First Week

The next day started with Transfiguration alongside the Hufflepuffs. The snakes got to class early and decided to read their books, they were confused by the cat that was sitting on the professor's desk, but they assumed it to be Mrs. McGonagall's pet.

The badgers got there before the time for class began, they were also confused by the cat, however, like the other students present they simply ignored it.

After the last student took a seat, the classroom's door closed and the cat jumped off the table, what happened next was fascinating for all those present. The cat turned into professor McGonagall.

The children had shining eyes as they looked at the professor, she saw that she had the attention of the students and started her lecture.

As it was common, she bagan giving them a warning about the art of transfiguration, she didn't leave any room for foolery in her class and she made sure that it was clear for the pupils.

After the warning came the demonstration, her table became a pig, once again the children were impressed, some less so than the others. The lecture continued with a theoretical part in which the professor made the students take note.

Then it began the interesting part, the practical activities.

The students were given a matchstick and were tasked to transform it into a silver needle. The majority of the slytherins menaged to make the item similar to a needle, only missing a few details, the exception were Gregory, Vincent, Lily, Millicent and Robert.

Robert was the one with the worst result from the snakes, his matchstick only lost it's head.

He felt discouraged with the result, Daphne who was sitting besides him tried to help him out, but at the end of the class he only managed to catch up to his housemate's first attempt, whereas they had managed to transform the item between a matchstick and a needle.

The Hufflepuffs had many more that didn't manage to perfectly transform the item, the only exception were Hannah Abbot and Susan Bones, it seems that just like the majority of the Slytherins they had practiced this before Hogwarts.

After that class they had Herbology and just like Rose had said to Robert the previous day, they learned about the Devil's Snare, it was an alright class, the Ravenclaws dominated it with questions, similar to what happened in the Charms class.

Somehow Rob didn't meet any of his friends in Gryffindor, it seemed that they had classes in totally different parts of the castle that day. Not that it bothered him, he already had a lot to do in order to catch up with his peers, and that's what he decided to do for the rest of the day.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Wednesday was a cold morning, today the snakes would have Defence Against the Dark Arts and Charms, they'd also have Astronomy at midnight. It'd be a packed day.

During the breakfast they were all excited for the first class of the day DADA was the most anticipated subject for the snakes, they were so excited that they cut short on their meal in onder to get to class earlier.

Surprise was the main emotion that they felt, followed closely by confusion, when they arrived at the classroom that'd be used by professor Quirrell. It stank of garlic, it was so strong that some were glad to not have eaten too much, with fear that they might throw up upon staying in the room for too long.

Their emotions changed when the class started, now all they felt was disappointment, they all came to the same conclusion, this class was the worst of them all. The main reason was the stutter that the professor had. Thanks to it, they couldn't understand anything, at least with Binns they could make out what he was saying.

During their lunch break they all avoided anything with garlic in it, some of them were already thinking of a time to spend learning the class from the books.

Charm class brightened their moods for the day, they were so starved for a good class that professor Flitwick had to keep them after the class time ended, thanks to the big amount of questions that the students had, some of them related to spells that were tough at the DADA class.

Their supper time was cut short thanks to that, but none of them were complaining, even the trio that normally would eat the most.

Robert alongside Theodore, Daphne, Tracey and Lily, waited for the midnight class in their common room. They spent the time studying the topics that they already had class on, with a focus on History and DADA, it turns out that it wouldn't be too hard to study these subjects with only books. Although they'd have to find a place to practice the spells of the defence class.

The midnight class of Astronomy was shared with the lions. The students from both houses had to go up the Astronomy Tower, the tallest of the castle. It was after a lot of stairs that they were able to get to the classroom.

The view from there was remarkable, the place and time made it so the stars were in the easiest way possible for the students to see them,and they could see countless of them, so many that one could easily get lost in time looking at them.

Robert arrived with his housemates and set up his telescope closer to the divide that the house members made.

Just like in History class Rose joined besides him, they didn't bother with hiding their friendship as they had done a poor job in the first place and everyone already knew.

What was surprising was the presence of Hermione, she had chosen to stay near her friend over staying closer to the professor, something that happened in every class she had attended thus far.

The three gave each other small greetings as the class was already beginning and professor Sinistra didn't seem the type to allow students to not pay attention.

They helped each other out, something that brought many ugly faces to them, from both houses, some even tried to make them stay somewhere else during the procedure of the class.

However, they ignore them, the worst ones were Draco and Ron. They used every opportunity they could to mess with either of the three. The rest of the class noticed, and some of them tried to help the boys while the ones considered friends by any member of the trio tried to help them.

It ended up becoming a competition between the Gryffindor girls and Robert's friends against all the rest of the students present, the conflict went out of hand when someone tried to mess the placement of a telescope and the object fell from the tower, its user, one really shocked bush haired girl, almost fell with it, had it not been for the quick reflexes of Rose, who was standing besides her.

The incident made Mrs. Sinistra to stop the class and take 50 points from each house, alongside with detention to Draco, Robert, Ron and Rose. They'd have to stay late and help organise the room so it could be used the next day by the other two houses.

All of them calmed down after that and the class ended without any more happenings.

The detention was fairly simple, just move one thing from here to there, if they helped each other they'd finish it fast enough for them to not miss much sleep. However, that wasn't what happened, Draco and Ron continued to fight each other, although they only did so with insults, it was distracting enough for Rob and Rose to delay their own part of the detention.

They did use this opportunity to figure out a date for their study session. They choose to wait for the weekends, since by then they'd already know what they should prioritize.

The duo also chose to include more students in the group, namely their friends. Rose was surprised with the amount of people that Robert had managed to befriend in only three days, but she thought that maybe this was a way for her to get more of her own, they had helped her during the shenanigans of the class.

The detention finished, having taken twice the time that really was needed, Ron had ignored Rob, he had only been mad because the Girl-Who-Lived had been friendlier with a snake while her house was there.

He felt bad about how he reacted toward Robert during the train ride, a feeling that diminished when he was sorted in Slytherin, but he still felt bad and he didn't know how to apologise, he didn't even know if he wanted to.

The next day was Herbology, this time they started to get to know about other magical plants, some safer than the Devil's Snare, they even had some practical lessons.

That afternoon was flying class, the kids who already knew about brooms and the wonder of flying were pretty excited, but that didn't last long.

That was their first class, so all they did was go through the theoretical side of flying and broom management. All in all it was a pretty boring lesson, not even the presence of the rival houses and their bickering had changed that, they had toned it down after Astronomy class.

What followed the next day was double Potions and Transfiguration, the majority of the snakes were good with potions, so they were excited for the class, they hoped it wouldn't be anything like DADA, the professor being Snape, their Head of House, gave them even more reason to look forward to the class, all the other Heads had been really good professors.

The Potions class was in the dungeons, the class was divided with Slytherins on one side and Gryffindors on the other. Rob's friends didn't let him sit close to Rose during this class, afraid that their Head would find a problem with that.

It turned out that it was a good idea, as soon as professor Snape got to Rose's name in the register, he said "Ah, yes, Rose Potter, Our new… Celebrity."

Draco, Blaise and Pansy giggle from where they were seated.

The professor finished calling the names and looked up at the students. He then proceeded to give them a passionate speech about how great of an art potion brewing was, not forgetting to insult them at the end.

Silenced downed on the dungeon, Hermione seemed to be eager to prove the professor wrong about the insult.

Suddenly the professor said, "Potter! What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

She looked like she didn't even understand the question, Hermione had raised her hand, but was ignored. Seind as the professor wanted her to answer, she decided to be honest with him. "I don't know, sir." she said.

The man sneered and said, "Fame clearly isn't everything." a breathe later he continued, "Let's try again. Potter, where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?"

She didn't know this answer either, she tried to look around, but the students were either ignoring her or suppressing their laughter, save for Hermione and Rob, the former was almost getting up trying to get the professor's attention, the latter seemed to be pointing at the professor's cabinet.

She gave a quick look at the furniture and, not wanting to repeat her former question, said "Your ingredients cabinet, sir."

Snape was surprised, her answer was technically correct, but it could have been a lucky guess. So he continued, "Somewhere that is not in this room."

To that Rose could only repeat, "I don't know, sir."

The sneer came back and he almost seemed delighted to say, "Thought you wouldn't open a book before coming, Potter?"

Seeing as the girl didn't break eye contact with him he continued with the question, "What is the difference, Potter, between monkshood and wolfsbane?"

She broke eye contact and looked for Robert, but Snape caught her and he seemed to growl, "Answer me, Potter!" he demanded.

"I don't know" she said a bit louder than she had talked before, "Hermione has had her hand risen since the first question, I bet she knows." she continued with some bravery.

To this Snape finally looked at the bushy haired girl and said, "Sit down!"

The girl quickly did so and avoided his eyes. The professor then returned to glare at Rose and said, "For your information, Potter, asphodel and wormwood make a sleeping potion so powerful it is known as the Draught of Living Death. A bezoar is a stone taken from the stomach of a goat and it'll save you from most poison. As for monkshood and wolfsbane, they are the same plant, which also goes by the name of aconite."

The man then gave a look at the students and raised his voice, "Well? Why aren't you all copying that down?"

He followed that with removing points from Gryffindor for "Rose's cheek remarks". After that the class became practical, they had to brew a boil curing potion, the students were separated in pairs, with Neville pairing up with Robert, since they were left out.

Rob noticed that his pair wasn't bad, he was very knowledgeable with plants and that seemed to help a lot during the preparation of the ingredients. The duo worked well together, they didn't need any form of verbal communication between themselves, it was as if they already knew the brewing process.

The class didn't have any big accidents, only some failed potions, the professor did take off points of the Gryffindor for seemingly no reason at all, he did the same with the Slytherin students, only he gave them instead of removing. He completely ignored Neville and Robert after he saw them brewing the potion perfectly.

The two houses went their ways, the friends who were from different houses said discreet goodbyes, afraid that professor Snape might find something wrong with it and punish the students even more.

The Transfiguration class that followed was much better for Robert, although he still wasn't amongst the best, he had understood the principle of the branch Transfiguration. Thus he started to catch up with his peers.

At night, the snakes decided to study a bit more before bed, they'd also do any homework they had so they could have the weekend free to explore the castle or just relax with their friends and housemates.