Chapter 37: Detention
An owl swooped into the Defence Against Dark Arts classroom as Douglas Wiblin was busy marking the essays of his fifth-year students. He honestly despised the work hours but he was told by quite a few people with connections that a professorship at Hogwarts would truly boost his resumé if he wished to get a chance at a leadership position within the International Duelling Committee. After all, one of its honourary committee members was the Charms professor and former champion duellist Filius Flitwick. There were also professional duelling clubs with student branches in Hogwarts, including the three most renowned clubs – the Golden Dragon, the Silver Spears and the Bronze Mystics. As a member of the Bronze Mystics, he had helped with some of the training sessions for the select few Hogwarts students in the local branch, hoping to get a good word in from some of the students with more illustrious parents.
He had also been getting tea with Professor Flitwick whenever he had the opportunity but the pesky half-goblin would always put office hours with tweens and teens above an opportunity to converse with an up-and-coming duelling star like himself. Flitwick would even choose managing detentions over having tea with him! Douglas offered to manage detentions for Flitwick this week and hoped that was enough to finally get in his good graces.
Douglas snatched the envelope from the talons of the owl and his eyes almost popped out when he saw the seal upon it. The Office of the Director-General of the International Duelling Committee! It had been months since he had sent in an application and he was ecstatic that he was finally hearing back. He really hoped all the hours he helped Marcus Flint perfect his jinxes convinced Nigellus Flint, the Head of the Office of Duelling under the Department of Magical Games and Sports, to write his recommendation letter in the end.
He ripped open the envelope aggressively, trying to get to the contents of the letter as soon as possible. His jaw dropped to the ground as he rushed out of his classroom immediately.
---
"Hold your wand higher when you cast the *Avis* spell. Or else the birds would not be flying very high," Professor Flitwick explained, before proceeding with a demonstration, "But very wise of you to consider using animals as a distraction in a duel. Especially with the specific choice of birds you have in mind."
Esther Davis smiled at Professor Flitwick's praise and returned to her practice. Professor Flitwick looked on proudly as members of the Golden Dragon duelling club's Hogwarts branch continued their weekly training. They had a solid cohort this year and he could not wait to recruit the second year newcomer for the following year. Training the young duellists and selecting who to recruit each year reminded him of his own youth as a dueller. Without the recruitment and guidance by his own charms professor Thomas Tofty, Professor Flitwick doubted he would become the man he was today. This was why he was so invested in giving students advice and actively participating in all of the Golden Dragon's student trainings.
But there were moments where Professor Flitwick wondered if he had been abandoning his Head of House duties somewhat with his focus on his charms students and duelling club students. Charms he aided the students in developing for the Halloween tradition were used in a major prank attempt right under his nose. He wondered if he should do more intra-house events next school year like tea times in the common room to get to know those in his house better…
...speaking of tea, Professor Wiblin seemed to always want to get tea with him. While he often had to reject his offers as he was genuinely busy, who could not help but feel like this young man was not really here to teach the students, but just to further his own duelling career. He had heard rumours that Professor Wiblin was spending more time with the Bronze Mystics' students than in his office to answer student questions in his free time. Then again, Professor Wiblin did offer to take on some of his detention duties this week to lighten his load as he prepared the Golden Dragons for the upcoming international student duelling competition. So maybe the young man was finally turning a new leaf.
---
"Professor Wiblin?"
Fred knocked on the door for a third time. He did not mind missing detention. However, something felt off when he still did not hear any reply from the star duellist who taught Defence Against the Dark Arts. He decided to give the door handle a push.
The door clicked open and he was met with an empty classroom. The professor's chair had fallen to the ground while his quill seemed to have been discarded on his desk in a hurry, leaving a small trail of ink dots on an essay. The student whose essay was being marked would probably not be too pleased with the mess the professor had made.
Suddenly, Fred noticed a letter and envelope lying near the ink-botched essay, slowly fading away. Curious, Fred walked over and picked up this disappearing piece of paper.