The Eighth Weasley

Notes: I have the feeling that might be one of those semi-long sections, since I have a whole lot to cover, cos this is where Willow starts her lessons and *sniffs* makes a new fwend! How sweet. I can't believe I'm writing something in which no one has died within 20 pages. Gah. I feel dirty!

As usual, none of this is mine. If it was, I would be rich! Alas, I'm not, so I'm just highly amused.

And sleepy. Can I mention the sleepiness? Tossing and turning for at least 2 hours from 2.30 til 4.30 and getting only 4 hours sleep...not one the things I recommend doing on a regular basis. And ick. I saw morning. I actually saw morning. I looked out the window and saw weird pale light and was thinking 'huh? wassat?'! I'm a student, dammit! I'm not meant to be up before noon! I hate it when my body decides to wake me up for no reason...although the fact I was almost strangling in my blankets might have been a bit of a problem...

Anyway, enough of the babbling - some more glitches in the plot were smoothed out by my distinct lack in sleep last night, so maybe there was a reason behind it, and as soon as this chapter is done, I intend to work on an essay I have due in in 6 days. And I've been saying I'll start it for the last three days...yes. See the commitment to my education there.

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Willow stared at herself in the mirror that stood against the wall near her bed.

Yes she looked...like she was about to be sick with terror.

Swallowing hard, she brushed down her robes with shaking hands, hoping she didn't look as white and terrified as she thought she did. She glanced towards the door of the small bathroom she and Hermione shared. "Hermione?"

"Mmm-hmm?" The older witch stuck her head out of the door, her toothbrush stuck in her mouth, her other hand in the middle of brushing her uncontrollable mass of brown hair.

"So I, y'know, look all right?" Willow asked, her expression saying for the record that she thought she looked stupid, weird and lost, all rolled into one, much as she had felt for much of her life in the early High School years.

Waving with a brush that she would be through in a moment, Hermione ducked back into the bathroom to finish cleaning her teeth.

When she hurried out, her long hair had been magiced back into a braid and she was wearing a scoop-necked cream blouse, with a light brown waistcoat and knee-length skirt, over which she would no doubt wear robes.

Making her way through the deep carpet to Willow, she gave the younger girl an affectionate look. "You look perfect." She said, gesturing for Willow to turn for her, so she could check every angle.

"I-I do?"

She was wearing the standard Hogwarts uniform: a heavy, grey skirt that reached her knees, knee-high white socks, a white shirt, the Gryffindor tie - which had been a regulation Hogwarts tie until she had been sorted - and grey sweater and the usual black robes, that hung to her ankles.

Hermione reached up and straightened her tie for her. "You look fine, Willow. I promise," she said gently, stroking loose strands of red hair back from Willow's pale face with her thumb "Don't be so scared. No one wants you to do badly here."

"Except Snape."

The Professor of Muggle Studies snorted. "Well, he's an arrogant prat anyway."

"What?" Willow gaped at her. Hermione gave her a prim look. "Hermione! You called Snape a prat!"

The older witch's eyes danced. "And you know that I'm always honest in my opinions of people," she said, tucking the loose strands of hair behind Willow's ears with a smile. "Snape just happens to be a pompous twit with a knack for scaring anyone under the age of eighteen. And you."

"You make him sound harmless," Willow turned back to stare at her white-faced reflection in the mirror.

"He is harmless, Will," The Professor of Muggle Studies propped her chin on Willow's shoulder, studying the red head's reflection. "Someone once told me 'what doesn't kill you makes you stronger' and Snape is definitely one of those things. He can't physically harm you, but he can make you tough enough to defend yourself if someone does try to."

"I'll bear that in mind when he starts picking on me," Willow mumbled, bunching a fist against her stomach to try to squish the butterflies currently doing a jazzed-up version of the rumba there.

Hermione just chuckled. "C'mon," she said, stepping back and going to get her shoes from under her bed. "We're going to be late for breakfast and if you miss that, you'll be off-track for the rest of the day."

"Big comfort," Willow moaned, grabbing her hefty canvas bag and swinging it onto her shoulder. "I'm just glad I don't have to fly until this afternoon. At least then, I won't barf my breakfast all over everyone."

"You have such a...graphic way with words," Hermione chuckled, fastening her shoes and straightening up. Snatching her own bag and robes, she joined Willow at the door that led down to the Gryffindor common room. "Shall we?"

"Do we have to?"

"Yes!"

***

"Good morning, everyone."

Professor Lupin greeted them, as the first years filed into the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, his pale eyes catching Willow's and he gave her a tiny yet hugely comforting smile.

He looked a little tired and Willow realised that only a couple of nights before they had come to Hogwarts, he must have been going through a stage of wolfiness. After all, the previous night was when the full moon was waning.

Part of her wanted to hug him, like she did Oz, when he came out of the wolfy state, looking so tired, but she knew that probably wasn't the best way to start her Defence Against the Dark Arts classes.

Making her way to the back, she sat unobtrusively in the last row, making sure to stay out of the way of all the scary, small and powerful younger pupils, who were starting to intimidate her a whole lot.

"As you all know," Perching on front edge of the desk, Lupin looked around at the fascinated faces staring up at him. "This class is where you will learn to defend yourself against the dark arts and creatures that are associated with them. Now, this class is very lucky to have someone who has actually lived through an experience in a Dark Arts-centred area."

Huh?

Willow looked around the room.

There was someone here who had been somewhere dark and oogy like she had...oh God! He was talking about her and looking at her with a very naughty look in his pale eyes and oh God!

"Miss Willow Weasley, the red-haired lady at the back of the class," Oh, she was SO gonna kill him! She was gonna kill him good! "Lived on a Hellmouth for eighteen years. Now, do any of you know what a Hellmouth is?"

A small brown hand shot up.

Leon Mzimba.

"Leon?"

"Yes, Professor," the boy answered eagerly. "A Hellmouth is a centre of mystical convergence, where all the powers are centralised over a certain point, which is often regarded to be an opening onto Hell."

"A very well-worded definition, Leon. Five points to Gryffindor," Lupin's eyes drifted around the class. "As Leon clearly said, the Hellmouth is viewed as a virtual doorway onto Hell. Can anyone tell us what the main populace of a Hellmouth is?"

Again, Leon's hand shot up, followed by a couple of others.

"D-demons, Sir?" Annie Wazzock said carefully.

"Very good, Annie. Yes. While most muggles believe that they are alone on earth, Hellmouths are hot-spots for demon activity and there are often more demons than muggles in habitation there," He raised his twinkling eyes to Willow, who was scarlet and glaring at him. "Now, perhaps Miss Weasley might come down to the front and tell us of a few of dark creatures she has faced."

"No she might not," she muttered under her breath, but still pushed her chair out with unnecessary force and stomped all the way to the front of the classroom, where Lupin gave her a raise of an eyebrow. "Prat," she hissed at him.

"Witch," he returned in a low voice, actually making her giggle. "So, Miss Weasley, you inhabited a Hellmouth. Can you tell us a little about what that was like and a little of your experiences there?"

She wanted to say 'No!' and run to the back of the class and hide behind her huge bag. She wanted to stick her tongue out at him and sulk. She wanted to do anything but sit and talk about demony things.

But then, she found she was talking.

Ho boy, was she talking!

A lot.

And lots of quills were scratching on parchment, making notes.

She started, without even noticing, about how her powers had been harder to control there, as if there was some kind of opposing force trying to prevent her from doing spells and things, so every spell was a struggle.

Then, she moved onto the various oogy creatures of the night that she had had the misfortune of coming across: vampires, werewolves, Mayor-snake-demon-thing which had made Graduation so much more memorable, Kung-fu ninja-psycho demon-chicks who wanted to end the world, horny-demon-guys who wanted to end the world, other strange demons that wanted to end the world - she was really starting to see a running theme there - Hyena demons, the Bezoar, zombies, the Inca mummy girl.

'Oooooh's and 'Aaaaaah's punctuated her words, along with the scribbling scratch of quills on parchment, wide-eyed faces staring up at her when she went into greater depths about certain creatures, especially the vampires.

Everyone always seemed to want to know about the vampires.

"You got bit?" A nervous little blonde girl from Ravenclaw squeaked.

"Not too badly," Willow admitted, her hand rising to her neck at the memory of Harmony aiming to bite and almost missing. Looking back on it, it was kinda funny to think about. "Although, there was this time that Spike, he was a really mean vampire, came to my dorm..."

She detailed how he had told her he was going to kill her, then had tackled her, pinning her down on the bed: How she had felt his fangs on her throat, how she had seen her life flashing in front of her eyes, how it felt like her heart was about to explode through her chest.

"Ooooooooh!" The class were staring at her wonderingly.

"How did you get away from him?" Professor Lupin was the one who actually asked the question. He was still leaning against the desk and he looked absolutely fascinated by her storytelling.

Willow shrugged. "It's not very exciting. He had a chip-thing in his head...a kind of muggly machine thing and it stopped him from hurting people, so when he tried to bite me, all he got was brain-fried. I hit him on the head with a lamp and ran away."

"Wow..."

Willow could feel a surge of embarrassment rising up her face in a red wave. "Um... yeah," she mumbled, shooting a dark look at Lupin for dragging her up in the first place. "So that's the boring life of Willow Weasley, lamp-breaker extraordinaire."

She had never been more relieved in her life than when the deep reverberating 'bong' of the bell signified that it was the end of the class, giving the chuckling Lupin one more dark look, as she fled from the class.

***

"So how did it go?"

Sitting at the end of the Gryffindor table, nearest the teacher's table, Willow looked up to find Hermione standing over her, smirking. "You knew he was gonna embarrass me, didn't you?" She pointed a ketchup-stained knife at the other witch.

"What on earth gives you that idea?" Hermione's eyes went round and innocent.

"Huh." Turning back to her chicken and vegetables, Willow glowered a little more.

Hermione just smiled and turned to walk towards the staff table, pausing as she mounted the first step. "Oh, I was wondering if you'd want to walk me to Muggle-studies after lunch. I have your class."

Jabbing a squashy lump of potato with her fork, Willow shot a glare of mock-annoyance at Hermione. "Sure. I guess I can do that," Her fork came up and pointed at the Professor. "But if you tell me we have to hold hands and walk in pairs...I'm not falling for that again!"

"Drat! You foiled my evil plot!" Laughing, Hermione continued up to the table, where she slid into a seat beside Lupin, who was watching them banter, a small smile on his face.

***

If the youngest Weasley thought she had been embarrassed in Lupin's class, it was nothing compared to what happened in Hermione's class, where only the impish smile of the Professor prevented her from stomping out.

It had started out well enough, with the Professor asking how many of them were muggle-borns and how many were first and second generation wizarding families, then she had - pointedly staring at Willow - asked if there was anyone who had been in a different position.

It had just gone downhill from there.

As she had done with Lupin, she had ended up talking about everyday life on the Hellmouth and the interesting uses that totally normal items could be put to, which became ridiculous.

Once more, she was glad when she could flee the class, her classmates still wanting to ask more of this strange yet totally fascinating wizarding-born, muggle-raised, wandless-wonder-witch.

However, it was only when she realised that she had a flying lesson that she slowed her pace, suddenly wishing she could run back to the dormitory to hide under her four poster bed.

It wasn't that she was afraid of flying.

It was more that she was terrified of not flying.

Of crashing.

After all, she still didn't have control of her wand, so how in the heck was she meant to make a broomstick do what she wanted?

"You all right?" a young voice asked beside her and she looked down to find the Leon Mzimba looking up at her as she walked towards the grassy lawn. He looked as nauseous as she felt, his face ghostly.

"Mmm," she whimpered at the sight of two rows of broomsticks lying on the grass and heard Leon do the same. "You?"

"I-I-I-I'm sc-scared of h-heights," he mumbled, staring fitfully at the broomsticks.

"Don't worry," Giving him a comforting smile - or at least what she hoped was a comforting smile - Willow nodded to two brooms that were side by side. "We probably won't go high, since it's our first time."

"Y-y-you think so?"

"Mmm," she hummed non-commitedly.

They took the last two brooms, looking down the line of other Gryffindors with clear unease at their flying instructor, Madam Hooch. The woman was smiling around at them, her grey hair standing up all over the place, her yellow eyes reminding Willow of Merlin's.

"Welcome to your first flying lesson," she said, her eerie eyes lingering on Willow briefly, before she launched into the speech about taking up positions and motioned for them all to summon their brooms to their hands.

Much to Willow's shock, her leapt straight to her hand, almost carrying her straight up into the air with the force of it. Around her, a few other people had their brooms in their hand, but Leon's was lying at his feet, shuddering.

"I don't think it likes me," he mumbled, punching his glasses up his nose.

Minutes later, when everyone finally had their broomsticks in their hands, Madam Hooch excitedly showed them how to mount and grip the broom, to prevent any of them slipping off in flight.

"Good...good..." She checked each of them. "Now, I want you to kick off a little way from the ground, hover for a few moments, then tip the broom forward slightly and come back to land. On my whistle..."

Nervous looks were exchanged, then the whistle blew.

Leon shot off like a bullet out of a gun and Willow found herself horribly reminded of what had happened to Neville Longbottom so many years ago, her voice rising with the rest of the classes, to call out.

The broom angled itself upwards, sweeping up the side of one of the towers, the skinny little boy wrapping arms and legs around it, his face going grey as he was carried higher and higher.

"He's going to fall!" a girl shrieked, pointing.

It certainly looked like it!

Leon's dark face was the colour of dishwater, and he was visibly shaking. Although they weren't close enough to see for sure, Willow was convinced that his eyes were rolling. If his phobia of heights was anything like hers of frogs...

Suddenly, he just seemed to lose his grip.

The broom kept moving, but he slipped off, falling at horrendous speed toward the spiked, gargoyle-like decorations that edged the roof of the tower.

The girls in the class were screaming in panic, Madam Hooch kicking off from the ground on a broom, her expression fraught and desperate, but Willow could see that even at the speed she was flying at, she wouldn't reach the boy in time.

Running forward, the red-haired witch stretched her arms upwards, focussing her mind on the boy, forcing her thoughts to become two immense hands that could move the air and catch him.

"DECELERANDO!" she screamed out.

Her eyes were pressed tightly shut, but she could feel him, through the air.

She heard gasps and cries of astonishment around her, carefully opening her eyes to see Leon bobbing in the air, barely inches from the spikes on the tower, his head lolling limply, his glasses hanging off one ear.

Panting with the effort of holding his dead-weight up, she mentally steered him away from the tower, towards the air over the middle of the lawn and slowly brought the boy's body towards the ground.

Running forward, she caught him around the middle and released her spell, dropping to her knees, the boy's body heavier than she expected, flopping like a limp noodle in her arms.

Madam Hooch landed lightly beside her, staring at the young witch. Her face was white and she looked like she had seen some kind of ghost. "How...?"

"Huh?"

"You levitated the boy without a wand."

"Oh...right...that. It's no big deal," Willow gently shook Leon, who was still a funny shade of grey. "Leon? Leon, can you hear me?" Shuddering violently, the boy's dark chocolate coloured eyes opened, strangely glassy. "Thank God! You're alive!"

"High..." he whispered, shivering in her arms. "So...high...couldn't hold on..."

A loud snap made them both jump, looking up. Madam Hooch bent and shoved a large chunk of chocolate into the boy's mouth, as well as chewing on a bit herself, her face white.

"Eat," she ordered in a shaking voice.

Leon didn't seem to have the energy to do anything but lie limply in Willow's arms and let the chocolate melt in his mouth, shivers still running through him, as the red-haired witch held him and carefully put his glasses back on straight.

The rest of the class were standing in silence, staring at the three in the middle of the lawn, but - most particularly - at Willow.

That was definitely not what they had been expecting from their first flying lessons.

Yes, they had expected someone to do the accident-prone thing and fly off out of control, but they never imagined that one of their number would almost get himself killed, only to be saved by some kind of freaky superwitch who could do charms without a wand.

"Should we take him to Madam Pomfrey?" Willow asked, when she was still sitting there, several minutes later.

Madam Hooch, still very pale in the face nodded. "Yes...yes...that might be a good idea...I'll do that right away..." She pulled out a wand giving Willow another cautious look, as if she suspected her to be dangerous.

"You're gonna be okay, Leon," the red head whispered reassuringly to the boy, as madam Hooch conjured up a stretcher and she and Willow both helped the shaking boy onto it.

"Musta looked...stupid..." he croaked, not releasing her hand.

Willow stroked his cheek. "Not at all," she said, smiling. "You were the only kid in the class who flew without a broomstick."

"I did?" He smiled shyly back at her. "Nifty..."

"Come on, young man," Madam Hooch sent the stretcher in the direction of the medical wing with a wave of her wand. "The rest of you, class is dismissed." She said loudly. "Be sure to pack away the brooms in the right racks. Weasley," Willow looked at her nervously. "Thank you."

***

"Good day?"

Willow, lying on her bed, reading up on some spells she would be doing in charms the next morning, looked up at Hermione, who had just entered their room, heaped down with armfuls of scrolls.

"I think weird describes it better," she answered, laying the book down.

"Hmm?"

The red head shrugged. "Well, you and Remus decided to embarrass me, which I can deal with kind of," Hermione snickered. "Then Leon, that cute little first year guy, almost gets himself killed an suddenly, everyone in my years is staring at me like I'm some kind of superhero for stopping him from falling on a tower."

"Um...could you give that to me once more?" The Professor of Muggle Studies turned to face her fully. "What's this about Leon and falling on a tower?"

"So it's not around the school yet? Oh good!" Willow hastily explained about the runaway broom, the falling boy, the spell, saving him, then the looks on the faces of her classmates. "And Madam Hooch looked like she was going to have a heart attack right there and then!"

"It's the wandless magic thing that surprises people," Hermione said. "Most people simply don't have enough power inside them to do spells that way. That's why we use wands - they're like a magical battery for us. You have your own built-in battery as well as a wand."

"So when I use my wand...?"

A pensive look crossed Hermione's face. "Either you'll be able to do the spells much more easily than everyone else..."

"Or...?"

Hermione gave her a helpless look. "Or you could blow the whole school to pieces with your power combining with the power of your wand," Willow blanched. "Oh, don't worry. I'm sure Professor Dumbledore'll understand."

Willow could just manage to make a sound that sounded remotely like 'eep!'.