Only For You

Only For You

by DPx

Chapter Four - The New Professor

September 2nd, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

I was awoken the next morning by shafts of sunlight spearing through the gaps in the curtains of my four-poster bed. Damn, I can't have remembered to pull them shut properly. I listened to see if anyone else was up, not hearing any voices or even any breathing, which seemed a little odd. I sat up, pulling the curtains back to find that there was no one else in the dormitory. I rolled out of bed, groping for my watch, which I'd left on my bedside table. Eight-thirty. Great, I was late for breakfast on my first day. I pulled on my clothes as quickly as I could and ran down from the tower room, through the Gryffindor common room and out into the corridor. On the way down to breakfast I managed to get lost twice, and have Peeves throw some chewing gum at me. I burst into the Great Hall pretty as pretty much everyone had finished eating. All eyes turned to me as I came in, and more than a few sniggers came from the Slytherin table, in particular from Malfoy, unsurprisingly.

'Hey guys,' I said, skidding to a halt by Harry, Hermione and Ron, who shifted down a little to allow me to sit with them.

'What happened to you?' asked Ron, taking in my rather rumpled appearance, and the fact that my hair, which was usually unruly, had looked in the mirror like I'd been electrocuted. But as I'd been in such a rush, I didn't have any time to deal with it.

'I overslept a bit.'

'Yeah, we heard you snoring.' Harry smiled.

'Then how come you didn't wake me up?'

'We tried, mate, really we did. Seamus even let off a Filibuster firework, but it didn't do anything.'

'Yeah, well, I've always been a bit of a heavy sleeper.'

'We saved you some toast,' said Hermione, pushing a napkin towards me.

'And some jam and butter for it,' said Ron, handing me two little pots.

'Thanks,' I said, spreading butter over one of the slices of toast. As I ate, one of the prefects came by, handing out timetables to all of us. I didn't even look at mine until I heard a groan from beside me.

'What's wrong?'

'Potions, first thing. Double lesson. With the Slytherins,' moaned Harry.

'What's wrong with Potions?'

'Malfoy. Snape. That Dungeon,' said Ron grimly.

'I was always ok at Potions.'

'You must be the first Gryffindor that ever was,' Ron said. 'Apart from Hermione, of course,' he corrected rapidly.

'Malfoy was saying they teach the Dark Arts at Durmstrang,' Harry said. 'Do they really? I mean you said they taught you a load of curses, but you didn't say much else.'

'Well, yeah. They don't call it that, they call it "Instruction in the Magical Arts" but they basically taught us a lot of Dark Magic, stuff that you'd probably get locked up for over here.'

'How did they get away with that?' asked Ron.

'Well, Karkaroff was never inspected by anyone, and he was a Death Eater, wasn't he? He was always going to try and recruit teachers who were least had a similar kind of idea to him.'

'I suppose so. Still, he disappeared after the Triwizard Tournament, so maybe they'll appoint someone who's a little less... dark.'

'Maybe. Seems to be a sort of Durmstrang tradition though.'

When I'd finished my toast, we grabbed out books and traipsed down about twenty flights of stairs to the Potions dungeon. Everyone else had already gone in and when Ron poked his head round the door, we were ushered to our cauldrons by a terse 'sit down quickly, and seeing as you're all a whole five minutes late, let's make it five points from Gryffindor each.' Professor Snape, I presumed.

'Oily git,' Ron mouthed as I went to sit at my cauldron, which was positioned right next to Draco Malfoy's.

'Late for your first lesson, mudblood? Not a good way to start,' he said quietly enough that Professor Snape couldn't hear.

'Shut up, Malfoy,' I hissed, drawing another sharp glance from Snape, as if he'd suddenly developed ultra-sharp hearing.

'Now, as I was saying, before I was so rudely interrupted,' Snape said, 'I was telling you what I will require from you this year, the year of your OWL examinations. I expect full concentration when I am speaking, no interruptions will be tolerated. I expect you to follow my instructions accurately and promptly. I expect all homework to be of at least eight out of ten standard, and to be handed in promptly and in legible handwriting. I will not accept any boorish behaviour in my class, although I expect that it comes naturally to some of you. One in particular,' he finished icily, staring down at me. I met his gaze and refused to break it until he continued. 'Some of us seem to think that we're above the law, that the usual rules don't apply. If it was down to me, I would not allow such a criminal into the school.' I flushed deep red at that, knowing that although I'd only just met Professor Snape, Potions wasn't going to be the highlight of my week.

'However, as Professor Dumbledore appears to be content to allow a certain criminal element access to this school, I would remind *him* that I will be watching him, and that any repetition of a certain incident that may have led to his expulsion from another institution will result in his expulsion from this one too.'

'Now,' he said, pausing for breath, 'we will start on today's lesson. Today we will be brewing a potion that is very likely to come up in your OWL examination, and as such may be beyond nearly all of you.' His glance took in the entire Gryffindor side of the room. 'You will be making a Chameleon Potion. Instructions are on the board,' he said, snapping his fingers, causing the instructions to appear in green chalk on the blackboard.

"Easy," I thought, as I'd covered all kinds of disguise potions at Durmstrang. And indeed, much to Professor Snape's annoyance, at the end of the lesson, when he tested my potion, he appeared to be immensely annoyed that he could find nothing wrong with it.

He stomped around the dungeon, being particularly horrible to any of the Gryffindors who'd done anything the slightest bit wrong, taking five points from Neville Longbottom for making an evil smelling, smoking concoction that gave off yellow sparks. All of the other Gryffindors had made a good go at their potion, and Snape couldn't manage to find another reason to take points from anybody.

He returned to my cauldron, even more annoyed that I hadn't made a mistake while he hadn't been watching. 'Acceptable, Weiss,' he snapped. 'But only acceptable. Don't make so much mess next time.' Yes, I like to work in a messy environment. Ordered chaos is a good thing. Or so I keep telling myself.

'Nice one,' said Ron as we were climbing up the stairs towards the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom. 'No one's been able to shut Snape up like that since Hermione got 98% in a Potions test in the Second Year.'

'Yeah, not even Snape had an answer to that one,' said Harry, smiling at Hermione. I felt we hadn't got away totally free though, as Snape had set us a foot of parchment on the preparation and use of the Chameleon Potion.

We took our seats in the Defence Against the Dark Arts class room, Harry, Ron, Hermione and I sitting in adjacent tables. The teacher had not yet entered the room, and we had time to get our books out and to further poke fun at Professor Snape for not being able to take more than twenty points from Gryffindor for what was apparently the first time ever in one of his Potions classes.

Suddenly the door was flung open and a tall, thin woman wearing a long grey cloak strode into the room, slamming the door behind her, bustled to the front of the room, slammed her books down on the desk and turned to face us, pulling the hood on her cloak back so that we could see her face.

DAMN. I knew the name Konchesky should have rung a bell when Professor Dumbledore had said it at the feast last night, but to be honest I'd barely been paying attention. The skeletal figure in front of me was part of a past I definitely didn't want to remember.

'Hello class. My name is Professor Daniella Konchesky. I vill, as you may haff gathered, be teaching you zer Defence Against ze Dark Arts.' I buried my head in my hands, unable to believe my luck.

'Miah, what's up?' whispered Harry, laying a hand on my shoulder.

'Konchesky... She used to teach me at Durmstrang,' I murmured, removing my head from my hands, turning in my chair to see Harry and Ron's concerned faces. 'I dunno, I just thought I'd got away from all this...'

'Mr. Weiss!' Oh great... 'I vould ask you to be paying attention ven I am speaking, but of course, it isn't very likely you vould listen, is it?'

'Yes, ma'am, I'd listen.' She arched her eyebrow at me, obviously unbelieving, before continuing.

'I haff been reviewing ze material zat your previous teachers haff left, and it is obvious zat you are very far behind in your lessons. Vile you haff been educated in ze Unforgivable Curses, it is my opinion zat you do not know enough about other Dark curses and how zey may be used.'

'And how we defend ourselves against them,' Hermione added.

'Ja, ov course,' she added, seemingly as an afterthought. 'But I do not recall asking you to speak, Miss...?'

'Granger.'

'So... 5 points from your house for speaking out of turn, no?'

'Bitch,' I murmured under my breath, shooting a supportive glance Hermione's way.

For twenty minutes, Konchesky outlined her plan for 'enhancing ze class's education in ze Dark Arts,' regularly picking on people who didn't look as if they were paying complete attention. Neville Longbottom, unfortunately bore the brunt of this, losing Gryffindor ten points and the third time she picked on him, Harry and Ron couldn't keep themselves under control and both earned detentions for answering back to her.

'I can't believe this,' muttered Ron darkly. 'I didn't think anything could be worse than Snape.'

The rest of the lesson seemed to last forever, everyone in the class desperately trying to avoid having any more points taken away, attentively taking notes on everything Konchesky said. It wasn't as obviously a Dark Arts workshop as her lessons at Durmstrang, but the list of Dark curses and hexes she said she was intending to cover was long and exhaustive. As she reeled off her list, Hermione's eyebrows rose further and further.

'All the curses she named,' Hermione said after the lesson had finished, while we were walking along a long corridor away from the classroom, 'they're all illegal. Especially the Invertex Curse.'

'What's that?' Ron asked.

'What it sounds like,' Hermione shuddered. 'It basically inverts you. So you end up with your skin on the inside and... other stuff on the outside.'

'How come it's not Unforgivable then?' Ron asked. 'It sounds pretty lethal to me.'

'Well, it's not classed as Unforgivable because there aren't many wizards who are even capable of using it. But it'll get you life in Azkaban if anyone catches you trying.'

'What about the others she mentioned?' asked Harry.

'Well, there aren't any others THAT bad, but some of them are pretty unpleasant. The thing that worried me was that she was talking like she was going to teach us how to use them all.'

'She is.'

'What?' exclaimed Hermione. 'But it's illegal to even demonstrate some of those to anyone below the age of seventeen. Dumbledore would never let anyone even show us that stuff!'

'Well, she taught me some of it last year anyway.'

'So you know some of those curses?' asked Harry.

'Well, yeah, some. I've never used any of them,' I added hurriedly, 'but a few of the fire curses she mentioned, the Eviscerator curse, a few others.'

A silence descended for a few seconds before Ron spoke again. 'Is she always like that, though?'

'Like what?'

'Handing out detentions like they're confetti.'

'Oh, yeah, I'm surprised I didn't get one. You might have noticed, she doesn't like me that much.'

'Why not?' Hermione asked.

'I always used to ask too many questions. The one she particularly didn't like was "why are we being taught how to magically disembowel people?"'

'She taught you that?' gaped Ron.

'That's what the Eviscerator curse is, yeah.'

'Whoa...' Ron whispered.

'Anyway, see you later,' Hermione said, turning off down a corridor towards her Arithmancy classroom. I followed Harry and Ron up to the North Tower, for my first Divination lesson.

'Trelawney's a big fraud really,' Ron said, 'but she doesn't seem to notice if you make it up, as long as you put lots of suffering and misery in there.'

'Right,' I said, laughing. After Potions and Defence Against the Dark Arts, I could do with a bit of relief.

The Divination room, at the very top of the North Tower, was very dark and hot, the air heavy with the scent of perfume. Everyone was already in the room by the time Harry, Ron and I got there, sitting in chintzy armchairs around small tables.

We found a chair and sat in silence, waiting for Professor Trelawney. Suddenly, from the darkness at the side of the room came a voice. 'Good afternoon dears, it is so good to see you all once again. Although, of course I saw much of you over the holidays, from my solitary tower residence.'

'As if,' Harry whispered, causing Ron and I to grin.

'Also, I notice that there is a new one among us. Naturally, I saw you from afar, dear,' she said turning to me, smiling mysteriously. 'Anyway, for the first part of this term, we will be concerned with animal omens.' The heat of the room was beginning to get to me already, and as Trelawney twittered on about how the patterns of geese flying can 'allow one to unravel the complex strands of the future,' I allowed my mind and my eyes to wander.

As was becoming more and more common, both landed on Harry. I think he was almost as sleepy as I was, his chin cupped in his hand as he stared into the distance behind my left shoulder. He really was something quite special, I couldn't stop myself from thinking... Not handsome in the classical sense of the word and his glasses certainly didn't flatter him, but his eyes were a beautiful deep emerald green that lit up when he smiled, and his raven black hair, endearingly scruffy, just invited me to run my fingers through it, to twirl it round my fingers... Ok, Miah, that's enough. You don't think about guys that way, and you certainly don't think about a new friend like that.

Most of the lesson, though, passed in a stupor like that, broken only when his eyes met mine, and sleepy smile crept across his features. Every time it did, my heart leapt a little in my chest, and I woke up a bit, only to fall back into day dreaming as the fumes and heat overcame me.

As we were packing our books away, Professor Trelawney came over to our table, staring at me through her over-sized spectacles, her eyes appearing very large behind them.

'Excuse me, dear, I just wonder if you could stay behind for a little while, I need to have a little chat with you.'

'It's lunchtime, Professor,' Ron said.

'It's ok, Mister Weasley,' Trelawney said with a sniff, 'he'll catch up with you. Run along now.'

Ron and Harry turned away, giving me a pitying smile before climbing down through the trap door at the back of the room.

'Now, dear... What was your name again?' I thought she'd seen me coming. A fraud, just like Ron said.

'Miah. Weiss.'

'Of course. I was just wondering how much of my noble art you learnt at Durmstrang Institute.'

'I thought you could see that sort of thing,' I smiled.

'Naturally, but one does not like to intimidate people by revealing their secrets. It does not do to boast about one's gifts.'

'Well,' I said softly, 'They didn't really teach much Divination.'

'I thought not, dear, I perceived very little of the psychic aura around you.' I kept quiet after that, not trusting myself not to say the same back. 'In that case, I'd ask you to read as much of "Unfogging the Future" as you can before our next lesson tomorrow.'

I nodded, and turned to leave, when a voice rang out, a harsh, strident voice, most unlike Professor Trelawney's usual breathy whisper.

'The victim yet survives, although as a mere shadow of his former self. A demon possesses his soul, and nothing but a second death will release him. His allegiance lies not with the side of light, but with the Dark Lord, though he knows it not.'

'What?'

'Sorry dear,' Professor Trelawney mumbled, as though she'd just woken up. 'I don't know what came over me.'

'You... you said something about the victim surviving, about a demon possessing his soul.'

'I certainly don't remember that, dear, I think you may have dropped off for a second there.'

'No, I was awake. You said something about a victim and Voldemo... the Dark Lord.'

'I rather doubt that, young man, I wouldn't say anything so rash. Run along now, it's lunch time.'

I walked into the Great Hall feeling rather confused, sure that I hadn't fallen asleep, but perturbed that Trelawney seemed to have remembered nothing of what she'd told me, like she'd been in a trance the whole time. I took my place beside Ron at the lunch table, everything still rushing through my head in no particular order. "The victim yet lives..." What the hell could that possibly mean? And how could anyone be allied with Voldemort but think that they weren't? Unless they were under the Imperius curse, of course.

'So, what did she want?' Harry asked.

'Er, who?' I got out, my mind still in a whirl.

'Trelawney, of course,' supplied Ron.

'Oh, she just wanted to know how much Divination I'd done at Durmstrang. She's odd, though, isn't she?'

'How do you mean? asked Harry.

'Well, just as I was going to leave, she went all funny, put on a different voice and started spouting some rubbish about some victim...'

'She made another real prophecy?' Harry said incredulously.

'What?'

'In our third year, she predicted that Voldemort would rise again,' Harry explained in a hushed voice, so that no one passing by could hear. 'And it happened, last summer, even if no one believes it.'

'The Ministry of Magic denied it, of course. They didn't want to spread panic, but Harry duelled him, right after the Triwizard Tournament.'

'It seems so stupid that they'd deny everything, especially after what happened last time, when no one took him seriously until he was at his most powerful.'

'Yeah, but everyone would panic, wouldn't they?' said Ron. 'My dad was telling me, after the first time, that Dumbledore has got plans to deal with him, but the Ministry didn't want to hear about it, so Dumbledore's been organising it on his own. I know Mum and Dad are involved somehow.'

'Well, at least someone's doing something about it.'

'Yeah,' murmured Harry from behind a mouthful of steak. 'What did Trelawney actually say, anyway?'

'Er... "The victim survives, though only a shadow of himself, possessed by a demon until released by a second death," or something like that. Doesn't mean anything to me.'

'I wonder what it could mean...' said Hermione thoughtfully.

'Well, I suppose Trelawney's other prediction wasn't obvious at the time, was it?' Harry said, also looking thoughtful. We didn't say much for the rest of the meal, eating pretty much in silence, each of us obviously trying to figure out what Trelawney might have meant.

We took a quick trip back up to Gryffindor Tower to pick up our books for our two afternoon lessons, Charms and History of Magic. I'd brought some food up for Davros and he gobbled it down hungrily, squeaking for more when I'd fed him the last of the steak I'd sneaked out for him.

Charms was taught by Professor Flitwick, a jolly little wizard, about four feet tall, who was remarkable among the teachers I'd experienced so far in that he actually seemed pleased to see me and interested in what I'd been taught by his opposite number at Durmstrang, Professor Kiriakov. He seemed particularly interested in a Charm that Kiriakov had invented, something called the Shadowdancer Charm.

'You must show me some time,' he said, as I tried to concentrate on the Floating Charm I was trying to put on a pebble at the bottom of a bowl of water in front of me.

'Sure, Professor,' I said, swishing my wand, and jumping backwards as a crack issued from the tip of my wand, causing the bowl to shatter, spraying water all over Ron and Harry. I turned a deep shade of red, scrabbling around, trying to mop up the mess that I'd made.

'Does it often do that?' Professor Flitwick asked, using a Summoning Charm to pick up the pieces of the bowl.

'Not often, Professor. It's a bit temperamental though.'

'Is it one of Mr. Ollivander's?'

'No, it's a Gregorovitch wand.'

'May I?' Flitwick asked, holding out his hand for my wand. I handed it over and he proceeded to put a Floating Charm on a different pebble five times without the wand misbehaving once. 'Try it again, maybe, Mr. Weiss.' I did, and the charm worked perfectly.

'Just a dodgy pebble, I suppose,' I said, smiling at Harry.

'Gregorovitch wands have always been a little, erm, aggressive. Not totally suited to charm work, perhaps. But powerful, yes...'

'It's good for Transfiguration,' I said, going to perform the charm again.

'Yes, I expect so,' said Professor Flitwick nervously as I swished my wand at the pebble. This time, it worked properly again, causing some visible tension to disappear from Flitwick's face.

Harry and Ron, either side of me, hadn't had any trouble with the charm and neither, needless to say, had Hermione, who was floating her pebble, along with two books in her bowl. 'Excellent, all of you,' Professor Flitwick exclaimed. 'Pack up now, though, please, the lesson is over. See you all again tomorrow.'

'What happened with your wand?' Harry asked afterwards, as we were taking our seats in the History of Magic classroom.

'I don't know,' I said truthfully. 'Like Flitwick said, I suppose, that wand isn't really designed for charms.'

Any further discussion about the wand was precluded by the arrival of Professor Binns, the History of Magic teacher, who I was shocked to find was a ghost - he floated into the room through the blackboard. He set his notes down on the lectern at the front of the class and began to read. In an amazingly monotonous voice. I struggled to take notes on the Giant-Wizard wars of 1657, but the way Binns read it out, it seemed the most boring thing in the world. You wouldn't have thought something as bloody as a war involving giants could be made to seem boring, but he managed somehow!

About ten minutes into the class, Ron, who was sitting in between Harry and I, tore a scrap off the bottom of his roll of parchment, scribbled something on it and showed it first to me and then to Harry - "Game of hangman?" it said. We spent the remaining forty minutes of the class playing hangman, much to Hermione's disapproval - she was taking notes at a furious pace.

'You really should try and take an interest,' she said as we crossed the entrance hall - we had decided to sit outside until dinner, the weather was still warm, and it seemed a pity to waste it by sitting in the tower until dinner.

'I tried,' said Harry, 'but he's just as boring as always.'

'It's important this year, though, isn't it? OWLs and everything.'

'Will you stop reminding us!' exclaimed Ron, clearly bored already of Hermione talking about exams in early September.

'I need to remind you, you'll never get anything done otherwise,' Hermione snapped indignantly. 'Anyway, I'm sure I find it just as boring as you do, but you don't find me playing stupid games in an important lesson, do you?'

Harry grinned and rolled his eyes at me behind Hermione's back. We found a spot down by the lake, and lay back, watching a gigantic squid scull idly across the lake's surface.

'I like this,' I said, sitting up a bit.

'It's only the lake,' Ron said, looking at me a bit oddly.

'No, I mean being able to sit outside after lessons. At Durmstrang it was far too cold to just sit, you had to keep moving or you'd freeze.'

'Yes, Viktor did say it was very cold.'

'Ah, yes, how is dear Vicky? Have you heard from him recently?' asked Ron, smiling cruelly.

'I told you, don't call him Vicky! And yes, for your information, I have. He got accepted to play for a professional Quidditch team.'

'Hardly surprising, really,' Harry said. 'He was easily the best at that World Cup game, even though Ireland won.'

'Yeah, he's an amazing flyer,' I added.

'Did you play Quidditch with him?' Ron asked.

'Yeah, although he didn't really say much to me. He was just the superstar Chaser while the rest of us were just left to play the game.'

'You're good though, right?'

'I'm ok.'

'Well, they should be announcing Quidditch trials soon. Angelina's captain this year, I think. You are going to try out, aren't you?' Harry said.

'If you think I should.'

'Well, we do need a keeper. Definitely if you're good.'

'I'll try out, anyway.'

'Good, mate,' said Ron. 'We better get up to dinner though, I'm starving.' I jumped to my feet, offering Harry a hand up, which he took, allowing me to pull him to his feet. Hermione looked at me a little strangely for doing that, but forbore from saying anything.

Dinner passed pretty quickly and before I knew it we were sitting around a table in the Gryffindor common room, trying to make a start on the homework that Snape had given us.

It was about eleven before Harry and Ron finished, I'd finished maybe ten minutes before and Hermione had long departed for the girls bedroom.

'I HATE Snape,' Ron said, vehemently, throwing down his quill, sending spots of ink all over his parchment. He used his wand to clean it up again, cursing under his breath the whole time. Finishing at last, he tucked his wand into his belt, grabbed his essay and stood up. 'Right, I'm going to bed,' he said, stomping off up the stairs to the dormitory.

I sat back slowly, running my fingers through my hair.

'You've finished already?' Harry asked.

'Yeah, you can have a read through if you want,' I said, sliding my parchment across the table towards him. He took it from me, his slim fingers brushing ever-so-slightly against mine, which sent shivers right through me, shivers that I hope he didn't notice.

'Oh, is THAT what the quicksilver does?' he murmured, scribbling quickly on the bottom of his parchment. He scanned the rest of my essay briefly, before looking up at me, smiling and saying 'finished' happily, rolling up his scroll and laying down his quill. 'I don't know about you, but I think Ron's right. It's bed time.' I looked round, and for the first time noticed that we were actually completely alone in the common room.

'Yeah, I think so,' I agreed, clearing all my stuff up and following Harry up the stairs to our bedroom. As we changed for bed, I tried, as hard as I possibly could, but I couldn't resist a sneaky glance up as he was pulling his shirt up over his head. I couldn't see much in the dim light, but I could just about make out his slim chest, the soft contours of his lightly muscled chest picked out by the light of a lone candle in the room.

Thankfully I don't think he noticed, and I changed quickly, totally ashamed of myself for peeking at my friend like that.

'Night Harry,' I said, slipping into my bed quickly, drawing the curtains around me, pulling the covers up over my head.

'Sleep well, Miah,' said Harry softly, sleepily.

For the second time in two nights I lay there, every time I closed my eyes, that image of Harry pulling his shirt up over his head imprinted into the back of my eyelids. It wasn't so much the pose or the fact that he hadn't had a shirt on that worried me, I'd seen my friends from home in various states of undress, but the thing that disturbed me was my intent. The fact that I'd deliberately sneaked a peek at him, checked him out, made me feel very guilty. It confused me more than anything, I'd never felt the urge to check out a guy before, for any reason at all.

I lay there for an hour at least, trying to work it out, what it was about Harry Potter that made me act completely differently, what it was that attracted me so much to him. I couldn't put my finger on it though. He was just Harry. And, for some reason, I just liked that. A lot.