Defense Against the Dark Arts is one definition of DADA. Daft Actor Doing Abysmally is the one that was written clearly on all the Hogwarts student's timetables, and for once Fred and George Weasley swore their innocence, and admiration.
For once, Hermione was guilty.
Hermione's reaction to DADA class being turned into musical theater, where Gildroy Lockheart's own portraits formed the chorus, was beyond negative. School was a church to Hermione, a shrine to learning and what was practiced there was her sacrament and worship.
Now the Purple Ponce was turning it into an utterly inappropriate grooming exercise for Gildroy Lockheart to whip his underage female fans into a worshipful frenzy, while filling their heads with nonsense that would do nothing but get you killed in a confrontation with the vampire, werewolf, banshee or whatever creature the current lie was about.
Noodle had identified the low level charm being put off by Lockheart as being potion based, similar to the Amortentia, or love potion, only greatly weakened by its use as a perfume. It was enough to induce fascination and to greatly enhance any natural attraction that may be present, or may be induced situationally, but not enough to cross the detection threshold hours later if a competent Mediwitch were to use a diagnostic to check for its presence. Worse, repeated exposures would layer enough suggestions that the target would grow to accept the thoughts and urges as their own. Grooming. Granted she had no evidence he was doing anything with her second year classes, but she had no one she knew enough to get information from in the higher classes. No one put that much effort into magical seduction if they were not in fact a predator.
Milicent and Neville shrugged it off. After all, since the most powerful Light wizard in existence hired the git, he must clearly know of and tolerate the abuse. Neville chose to believe that meant Dumbledore wouldn't let anything truly objectionable happen. Milicent patted his hand in a way that said "you are very sweet, and very dim, and I will take care of the things you don't need to know about", because Slytherin could be supportive and murderous in the same gesture. Their communication economy was fairly impressive to Hermione.
Harry favored confronting him directly. They had killed the last DADA professor and gotten away with it, so clearly it wasn't off the table.
Hermione had been dealing with Auror Dawlish and his cronies all year, and rather suspected that Gildroy Lockheart was some form of trap. They could not act against him directly, but they could and should force him to act directly instead, and expose him as a fraud and pervert.
Today's DADA class was promising to be less boring, as Lockheart insisted everyone draw their wands, and be prepared to defend themselves.
The Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw students drew their wands and prepared for some sort of menace, but Ravenclaw Marietta Edgecomb burst out laughing and identified the caged creatures on Lockheart's desk.
"Five points Ravenclaw, yes indeed, these are freshly caught Cornish Pixies, and they have been devenomed this morning through a potion from our dear Professor Snape, so do not fear for your lives. The Pixie is one of a number of magical swarming pests, many of which can kill you quite swiftly if you lack the trained reflexes of an Order of Merlin (Third Class) and Dark Defense League Knight (honourary) like myself."
Said Lockheart preening visibly, his ranked portraits leading the applause of the female half of the class to his posturing.
"Now now, I am not the only celebrity in this class. We are graced with Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, and as anyone can tell you, the more books written about you, the more important and powerful you must be, and Harry has even more books written about him than I do." Gildroy said lightly.
Gildroy smiled cruelly, ready to complete his preplanned dominance play to establish himself as the one true celebrity in Hogwarts.
"For that reason, when I release the Pixies, I will let the class see what they can do on their own, then let Mr Potter finish up the rest if they prove too much for you." Lockheart said, opening the cage, and stepping back through the door to his teacher's prep room to watch the festivities in peace; ready to step in once the boy had been properly humiliated.
The Pixies charged everywhere, grabbing inkpots and hurling them at students, stealing wands and grabbing long hair to pull witches forward by, or pulling male students robes over their heads to blind and muffle them.
Neville and Hermione were stunning any that came at them, but Hermione turned and told Harry. "Look, he's not going to do anything until you deal with these little idiots. If Neville and I do something beyond potting the occassional one, we are going to damage them. Can't you do a little air stuff?" Hermione made a little sweeping motion, indicating Harry should clean up the mess.
Harry on the whole didn't like to use his wind magic, as it seemed rather happier to unleash storms of wind and lightning to devastate whole city blocks than to do casual dusting of his dorm room, but he had been practicing.
With a sigh, he raised his wand and made a circular motion, chanting "hvirfilvindr" and a whirlwind was born from his wand tip.
With a growing smile, he directed his whirlwind to dance around the room and collect pixies. Soon the tornado was shot with gaping mouths, wide eyes and flailing hands as little blue winged pixies spun in the wind like they were berries in a muggle smoothie blender.
He directed the whilwind to collect most of the pixies and shot them from the bottom of the wind into the cage where they were too dizzy and pummelled to rise.
Gildroy Lockheart's face looked like he had just bitten a Berty Bot Every Flavoured Bean named vomit, clearly unhappy with his planned chaos. He strode forth from the class and found Hermione sneering openly at him.
"Not quite the result you were hoping for, Professor?" Hermione said in a caricature of politeness.
Gildroy looked at her. A mop of brown curls with a small girl attached. Not a hint of curve on her, nor any trace of proper aristocratic features. Plain girl. Honestly, if she was actually ugly she would at least be interesting to look at. How dare such a plain non-entity seek to mock Gildroy Lockheart?
"For a girl with neither beauty nor any trace of grace, you seem to be entirely too comfortable with letting famous wizards defend you. It won't be long until he grows up a bit and finds virtually any other girl more interesting than you. Who will defend you then?" Lockheart sneered.
One pixie who had been hiding in the candelabra while the whirlwind hunted, dove down at Lockheart in an attempt to grab hold of his perfect ringlets and rip off a handful. Unfortunetly for the screaming Lockheart who ducked from Hermione's drawn wand under the assumption that it was meant for him, she was actually targeting the pixie.
"Incindeo" She muttered and the diving pixie burst into flames. It fell onto the ground and screamed as it rolled from side to side. Lockheart finally fumbled out his wand and cast a shaky Auguamenti to pour water on the pixe, but the pixie continued to burn, even under the water until it died.
Hermione looked at the pixie, then poked it with her foot. Making a tsk tsk noise she turned to Lockheart and smiled. "I imagine I'll be fine, don't you think sir?" Hermione said smiling brightly.
Lockheart backed away, and dismissed their class.
If the morning DADA class was offputting, the afternoon class was actively disturbing.
This time, Gildroy Lockheart was facing the Slytherin/Griffindor class, and he was simply trying to build his reputation as a dangerous wizard in their minds. The Griffindors were not Ravenclaws to believe something just because they read it, and the Slytherin respected only power. For that reason, he had to demonstrate his power on something safe, so he didn't have to do it again when he got to actually dangerous beasts.
Gildroy began with his trademark speech about the pixies.
"Yes indeed, these are freshly caught Cornish Pixies, and they have been devenomed this morning through a potion from our dear Professor Snape, so do not fear for your lives. The Pixie is one of a number of magical swarming pests, many of which can kill you quite swiftly if you lack the trained reflexes of an Order of Merlin (Third Class) and Dark Defense League Knight (honourary) like myself."
This time, he wasn't planning on leaving it to the students, but to use the spell he had learned from the actual pest exterminator he based his book on. The poor fellow got oblivated back into idiocy before Lockheart was done with him, but his own invented pixie binding spell had indeed made him locally famous and rich enough to draw Lockheart's attention.
He had practiced the spell in front of the mirror a hundred times, turning the boring snarled barely verbal grunts into a properly theatrical delivery, but the basic wand movements and words were still there. His was just a whole lot easier to appreciate. No wham bam thank you ma'am from Gildroy Lockheart! When he cast a spell, he wanted everyone to appreciate his sheer artistry and presence! Not like he was facing a Dementor after all.
"Now, I will release the pixies, and demonstrate the Pixie binding charm. I expect I will bag almost all of them, but there should be a few left for you students to show what you have learned from your other professor. Of course, he got killed by a first year, so he can't have actually had much to teach you." Mocked Lockheart, making Draco Malfoy in the audience seethe with rage.
Draco Malfoy didn't know that Voldemort was Tom Riddle, but Tom Riddle did. Hearing himself mocked like that by a patent fraud like that hit Tom in his ego, which bled through to hit Draco's already fragile ego, and set the two of them into a spiral of self amplifying rage.
Lockheart released the Pixies and began gesturing theatrically and chanting like he was acting the part of Merlin in some staged Artherian drama, not engaging in close quarters combat with a swarm of pixies released already inside arms reach.
Malfoy had no idea if the spell would have worked, Lockheart's wand was plucked from his hand and his nose tweaked harshly by two different Pixies who proceeded to steal his cravat and blindfold him with it.
Lockheart screamed and crawled beneath his desk, clearly leaving the students to their own devices.
Draco Malfoy saw the little beasts take Crabbe's wand away and blind Goyle with a splash of ink to the face. Then they lifted Pansy by her hair to dangle in the air, which ought to be impossible for such small figures, but he knew they had mass altering magic of their own.
If they thought it was fun to dangle things in the air, so be it.
"Leviocorpus Acer" Malfoy snarled, and made a gesture similar to fly fishing as he caught half the darting pixies in his curse. This was based on the Leviocorpus jinx his uncle Severus had tried to teach him. Draco didn't used to have the raw power to make it work, but since finding Tom and the diary, dark magics came to him so much easier and he had so much more raw power to use them with.
Tom had suggested a change. Leviocorpus dangled subjects upside down from their ankles, but did no real harm. Leviocorpus Acer added a piercing element to the jink, making it a proper dark magic combat spell.
A dozen cornish pixies were caught in the whip of dark magic, and a black wire of curse magic pierced both legs between ankle and achilles tendon and dangled them upside down like so many caught rabbits strung up for the cookpot.
The little pixies whimpered in pain, and a fine rain of blood dripped down them as they twitched and fluttered helplessly. The class looked on with a mix of shock and horror, except for Milicent Bulstrode who was busy dealing with the rest.
Taking out her own wand she raised it up, and slashed it down with authority, calling out "Haglaz".
Icy hail sprang from the ceiling and hammered the pixies to the ground. Sweeping her wand in a much tighter motion, she traced a short vertical slash less than five centemeters with her wand, leaving a short glowing " I " hanging in mid air as she whispered "Isa".
The downed pixies were frozen but unharmed and she simply used a muttered "Accio Pixies" To refill the cage with the frozen pixies, leaving only Draco's hanging, bleeding, and whimpering ones.
Draco looked at Milicent and sneered. Milicent looked at Draco and raised one eyebrow.
Dominance attempted, and ignored.
If Draco thought to cow Milicent Bulstrode with a demonstration of brutality, he had been raised far more gently than a Half Blooded daughter in a Pure Blood dark family.
"Well, stuff them in." Milicent said, tired of holding the cage door open while Draco Malfoy played dominance games.
"Or do I need to get a Weasley like Ron over there to show you how to stick it in?" Milicent said in a reference to his rumoured parentage she would regret making later, but at the time she was too annoyed at his bullshit dominance games to care.
Malfoy flushed red, and directed the Pixies into the cage as Ron Weasley set off the whole class into laughter as he defended his father's honour.
"It's not true. My dad never looked at another woman. He would never touch a filthy snake like Malfoy's mum." Swore Ron hotly.
"Yeah," Said Seamus Finnegan, "Even if she is hot enough to be a coverwitch."
"And stacked" Chimed in Dean Thomas.
"Why wouldn't he?" Said Tracy Davis. "I've seen Weasley's mother, and no offense, but Narcissa Malfoy is one of the great beauties of her generation, and Weasley's mom is just..."
Draco Malfoy lost it again. "My mother would never let a Weasley even look at her!"
Daphne Greengrass chimed in "But you have to admit he would want to."
"Not helping Daphne" Said Milicent.
"I'm just saying." Protested Tracy Davis
"Did more than look, I heard." Said someone from the back of the Griffindor side.
Draco Malfoy was beyond all reason when he left DADA. He had told the diary that all he needed was to demonstrate his power to claim his rightful place in Slytherin as the Heir of Slytherin and their rightful ruler. Tom had argued he needed to do more than talk, Hogwarts needed to be cleansed of the Mudbloods and Blood traitors, the halls needed to run red with blood, before they could truly be clean again.
Draco thought Tom wanted Draco to do what he feared to, all those years ago, but dared not say it to the one voice that was still on his side. Once again, Tom was right.
The time for words and pretty demonstrations was done. It was time the Heir of Slytherin taught Hogwarts to fear the sound of his name, and obey the whisper of his words.
That night, after curfew, a Ravenclaw Ghost sat in her toilet and sang softly to herself. She liked night time. No pesky students in the hallways, no intruders in her toilet. She died here all those years ago, and still they wouldn't leave her alone.
The door opened. A boy came in. Blond hair, and very pretty. A Slytherin.
"You are very pretty for a boy, but you cannot be in here. This is a girl's bathroom." Myrtle said.
Draco screamed and dropped the black diary in his hands.
"I don't know what you are screaming about. I didn't break into your toilet. I do like to sneak into the senior prefect's bathrooms when they are showering, and they do tend to scream, but this is my bathroom, and you have your clothes on." Myrtle said, spinning in mid air in unconcern. She was sensitive, for a ghost, but still a ghost.
"Who are you?" Malfoy screamed again, really not responding well to this many surprises.
"This is Myrtle's bathroom. Everyone knows that. I am Myrtle. You are in my bathroom. A girl's bathroom." Myrtle stressed again, and tried to peek at the dropped diary.
"Oooh is that a diary. All your thoughts and fears poured into it. I had one once, the only person I shared it with was Tom, but he stopped coming after I died." Myrtle said, swooping for the diary, but when she touched it she cried out in pain and retreated in tears.
"Meany! How can you hurt a poor dead girl like me? " Myrtle sobbed. "You aren't pretty after all!" She dove into her toilet, and in her tears, began to cause it to back up all over the floor.
Draco picked up the precious diary before it could get wet. Holding it in his hands, he walked to the sink with the serpent taps. Closing his eyes, he tried to open himself fully to the diary, to let its cold essence flow into him.
He had been working on these exercises for weeks, and he was starting to black out sometimes when he did so. He would come to in a different part of the Dungeon, with no memory of how he got there, but Tom seemed to tell him that was all a part of learning to tap the powers of the Heir of Slytherin. He couldn't be the true Heir unless he opened the chamber, and he could not open the chamber until he could speak the words.
Draco was proud of his birth, proud of his pure blood, and even more proud of their allegiance to the Dark Lord who spoke Slytherin's own tongue. Now he was stuck in a school where two half bloods, a blood traitor and a MUGGLEBORN all spoke Parseltongue while he, the Malfoy heir, could not.
The diary could change that. Tom swore if he opened himself fully enough, let the power flow into him fully enough, he too could speak it. He could take the spirit of the Heir into himself, and become a Speaker. Like Voldemort, he could become Slytherin's Heir and the world would tremble before him.
Draco felt the water from the overflowing toilet soak into his socks. Bitter tears rolled down his face as something nudged his shoe. He would not look. He would NOT. He was a Malfoy. Ignoring a sobbing ghost and backing up toilet, Draco Malfoy poured his heart and soul into Tom Riddle's diary, and felt his mind grow blank.
The expression of a fragile little boy fell from Draco Malfoy's face, and an expression Myrtle might well have recognized replaced it. The calm confident tones of Tom Riddle sounded from the mouth of Draco Malfoy and spoke only one word.
"$ Open $"
Dust added a layer to the overflowing toilet water as the chamber opened for the first time in decades. With a smile, the Heir of Slytherin stalked into the chamber to awaken its sleeping guardian.
He had held back the last time because his soul could not bear the burden of the blood of wizarding children, even to bring forth the world they deserved but were robbed of. This time, this time he would not hold back his hand. This time, he would do what was necessary and cleanse Hogwarts as the first step to reshaping a pure and untainted wizarding Britain.
Tom Marvolo Riddle did not know why the him who had left Hogwarts had failed to bring about this vision the first time, but this diary was his second chance, and he would fix what his original had failed to do.
The Dark Lord that should have been would rise. The Heir of Slytherin was reborn.