And here's the twenty eighth chapter of "A Year Too Soon"! Enjoy!
* Review Response:
YDdraigGoch94, isn't that Numerology, a branch of Arithmancy?
DarkRavie, Clearhorse, Clavyus, LifeIsAGreatAdventure, Dovack, Amortal, mizzrazz72, Yaw613, lou2003us, JaxesKain, hellfire45, mwinter1, nkh1, Autismguy593, Shin1gam1, Calmzone1, richard333, Luiz4200, Hoshi124, Guest, Casey Chua, Kuman, thank you for your reviews, folks!
Pixel and Stephanie Forever, well, I had just wikipedia and the likes to take information from. I believe, I did adequately. =P
magitech, you're probably right there. Might be an interesting point for OWLs to have Harry (or Flora, or Hestia) argue against the examiners about Muggle world.
Noble Korhedron, long story short, I lost my previous job and had to quickly find a new one with a decent compensation/salary. It's... not exactly an easy task.
John Patrick Ryan Sr, horcruxes will be discussed soon-ish, and Room of Requirement will be visited before the end of the year.
NabikiB, I believe almost every country still has steam trains for tourists. I wasn't talking about those, though.
* AN: As always, great thanks to my friend Skelekitty for his help in polishing this chapter.
Disclaimer: I DO NOT own "Harry Potter" franchise. No profit is being made. Same goes for any books, video games, anime or manga I may or may not use for ideas.
"speaking"
"parseltongue"
'thinking'
written text
spells
A Year Too Soon
Chapter XXVIII: Hogsmeade Weekend
As Professor Lockhart's teaching saw no improvements over the next couple of weeks - the classes were still nothing more than readings of the man's own adventure novels - Harry decided that something had to be done. Defense Against the Dark Arts was an important subject, and losing an entire year of it because the Headmaster had somehow hired a man more interested in his own fame than in teaching anything useful wasn't something that the young Potter would tolerate. And many of his classmates agreed with him there.
Harry, however, wasn't sure whether is was alright for the students to approach the Headmaster directly with a petition to do something about one of their teachers was a proper way of doing things, so he decided to enlist his head of house's help.
"Come in." Professor Snape grunted from within his office. Taking a deep breathe to steel his nerves, Harry opened the door and stepped inside. "Something I can do for you, Mr. Potter?" The Potions Master asked, looking up from whatever he had been reading.
"Sir." The green-eyed youth spoke. "After two weeks of classes with him, my classmates and I feel that Professor Lockhart is not fit to teach at Hogwarts, much less something as important as Defense Against the Dark Arts. And we would like you to bring our concerns to the Headmaster's attention." Harry said before giving a parchment with a dozen signatures he had collected in support of either making Gilderoy Lockhart teach DADA properly or finding a better DADA Professor to the Head of Slytherin.
"I see…" The man said once he took a good look at that parchment. After a few moments of silence, he continued: "I'll deliver your petition to the Headmaster, Mr. Potter. Hopefully, it, along with the complaints made by your upperclassmen and students from other houses, will see something done about that man's teaching, but I don't want to give you any false hopes."
"Thank you, Sir." Harry replied.
"Now, if you don't mind, I have Potions essays to grade." Giving his head of the house a brief nod, the green-eyed wizard quickly left the office.
~/ *** \~
While Harry didn't really expect anything to come from his appeal to Professor Snape this soon, he was still a bit disappointed that even after a whole week nothing at all appeared to have been done about Professor Lockhart and his lackluster teaching methods. Hopefully, he was just being impatient… However, if reading one's own novels was an acceptable method of teaching a class, then, Harry decided, he might as well seek knowledge elsewhere, either from his upperclassmen or through some sort of a self-instruction group and old textbooks that could be found in the school's library.
Shaking his head slightly, the young Potter pushed those thoughts aside. It was breakfast time now and he really shouldn't be thinking about stuff like this so early in the morning. Especially when he had Flora and Hestia, his best friends, for the company.
The three of them walked past the grand marble staircase and were about to enter the Great Hall when they saw Hagrid talking to Sylvanus Kettleburn next to the castle's main doors. Nothing that would be too interesting if not for a dead rooster the gamekeeper had in his hands.
"I'm telling you, Hagrid, it wasn't done by a fox or some other forest creature." The Care for Magical Creatures Professor said. "No such creature would strangle every single rooster in your pen - and by strangle I mean exactly that, not biting through their necks - and not eat a single one. Quite honestly, to me it sounds like a work of some vandal who doesn't like chicken."
"But who would do somethin' like tha'?!" The half-giant asked, waving the dead rooster he was holding around. And not even his deep, booming voice could completely hide the fact that this whole thing actually had the man on the verge of tears.
"That I don't know." Professor Kettleburn replied. "I'm simply telling you how Hogwarts' stock of chickens has most likely died." Hagrid looked a bit upset upon hearing that. There was a brief pause, before he spoke:
"If it was a fox that killed'em after all, can yeh put a ward around the pen 'fore the new ones arrive, Professor?" He asked. The much-injured Magizoologist nodded.
"Of course." He said, before bowing out and walking into the Great Hall. Hagrid just stood there for a couple of moments before turning around and heading back to his hut.
"Something happened to Hagrid's little farm, it seems." Harry summed up. "Do you think it really was some student that killed all those chickens like Professor Kettleburn says?" He asked the twins then. The girls looked at each other, before shrugging.
"Well, that's what he says." Flora said. "Bit I can't really think of a reason why someone would sneak out of the castle at night and kill the roosters. I don't think we have anyone who hates eggs and chicken that much, do we?"
"So this isn't a scheme of some cult of insane chicken-haters, good to know." The green-eyed wizard joked poorly. And was immediately punched on his shoulder by Flora. While the tree of them were straightening themselves up, a Gryffindor firstie with a chicken feather stuck in her red hair slipped into the Great Hall with no one paying her any mind.
"Harry, be serious." Hestia admonished him. "You shouldn't say things like that."
"Alright, alright, that was a wrong thing to say." Harry agreed. "But, like you said, no one has any reason to go and kill all those chicken. Hell, I think a lot of the students don't even know that Hagrid has… well, had, them. What happened tonight is just weird." The twins nodded in agreement.
"That it is." Hestia said.
"Alright, let's hope that whatever it might have been, won't happen again" Harry said, receiving another nod of agreement from the girls. "Now then, there is a breakfast waiting for us. Let's go eat it before someone else eats it for us."
~/ *** \~
Another week passed without much of anything happening and then, suddenly, Lockhart decided to have a change of heart and actually taught a lesson for once. Well, he was still reading passages from his novel, but now he was giving incantations of the spells mentioned in the books. The blond wizard also explained why those particular spells were used in that situation and in what other way those spells could be used to defend oneself against Magical Creatures or Dark wizards.
"What has happened to Professor Lockhart today?" Flora wondered aloud. "He actually taught the class properly." Harry nodded: today they learned more about actual Defense Against the Dark Arts than in all previous classes this year combined.
"I don't know, but I hope he's teaching like that from now on." The green-eyed wizard replied.
His wish wasn't meant to come true, though, and the next class the things were back to usual: no talking about various spells and ways to use them, no background on Magical beasts, nothing. Just dramatic reading of Lockhart's novels with the man occasionally commenting on how handsome and heroic he was in a particular scene.
Understandably, it did nothing to improve his popularity with the student body, and quite a few were wondering why the man wasn't teaching his classes properly when he was actually able to. The other question, of course, was why he actually taught that one class well, but didn't any other. And while people could only speculate about the answer to the former, the latter got a definitive answer when Professor Snape called a house meeting.
"The Headmaster had received your complaints about Professor Lockhart and his ...style of teaching." The Potions Master said. "A member of staff was sent to discreetly observe his classes in order to determine the validity of your accusations. And, according to them Professor Lockhart's teaching is rather unorthodox but does meet the quality standards set for Hogwarts' Professors. No action will be taken against him." This announcement with disapproval from the students, and even Professor Snape himself made it no secret that he wasn't happy with the result of this little investigation himself.
"Hm… Do you think that this observer sat through the class when Professor Lockhart was teaching properly?" Harry asked the twins.
"That is quite likely." Hestia agreed. "That would certainly explain why the class was so much better than usual. But how did he know that was being observer?" She asked.
"Some sort of a ward around the classroom that alerts him when there is someone other than him and his students inside, perhaps?" Harry presumed.
"You're probably right, Mr. Potter." Professor Snape, who apparently could hear their conversation, said. "Unfortunately, the Headmaster believes, quite adamantly, that this case is closed, so even if this ward is found and disabled without Lockhart noticing it, there, unfortunately, will be no second review of his classes by a member of faculty in the foreseeable future."
That, indeed, was very unfortunate as it meant that they were stuck with Professor Lockhart 'teaching' DADA for at least a few next months… Perhaps, the young Potter thought, he should really think about getting an upperclassman to tutor him and his friends. Or, if no one agreed to do that, found a study group and try to learn Defense Against the Dark Arts from the previous years' textbooks…
~/ *** \~
At long last, the most awaited day by the third-year students had arrived: their first Hogsmeade weekend.
Since Slytherin students had already given their permission slips to Professor Snape at the beginning of the year, all they had to do to leave the castle was to tell Mr. Filch that they were going to Hogsmeade and, once the man verified that their privilege to visit the village hadn't been revoked for one misdeed or another, they were free to go.
Harry, being pretty much an exemplary student, hadn't done anything to get himself blacklisted from visiting Hogsmeade - not that it stopped the school's caretaker from glaring at the piece of parchment in his hands for half a minute in hopes that it would somehow make the young Potter's name appear on the list of the students banned from leaving the castle he had there. The 'miracle' refused to happen, though, and the man had to let Harry out.
For whatever reason, Mr. Filch didn't seem to have nearly as much problem with Flora and Hestia and needed only a couple of seconds to confirm that they too were allowed to visit Hogsmeade.
Once outside the castle, Harry and the girls boarded one of the "horseless" carriage, which shuttled the students between Hogwarts and Hogsmeade. A few moments later they were joined by an older Hufflepuff students - the cold and windy weather made sure only a handful of students chose a walk over a carriage ride.
The journey itself went without any incidents and soon enough the carriage arrived at Hogsmeade.
Even though he had been there a few times before, this was the first time Harry had a chance to take a good look at the village. It wasn't actually very big - only a few dozens of houses of gray stone with high, tiled roofs huddling along the main street and a few smaller alleys connecting to it - but it was beautiful. Like an image from a postcard...
"What should we do, Harry?" Hestia asked, pulling him out of his thoughts.
"Hm…" The green-eyed youth hummed thoughtfully. "Perhaps we should do our shopping first and then go explore the village a little?" He suggested.
"That sounds like a plan." Flora agreed.
"Honeydukes first, then?" Harry asked.
Even though they were among the first students to arrive to Hogsmeade, by the time the three of them finally got to Honeydukes, it was already quite crowded inside the shop with students trying to get the sweets they wanted before the stock ran out. Yeah, this place was really popular… With a shrug, Harry dove into the crowd and the twins followed him a few moments later.
After surviving the crowds at Honeydukes, Harry, Flora and Hestia went to Scrivenshaft's Quill Shop, which sold quills and other assorted stationery. Thankfully, that place wasn't as popular with the Hogwarts students as Honeydukes and Harry was able to peacefully inspect sold goods while the twins bought some extra rolls of parchment for themselves and a couple of spare quills for Blaise.
The shop wasn't very big - definitely smaller than Amanuensis Quills or Scribbulus Writing Instruments in Diagon Alley - it still featured a wide selection of merchandise. In addition to simple quills of all sizes and colors imaginable and normal inks and parchment, the shop also sold various enchanted stationery. Self-inking quills, quills that corrected spelling mistakes, dicta-quills, inks that changed colors, invisible inks, parchments that allowed only select people to read what was written on them, and many other things. A few of those looked rather interesting too, though Harry wasn't going to buy any of them: he already had a pair of self-inking quills and the rest of interesting goods were either something that he had no actual need of, or were disallowed during the classes at Hogwarts.
"Alright, Harry. We're done here." Flora called once she and Hestia had everything they needed. "Shall we go?" Nodding, Harry walked away from the showcase and the three of them left the store.
"Where should we go next?" He asked then.
"Hm…" Flora hummed thoughtfully as she looked up and down the street. Then the Gladrags Wizardwear shop caught her eye. "Let's go check what they are selling?" She suggested. Her sister seemed to like the idea as well. Harry, on the other hand, wasn't especially interested in visiting a clothing store - what boy is? - but let the girls drag him into the shop regardless.
Much like the main branch in London, the Hogsmeade's "Gladrags Wizardwear" was full of quirky merchandise, including ridiculously-looking socks that screamed whenever they got too smelly or dirty. Of course, not everything in the store was as eccentric as that, normal robes, cloaks and dresses were sold there as well. And it were those 'normal' clothes that piqued the twins' interest. Leaving their bags with Harry they went to browse through the racks...
"Let's go grab some lunch?" Harry asked as he, Flora and Hestia finally left the wizardwear shop. The twins spent close to an hour trying outfits that caught their attention, asking Harry what he thought about them. The green-eyed youth didn't know much about clothing, but he could clearly see that some of those outfits made his companions look really nice. And while Flora and Hestia were in agreement with him about those clothes looking pretty good on them, they decided against buying anything today.
"Let's." Hestia agreed: it was an early afternoon already and everyone was getting a little hungry. "Three Broomsticks?" She suggested.
"Sure." Harry said: from what he knew about the village, 'The Three Broomsticks' inn was the only good place to get some lunch at. Sure, there were also 'Madam Puddifoot's Tea Shop' and the 'Hog's Head' inn, but the former was a place catering to couples on dates and didn't actually serve any proper meals, while the latter was a cheap, dingy pub that attracted interesting clientele - something that he'd rather not have to deal with right now.
The walk to 'The Three Broomsticks' was a quick one, and just a few minutes later the three teenagers stepped into the welcoming warmth of the inn. The place was a bit crowded and a bit smokey, but clean and welcoming. Thankfully, most of the students visiting Hogsmeade weren't there yet, so Harry, Flora and Hestia were able to claim a table for themselves with little difficulty.
Just as they sat down, three sets of menus magically appeared in front of them. Picking one up, the young Potter flipped through it, looking for something interesting that wasn't all that expensive - there were only four Hogsmeade weekends throughout the school year, so he might as well indulge himself a little… A couple of minutes later, their table was approached by Madam Rosmerta, the owner of the inn.
"Anything I can get for you, dearies?" The witch asked.
"Three butterbeers…" Harry began, but quickly trailed off, realizing that it was a bit arrogant of him to order Flora and Hestia drinks without even asking what they wanted. The twins, however, didn't seem to mind it, so he continued: "Three butterbeers, please." Madam Rosmerta nodded as she quickly noted something in her notepad. "And a plate of goulash for me." The witch nodded again.
"I'll have pork chops with a side of fried potatoes." Flora said.
"Can I have fish'n'chips please?" Hestia asked.
"Of course." Madam Rosmerta said, putting another note into her notepad. "Anything else?" The three teens shook their heads. "Alright then." The witch continued while making the menus zip away with a wave of her wand: "If you decide you want anything else, just ask." She then promised that their order would be done soon enough and walked away to service the next client.
After the lunch Harry, Flora and Hestia continued exploring Hogsmeade. Their first stop was the 'Tomes and Scrolls' bookstore. The shop had a nice collection of spellbooks in stock. There was a tome on Charms developed by wizards of Middle East and Central Asia. Or a diary-style book in which a seventeenth century explorer talked about various rituals used by African shamans. Or a book about weaving Magical effects into music or songs.
The latter two weren't of great interest to Harry, but the book of Charms did pique his interest. It was quite expensive however, and he couldn't afford to buy it right now. Thus, he did best to memorize its title and the author's name and hoped that it will still be in stock during his next Hogsmeade weekend.
The trio's next stop was the Hogsmeade Post Office - a large building housing several hundred of owls of all sizes and colors. Neither of the three teens had any need for postal services, of course, but it was still interesting to observe the various owls laze around on their perches. Harry in particular had an interest in them as he planned to get himself an owl during the next summer break.
Afterwards, they stopped by the Wizarding Wireless Network Headquarters. Alas, the WWN didn't conduct any tours, so the teen had no chance of learning anything about the inner workings of the Magical radio.
Their final stop was the Shrieking Shack, an abandoned house on the outskirts of the village which was rumored to be the most haunted building in Britain. How true those rumors were, however, was hard to say; though, the shack was definitely an odd building. It didn't look any more than fifty or so years old. Its windows were heavily barricaded and there wasn't any door that the three teens could see. It was almost like the shack was built as a house-shaped cage to permanently imprison something. Perhaps even some malevolent entity that the people believed to haunt the place...
After spending a few more minutes looking at the rundown shack, Harry, Flora and Hestia turned around and headed back to the village's central square where the "horseless" carriages were waiting for students that wanted a ride back to Hogwarts. Having bought everything they needed and saw all of the sights they had intended to, the three of them felt content. If only weather was a bit nicer then today would have been a perfect weekend day for them. Alas, cold winds and incipient drizzle were making them hurry back to the castle. And as the teens hurried down the road, they could only hope that the weather would be more pleasant when they had the next Hogsmeade weekend shortly before Christmas.
That's all, folks!
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