if it's the only way," Hermione says in a quiet voice before taking out her wand.
"Stun who?" Harry finally asks curiosity and confusion in his tone as both Ron and Hermione freeze and slowly turn to look at Harry with wide eyes filled with terror and fear, for what, Harry didn't know.
"Harry, Mate-," Ron says, holding up his hands in a placating gesture, "-You need to step out of the room, please," Ron begs as he slowly approaches Harry as Hermione looks between the two boys with worry.
"Harry, Ron's right, you need to le-" Hermione says, sounding scared before she is cut off by a single sound.
A hoot(..har..ry..)
A soft hoot that came from Harry's bed, a hoot that carried with it so much pain and weakness it nearly stopped Harry's heart. Ron closes his eyes as a look of defeat overcame his face as Hermione begins to slowly back away to the other side of the room, giving Harry a clear view of his bed.
Harry's messy bed was covered in blood and white owl feathers.
Hoot(I…brought…)
Hedwig, using what had to be the last of her strength to stand tall and proud, even with her bent and twisted wing and the bleeding hole shooting through her body leaking her life's blood, looked at Harry with glassy eyes and letters clutched in her talons.
Hoot(Your…let..)
Before collapsing forward onto the bed, unmoving.
Harry's next word rocked the tower to its core as not a single person who called it home did not feel the Hunt call out for blood.
Chapter done!
And oh boy, if this doesn't put you all into a rage I don't know what will.
But for those of you who don't know, Umbridge attacks Hedwig in the fifth book trying to steal Harry's letters from Sirius, but our Queen delivered Harry's letters to him without fail.
In this, Hedwig is a blessed member of the Hunters of Artemis, so Umbridge had to do something a bit more extreme to get the letters from our Queen and still failed in the process.
Needless to say, there is going to be HELL to pay, because Harry is about to go off the deep end.
But not only did Umbridge manage to piss off the Heir to the Hunt, but also the King of Cats.
There are not enough gods in this universe to save Umbridge from her coming fate.
Bahannah! Put that down! I said put it fucking down! She's not dead, I swear she's not dead, so put it down!
Kingsaxcul, Out!