A Conversation with Moody

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Mad-Eye visited them on the second day of the Easter holidays. This time he entered the house like a human: he knocked quietly on the door and waited for it to be opened. On the threshold, Moody greeted Ted and Andromeda before walking through the open door. Because of this uncharacteristic overly suspicious friendliness, while Mad-Eye was around, Tonks kept her wand in her hand and was ready to jump back in case of any sudden action. Noticing this tension on Nymphadora's part, Harry decided to reassure himself as well: he pulled out his wand and began to prepare for the unexpected.

- Come on, I won't bite you," Moody said, noticing this behaviour and giving a very similar smile.

The words didn't have the effect Mad-Eye had expected. Tonks raised her wand to chest level and said threateningly:

- 'This is the first time since we've known each other that you've smiled like a human instead of a wild porcupine in mating season. After that, I'd rather eat undiluted bubontuber's pus than believe you haven't prepared some kind of mischief.

- Well, believe it or not, I'm really not going to do anything today," Alastor shrugged. - I just came here to talk to you both. I don't have time or inclination to play war games with you.

Harry put his wand back in his pocket, he trusted Moody and could breathe easy. Potter didn't think Mad-Eye would pull anything after those words. Tonks, on the other hand, was not so easy to convince. She still kept her eyes on Alastor Moody's hands and waited for a catch. Which never came.

It was lunchtime. All the inhabitants of Tonks House sat down at the table. Moody was talking softly to Andromeda, and Ted tried not to notice Nymphadora's tension and at Potter's request began to tell him the history of all four faculties of Hogwarts. After the end of the story, they both began to observe Tonks' strange behaviour. Nymphadora was definitely not going to relax; she gave Moody a hard stare and only took food from the plate and the place Mad-Eye had taken it from. She didn't touch the juice, just looked at it with a suspicious look and set it aside.

- Nymphadora, stop being childish, nobody's going to poison you," Ted said.

- I told you not to call me Nymphadora! - Tonks' hair changed colour from bright red to red, as it did in moments of extreme irritation. - I'd argue about poisoning, though. Some of us, I won't point fingers, would put poison in our food just to shout 'Constant Vigilance' one more time.

Moody didn't react to this rant, he just kept eating, pretending it didn't concern him, Ted was about to say something else, but was silenced by his wife's menacing stare. Just in case, Harry examined his plate carefully, but found nothing suspicious in it, the potatoes tasted like potatoes, and the fish like fish. Well he particularly liked the pumpkin juice, it was from pumpkin as it should be. Potter looked at Tonks' untouched drink and still risked addressing her, despite the fact that she was angry and tense at the same time.

- I'll have the juice? - Potter pointed to the glass of juice.

Nymphadora nodded, keeping her eyes on Moody.

- 'Alright,' Moody stood up from his chair. - 'Consider yourself defeated.

- Well? - Tonks wasn't about to relax. - What's the catch?

- The juice. I planted something in there.

- You... What?!" Ted was indignant and started to get up from the table.

- Sit down, Ted. I put vitamins in there. Just vitamins. Nothing for you to worry about. It'll do them good. Tonks, good girl, she's got it all figured out, and Potter's poisoned and, well, dead. I told you, it's always--

- We know! - Nymphadora interrupted him. - You'd better tell me, should we expect any more surprises?

- Are the Death Eaters going to tell you all their plans too? We need to be ready to fight back at any moment!

- Alastor," Andromeda, who had been silent until then, said. - We all respect your experience and realise that in the field of battle against dark mages you can give a hundred points to each of us. But you must also realise that this is a time of peace and you shouldn't force your children to be ready to attack at any time. If Tonks' testing is anything to go by, Harry... I don't think even 'you' at that age was ready for something like that. We welcome you into our home and we trust you...

Tonks hummed loudly, and Andromeda had to rephrase the last sentence.

- Or rather, we try to trust you, it's very difficult, but we try, and from someone we trust we don't expect an attack at any second. Do you understand me? Death Eaters wouldn't be allowed on our doorstep, so please let us rest easy.

- Okay, I hear you, Andromeda. I won't do anything else," no emotion slipped across Moody's face. Harry may not have been much of a judge of character, but he was sure the one-eyed auror was definitely not remorseful.

- There's also a magic trap in your rooms. Don't go in there just yet. It will take me two minutes to remove them," Mad-Eye turned to Tonks.

- 'That's fine,' Nymphadora visibly relaxed, smiled and put her wand away. - You know, and when you're not trying to attack anyone, you don't even want to be cursed.....

As soon as Tonks said that, her hair changed its colour from red to light green. The truce was signed.

* * *

Soon Moody locked himself and Nymphadora in her room. For an hour the sounds of explosions rang out from there, but the older Tonks stubbornly pretended that nothing much was going on. They were so good at pretending that long practice was evident, and Harry decided that this was probably not even the tenth time such training had taken place in this house.

Potter was very curious about what was going on behind the door, where almost every minute there were sounds of something being bombed, but he decided not to peek, but when he heard the familiar "Constant vigilance!" he was still interested and decided that if he listened for a few seconds to what was going on in there, it wouldn't hurt anyone.

- You're just sick! The only one I keep constant vigilance with is you!" shouted Tonks.

Although the sound was very quiet, it was clear from the timbre of her voice that Nymphadora was yelling loudly. "Some kind of muffling spell," Harry realised. - That means you can't hear almost anything."

He stepped away from the door and went back to his room, deciding that as long as Mad-Eye was around, he wouldn't let his wand out of his hands.

It wasn't long before Moody appeared.

- Potter," Mad-Eye said as he walked into the room. He conjured himself a chair and sat down, then grimaced in pain as he began to remove the prosthetic leg. It seemed Tonks had gotten something in it after all. Something nasty.

- Hello," Harry said, deciding that the word 'Potter' was a greeting.

- Don't point your wand at me," Moody studied the wound on his leg with his healthy eye, but with his magical eye he was able to detect that Potter had his wand in his pocket.

- 'And you won't curse me?

- Will I curse you? No, Potter, I won't curse you. You're still a child, Andromeda was right, you're just finishing your first year, and you're obviously not ready for the constant stress. But Tonks is a different matter, she's going to be an Auror in two months, and calling her a child is like calling You-Know-Who an innocent lamb. Okay, let's make sure we don't have any misunderstandings, you ask the questions first and then me, okay?

- Deal," Harry agreed.

He put his wand away and asked the first question:

- Will you be teaching me magic?

- We'll see.

- What do you mean?

- Directly... It's up to you. If you try hard enough, I will.

- I see... And what faculty did you study in? - Harry wasn't quite sure why he asked that question.

- What do you think? - Moody answered the question with a question.

- Well...

Mad-Eye didn't look like any of the Hogwarts students Harry knew, so we'd have to guess based on qualities.

Whether Moody was brave and noble, kind and honest, intelligent and erudite, or cunning and devious. Definitely not Hufflepuff. Kindness and honesty are the last things that fit the Mad-Eye. Nobility? Not likely either. Ravenclaw is less suited than Slytherin. All those clever traps and surprise attacks are more akin to the snake faculty.

- Slytherin?

- What the hell's a Slytherin?! Gryffindor. That's the faculty almost all of us went to.

The answer took Harry by surprise for a moment. Nobility and Moody?! Well, at least it wasn't Hufflepuff, otherwise he would have had a complete breakdown.

- Ours?

- Order of the Phoenix. We fought against You-Know-Who for eleven years and finally won.

- Was there anyone from Hufflepuff?

- No, I don't think so. Not that I can remember, anyway. It was weird, Gryffindors fighting against You-Know-Who, and the winner was a Puffendoor. Hogwarts is a character-based school, and Hufflepuff is usually only for the weak.

- I'm not weak!

- Are you sure about that? Anyway, Hufflepuff isn't a judgement, there's Tonks, for example, and you can't tell from her, and then there's Amelia Bones, the iron lady, whose character doesn't really fit Hufflepuff.

- And Ted and Andromeda?

- Andromeda's a Slytherin, she's a Black, and all the Blacks graduated from Slytherin... Except Sirius, but that bastard was probably trained as a spy from childhood. And Ted, surprisingly, was a Gryffindor. It's weird though, Mrs Tonks is much easier to talk to than her husband. Any other questions?

- Mm-hm.

Harry wondered what else he wanted to know about. The war? Or maybe the most powerful spells?

- No, that's it.

- Great, now it's my turn," Moody stopped fiddling with his leg and put the prosthetic back in place. - How's school going?

- Me? Or at all?

- Generally. How's Dumbledore? What's going on that's so interesting?

- Well, Dumbledore... He's been filling in for Professor Snape as Potions teacher for six months. Then he got busy and found another teacher - a ghost. The Quidditch Championship was won by Ravenclaw, and....

- Never mind Quidditch. How's Hagrid?

- Hagrid burned down his hut the other day. It was a strange story, no one knows how it happened, it was just that everything was fine in the evening and in the morning the hut was gone. Hagrid was very upset and left for Norway the next day, Dumbledore had given him a holiday.

- That's interesting. Did anything else happen?

- No, not much else. At the beginning of the year, a troll broke into the school.

- I know about the troll... Tell me, what do you want to be when you graduate?

- Auror! - Harry had his answer ready. - Killing evil wizards. You know, the ones that eat death.

- You managed to give both the right and wrong answer at the same time.

- How's that?

- It's my turn to ask questions," Moody objected gruffly, and it was only now that Harry realised that Alastor had been trying to speak to him as gently as possible all this time. - What's your favourite subject?

- Spells. And Potions, but only when Dumbledore was in charge.

- And Defence Against the Dark Arts?

- No, it's a disgusting subject," Mad-Eye said, expecting a completely different answer. - I didn't like it at all, Professor Quirrell doesn't say anything interesting at all, he just reads some books, and sometimes he's not in class at all.

- I see," Moody's face smoothed out. - I know Quirrell's a bit of a character, but I thought he was worth something as a teacher. But you should definitely take Defence Against the Dark Arts next year. It's a very useful subject. You said you like spells? How's that working out for you? Well, you must be good if you're comfortable with Protego.

- Not good, but excellent," Flitwick had taken five points off Potter in his last spellcasting lesson for not writing down theory, but that was nothing. - I've learnt some spells outside of the syllabus on purpose, I can show you.

- Not necessarily, I'm just interested in your attitude towards the right subjects.

- How about I show you? It won't take long," Potter had spent a lot of time learning spells on purpose over the last month to impress Mad-Eye, and he needed to show what he could learn now.

- Come on, what kind of magic? Defence?

- More like offence, and a little bit of sorcery.

Alastor stepped to the far corner of the room and raised his wand:

- You can attack, here's an impossible goal - try to get me to move or make a sound.

- Alright... Furunculus!

Mad-Eye waved his wand, and the spell beam disappeared before it had travelled halfway.

- Dantisimus! - and that spell failed to reach its target. Oh, well. Time to use all the ammunition. - Tarantallegra! Rictusempra! Expelliarmus! Spangifai! Flippendo! Immobulus!

* * *

Three weeks ago.

"I want to find a book of spells that a first year student can learn in a month.

"I want to find a book of spells that a first-year student can learn in a month.

I want to find a book of spells that a first year student can learn in a month."

Harry turned around and opened the door that had just appeared in the wall. This time the Room-as-Wish turned into a tiny room with a small table with a single book on it. The title didn't impress Harry much:

"Accumulating Magical Power. How to safely train young wizards?"

It was the first time Potter had heard of the author either, someone named "A.W. Dippet." However, the room has never been wrong yet, so it's worth at least partially familiarising yourself with this book, maybe it will really help solve the problem.

Whoever this A.W. Dippet was, he was definitely a genius. The book was very small, but there was so much information in it that within an hour Potter had already left the Room-as-Wish and entered it again, only this time for training."I want to get to a place where I can practice using magic."

In the next half hour, Harry learnt how to use two spells at once. Except time didn't allow Potter to linger for a few more minutes, it was about to be dismissal time, and the journey from the Wishing Room to the Hufflepuff common room was long enough.

* * *

All spells shattered against Moody's powerful defences.

- Not bad Potter, very good, I'd even say very good. Is that it?

- From the attack, yes.

- Where did you learn that? I don't think a first year can learn all the spells at once. And I know for a fact that half of them aren't in the school curriculum.

- I read it in an interesting book.

- Dantisimus, too? That's pretty original. I mean, using a spell that was originally meant to heal in an attack.

- No, that wasn't in the book. A friend suggested it.

"Thanks to Malfoy for the idea."

- Well, a friend is a friend. What else do you know about witch medicine?

- Anapneo. Ferula and Dantisimus, actually.

- Have you used any of those?

- Yeah. I did.

* * *

A week ago.

- Why do you want to know why you're doing this?

- Justin, not again!

- Not again, again. You still can't explain it to me.

Harry and Justin were sitting in the half-empty Great Hall, and Finch-Fletchley was once again arguing about the benefits of learning medical spells. To Harry's disappointment, the fact that Justin was eating did nothing to stop him from continuing to argue.

- No, seriously, if I break my leg, I'm not going to sit around for a thousand years looking for the right spell....

- You have to find the spell beforehand," Harry interjected into Justin's already boring monologue.

- Okay, so be it, but anyway, if I get hurt, it'll be easier for me to go to Madam Pomfrey and have her fix it for me in a second. Only a fraction of the time I save on 'ignoring' these spells is spent going to Madam Pomfrey. And that's still if you don't count the possibility of me messing it up. Learn a spell wrong or use it wrong. I could even die from such a mistake.

- Look, this isn't the first time we've had this conversation, do you think I've changed my mind? Or that I'm gonna give you other evidence? I'm sorry to disappoint you, my arguments remain the same. Firstly, Madam Pomfrey may not be around, and secondly, help may be needed urgently, which needs to be given at this very second. And if you run to Madam Pomfrey, you may not get there in time.

- Still, this is not a good enough reason to learn these spells. There are special people called healers, and if you're not going to become a healer, you don't need to learn these spells. I'm not going to become a healer, are you?

- Who knows? I haven't made up my mind yet. I can tell you I'm not going to be an astronomer.

Justin laughed out loud, apparently remembering the events of the last astronomy class. Back then, Harry had agreed to teach Ron how to use the Furunculus spell he had used against Malfoy. However, an unforeseen thing happened: when Potter was showing the correct wand movement, the spell for some reason snapped and almost hit Professor Sinistra, but as luck would have it, Hannah Abbot was at the teacher's desk at the time and took the spells.

The Hufflepuff was taken off thirty points and Harry was sent off to have another conversation with Pomona Stable. She suddenly believed Harry's story, agreed that everything had happened by accident, and did not impose a punishment. And Justin was terribly amused by the incident, according to him, he saw the whole situation and was able to enjoy Potter and Weasley's reaction to the spell that had unexpectedly come out.

- I....I imagine if... You... Become an astronomer... There... Sinistra... Would be surprised..." choking with laughter, Justin muttered something.

Laughing, eating and talking at the same time was not an easy thing to do. So it wasn't surprising that Finch-Fletchley choked and started to make unintelligible noises.

Harry reacted to the situation almost immediately. He pointed his wand at Justin's throat and exclaimed loudly:

- Anapneo!

The spell cleared Justin's throat, he stopped choking and looked at Harry in surprise.

- Why? - He asked.

- Why what? Why use the spell? - Potter suggested. - So you were choking, so I used it.

- I just choked, a couple of seconds and it would have gone away.

- Or it wouldn't have. How would you know? And even if it had, it's still better to be safe. Now you have to admit, medical spells are useful.

- It's nothing like that. Just because you can use something once doesn't mean it's useful.

- Oh, come on. Next time you'll save yourself," Potter finished his pumpkin juice, got up from the table, and headed for the faculty lounge.

* * *

- Well done, Potter, for not being afraid to use what you've learnt.

- What's the big deal? I'm obviously not the bravest of men, but I don't see what there is to be afraid of? If the spell works, good. If it doesn't, nothing happens. It's better to try.

Mad-Eye laughed hoarsely.

- You know, Potter, I'll answer your questions more precisely now. Will I teach you magic? Definitely, I will. You're a very interesting chap. Very interesting. I could be wrong, and you could turn out to be a weak, weak little brat I have to babysit, but I'm not usually wrong about people.... Tonks, Vance, Dingle. I see people with potential right away, and I see the creatures as well: Snape, Malfoy, and Karkaroff. It's probably a good thing that I'll start teaching you at such a young age, but I didn't notice Tonks until sixth year, and she can't get my point of view on some things, unfortunately. But you can. I can teach you that you need to expect an attack at all times. And I will teach you magic, not the heresy that you are taught in divination, astronomy, history of magic and other such useless subjects. Not right away, of course, there's still a lot of things you need to learn first, but I promise that in two years at worst, I'll start showing you different tricks. - Moody's magic eye suddenly turned and stared somewhere near the back of his head.

- All you have to do is listen to me and not interrupt me. Maybe I can convince Tonks to give you a lesson or two from the ones she's been able to learn on her own. One more thing. Don't tell Ted and Andromeda what we're really doing. If anything, I'm giving you a crash course in defence against the dark arts. They know Dumbledore asked me to teach at Hogwarts next year, only I turned him down, so it's a working theory. Next, I'll answer the next question.

- How did you manage to get it right and wrong at the same time? Being an auror is right. Killing is wrong. Remember once and for all, I won't say it again. Killing is what separates a dark wizard from a light wizard. Death Eaters kill people for fun. It's up to the Aurors to catch the Death Eaters. Capture them, not kill them. Killing a murderer doesn't change the number of murderers. Look at me. See the missing leg, the missing eye, the tip of my nose and all these scars? I've been fighting Eaters for most of my life and in all that time I've only killed three people on purpose, and then I simply had no other choice. You will have a choice. And you have to make it right.

- And your last question is, "What could go wrong?" In sixth year, I was dueling with a Slytherin brute, and it just so happened that his carelessly cast spell bounced off my shield and into him. It was a pain spell, not Cruciatus but something else, and he ended up practically torturing himself without any way to stop. I decided not to make a fuss, I wasn't on good terms just because of duels like this, I used what I thought was a universal Finite Incantatem and accidentally increased the pain tenfold. The guy was in the Mungo for three years, and I was on the verge of expulsion. I was saved by connections and the Priori Incantatem, it showed that it wasn't me who let the pain spell go, and also that I was trying to help.

- That's all. You have visitors there, I don't want to stress anyone out with my presence. Next time I'll come in the summer holidays. And you prepare for your exams and try to learn as many spells as you can and don't be afraid to use them if you need to. I don't care what anyone else thinks, if you need anything, go to Dumbledore, he'll help you. And if it's an emergency, you can send me an owl, but use a code word or a number, "1235" for example. No one will understand, and I can read your letter without fear of any curse.

Moody used his magical eye to look around the house once more and without saying goodbye, walked out of Potter's room, closing the door behind him. And Harry remained seated. He was digesting all the information Mad-Eye had dumped on him. He was only distracted from his thoughts when the door opened and Tonks and Cedric Diggory appeared on the doorstep.

- Harry, Moody's gone, if anything. And this is Cedric Diggory - my boyfriend. I don't remember if you two know each other or not, but I'll introduce you just in case.

- Yeah, we know each other, hi Harry," Cedric said and extended his hand for a handshake.