Tim went and sat with Harry and his friends for breakfast on Sunday, which was completely fine with Purdie. In fact, he might have gone so far as to find it ideal. After all, there was a matter of great importance to discuss with his two closest friends, and that matter was Tim Drake-Wayne himself.
"He lied to me again yesterday," Purdie announced once Aruna had finally dragged herself out of bed and down the staircases to the Great Hall.
Cordelia piled what appeared to be a second helping of pancakes onto her plate, a bottle of syrup drizzling itself over the top of the stack. "How do you mean?"
"Remember when we followed the pair of footprints that disappeared into that back alley? And the case of Dungbombs that one of the Weasley twins gave Tim was lying on the ground?"
"And we thought he'd been kidnapped?" she said. "Yeah, of course I do, but he showed up later, I saw him at Tomes and Scrolls."
Purdie nodded. "Yeah, and I saw him at Honeydukes, too. And I asked him, I said, 'Tim, where were you?' And you know what he told me?" He turned to Aruna, who shrugged vaguely.
"He told me that he had gone straight to the Three Broomsticks. That directly contradicts what we saw. We saw—or I guess you did, Aruna—him leave before everyone else, which was why we could tell which footprints were his, because no one else had left recently. There were only two sets of footprints—Tim's and someone at the pub's—and they clearly led to the back alley. Right?"
"Right," agreed Cordelia, drumming her fingers against the edge of the table.
"So, him telling me that he went to the Three Broomsticks was a flat-out lie. We stayed there, we watched everybody else leave the Hog's Head, and Tim wasn't there. Oh, and get this!" He shook his spoon at Aruna in frustration. "He had a pair of bags with him at Honeydukes, and right there on the top of everything was that same package of Dungbombs with the same fake wrapper! Meaning he had to have gone back and picked that up at some point!"
Cordelia narrowed her eyes, her fingers moving just a little bit faster. "So, where do you think he really was?"
"That's the thing, I just don't know…" He pulled out a thick hairband from his pocket and began drawing his dreadlocks back into a bun. "One minute, he's flaming Malfoy, and I'm like, 'Whoa, this kid rocks!' and then the next minute, he's sneaking around in the middle of the night and disappearing into thin air! I don't know how to even feel about him!"
"He's a good guy," Aruna stated without looking up from her singular pancake, which she had been eating at a snail's pace, seemingly content to push the butter around with her fork for minutes at a time.
Purdie groaned, putting his face in his hands. "Meaning…?" Why couldn't Aruna ever be direct about anything?
Cordelia, however, seemed to understand these words better. "So, you think he has a valid reason for lying to us?" she summed up, looking at Aruna. The dark-haired girl nodded.
"Do you think this is related to all the time he spends with Harry Potter and his friends?" he asked her. Aruna nodded. Good, now they were getting somewhere.
Cordelia shook her head. "At this point, it's like there aren't any mysteries at Hogwarts that don't involve Harry Potter."
She glanced over at the Gryffindor table, where Tim was sitting next to Ron Weasley, laughing at something the other boy had said. "So, what's the plan, Detective Burnett?"
Purdie frowned. "I…don't know. Because Aruna's right, usually people have a good reason for hiding the truth. And Tim's never done anything to suggest that he's anything less than a good person." He sighed and shook his head. "I dunno, it's like I feel like I can trust him, even when I know he's lying right to my face. Maybe…maybe we should just let him do his thing… It's just hard when you know someone's lying to you, even if they might have a good reason for doing so, you know?"
"But then what if he gets caught up in something dangerous?" posed Cordelia, still drumming her fingers. "Or something terrible happens because of him?"
"Well, yes, we'd obviously have to intervene, but for now…" He looked over his shoulder at Tim from afar. "I think I'm going to let Tim do Tim while keeping a close eye on him."
Aruna gave Purdie a thumbs up without looking up from her meal, her attention still apparently on that thick slice of butter before her.
— BY ORDER OF —
The High Inquisitor of Hogwarts
All Student Organizations, Societies, Teams, Groups, and Clubs are henceforth disbanded.
An Organization, Society, Team, Group, or Club is hereby defined as a regular meeting of three or more students.
Permission to re-form may be sought from the High Inquisitor (Professor Umbridge).
No Student Organization, Society, Team, Group, or Club may exist without the knowledge and approval of the High Inquisitor.
Any student found to have formed, or to belong to, an Organization, Society, Team, Group, or Club that has not been approved by the High Inquisitor will be expelled.
The above is in accordance with
Educational Decree Number Twenty-four.
Signed:
Dolores Jane Umbridge
HIGH INQUISITOR
The barman…the man with the bandages…the two sitting near the window… As Tim jogged down the stairs to breakfast, he tried to clear his mind and remember if any of them had done something suspicious. An offhanded glance, a belated response, a lull in their conversation, anything that could enlighten Tim as to how he, apprentice to the World's Greatest Detective, hadn't noticed another informant in their midst.
Behind him, Cordelia and her fellow Ravenclaw Beater, Duncan Inglebee, were in a heated discussion about the future of their Quidditch team, if 'discussion' was the right word to describe the way they were basically echoing each other's points over and over again.
"—and we don't even get a real reason, but we're supposed to follow it because she said so!"
"And expulsion? Is that really necessary?"
"Rather be expelled than not play Quidditch, I can tell you that…"
It has to have been the barman. The siblings had been there far too long for someone who was trying to eavesdrop on a conversation. Plus, they were there when I came back, I saw them through the window. The man with the bandages wasn't there, though, but that doesn't matter because he was already intoxicated when we first arrived. Umbridge would never hire someone so incompetent as to drink like that on the job. That left the barman. He must have been associating with Umbridge.
When he entered the Great Hall, his eyes immediately went to the Gryffindor table, where a gaggle of students were clustered around Harry, Hermione, and Ron. And there were some Hufflepuffs looking to join the group—?
Idiots! Tim thought. Are they trying to tell the whole school that they have a secret? He grabbed Zacharias's shoulder as the boy headed towards the Gryffindors and spun him around one hundred eighty degrees.
"What are you doing?" he hissed, dragging him back to their table. "You can't just go talk with Gryffindors out of the blue and expect no one to notice!"
"B-but…" Zacharias looked over his shoulder. "Don't you do that all the time?"
Tim let out a frustrated huff. "Yes, but that's because I'm a known friend of Harry, Ron, and Hermione. The same can't be said for you, can it?"
"I—" Zacharias leaned closer to Tim and whispered, "But what are we supposed to do about the…the…you know…"
"Not now, Zacharias. Just keep your head down and wait until someone tells you what's going on." It came out harsher than Tim had intended, but it apparently got the point across, because Zacharias nodded feverishly.
"We, uh…" he said slowly, like he was waiting to see how Tim would respond, "we're still doing it though, right?"
Tim shrugged as though he hadn't decided the moment he saw the notice posted in the common room. "If they won't, I will."
After the notice posted that morning, Tim had almost forgotten that the High Inquisitor had other duties besides making arbitrary rules until he walked into Ancient Runes. Tim had just handed in last week's translations to Babbling when he turned around to find that there was a pink plush armchair in the back of the classroom that had not been there when he had arrived. He blinked, watching as it seemed to shift, before he realized that a certain Professor Umbridge was sitting on said chair. Her cardigan and skirt truly were the perfect camouflage.
Tim avoided unnecessary confrontation and sat down in the front of the classroom next to Cordelia, who looked completely oblivious to the whole thing, having taken out her texts and begun to look over them.
"A crisp and valorous morning to you all, dear scholars," Babbling began once the rest of the class had entered.
"And many greetings to you, Professor," the class responded in unison, save for Cordelia, who was still staring at her texts and rarely, if ever, had the attention necessary to respond to their teacher, being so hyperfocused on runology the minute she entered the classroom. Tim was very tempted to turn around and see Umbridge's reaction to their spot-on response, seeing as the first time he was in her class, she had struggled to get her students to even greet her at all.
"Today, the High Inquisitor herself has graced us with her presence," Babbling continued, riding a fine line between sounding genuinely honored and being not-at-all impressed by Umbridge. Even Tim wasn't quite sure if she was being serious. It was hard to tell with Babbling sometimes.
"It would behoove you to answer any queries she may pose to you during this time. Now, it pleases me to find that all of you successfully completed your preliminary translations without complication. Today, however, you will be introduced to a new concept which will almost certainly present itself on your Ordinary Wizarding Level examinations in the spring. In years prior, your study has consisted of applying known runes and scripts to ancient texts, but this semester commences an approach quite the opposite. Now, scholars, you will decode runes unfamiliar to you by means of carefully applying certain methods and principles which will be detailed over the next three weeks."
"Hem, hem," came the dreaded cough from behind Tim, and he and the other 'scholars' turned to see what the matter was.
"Yes, Dolores?" Babbling asked, adjusting her bejeweled spectacles, her face betraying the finest hint of annoyance.
"What texts do you translate this year?"
Babbling paused for a moment, then began to tick off her fingers, her demeanor pleasant once again as though nothing had happened. "We start off with Agrippa with excerpts from On Society and the Elven Records, briefly dip our toes into Toothill's Consideration of Diplomacy, and then move on to Merlin, whose works we study the rest of the year and into sixth year. In between these, we decrypt anonymous texts from around the world."
Umbridge seemed to tune out her fellow professor, writing down notes on a clipboard. Tim wondered what exactly it was that she was looking for in her evaluations of this class. She was probably looking for chances to sneak Ministry professors into the school like the rest of the classes. Or maybe she was just making sure that nothing was being taught to the students which could be used to fight the Ministry. Ironically, if Babbling was, in fact, teaching them radical material, he doubted Umbridge would be able to translate it into a language she understood.
"Now, this method seeks to resolve a dilemma that any professional scholar would confront when she encounters an ancient text: how is one to translate a passage written in unknown runes? Ordinarily, an individual need only assign each rune to a letter or word based on her comprehension of the English language, but how can one be certain that the text before her is written in English? How does one decipher a text when unfamiliar with both the writing system and the language? The solution is neither simple nor easy, and the process…"
As Tim was jotting down notes, he watched out of the corner of his eye as Umbridge made her way over to his desk. He was quite pleased to be her first choice—it meant that he was still in her good graces.
"Good morning, Timothy dearest," she greeted him, standing over his desk and sticking her nose into his notebook, frowning ever-so-slightly when she apparently did not understand his scribbled shorthand. To his right, Susan shot Tim an incredulous look and glared at Umbridge with a deep contempt quite contradictory to the girl's generally pleasant demeanor. He winked in her direction before addressing Umbridge.
"Good morning, Professor. You look well." He flashed her his winning Drake-Wayne smile, perfected through years of practice at galas and press conferences.
Umbridge placed a hand to her chest with a little giggle. "Why, thank you, Timothy." She was speaking quite loudly, as if she had no respect for the fact that a class was being taught in her midst. She probably didn't. "I was hoping you could tell me about your experiences in this class. What does your average lesson look like?"
"Well, we usually go over our homework in pairs, and Professor Babbling will help if we get stuck. Then, she'll go over a new concept and vocabulary that will pop up in the next passage. There's a lot of practice and repetition. Then we'll receive the next passage, which serves as our homework for the next week, as well as studying the new vocabulary."
"And, what of Professor Babbling herself?"
"Oh, she's spectacular," he continued, and he noticed how, just behind Umbridge, his teacher shot him a very grateful look. "She's really intelligent and knows a lot about complex syntax. She's always got an answer for any of our questions, and she's willing to adapt her lessons if we're not understanding a concept."
"Is that so?" Umbridge was tapping on her clipboard, like she was ticking off checkboxes. "Well, I'll keep that in mind, dear. Thank you." She leaned over and patted Tim's head. The moment she turned around to go talk with Babbling, Tim turned to Susan and rolled his eyes, pointing at his throat in a 'gag me' kind of gesture. Susan snorted, doubling over and covering her mouth to stop herself from laughing.
During the lunch hour, Tim watched from afar as Harry, Ron, and Hermione got up from their table and headed out of the Dining Hall, presumably out to the courtyard, if Tim knew their schedule well enough (which he did, he knew everyone's schedule). He counted to one hundred before quietly excusing himself from the table and making for the courtyard. He caught the tail-end of their conversation.
"I just think she's an absolutely appalling teacher and a real old fraud…" Incredibly unusual words, coming from Hermione. "But Harry's already missed History of Magic and I don't think he ought to miss anything else today!"
"Why did you miss History of Magic?" Tim asked, having caught up with them.
Ron flinched so hard it looked like he was silently sneezing. "Blimey, Tim, could you not do that every time?"
"Do what?" Tim asked innocently, though he was entirely aware of the nature of Ron's complaint.
"You know, appearing out of nowhere and scaring the hell out of us?"
No, no I can't… Tim thought, smiling. It was in the Bat-Family code that a Bat was to always sneak up on their companions silently and 'scare the hell out of them.' It was tradition.
"Nope." He turned to Harry. "So, what's with you skipping History of Magic? Not that I blame you, Binns is a horrible teacher." He only lectured and never gave his students an idea of what was important to note and what was just trivial information, leaving them scrambling to try and shove all the new information into their brains. No tests, no quizzes, the only homework was reading the next chapter. Tim was not big on Binns.
No one, Tim noticed, objected to his statement, though Hermione looked slightly taken-aback.
Harry looked over at Tim concernedly. "Hedwig came to deliver a letter, but she was injured, so I took her down to Professor Grubbly-Plank to look at." It didn't take a genius to gather that Hedwig was Harry's pet owl.
"Okay, give me a summary."
Harry blinked a couple times in rapid succession. "Come again?"
"Give me a summary." The trio stared at Tim with confused frowns, which was when Tim remembered that these kids were probably not used to assessing injuries like he was. "Sorry, I just mean, like, explain to me what state Hedwig was in—what were the visible injuries, how was she acting, was her pulse steady for her species?"
"Well, er, I don't know about all that," admitted Harry, blushing a little, "but something was wrong with her wing. The feathers were all ruffled, and she was holding her wing oddly, kind of leaning towards it. And she was shaking. Professor Grubbly-Plank said that something attacked her."
Tim circled back to what the boy had said earlier. "You said there was a letter. Do you have reason to believe that it was intercepted?"
Hermione turned to Tim, looking impressed by his line of reasoning. "Actually, we do. Professor McGonagall told Harry that communications in and out of Hogwarts were being monitored, isn't that right, Harry?" The boy in question nodded quickly.
So, chances were that Harry's owl had, in fact, been intercepted. "And what were the contents of this letter, exactly?" Normally, Tim wouldn't pry into something like that, but the fact that Hedwig had been intercepted and still managed to show up at Hogwarts with said letter meant that whoever had intercepted her was okay with Harry seeing this message. Perhaps they wanted Harry to see it.
Harry fished around his pocket and pulled out a crumpled-up piece of parchment. "It was from, uh…" He looked at Hermione nervously. "…Snuffles…"
Tim looked to Hermione for an explanation for this one. After checking to see if anyone was nearby, she put her hands up to shield her mouth from those in her periphery. She then mouthed 'Sirius' to him slowly.
Harry was in contact with Sirius Black? The same Sirius Black that was a wanted fugitive of the state? It had to be a miracle that no one had traced an owl to the Order's headquarters. That or, more likely, the apparent Fidelius Charm over the property. Tim hurriedly snatched the paper out of Harry's hand.
Today, same time, same place.
"You're meeting with him?" whispered Tim, who was trying to decide what level of stupid this idea was. This wasn't even Steph-stupid—this was bordering on Kon-El-stupid. "I thought he was supposed to be in hiding!"
Ron took the letter and handed it back to Harry. "Chill, mate, it's just with Floo Powder."
"Which, from what I've read, is monitored by the Ministry of Magic!" he shouted in a whisper. "What do you think they're going to do when there's activity coming from a Hogwarts fireplace connected to seemingly nowhere? If they can't find the other fireplace, they'll know something's up. So they'll have to track down the one end of the connection that they could identify, the Hogwarts fireplace. Do you want Ministry officials snooping around the school? Isn't one enough?"
"Well, what are we supposed to do?" Hermione whisper-shouted back, panicked. "Siri—Snuffles doesn't know that it was intercepted, he's still going to make that connection. If he's going to show up either way, shouldn't we at least get something out of it?"
Tim sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose between his fingers. "Ideally, you should just let him show up, realize none of you are there, and then he'll leave. We can at least minimize the amount of time the connection is held."
"But what if it's something important?" argued Harry.
"If it was important, he could have told McGonagall or Snape, and one of them could have told you."
Harry didn't look pleased at this statement. He shook his head. "No. I'm going to talk to him tonight. I don't care."
"You should! The secrecy of the Order of the Phoenix is at stake!"
Harry rolled his eyes, which was when Tim knew that he had lost the argument and there would be no convincing Harry otherwise. "He knows the risk. If he thinks it's safe, I trust him."
Tim thought back to the lonely man in Grimmauld Place, and he wondered if it would even matter to Sirius how safe it was at this point. In one of the works of Ibn Sina that Tim had skimmed through in Dumbledore's office, the philosopher made the claim that human beings cannot survive alone. What was Sirius willing to do to survive? And, more importantly, was he willing to bring the entire Order down with himself?
That night, Tim was tempted to head up Gryffindor Tower and observe the meeting with Sirius. The only place those three could be meeting Sirius after curfew would be the Gryffindor common room, which Tim could only assume hosted a fireplace. It wouldn't be that difficult, really. Tim had been keeping track of the Slytherin and Gryffindor passwords since he discovered that both common rooms required them for entry; Slytherin was on their third one (Weedosoros), while Gryffindor was on their second (Flummadiddle). And if the woman in the portrait didn't let Tim in, he could always scale the place from the outside and slip in through a window, though that would require a truly unique explanation for Hermione, Ron, and Harry.
But, ultimately, Tim decided against this. Even if he tried to stop Harry from meeting Sirius, there was no way to stop Sirius from meeting Harry, and Tim had the feeling that Sirius would brush off Tim's concerns just like his godson had. He would just have to hope that they would advise Sirius against any future meetings.
He would come to regret this when Hermione informed him on their way to lunch on Tuesday that Umbridge had broken up their conversation with Sirius.
"What?" This! This was what I was trying to avoid! "So, this confirms that Umbridge either attacked Hedwig or had someone else do it, read Snuffles's letter, understood what his vague words meant, and actively intervened on said conversation."
"Yeah, pretty much," said Ron glumly.
"Peachy…" Tim muttered. "Any other pressing matters I should know about?"
Hermione shook her head. "Nope, that's pretty much it." Next to her, Harry was unusually quiet, avoiding eye contact with Tim like a child who had been caught writing on the wall. Figures.
In contrast to yesterday, Harry and the others were practically bouncing in their seats the following day during Transfiguration, each of them constantly looking at Tim from across the room and giving him enthusiastic grins.
Finally, the bell rang, and class was dismissed. Harry practically dragged Tim away from Cordelia and Purdie, chaperoning him down to lunch.
"Okay, what's all the excitement about?" asked Tim when Hermione and Ron stared at Harry eagerly.
"I have a room for the Defense Against the Dark Arts club!" Harry practically shouted, and Tim winced, subtly checking around them to see if anyone had heard this outburst.
"Where?"
"It's on the seventh floor opposite that tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy being clubbed by those trolls."
"There's no room there," said Tim automatically, because he'd passed that painting nearly a dozen times while mapping out the castle.
"That's the thing, it's hidden," Harry said dramatically. "It's called the Room of Requirement, and it only appears when you have a specific need for it."
"If it's hidden, how did you find it?"
"Dobby—he's a house-elf—" Harry tacked on helpfully, "told me about it." Tim wasn't surprised to know that other people chatted with the house-elves. The one he often spoke to, Tisky, was also wont to explain the layout of the castle to Tim whenever they came across one another.
"Great. When do we start?"
"Tonight at eight," said Hermione. "Pass it on." Great. Tim was itching to begin. Or maybe he was just itching to start breaking another set of rules.
On the way to the seventh floor, Cordelia kept up a constant one-sided babble. "I wonder what we're going to learn first! Do you think it makes more sense to learn jinxes or counter-jinxes first? If this is about defending ourselves, counter-jinxes would make more sense, but I've read that it's often easier to learn counter-jinxes after you've learned their respective jinxes. Or maybe he's saving jinxes for another lesson?"
"I think," Tim said as they approached the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy, "that that door wasn't there before." Well, he didn't think it. He knew it. Tim would have known if there was a twelve-foot tall arched portal with a set of polished doors in the center in this hallway. It wasn't exactly inconspicuous.
An older Gryffindor approached them from behind. "Is this the place?" Purdie nodded, though he looked like he was still trying to come to terms with the fact that there was a door here where there was once only stone masonry.
By the time Tim entered the room, Aruna was already comfortably seated on a large cushion around a few Gryffindors. Tim found himself having to take a moment to take in the whole place. The walls were lined with bookshelves housing dozens of copies of different textbooks. There was a whole batch of martial arts dummies marked up like shooting targets. On the right wall was a cabinet filled with bottles labelled 'Skele-Gro.' The room, as its name promised, had truly provided everything this club would require.
It seemed that all the students were prompt in their arrival, so that, at eight o'clock sharp, everyone had fallen completely silent, waiting for Harry to speak. Harry, who was looking very pale and very tense.
"Well," he started, clearing his throat, "This is the place we've found for practices, and you've—er—obviously found it okay—"
"It's fantastic!" Cho interrupted, which felt like an act of divine mercy, granting Harry a couple more seconds to compose himself. Cordelia stared around at the room like it was an answer to all her prayers.
"It's bizarre," added Fred. "We once hid from Filch in here, remember, George?" Beside him, George nodded solemnly. "But it was just a broom cupboard then…"
"Hey, Harry, what's this stuff?" a Gryffindor in Tim's Transfiguration class asked, pointing to a shelf with a variety of devices on it, like the stuff that Dumbledore had in his office.
By this point, Harry had finally found his voice. "Dark Detectors. Basically they all show when Dark wizards or enemies are around, but you don't want to rely on them too much, they can be fooled…" He looked at one of the reflective surfaces and then, with a well-concealed wince, turned back around to address the students.
"Well, I've been thinking about the sort of stuff we ought to do first and—er—"
Hermione's hand shot into the air like they were in an actual classroom.
"What, Hermione?"
She quickly lowered her hand. "I think we ought to elect a leader."
"Harry's leader," Cho immediately said, and Tim remembered the way that she and Harry had been looking at each other at the Hog's Head.
Yep. Definitely a mutual crush going on here.
"Yes, but I think we ought to vote on it properly," Hermione said. "It makes it formal, and it gives him authority. So—" she stood up, and it seemed like she had made the executive decision to hold a vote right here and now, "—everyone who thinks Harry ought to be our leader?"
The answer was immediate and unanimous.
Harry laughed nervously. "Er—right, thanks. And—what, Hermione?"
"I also think we ought to have a name. It would promote a feeling of team spirit and unity, don't you think?" Tim was sensing a secret co-leadership here.
"Can we be the Anti-Umbridge League?" said a Gryffindor girl, eliciting a handful of chuckles.
"Or the Ministry of Magic Are Morons Group?" suggested Fred.
"I was thinking," Hermione said, a little louder than before, "more of a name that didn't tell everyone what we were up to, so we can refer to it safely outside meetings."
"The Defense Association?" Purdie posited. "The D.A. for short, so nobody knows what we're talking about?"
"Yeah, the D.A.'s good," said Ginny, nodding sagely. "Only let's make it stand for Dumbledore's Army because that's the Ministry's worst fear, isn't it?" That got a laugh out of Tim. He hadn't really ever talked to Ginny, but he decided that he liked her already.
Surprisingly, Hermione jumped onto this bandwagon. "All in favor of the D.A.?" Again, a headcount was hardly necessary at this point. "That's a majority—motion passed!" She reached into her bookbag and pulled out the list of signed names from their meeting in Hogsmeade and pinned it to the wall, writing "Dumbledore's Army" at the top with a flourish.
Harry had them start with the Disarming Charm, Expelliarmus, a spell in which a certain Zacharias Smith did not seem particularly interested until it was made known to him that Harry had, in fact, used the spell against Voldemort, at which point Zacharias suddenly became much more attentive to Harry's instructions.
Fortunately for Tim, the Disarming Charm was one of a couple of spells that he had practiced to perfection over the summer. Out of all the spells in his books, he had easily recognized this one as the most useful, especially in his line of work. Getting a gun out of someone's hand with a single spell? Of course he'd want to know it.
He did feel a little guilty when pairing up, as though he had an unfair advantage, but perhaps that was a valuable lesson for these students to learn, that fights were never evenly-matched. Apparently, Purdie would be the one to learn that today.
From behind Tim, Harry called out, "Right—on the count of three, then—one, two, three—"
"Expelliarmus!" whispered Tim, and Purdie was sent flying backwards, disappearing into a pile of cushions.
Whoops…Guess that was a little too strong…
"Blimey…" Ron breathed, wide-eyed. Tim jogged over and offered Purdie his hand.
"You alright?" Tim asked him, helping him up and going to retrieve his wand, which was on the other side of the room.
"Yeah," Purdie assured him. "That was bloody incredible, Tim. How'd you do that?"
Tim laughed. "Truth be told, I learned that spell over the summer."
"Ah. Figures," said Purdie, though he did not look the least bit put-off by this new information. "All right, let's try this again." Tim gave the boy a couple seconds handicap to disarm him, but Purdie's spell hit Tim in the arm and barely made it tingle.
"How's it going, you two?" From across the room, Harry had approached, seemingly making the rounds to check in on students. Already he was a better teacher than Umbridge.
"Tim's killing it," Purdie immediately said, his voice muffled by the cushions into which he had once again fallen.
Harry raised an eyebrow. "Really? Mind showing me?"
"No problem," said Tim after he had helped Purdie back up again. The two backed up a couple steps.
Harry nodded in approval of their stances. "All right, then. Three…two…one—"
Tim and Purdie both said "Expelliarmus!" at the same time, but, while Purdie's spell fizzled out halfway to Tim, Tim's hit him directly in the chest, sending him tumbling back into the pillows. Purdie's wand soared in a nice arc right into Tim's hand.
"Wow." Harry hurried over to help the Ravenclaw up. "That was incredible, Tim."
Tim thanked him, but he couldn't help but feel sick watching Purdie get back up. If the boy was in a real fight, he would have been dead already. Without his wand, he was completely defenseless.
In fact, looking at the others around him, Tim could see that this was not an isolated problem. When their wands were taken, these kids had no clue what to do except for trying to find their wands again.
"Say, Harry?" Tim walked over to him, careful to keep his voice low and not to make a scene. That wasn't what this was about, not by a long shot. "I'd like to make a suggestion for the curriculum of this club." Harry looked a little hurt at this, which was understandable, given that he had clearly never taken a real leadership role like this before and probably still saw all suggestions as flat-out criticisms. But he allowed Tim to continue.
"Y-yeah. What's your idea?"
"Unarmed maneuvers."
Harry stared blankly at Tim like the concept was entirely foreign to him. "Why would we need to know that? We have wands."
"Currently, you do, but what about when an opponent disarms you faster than you get to them. What are you supposed to do?"
Harry took a moment, furrowing his brow. "Uh, I'm…" he scratched the back of his head, "…not sure, actually. I'd think the top priority would be getting my hands on a wand, any wand, really."
"But you can't always do that, can you?" He gestured over at Purdie. "Like, just now, for instance. I didn't just disarm Purdie, I took his weapon. Now what's he supposed to do?"
"Take cover, I guess?"
"Which will keep you alive for maybe another minute." He glanced around at the other students practicing. "I'm just saying that people need to be able to defend themselves whether or not they have a wand in hand." Tim could see in Harry's eyes that the idea made sense, but the boy was frowning like he didn't want to admit that.
"And who would be able to teach that? That's not exactly my field of expertise."
"Luckily for you," Tim grinned, "it just so happens to be mine."
Me, writing about Study of Ancient Runes and going into way too much detail about the syllabus: at last, my years of learning Latin and Ancient Greek have led to this exact moment