Slughorn and Snape

The ride to Hogwarts was the weirdest ride among all rides to Hogwarts. Chris was staring out of the window to get a glimpse of the Thestral, Luna and Neville were explaining about their first time Thestral witnessing incident, and Hermione was confused that she should be happy or sad for not witnessing any death.

Their carriage was the last one to reach Hogwarts, because of the exchanged between Chris and the Thestral. They were late when the coach stopped just inside the metal gates of Hogwarts. Chris noticed that the gate locked after them and chains wrapped around it.

"Planning a grand entrance?" 

A cold voice said standing beside the carriage as they climbed out. Chris whipped around to face the uplit hooked nose and long, black, greasy hair of Severus Snape.

"Well, now that there are no flying cars available you decided that bursting into the Great Hall after everyone has seated will give a dramatic effect," Snape sneered at Harry, who clenched his fist, glaring at Snape.

"We are not that late, are we?" said Chris coolly.

"Quite enough late, Miss Norton," Snape turned to Chris. "I had to come down to look for the last carriage which was unusually late."

Snape's black eye glint in the pale moonlight, Chris didn't lower her gaze, she wanted Snape to know that she had mastered Occlumency. Snape glared at Chris for a long time before turning back to the castle.

"I guess you will get sufficient attention if you walk into the Great Hall, now," spat Snape. "Or our heroes want to be a little more — ah, more fashionably late?" 

No one spoke and followed Snape into the castle. Neville looked a little fearful and the others just took turns to glare at the back of Snape's head. 

As they reached the entrance hall, the oaken front doors of Great Hall swung open, a burst of talk and laughter and of tinkling plates and glasses greeted them.

"No Cloak. You can walk in so that everyone sees you, which is what you wanted, I'm sure," said Snape to Harry before marching straight to the staff table at the end of Great Hall.

"I am already regretting this," whispered Hermione. "We shouldn't have been late."

"What's done is done, Hermione," said Ginny. "We didn't do anything wrong, no need to be scared."

"Come on," said Chris holding her head high and keeping her body straight.

The Great Hall, with its four long House tables and its staff table set at the top of the room, was decorated as usual with floating candles that made the plates below glitter and glow. As soon as they stepped inside people turned to them. But Chris didn't look, any one of them, she walked ahead, to the Gryffindor table. From the corner of her eye, Chris noticed Jason sitting beside Astoria on the Slytherin table, he looked up as Chris passed. Chris also noticed Professor McGonagall, Head of Gryffindor House, removing the Sorting Hat and the stool, meaning the sorting had finished. Luna, who was from Ravenclaw sat on the Ravenclaw table just at the start of the term, so she went to sit there. By the time Chris reached near Hufflepuff table, the students were standing up to get a better look at Harry. After a few more minutes of people ogling at them, Chris finally dropped on the Gryffindor table with a sigh.

"That was way more exhausting than I imagined," she said.

The others took their seat as Chris turned to her left and saw a small dark boy with black short hair staring at her.

"Hi," she smiled guessing the boy had just sorted.

The boy's eyes widened and he went scarlet on the face and fumbled with his spoon. A girl, beside the boy (smaller than him), with shoulder-length curly blonde hair, piped up seeing Chris smile.

"Hi," she grinned widely. "I am Katrina Harrington. You are Christina Norton."

"Yeah, I guess I am," Chris chuckled and extended her hand.

The girl's round grey eyes widened more as she took Chris' hand to shake.

"Nice to meet you, Katrina," said Chris. "And congratulations on making to Gryffindor."

"Thanks," she said tentatively then her eyes spotted something behind Chris. Her eyes —if pos­si­ble—grew wider. "He is Harry Potter!"

Chris turned to look at her right and saw, beside her was Hermione and after her, indeed, was Harry, he was looking at Chris and the first years.

"Yeah, he is Harry Potter," Chris smiled back to Katrina. Chris glanced at Harry and he waved a little to Katrina. Chris could swear Katrina looked she might faint then and there.

"This is Wes," said Katrina after a moment, she pointed at the boy, who first looked at Chris.

"Hello," said the boy looking shyly at Chris.

"Hi," Chris laughed and finally started eating some roasted chicken.

Chris looked up at the staff table while eating, Hagrid grinned and waved. She waved back. Hagrid had never quite managed to comport himself with the dignity of Professor McGonagall, the top of whose head came up to somewhere between Hagrid's elbow and shoulder as they were sitting side by side, and who was looking disapprovingly at this enthusiastic greeting. Chris was surprised to see the Divination teacher, Professor Trelawney, sitting on Hagrid's other side; she rarely left her tower room, and Chris had never seen her at the start-of-term feast before. She looked as odd as ever, glittering with beads and trailing shawls, her eyes magnified to an enormous size by her spectacles.

As the pudding vanished Dumbledore got to his feet at the staff table. The talk and laughter echoing around the Hall died away almost instantly.

"The very best of evenings to you!" he said, smiling broadly, his arms opened wide as though to embrace the whole room. "To our new students, welcome, to our old students, welcome back! Another year full of magical education awaits you . . ."

"We are pleased to welcome a new member of staff this year. Professor Slughorn"— Slughorn stood up, his bald head gleaming in the candlelight, his big waistcoated belly casting the table below into shadow —"is a former colleague of mine who has agreed to resume his old post of Potions master."

"Potions?"

"Potions?"

The word echoed all over the Hall as people wondered whether they had heard right.

"Professor Snape, meanwhile," said Dumbledore, raising his voice so that it carried over all the muttering, "will be taking over the position of Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher."

"You know," said Chris leaning forward to Ginny and Colin. "Sometimes I feel Dumbledore likes to give this kind of surprises, to see how people react."

"For the sake of amusement?" laughed Colin, as the whispers grew louder.

Snape, who was sitting on Dumbledore's right, did not stand up at the mention of his name; he merely raised a hand in lazy acknowledgement of the applause from the Slytherin table, yet Chris was sure there was a look of triumph on his features.

"Well, there's one good thing," Harry said savagely. "Snape'll be gone by the end of the year."

"What do you mean?" asked Ron.

"That job's jinxed. No one's lasted more than a year. . . . Lockhart got kicked out, Remus had to resign, Mad-Eye — well, he wasn't Mad-Eye exactly, then Umbridge," said Chris counting her fingers.

"And in our first year, Quirrell actually died doing it. . . . Personally, I'm going to keep my fingers crossed for another death," said Harry.

"Harry!" said Hermione, alarmed and reproachful.

"You are sounding more and more like Sirius," said Chris. "Stop it, don't let Snape get under your skin. That's what he wants, to bother you."

Seemingly oblivious to the sensational nature of the news he had just imparted, Dumbledore said nothing more about staff appointments but waited a few seconds to ensure that the silence was absolute before continuing.

"Now, as everybody in this Hall knows, Lord Voldemort and his followers are once more at large and gaining in strength."

The silence seemed to tauten and strain as Dumbledore spoke.

"I cannot emphasize strongly enough how dangerous the present situation is, and how much care each of us at Hogwarts must take to ensure that we remain safe. The castle's magical fortifications have been strengthened over the summer, we are protected in new and more powerful ways, but we must still guard scrupulously against carelessness on the part of any student or member of staff. I urge you, therefore, to abide by any security restrictions that your teachers might impose upon you, however irksome you might find them — in particular, the rule that you are not to be out of bed after hours. I implore you, should you notice anything strange or suspicious within or outside the castle, to report it to a member of staff immediately. I trust you to conduct yourselves, always, with the utmost regard for your own and others' safety."

Dumbledore's blue eyes swept over the students before he smiled once more.

"But now, your beds await, as warm and comfortable as you could possibly wish, and I know that your top priority is to be well-rested for your lessons tomorrow. Let us therefore say good night. Pip pip!"

"Ginny, Colin, it's your duty to show the first years the way to Gryffindor Tower," said Hermione at once.

"Oh, right," Colin hastily got up.

Ginny looked at Chris, who gave her an encouraging smile. Ginny smiled back and got up.

"First years — this way," she said in a commanding voice.

"Follow us, please," said Colin walking ahead with Ginny.

Chris smiled at Katrina and Wes before walking out with Harry.

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