CH 151

He has been practising.

It wasn't quite as powerful as Harry's own, which could form a wall of light too bright to see past if he poured his magic into the charm, and nor was it perfect, the light trembled and shivered, but it certainly had the potential to be formidable once he'd fully mastered it. He was suddenly rather glad he'd chosen to keep Neville as a friend, the young wizard had potential after all.

The shield flickered, gaps appearing from where Neville's concentration lapsed slightly and then it faded away completely.

The click of pink heels echoed down the hall from around the corner, and Neville quickly slipped in to hiss a warning to the others inside. Harry waited for a moment then wandered in and joined Neville at the back of the room.

A handful of other students joined the, before Umbridge swept into the room, her pink cardigan flaring out behind her and lurid handbag bouncing on her elbow.

'Good morning class,' she greeted them, 'placing her handbag down on her desk and turning to face the class. Nobody gave her the response she was looking for.

'Now that won't do,' she frowned, the corners of her wide mouth turning down. 'That's not polite at all.'

Is she really going to insist on this at the beginning of every lesson?

A half-hearted good morning, Professor Umbridge, rang out, mostly from the vulnerable looking students at the front.

'Today we will be continuing with our reading,' she announced with a satisfied smile as the room groaned. 'Please turn to the next chapter, and copy out all the relevant, key passages at the bottom of each page.'

'Anything that's not a picture a four year old could have drawn, then,' he heard Neville mutter to himself and he had to suppress a smile.

Retrieving Slinkhard's worthless compilation of nonsense from his bag, Harry propped it up open on the edge of his desk and pulled just enough of his things to make it look like he was doing as Umbridge instructed.

'I managed to get a copy of the curriculum off of Hermione,' Neville whispered, when Umbridge turned away to loom over Dean and Seamus who were unwisely sitting at the front still.

'What does it say?' Harry asked.

'It says that if things carry on like this then the only ones who are going to even pass will be us and Hermione. There's a list of almost twenty spells you can be asked to demonstrate, of which the shield charm is one of the simplest, and Umbridge isn't going to be teaching us about any of them.' 'Sure about that, are you?' Harry smirked. 'She might have a change of heart.'

'We had a peek at her lesson plan when we got here before she did,' Neville made a small disgusted sound in the back of his throat.

'That bad?'

'Once we have finished copying out every written word from this,' Harry hadn't seen that much anger in Neville's eyes since they had talked about Barty Crouch, 'she's going to teach us to run away from our problems.'

'You're serious?'

'Officially it's called conflict avoidance and fleeing,' Neville bit back a laugh. 'There's a bit on iguanas too. I thought we'd be free of those lizards once Quirrell was replaced, and his pet was gone.'

'I miss that iguana,' Harry sighed nostalgically. 'It used to escape and hide on top of the cupboards. Parvati was terrified of it.'

'I was terrified too,' Neville pointed out, slightly embarrassed.

'It was a big reptile, there's no reason to be ashamed,' Harry smirked, reaching out to pat Neville on the cheek.

'You've been spending too long with Katie,' Neville grumbled, brushing of Harry's hand.

'The first years are almost as scared of her as they are of me now,' Harry remarked. 'Can I have a look at that curriculum?'

Neville glanced down to the front of class where Umbridge was supervising Ron's very slow, half-hearted textbook.

attempts

to

copy

out

of

the

'Here,' he murmured, slipping the sheet of paper to Harry under the table.

He took a glance down the sheet, making a mental note of the recommended books, then passed it back. At the front Ron earned himself another detention for accidentally misspelling the title of the book as something that looked suspiciously like A Hundred Ways to Let You-Know-Who Win.

'We can get some of those books out of the Room of Requirement,' he decided. 'It'll be easy to learn them on our own up there and I can help you if you struggle with any of them.'

'Thanks,' Neville smiled, then he looked sharply back down at his work and tucked the curriculum out of sight. 'Incoming,'he hissed quietly. Harry quite deliberately knocked his ink pot over his blank piece of parchment and made an extravagant show about trying to save his work as Umbridge approached.

'What are you doing, Mr Potter?'

'I spilt ink on my work,' Harry explained slowly and carefully, holding up the dripping piece of parchment, spreading the mess further. The drops joined up to run over and down the edge of the desk, drawing close to Umbridge's spotless, pink shoes.

'That was clumsy of you,' Umbridge tittered, 'you'll have to start again, won't you?'

'I know,' Harry nodded amicably. 'Would you mind vanishing the ink for me, Professor Umbridge? I'd do it myself, but I don't want to injure anyone by using magic in the classroom.' He couldn't have poured more false concern or innocence to his tone if he had tried.

'I'm sure your attempt will be safe, Mr Potter, but I'm glad you had the wisdom to ask for the approval of one more knowledgeable than yourself before attempting anything,' Umbridge simpered.

'If you're sure, professor,' Harry responded, simulating nervousness.

Raising his wand he tentatively spoke the words to the vanishing spell, and wordlessly banished the ink off the desk to spray Umbridge's pink cardigan and shoes in dark blue.

A tiny fraction of what you deserve for insulting Fleur.

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