"Trelawney AND Snape in the same day? What do they think they are playing at with these schedules. We’ll never make it through our first day."

"Trelawney might be right when she predicts my death today, a pretty safe bet with potions this afternoon." Harry said glumly

Hermione sighed, "Harry, Professor Snape isn’t trying to kill you, and you two wouldn’t have to put up with Professor Trelawney if you had just-"

"Taken muggle studies, like you. We know Hermione." Ron said rolling his eyes.

Hermione looked like she was going to say something but Harry jumped up quickly.

"Well Ron, we better get going or we’ll be late. Bye Hermione, see you after class," and he dragged Ron away quickly.

***

Dumbledore shook Snape gently on the shoulder.

“Severus, your class starts in an hour.”

Snape opened his eyes slowly. He had fallen asleep at his desk, and he had big bags under his eyes as well as a red line on his forehead that was the result of resting his head on a pen. He looked at the headmaster for a few seconds as if he had forgotten who the man was, but then his eyes widened in shock.

“An hour! I’ve still got to-“ Snape jumped up, but Dumbledore put a firm hand on Snape’s shoulder.

“It’s all done. You may want to clean yourself up and have a quick breakfast, but Sirius and I prepared the classroom for your first lesson.”

Snape headed in to the classroom to inspect. After a very thorough examination from corner to corner he nodded grudgingly

“Everything seems to be in order Headmaster.”

“Now Severus, you’ve got a long day ahead of you, I suggest you go and get ready.”

Snape started towards the door but stopped at the threshold.

“Thank you Albus.” He said without turning around, and after a second long hesitation continued out the door.

Dumbledore smiled.

***

Harry’s feet felt like they had lead in them on his way up to divination. Obviously Ron felt them same way, and the boys arrived at class with barely enough time to collapse into beanbags around the same table.

“Welcome back,” said an airy voice said as Trelawney melted out of the shadows. “I hope you all had a good summer, for it might have been the last summer for some of you.”

There were a few gasps and Trelawney gave Harry a pointed stare. Harry yawned.

“I am going to start you on a very important, but often overlooked form of divination today,” Trelawney continued ignoring Harry. “Bird entrails...”

It was Ron’s turn to gasp in horror. “Did she just say what I think she said?” he whispered to Harry.

Harry looked around the room, even Lavender and Parvati, who were normally listening to every word Professor Trelawney spoke as if her words were the key to salvation, were staring with horror at her words. “I think she did,” replied Harry.

To the class’s amazement Professor Trelawney pulled out a bin full of dead birds.

“I have been very busy collecting birds this summer, but you must be very careful with the one you are working with or we may run out. Everyone come up and pick out a bird.”

Harry looked at Ron, whose eyes were bulging.

“She can’t be serious.”

“She’s serious alright.”

No one in the class moved, but this didn’t seem to faze Professor Trelawney, she started walking around to each of the tables handing out not only a bird but a knife and a plate to each student. Once finished she took a bird and a knife for herself and went back to the front of the room.

To the classes surprise she started to demonstrate the precise cuts they would be making to open up their birds. Harry felt that Trelawney’s airy voice didn’t quite match the words coming out of her mouth

“Start at the throat, and make one long cut...”

After she was done explaining she motioned for the class to begin. For a few seconds no one moved. Then to everyone=s surprise Neville Longbottom started gutting his bird. Not to be outdone by Neville, Seamus and Dean followed Neville’s example. Soon the whole class had begun cutting open their birds. It wasn’t until the intestines sloshed out of his birds belly that Harry felt truly sick. Beside him Ron had gone completely pale.

“Good, now that you have all finished that part turn your books to page 157 for the key to interpreting your entrails.”

It was too late to go back now, Harry pulled out his book and opened the page. It was bad enough having to cut the bird open, but looking for signs out of it’s internal organs was horrid. The only thing that went right was that halfway through the lesson Pavarti almost got sick, and Professor Trelawney had no time to predict Harry’s death. But by lunch time no one from class was hungry.

Hermione sat across from Harry and Ron eating, while they picked at their food, both unable to get the bloody plates out of their mind.

“What’s up you two? How come you aren’t eating?”

Ron gulped and shook his head, so Harry told Hermione about divination. To Hermione’s credit she confined her amusement at the story with a well hid, smug smile.

“Well you better at least try to eat, we’ve got potions next, you’ll need your strength.”

Ron groaned and Harry chanced a glance up at the head table. Snape was there, looking particularly nasty today. Harry groaned inwardly in agreement with Ron. Could today get any worse?

But as most people who think such things Harry found out that things can always get worse, and frequently they do. As he took a seat in the back of the dungeon classroom with Ron and Hermione, Snape stalked in the room, his expression was set in a foreboding scowl and a look of general disgust at the entire class. Not even the Slytherins could get on Snape’s good side today. He started the lesson without a word by writing up a summary on what you should have learned over the summer about drying potions. Then he wrote up the ingredients and growled at them to start.

Harry watched as the potions master sat down at his desk and started reading a pile of parchment on his desk, making occasional notes.

“Come one Harry, we better start, this is going to take ages,” Ron poked him in the back.

Harry reluctantly started collecting the ingredients for the day’s potion. To the surprise of the class Snape didn’t say an entire word until the end of class. Hermione leaned over at one point and asked Harry if he though Snape was sleeping. But five minutes before class was done Snape stood up suddenly and announced that everyone should be done now.

“And now we will test some,” Snape’s eyes darted menacingly around the room. “Potter, you first.”

Harry waited bravely as Snape brought a wet rag up to Harry’s caldron. Harry held his breath as Snape ladled a bit from his caldron onto the rag. Instead of drying the rag turned purple and the potion started to burn a hole in the middle.

“Potter, I suppose you added powdered unicorn horn instead of shredded hoof,” Snape was snarling at Harry.

“But, professor,” said Hermione from beside Harry. “You wrote on the board...”

“Ten points from Gryffindor for Harry’s mistake, and twenty because Miss Granger can not HOLD HER TONGUE!”

“But Professor,” Hermione tried bravely again. “Just look at the board.”

“ENOUGH! Detention Miss Granger, and ten more points from Gryffindor. Class dismissed.”

No one could get out of the class room fast enough, but Harry noticed Snape standing very still in front of the board, his head in his hands.

That night at dinner a much calmer Snape sat at the head table. He didn’t talk to anyone, but the look of hate for the world was decidedly absent. Harry couldn’t help but wonder what had happened to Snape this afternoon.

***

“I wrote it wrong headmaster. I didn’t think it was possible. What if I had written that they use goat hair instead of goat whiskers. The whole room would have exploded, they could have been seriously hurt- I-“

Dumbledore held up his hand. “That’s quiet enough Severus, you are overworking yourself that’s all. No harm done, just get some rest.”

Snape looked into Dumbledore’s eyes, and Dumbledore saw a haunted look in his eyes.

“There’s more? Surely not tonight...”

“Tonight,” said Snape softly.

Dumbledore waited a moment before speaking. “Well then I suggest getting some rest before tonight then.”

“Yes headmaster.”

And with that Snape headed out the door.

***

The next day Harry had care of magical creatures. He, Ron and Hermione left early, hoping to talk with Hagrid before class started. They found him tending some colorful looking birds who seemed to be singing, but no sound was coming out of their mouths.

“Hagrid, are those Fwoopers?” Ron asked curiously. “I had an aunt who forgot to put the silencing charm on her one month and went completely insane.”

“That’s right Ron. We shouldn’ ‘ave any problems with that ‘ere,” Hagrid smiled down at them. “’ow was yer summers?”

They talked with Hagrid for a long time until the rest of the class started filing across the grounds over to Hagrid’s hut.

“What did you do over the summer?” Harry asked Hagrid.

“Well I- er- took a trip. Traveled, I did. Picked up these birds too.”

Harry was going to ask another question but Hagrid quickly rounded everyone up to begin the lesson.

The lesson was one of the better ones Hagrid had given. The Fwoopers were a beautiful bird whose song made people go crazy. The class got to feed the Fwoopers and pluck a few of its feathers, which were used for fancy quills. The only blotch on the lesson was Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle, who snickered through the lesson, while shooting nasty looks and Harry, Ron and Hermione. Harry had to stop Ron from plucking all the feathers out of his bird. Ron was about ready to jump on Malfoy, and Hermione saw this and put a hand on Ron’s arm.

“Pay attention to what you are doing!” she whispered to him as Ron accidentally pulled on his Fwoopers ear and the bird gave a silent screech.

“Be glad you aren’t gutting them,” said Harry to Ron and that brought a smile to his friends face.

“Right, I’d hate to see what Trelawney would do to these birds,” and Ron started laughing hysterically.

Luckily for everyone Draco decided to give Ron his distance and he and Ron managed to make it through the lesson without killing each other.

“What do we have next?” asked Harry as they waved goodbye to Hagrid after class.

“Defense against the Dark Arts,” said Hermione. “Lets hurry up so we can get good seats.”

Hogwarts had five different defense against the dark arts teachers over the last few years, and people were starting to say the job was cursed. In fact after the last teacher had spent the school year locked up in his own trunk there were rumors that no one would want to take the job, and that Dumbledore would have to teach the classes.

How Dumbledore had convinced Penelope to take the job Harry didn’t know, but he was sure it would be an interesting year, and wondered if quidditch defenses would be one of the topics they would discuss. Nothing, however, prepared Harry, Ron or Hermione with what met their eyes as they walked into the classroom.

The walls of the classroom had been painted a blue and silver. All the windows had been shut and covered, and the only light in the room was coming from a few candles. The tables, normally in straight rows had been pushed back against the walls, and the center of the room was empty, with nothing but a exquisite rug, which matched the walls. Penelope was nowhere to be seen and as the class entered they stood in the middle of the room looking in awe at the set up, unsure of what to do.

But after a minute the door to the office swung open and Penelope entered with a huge smile on her face. She was dressed in pure white robes, and looked more like an angel than a professor.

“Welcome everyone, I hope you like my decorating job. You can just take a seat on the floor around the mat.”

Hermione had to prod Harry and lead Ron to the mat in order to get them to sit down. But once Penelope asked them to get out their books out everyone snapped to attention.

“I want you all to take a moment to read the second paragraph on the third page of the introduction please.”

Harry paged through his book, found the paragraph and read:

Another form of wandless defense is called Telepensieve. However, due to the lack of proper study of this field it is not one used frequently. There are some wizards who deny the usefulness of this type of magic. The last minister of experimental magic outlawed the study of telepensieve for that very reason. The law was later revoked after a witch, who spent her entire life developing new methods of the magic, used telepensieve to hold the minister captive in a sugar jar.

Harry looked up when he was done reading, he hoped they would get to learn about this new type of magic. He absent mindedly flipped to the table of contents, looking for the chapter on Telepensieve, but was interrupted when Penelope cleared her throat.

“Dumbledore has requested that I start to teach you about Telepensieve. If you catch on quickly we may get to practice some simple spells by the end of the term, but it’s very complicated. The good thing about studying this type of magic is that you have now completed the completed the entire reading for this class.”

There were a few gasps at this announcement.

“The paragraph you just read in the only time Telepensieve is mentioned in the entire book. In fact there are only 5 books written on the subject at all. What we will be doing will be mostly practical, with some experimentation, so feel free to chuck your books out the window.”

Dean let out a whoop and slammed his book shut. Everyone in the class laughed.

“And now,” said Penelope, “I will show you what Telepensieve REALLY is.”

With a light wave of her hand the lights in the room dimmed. The remaining light reflected weirdly off of Penelope’s white robes. She stepped into the middle of the room took a deep breath and closed her eyes. The class sat in heavy anticipation for a few moments before Penelope opened her eyes again. She smiled at the faces of her excited students.

“I’ll need some help with this demonstration. Any volunteers?”

Ron’s hand went up immediately, and Penelope motioned for him to join her. Ron jumped up and rushed to the middle of the carpet.

Penelope walked over to one end of the rug and motioned for Ron to the other. They stood facing each other and Harry realized Penelope had assumed a dueling stance, without her wand.

“I would like to demonstrate the effect Telepensieve can have on curses. That means, Ron, that I need you to curse me.”

Ron’s jaw dropped and he got pale. Harry felt just like Ron looked, had their new teacher just asked Ron to curse her? Harry, for a split second, wished that it was Snape, and not Penelope who was teaching them about Telepensieve.

“It’s okay Ron, you won’t hurt me.”

Ron gulped and slowly lifter his wand. He croaked out a indistinguishable word, and a curse shot out of his wand towards Penelope. What happened next took place so fast Harry almost missed it. Penelope held her hand up and made a quick motion. The curse hit her hand, and disappeared.

“Wicked!” said Ron, obviously relieved.

Penelope smiled at the class. “One way of using Telepensieve is took block curses cast upon yourself. This has been tested on almost every curse, including the Imperius curse and the Cruciatus curse. But it can also be used to protect individuals against particular curses.”

She walked over to Ron and put her hand on his head, whispering something and making another quick motion with her other hand. Then she stepped back.

“Harry, I will need your help with this demonstration.”

Harry stood up apprehensively.

“I have just protected Ron from the disarming spell. I need you to try and disarm Ron.”

Harry nodded and looked at his friend. Ron was looking nervous. Despite the positive demonstration, being on the receiving end of the curse was different.

“Don’t be scared Ron,” Penelope said encouragingly. “I’ll be right next to you the whole time.”

A few people in the class snickered and Ron turned red, but he stood up straight and help out his wand with created confidence.

“Expelliarmus,” said Harry before he had a chance to convince himself not to.

To the class’s surprise Ron was jostled lightly by the spell, and he kept his wand easily. There was a smatter of applause for Ron and Harry gave a deep sigh of relief. Penelope gave Ron a friendly pat on the shoulder, and smiled at Harry.

“Well done both of you. Ten points to Gryffindor.”

Ron was beaming as he and Harry went to sit back down next to Hermione.

“The last use for Telepensieve has never been fully tested.” Penelope continued. “Theoretically, those who are able to use telepensieve should be able to get into others minds. In essence, it would allow a person to attack another person’s mind. You could cause someone to do almost anything; suffocate, go crazy, lose direction, the possibilities are endless. However no one has ever recorded a case of Telepensieve being used in this way, although many have tried. It takes a very powerful wizard to force their way into someone’s mind, and it can be very dangerous if concentration is broken.”

Harry thought instantly of what happened to Dumbledore. Theavolos was undoubtedly a strong wizard, could he know how to use this type of magic?

“Today I’m going to introduce you to a very basic form of this type of telepensieve. I want you all to think of a number and write it down. When it’s your turn I want you to open your mind up to me and with any luck I will be able to switch your number without you even realizing it.”

The class scrambled for quill ink and paper, and after a quick second they all scribbled something on a paper. Penelope started on the opposite end of the room and concentrated on every person in turn. One by one they silently wrote down another number on the other side of the paper. The silence in the room was eerie, and Harry sifted uncomfortably as Penelope made her way around the room. She finished with Ron and Hermione quickly, but as Harry opened his mind to her the class realized something was different. The light got a little bit brighter, and Penelope shut her eyes and took a step closer to Harry. Harry’s eyes rolled into the back of his head, and he became aware of nothing besides a voice in his head.

Harry, can you hear me?

Yes.

What’s your number?

31

no, it’s 15.

31 I said.

Why did you pick the number 15 Harry? I didn’t. YOU picked 15, I chose 31.

HARRY, Listen to me. Do as I ask.

Deep down in Harry’s mind he knew what to do. Reaching out with his mind, imagining that it had hands he threw out the intruding voice, and then pulled part of himself into Penelope’s mind. There was a sharp gasp from Penelope and Harry felt a sharp pain in his arms as he crashed back to reality.

When his eyes came back into focus he saw the class looking between him and Penelope curiously and Penelope, white as a sheet looking in amazement at Harry.

“Everyone look at what you wrote down now.” she said a little breathlessly.

The rest of the class had two different numbers written down on their paper.

“But Ms. Porticalus,” protested Seamus. “I don’t remember writing this first one down, I swear I was thinking about the second number the whole time.”

There was a mummer of agreement from the rest of the class.

“That’s why this type can be so dangerous. Most people would never know that their mind had been tampered with.”

“What about me?” asked Harry quietly.

Penelope considered Harry for a moment. “I don’t have an answer for you, but I’ll do my best to find one.”

The rest of the lesson Penelope assigned them their first homework piece. They had to memorize a series of hand motions. It was by far the easiest, and most fun piece of homework they had ever been given. The class talked of nothing else the rest of the day. Harry had to tell the story about how he had heard Penelope in his head over and over as his classmates tried to guess what happened. No one else had known anything had happened to them.

***

Tipsy watched as Jasper started playing with a loose piece of paper absentmindedly.

“What are you doing?” she asked Jasper airily.

“I’m bored,” said Jasper very simply.

Tipsy sighed. She was bored too. Ever since the funny man who liked to dance left the house had been very quiet. Mrs. Figg and Arabella were busy all day, and they hardly spoke to each other, let alone the cats.

“We should go ask to be fed again.” suggested Jasper. “Arabella always hates it when we interrupt.”

Tipsy laughed and agreed. The door to Arabella’s room was slightly open and as the two cats reached it they heard two voices.

“I mean what I said.”

“I know you did Severus, but I don’t think now is the time...”

“Then when is the right time?”

Arabella was silent for a moment.

“I’ll change the subject.” said the deeper voice. “You know what Lupin is going to be doing.”

“Yes,” answered Arabella and the cats could almost here the frown in her voice. “I’m not happy with it. Have you made any progress with his potion yet?”

“It’s ready to be tested. I can’t be sure of all the side effects though. If Lupin is willing to be my test case-“

“He’ll be willing, I’m sure of it. Thank you Severus for spending time working on it.”

“It is important that Dumbledore-“

“I know you didn’t do it just for Dumbledore Severus. Your heartless act may fool everyone else, but it won’t fool me.”

There was a long silence. Tipsy and Jasper edged closer into the room. Arabella was holding a mirror in front of her looking annoyed and embarrassed at the same time. The mirror spoke to her.

“It has long since stopped being an act Bella,” and after another shorter pause, “I’m going now, we’ll continue our discussion later. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight Severus.”

Arabella laid the mirror down gently. She looked sad now, and Jasper nudged Tipsy.

“Let’s go ask her now, she looks like she needs a distraction.”

Tipsy nodded and walked into the room. Poor Arabella, the last 11 years had been hard on her. The two cats had to meow very loudly to get Arabella’s attention. She shook herself slightly and frowned at then.

“You can’t possibly be hungry again,” she said skeptically.

Jasper sat down firmly and glared at her. Arabella threw her hands up in exasperation.

“Alright, alright. Let’s go find you more food.”

The cats lead her into the kitchen, where to their surprise Mrs. Figg was sitting at the table, a mug out and the water kettle just starting to heat on the stove. She looked older tonight, it seemed like her back was bent just a few more inches and her shoulders sagged a bit lower. Arabella checked at the door for a mere second but continued in and put a light hand on her mother’s arm.

“What happened.”

Mrs. Figg turned to face her daughter.

“Peter,” she said solemnly “They let him go.”

“WHAT!” cried Arabella suddenly in a rage. “What about all those people he killed, what about Sirius. How can they do that!”

Mrs. Figg shook her head slowly. “The ministry of magic refuses to cooperate with Dumbledore now. It seems that Fudge has some suspicions about his loyalties.”

Arabella stood with her mouth open for a few seconds before she stammered out “Dumbledore, they think DUMBLEDORE is in league with Voldemort?”

“How else would he have known about the dark lord’s return?” Mrs. Figg’s words were bitter and harsh.

There was a short pause and then the kettle started to steam. Arabella grabbed herself another mug, poured two cups of tea and sat down opposite her mother.

Tipsy looked at Jasper, who was looking rather annoyed, his tail flailing angrily.

“You know what this mean,” he asked, sounding annoyed.

“That the damn rat we caught is not going to be punished. After all we did to catch it.”

Tipsy could feel her blood pressure rising as well. Mrs. Figg looked down at them.

“I’m sorry you two, there is just nothing any of us can do about it.”

Tipsy stood up as tall as possible. “Yes, there is.”

Jasper didn’t need help getting at what Tipsy was saying. “We’ll just have to catch him again, that’s all,” he continued for her.

“There aren’t too many talking rats around, it shouldn’t be too hard to catch one.”

“And when we get him we will deal with him ourselves.”

Mrs. Figg sat very still while listening to the cats. “I suppose so, but you do remember what he did last time. He’s not just a rat, he can be human as well.”

Tipsy and Jasper looked at each other again.

Tipsy spoke again very slowly. “That man is a rat no matter what form he takes. We’ll be able to get him.”

The subject was closed. Mrs. Figg looked distressed, but she realized the futility of trying to force a cat, especially her cats, to do anything. She quickly relayed the message to her daughter who had been watching them with interest.

“Tipsy, I have something which might help you,” Arabella said, and she pulled a minuscule flask connected to a string out of her robes. Inside of the flask were thousands of tiny insects, which looked like they could be bees. “When you find the rat release these. They won’t bother you, but they will certainly bother any humans within 10 feet of you.”

Tipsy waited patiently as Arabella tied the string around her neck. Then the two cats sped out of the room looking for Scorn and Trouble.