Disclaimer: Any characters you recognize from the books in the Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling belong to the aforementioned J. K. Rowling. I am simply playing with them for my amusement, and to see what kind of reaction I can get.
Not Another Author's Note: Many thanks to the_scribbler for his kind assistance with this chapter. You the reader get to enjoy an extra 700 or so words and well as other corrections and enhancements.
42 - Bloody Tuesday
"This term we will begin to study Human Transfiguration. You should have read ahead in your texts as you were assigned at the end of last year. This is very dangerous magic, if you make a mistake, you could kill yourself or your partner." Said McGonagall. Oh goody, thought Harry, wondering if he could partner up with a wandless Draco Malfoy and accidentally kill him, on purpose.
The Professor pointed her wand at the chalkboard and the appropriate instructions and diagrams appeared. "Today we will change a finger into a claw." The illustrations on the board showed four stages of the progressive changing of a finger into a finger sized claw. "Next lesson, if you all get through this one, will be to change a whole hand into a bear paw with claws. You can work in pairs if you want."
Harry thought for a moment, then stared at his left hand until its forefinger started to morph into the shape of a claw similar to the image on the chalk board. Hermione shook her head ever so slightly, but what caught his attention quicker was her feelings that he was cheating the system with his Metamorphmagus abilities. Harry sighed and was about to change it back when the Professor spotted him and gave him a disapproving look. "I think you two need to work on each other, not yourselves."
Harry hid his left hand under the table and placed his right hand flat on the table for Hermione to practice on. The Professor waited until Hermione pulled out her wand, referred back to the board and silently transfigured Harry's finger. Harry drew the claw across the table making a deep gouge in the wooden surface and a nerve jarring screeching noise. Harry, taking his wand in his left hand, and instead of cancelling her spell he retransfigured the claw back into his finger.
"Good enough," said Minerva, "You two help the pair behind you while I check on the others." Minerva looked up and saw blood on a back desk, she hurried over to Malfoy and Parkinson. Harry and Hermione turned around to find Seamus and Parvati with what could best be described as disfigured appendages. Hermione made short work of sorting out their hands. She did so well that Seamus was hungrily admiring his new fingernails as if they were snack food. Parvati shook her head and slapped Seamus's hand away from his mouth before he could chew those fingernails off too. By the time the class was over, the four had not only mastered the claw, but were well on the way to completing decent looking bear paws as well.
The next hour would be Theoretical Defence (TD) with Professor Lupin. Professor McGonagall thanked the Head Students for their help in the class and was quite pleased with the results of the foursome. As the class broke up Professor Weasley returned, the two Professors again had a quick discussion before the Headmistress left and the second years started drifting in.
Edward and Jeannette made their way in and ended up in the same seats on the right hand side of the room that Seamus and Parvati had just vacated. Jeannette had made some friends in Ravenclaw and among them was Edward Normalis. He was quite tall, large and fairly muscular, his nickname was E-normous. He was already near six foot tall, a good head taller than Jeannette. They had met and talked on the train, Jeannette needed to find Rose and thank her for introducing her into that compartment of second years. They gravitated to each other at the feast and had progressed to holding hands this morning. Molly had noticed them holding hands when they came in, and as she wandered through the class handing out trays of buttons, she overheard some heavily accented words from the young lady that sounded much like her daughter-in-laws French accented attempt at English. Molly had been told that Jeannette could speak perfectly good English when she wanted to and thought that maybe, at the moment, with this boy in tow, she may not want to. Ed liked the accented French, he had told her it made her sound as exotic as she looked, at the time, she had smiled at him and blushed.
Professor Weasley flicked her wand at the board making her name appear, then called the roll so she could identify the students. Several of them she knew, and they knew her, because she knew their parents, the rest were new names and faces. "I am ... Professor Weasley ... and I'm teaching first through fifth year Transfiguration. Transfiguration is some of the most useful and also the most dangerous magic you will learn at Hogwarts. That is the first thing Professor McGonagall would have told you last year and it will apply for all of your years here, Don't forget it!" said the Professor, "If I even suspect that any of you are doing anything inappropriate in this class, and that includes holding hands under the desk with your boyfriend Miss Lamonde! You will be out of here faster than you can say Quidditch! Do I make myself clear?"
Everyone looked at her and responded, "Yes, Professor Weasley." Ed and Jeannette's hands had separated faster than if they had been blown apart, both blushed a fine shade of crimson and were able to maintain it for a good five minutes while the class was given their instructions. Jeannette, as reputed, was quick to pick up new spells, as was Ed and by the end of the hour they were the only two to have live beetles scampering across their table attempting to gain freedom.
Harry and Hermione took a detour on their way to the TD classroom and arrived to find that they weren't able to sit together. As it turned out, it didn't much matter. Most of the hour was spent on discussions of defence against multiple attackers. In the last ten minutes Harry was asked to come up and defend against a combined assault by Ron and Neville. Professor Lupin knew well enough to not allow Hermione to go against Harry as well, not that he thought Harry couldn't defend against her too. He had seen them duel each other in the Room of Requirement. He didn't want to give away too much of Harry's abilities or anything at all to suggest that Hermione could do equally as well. Ron and Neville pounded on Harry for over five minutes, all three using wands only and Harry was using his real wand. Harry was kept reasonably busy by the other two, but still managed to spot what looked like a Slytherin discussion group in the back corner. Their heads moved apart indicating that the discussion was over, and Vincent Crabbe's chair made a scraping sound. Harry quickly transferred his wand to his left hand and in a surprise move pulled his staff out of a hiding spot on his right leg. He used the staff to block a cutting curse from Crabbe before the Professor realized what was happening.
Crabbe then used an accio charm to summon Harry's staff and Harry allowed it. The staff sailed directly into Crabbe's outstretched hand and he grabbed it solidly. Hermione and Lupin saw the staff fly through the air and both knew something was going to happen if the summoner grabbed it. Staffs have protection wards against being taken or used by anyone the owner has not specifically included in the wards, Harry and Hermione were the only ones included in the wards. They could handle each others Staves, that was all that Frisel had allowed for. Six cutting curses came out of the staff slicing Crabbes left hand and fingers into bite sized pieces clear to his wrist. The staff and the bits of Crabbe fell to the floor leaving a shocked Vincent standing there spraying blood on the nearest students. Once Crabbe's brain had caught up with reality his eyes rolled back in their sockets and he collapsed onto the floor too. Hermione knew that earlier, Malfoy had managed to cut several fingers off Pansy Parkinson's left hand in Transfiguration, and she was still in the Hospital Wing. This was going to be Bloody Tuesday, she thought.
"No one touch that staff!" Lupin yelled and then repeated himself, "No one is to try to pick up that staff, no one!"
Hermione saw that no one was going to the aid of the stricken Crabbe, disgusted as she was by the thought of helping the Slytherin that just tried to kill Harry; she hurried to Vincent's side and tore a strip of cloth from his cloak. Using the Slytherin's wand as a lever to tighten it, she made a Muggle tourniquet just above his elbow to slow the bleeding. Harry had come near enough to safely summon his staff; he cleaned it up and tucked it away in its case. Professor Lupin, when he realized that Hermione had the situation mostly under control, confiscated Draco's wand, summoned the bits of Crabbe's hand and levitated Crabbe for the purpose of taking him to the Hospital Wing.
"Granger, Potter, you're in charge until it's time to leave for lunch." Said Professor Lupin as he left the classroom. "I suggest that you explain the safety features of your staff to the class." He yelled as he ran down the hallway with Crabbe hovering in front of him.
Harry made his way to the front of the classroom while Hermione cleaned herself up. Ron, Neville, Parvati and Lavender helped her since she was covered with blood from head to toe. Fortunately none of it was hers and that was all Harry was thankful for. It didn't take the four of them long to clean her up to the point that she didn't look like a walking war zone. The girls then shooed the guys away and hustled Hermione off to the Ladies Room where they could finish the job without the boys prying eyes.
Harry cleared his throat gaining most students attention, then he spoke, "I'm supposed to tell you something I don't know a whole lot about. I was given the staff a few days ago by a very special old gent who seemed to believe that I would need it. He did tell me that only myself and one other individual would be able to handle it," he paused, and after a few curious looks he continued, "No ... I'm not telling you who the other person is. He didn't tell me what would happen if someone else held the staff or tried to take it. I used the staff to block Crabbe's cutting curse, and when he followed it with a summoning charm ... I was too busy dealing with Ron and Neville's attack to be concerned about stopping it." While that wasn't exactly true, he could have stopped the summoning charm, he didn't think the results to Crabbe would be that dramatic. "I knew Crabbe wouldn't be able to use the staff against me ... I didn't know what it would do to him."
Harry looked around to find Malfoy and starred at him for a moment. "Mr. Malfoy," Harry called out, Draco looked away from his friends, towards Harry, "Since Crabbe attacked me after conversing with you and a few of your ... friends ... perhaps you can explain why?"
"I don't have to explain anything to you Scarhead." Responded Draco.
"I know you'll have to explain it to someone, since Professor Lupin took your wand with him." Stated Harry. "I suspect that the Headmistress will want to know why there are two of your friends in the Hospital wing this early in the term and what she will have to look forward to in the coming days.
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After the girls entered the privacy of the Loo, "Hermione, why did you bother with that creep?" Asked Parvati.
"Someone had to or he would have bled to death." Sighed Hermione. She might have been exaggerating, but there was enough blood on her and the floor to think it was possible. Lavender looked up after rinsing some more blood out a cloth and handing it back to Hermione who was now down to her knickers and bra trying to get all the 'pureblood' off.
"What is Ron going to say?" Asked Lavender who still expected Ron to be her boyfriend. Parvati and Padma obviously hadn't said anything about Harry's birthday party and her change in partners.
Hermione never got a chance to respond. Parvati was cleaning her robes and felt something hard, round, long and invisible on her school robes. "What do you have here?"
Hermione looked at her not really following the question until realization dawned on her that Parvati was holding the staff case that was magically attached to her robes. "STOP! Or you'll end up like Crabbe!" Parvati dropped the robes and backed away.
"Sorry." Hermione said, relieved that Parvati was still alright. "It's another staff ... similar to Harry's. What happened to Crabbe's hand was because he took and held the staff ... it has protective wards." Lavender and Parvati looked at the robes as if they were a dragon ready to breathe fire.
"It's okay as long as you don't hold the staff itself." Said Hermione as she held out her hand to summon her robes from the floor. She left them hanging in mid air and pulled the staff out of its case, it expanded in her hand and made a thunk sound when it met the floor sending out a shower of gold sparks, she then leaned it against the closest mirror.
The two girls were in shock and not much help after that bit of wandless magic and their drooling over the staff. Hermione scourgified the rest of her clothes and got dressed. Replacing the staff in its case, she guided Lavender and Parvati to the Great Hall for Lunch. As she walked past the TD classroom, using their mind link, she mentally asked Harry if he and Ron would collect their books and things.
For lunch Ron and Seamus came with Harry and passed Lavender and Parvati their book bags. Harry had Hermione's bag and Luna appeared beside Ron, they all sat at the Gryffindor table. Neville and Ginny soon joined them and Harry brought the newcomers up to speed on Pansy's severed fingers, Crabbe's diced hand and Hermione's first aid talents.
With lunch about half over, and before any students had left, The Headmistress stood up to speak and all the students became quiet. "I have some good news ... Miss Parkinson is expected to be back in class tomorrow ... with all her fingers. Mr. Crabbe will soon be transferred to Saint Mungos for further treatment. After a talk with someone from Magical Law Enforcement, his future at this school will be decided. Miss Granger and Misters Malfoy and Potter ... will you kindly see me after you've finished eating." Then she sat down. There was a mad buzz of conversation that followed the announcement, which slowly reduced to a more normal background drone.
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Draco made his way to the head table first and the Headmistress spoke to him, "Mr. Malfoy, this is only the first morning of classes and already you seem to be involved in two incidents. I am under some pressure to keep you here, but I will only tolerate your behaviour so far. I suggest that you sever connections with your existing cronies and cultivate a more studious group of friends. I don't want your name to come to my attention again unless it's in the form of praise for something well done. Professor Slughorn has your wand. Get out of my sight." Draco made his way to Horace and collected his wand after another tongue lashing then left the Great Hall.
Seeing that Malfoy had been thoroughly scolded, our otherwise happy couple, presented themselves to Minerva. Missus Potter ... sorry, Miss Granger," Minerva started to say. Her first two words caught their undivided attention and Hermione's face had a huge smile on it. Hermione looked up at Harry and he smiled back squeezing her hand. Minerva further collected her wits before continuing. "Your quick action and, Poppy tells me, your expertise, most likely saved Mr Crabbe from bleeding to death. As it was he required three blood replenishing potions that I am aware of. I fully expect there will be an award for your actions."
"Thank you Ma'am," responded Hermione as she bowed her head slightly in respect.
"Mr. Potter ... could you explain how you managed to loose possession of your staff so quickly?"
Harry knew something like this would come up and he had a story prepared. "Professor ... I was using my wand to shield against two attackers in front of me, namely Ron and Neville. I had noticed a Slytherin conference in the back of the classroom breaking up and transferred my wand to my left hand. When Crabbe stood, wand in hand, I drew my staff in time to block a cutting curse from him. My attention was drawn back to the first two when Crabbe summoned my staff. I knew my staff had its own protection, but I didn't know exactly what it would do. I expected it to stun him ... or something."
"And that would probably be what would have happened, Mr. Potter ... had your staff not just blocked a cutting curse from him. That explains how it happened. You have Practical Defence next I believe, please have Moody explain to the class about staffs, I don't want any more problems. No one has seen yours yet have they Miss Granger?" Minerva questioned.
"Lavender and Parvati have seen it Professor," responded Hermione, "I did ask them not to say anything."
"Yes ... well, we'll see what happens, I don't believe those two could keep a secret if their lives depended on it." Said Minerva, "I suggest you impress on them that it does."
"Yes Ma'am." Said Harry and they went back to their seats.
When they arrived back at their seats, Harry looked around, there really was no privacy, he cast a wandless muffliato charm for which Hermione gave him a disgusted look, then he spoke, "By now you all know that I have a staff. There hasn't been a good time to tell you all before, and now isn't the best time either. Hermione also has one." Lavender looked at Parvati with one of those 'why didn't you tell me' looks that she was almost famous for, when she realized that Harry and Hermione must now be a couple. Then Harry, looking specifically at Lavender and Parvati continued, "It is important for now, that nobody knows about Hermione's staff or that we are a couple. Let's meet tonight right after supper in the Room of Requirement." Everyone in the discussion nodded including Hermione, so there would be a meeting of nine tonight. Harry looked away for a moment and the muffliato charm was cancelled.
Nearly all of them ended up needing more books for the afternoon; there was a mad rush to various rooms. The class after lunch today was a double period of Practical Defence (PD), it looked like another full class. The usual Slytherin suspects were congregated in the back corner minus the two injured ones. When the normal starting time passed Hermione began looking around, trying to determine if Alastor could be hiding in plain sight ... disillusioned or under an invisibility cloak. Harry quickly caught on to what she was looking for and whispered it to Ron so he could search the room too. About five minutes later Hermione noticed a ripple in the background that seemed to be getting nearer to Moody's desk, she gave Harry a mental nudge and he picked up on her line of sight as the ripple moved across the front of the classroom and out the door. Shortly thereafter Moody's peg leg could be heard in the corridor, before he entered the classroom. The students greeted him with a rousing "Good afternoon Professor Moody".
Alastor grunted a response then yelled, "Constant vigilance." Startling most of the students. He then told the class that today and for the next few classes they would be listing, demonstrating and if necessary practicing spells that they were supposed to know.
Moody had been listing spells his second year students had mentioned, demonstrated and practiced during the morning on two boards. One board had purely defensive spells, the other had offensive spells and other charms. His day so far had been first and second years so the lists, with a few exceptions, contained the DADA spells common to those years. He had the first years go through their texts to list the spells they were to cover this year. The Unforgivables and a few other deadly spells were also listed. Harry noticed that sectumsempra wasn't listed ... yet; he wondered if Malfoy might mention it, he wasn't planning to, it is not something you can practice in class.
Moody went through the spells already listed on the boards picking one student after another like a pop quiz. He had them demonstrate the spell on the student beside them and then reverse it. The Slytherins, of course, tried to jinx the Gryffindors who, for the most part had been in the old DA and had been taught by Harry how to block unfriendly spells.
At the end of the double lesson, the last pair was Draco and Hermione. Alastor told Draco which curse to use and he also told Hermione how to block it, not that he expected she wouldn't know already. Draco however, had other plans and a different spell in mind. Hermione had picked up on Harry's concern and signalled him with a thumbs up, behind her back, that she was ready. Harry had his arms crossed over his chest, his wand already clutched in his hand, ready to do something, he thought he knew what might be needed.
When Harry saw the ragged jet of purple flame shoot out of Draco's wand, he knew that was wrong ... very wrong. Instantly Harry jumped into action, Moody did as well. Mad-eye put up the strongest shield charm he could, knowing full well it couldn't stop the curse Draco used, but it might lessen the severity. Hermione knew what to do as well, she had positioned herself to be able to dive between two bookshelves if need be ... and now was that time. Her jump sideways was a pure leap of faith, once she was out of sight of everyone but Harry, and before she could hit the stone floor, she transformed into Caledfwlch and flashed into the far corner of the room where she could observe. No one would be looking in that direction.