Chapter 6: A Black Encounter

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I slung my satchel over my shoulder and shifted my weight from one foot to the other, waiting for the line to shuffle on out of the classroom. My eyes flicked to my wrist and I smiled. For my first lesson, I reckoned I did quite well. Not many managed to complete both tasks by the end of the lesson. Though a pretty big handful managed to repair their books— and boy were there a lot of them. There was one on skincare potions, others for prank spells, calming charms for newborns, and—to everyone's amusement—there was even somebody's diary.

Those of us who'd managed to complete both tasks were a minority, comprised of myself, Lily, Remus, Stebbins, and a Hufflepuff boy by the name of Cadmus McCallan— he had quite the strong Scottish accent. That took us up until the end of the lesson, though Remus and I had finished with a couple of minutes to spare, during which Flitwick decided to strike up a conversation with us.

I quite enjoyed the lesson, to be fair. As new to the job as he was, I couldn't deny that the man had a knack for teaching. I was just about to leave the classroom when Flitwick placed a hand on my shoulder.

"Just a moment if you will, Mr. Azar." he said.

I looked at him, my face asking him why but stayed regardless.

Remus stopped and looked at me curiously before a Ravenclaw boy stuck his head through the door. "Remus, you coming?"

He flinched. "O-Oh yeah, coming!" and scurried through the door after giving me one last look.

Noticing it, Flitwick gave me an apologetic smile. "I won't keep you long, I promise. Just indulge my curiosity for a moment." with that being said, his eyes dropped to the holster around my waist before meeting my own. "In all my time here—despite not being here for long—I have never seen a first-year with a wand holster. Do you perhaps have an interest in duelling?"

Caught completely off guard, I stilled. There wasn't that much thought put into the purchase. I honestly bought it because I had the cash to spare, and it seemed to be far better than stuffing my wand into my pocket. But duelling, if it were anything similar to boxing, definitely sounded interesting. Unfortunately I had priorities; money first. Everything else later.

"Honestly, I can't say that I'm not." I admitted. "But I think that it's too early for me to focus on a specific thing. I'm going to learn everything that I can for now. But if an opportunity comes around, I'd definitely be interested."

Flitwick smiled appreciatively. "An admirable choice." he moved over to his desk and took a seat. "Off with you then. If my timetable is correct… You have History of Magic with… Slytherin, if I remember correctly?"

I nodded. "I do. I guess this is goodbye, Professor. Or I suppose 'until we meet again' would be more apt."

He laughed. "Quite."

Nodding at him once more, I raced out of the class and almost stumbled at what awaited me outside of it. Lined up in front of the door were my housemates. Each and every one of them stood against the wall.

"Why are you guys here?" I asked, blinking owlishly at them.

From the front of the line, a short mousy haired girl spoke up. "W-Well, we couldn't leave without you, right?" she looked back at the rest of the line. "Right?"

I couldn't help but smile fondly at her and patted the top of her head. She squeaked and retreated back into the line.

Though my happiness was swiftly put to an end when a familiar voice spoke out in a Scottish twang. "Then how would we get to our next class?"

I shook my head with a wry smile. I supposed it made more sense than all of them deciding to wait for someone they barely knew out of some misplaced sense of friendship.

"Well then, people!" I chuckled, pointing a finger down the corridor. "Off to History of Magic."

OOOO

I'd read a lot on how much of a bore History of Magic was. So much so that it was some kind of running joke. From Fanfiction, to the original books themselves. They all spoke of how mind numbing the subject was— and sure to some extent that was true.

Binns' voice made it difficult to really get invested into it, but the content of the lecture was enough for me to stay awake for. I glanced down at my watch; only fifteen minutes left. Beside me, a quiet Slytherin girl sat rapt as she scribbled down what I believed was every single word that came out of Binns' mouth.

"Although short-lived, Emeric's reign of terror over the South of England in the Middle Ages was so fearsome that we talk about him until this very day. He was eventually brought down by Egbert the Egregious, who bested him in a duel that spanned…" The spectral man droned on about the minute details of the duel, as well as anything else that caught his fancy.

Though what happened next was arguably the best thing to happen in the entire hour. Binns ended up speaking for so long that he'd drifted off to sleep. The class was completely silent, waiting for the ghost to wake up at any second.

But he didn't. At all. Moments passed and the class was silent still, nobody daring to utter a word.

Someone was even bold enough to throw a wad of paper at him. It simply passed through his torso with the sleeping ghost still completely unconscious.

Already holding back my laughter, I let out an unintentional snort as the ball of paper landed in the bin behind the ghost. I knew that the ghost tended to fall asleep midway through class, but I didn't think it would happen on my first day at school.

Gathering myself, I glanced at my watch before whispering to the rest of the classroom. "The lesson's more or less over, so I reckon it'd be fine if we leave to go to break." I looked back at the still sleeping ghost. "If objects going through him couldn't get him to wake up, then I doubt anything else could."

With that said, I kept my eyes trained on the sleeping ghost as I backed away towards the door. One by one, the children hopped out of the chairs and carefully tiptoed towards the door, not bothering to push their chairs underneath the tables.

A few were reluctant to leave, though soon, they succumbed to the wondrous effects of peer-pressure as the vast majority of children followed me out. Nobody made a noise until we'd left the classroom. Soft snickers soon filled the hallway as the children raced down the corridor.

I stayed back to make sure that the door was closed before I left. The last thing I wanted was for the elderly ghost to follow us out of the classroom.

Was this going to be a constant thing? I had the feeling that it would. I thanked my lucky stars for Sadie once more and strolled down the corridor, smiling at the snorts and giggles of around twenty-eight or so children.

OOOO

I didn't know why I expected to walk away from class without any consequences. Not that we were thrown into detention, but we were told to simply wake Binns up when he would doze off— how we were supposed to do such a thing was completely beyond me.

Otherwise, my life for the next couple of days passed by in the blink of an eye. I'd done much and explored the castle to my heart's content— even the kitchens. There was a particular elf that I'd become friends with over a period of two days. After I had asked him about his day, he seemed intent on feeding me all sorts of foods every time I stopped by.

And I'd never say no to free food.

Since school had started in the middle of the week, there were some lessons that I just wouldn't have until the next week— one such lesson being Defence Against the Dark Arts. Though it didn't really hamper my spirits all too much. My plate was already full thanks to the Charms book that I'd repaired in class.

With Snape currently being my age, Potions was headed by Professor Slughorn. There wasn't all too much I could find to fault about the man. All things said, he was a pretty good Professor but he did have an eye out for the more talented and affluent members of his class.

Astronomy, as expected, didn't really interest me all that much. Though I could name a few stars now, which was pretty cool.

If there was something else I was looking forward to, it'd be our Flying Classes. My—very rational—fear of heights notwithstanding, I was pretty excited. I would, after all, be fulfilling another childhood dream of mine.

All that aside, there were a lot of practical elements of the year that I hadn't tried out at home. It doesn't matter how much theory you learn, if you can't exercise it in a real life situation then it's a waste of time.

"Thank fuck I don't have to sit through Umbridge!" I snorted.

But there was one thing that, for now, took priority over everything else: the Room of Requirement. Definitively, I had no idea what it was capable of. I knew that it catered to the needs and desires of the castle's residents, but what of its limitations? That was one of the first things on my list.

However, in order to do that, I had to traverse several sets of staircases to get to the seventh floor— which was by no means an easy feat. It was as if the castle itself was taking joy in my suffering. Steps would disappear just as my foot would touch down, entire staircases would wheel around and take me back to wherever I came from— and not to mention the menace to society that haunted the halls of the castle: Peeves the Poltergeist.

"Oh, look at the ickle firstie, all sweaty are we? Let Peeves help you!" he crowed, zooming overhead with a bucket. The water within sloshed threateningly, a few droplets sliding down the rim.

I raised my wand with a snarl. I was way too tired for his shit. "I swear on everything, Peeves, you had better turn around and dunk your water on somebody else!"

The poltergeist chuckled darkly at the threat, his crimson jester hat jingling, and his shoulders shook with mirth.

"Really now?" he leered at me, raising the bucket a little higher. "Peevesey here doubts that a little— just a smidge is all."

He tittered and began to raise the bucket overhead. Watching him mutter to himself in between suppressed giggles, I panicked and did my best to invoke my desire for light. "I warned you, Peeves! Lumos!"

Contrary to my expectations, my spell didn't cause Peeves to turn tail and run like he'd seen the devil. I'm pretty sure it made the menace even angrier instead, his perpetual smirk stretching across his face.

He grinned like a cat that'd eaten a canary. "Little 'puff thinks he's tough, huh?" he laughed, his spectral eyes alight with madness and barely restrained anger as he dropped the bucket of ice cold water right on top of me. "See I really do think that you should cool off!"

"M-Man," I growled, my teeth chattering. "F-Fuck you, P-P-Peeves!"

He gasped, comically bringing his hands over his mouth. I had no idea how but his pallid cheeks somehow flushed. "Who me? I'm sorry little firstie, but you're much too young for anything like that!"

He raced off to God knows where, leaving me freezing, but absolutely livid on the staircase. That brought up the blighter all the way to the top of my shit list. Not that there was much debate on that, the only other person on it being the arsehole landlord who owned my house. But without any actual way to vent out my anger, I could do little else but stomp my way up the stairs.

They seemed to take pity on me after my encounter with Peeves and I reached the seventh floor wheezing for air. Completely soaked, I trailed water all the way across the hallway, drawing odd looks and the occasional snicker but I could honestly care less about how I looked to others right now.

I stopped for a moment to mutter out an apology to the House Elves. Lord knew if they could hear me but I felt a touch of guilt once I thought about the mess I'd brought with me. I continued on, my eyes scanning around for the tapestry.

What I was about to do would either make or break how I went about my time at the school. I trudged past the moving tapestry of trolls performing pirouettes for a bearded wizard standing atop a stage. Making a turn, staring right at the section of wall opposite the tapestry, I looked around to make sure I was out of sight before I began my pacing.

'I'd like a room with all the books in the restricted section.' I ran the sentence through my mind like a mantra until a door appeared completely out of the blue.

Grinning, I quickly entered the room and shut the door behind me, whistling at everything on display. It was as if I were standing inside the Restricted Section itself, with its shelves towering over me, casting the room into darkness. For a while, I explored the aisles, not removing a single book from the shelves. Though when I eventually did, it was because I spotted a book with a title that I just couldn't pass up on.

"'Shield Your Mind: A Practical Guide to Becoming An Occlumens', huh?" I muttered, sliding the book out of its shelf.

Though the minute I opened it, I yelped and dropped it in surprise.

Not only were the pages completely blank, but a shrill voice, for lack of a better term, leapt out of the book. "DEGENERACY! THEFT! I AM BEING STOLEN FROM THE LIBRARY BY AN UNSCRUPULOUS, UNPRINCIPLED FIEND! HELP! HELP!"

Once the initial shock had abated, I gingerly placed the book back onto the shelf and removed another, only to face the same dilemma: a screeching banshee crying out to the heavens about a theft— as well as choosing other colourful choices of vocabulary to describe the would-be thief.

That wasn't all I'd found though. There was one that stung my hand when I tried to open it and another that decided to skip that and try to bite it off instead. Eventually, I left the library annoyed and disgruntled, thinking that some fresh air would help me.

"Damn." I sighed, stepping out of the Room of Requirement and onto the fairly empty corridor.

To say I was disappointed would be an understatement. I'd expected the room to pretty much solve all of my problems when it came to studying material— and to be fair, it did. I could still ask for books on things that weren't locked behind the Restricted Section and have them all to myself.

Curious, I spent the next couple of hours testing out everything I could to do with the room.

Essentially, I'd discovered that it had no limitations regarding space— not any that I had encountered, at least. If something existed in the castle, then you could bring it into the room.

Briefly, I wondered if it brought the object itself, or just a copy of it. If it was the former, then that might be a bit of a problem. I assumed it was the latter though, it would only make sense. If the room hadn't been discovered by the professors despite the school existing for around a thousand years or so, then I reckoned it was pretty safe to assume that anything in the room was a copy, and therefore couldn't be brought out of the room.

But that was just what I thought.

"Yeesh…" I hissed, sniffling as I drew my robes tightly around myself.

It wasn't actually that cold outside, but the evening wind coupled with my earlier impromptu shower meant that I was feeling a little chilly.

What I saw next was enough to warm my freezing toes. A small voice in my head told me that I should probably go, but I ignored it. For some reason, I was too curious to leave.

Either that, or my toes were just too numb.

"You gormless idiot!"

An older Slytherin boy slid across the hall so fast that I only noticed his house once he'd slowed down. Unfortunately, the only thing stopping his momentum was the stone wall behind him. Grunting and groaning, he picked himself up from the admittedly cold floor, looking more confused than hurt.

A slow but ominous set of footsteps travelled down the hall and a furious voice echoed towards us. "You mistake my civility for some kind of romantic interest, you complete and utter maggot!"

The insults aside, as hilarious as they were, weren't the most fascinating bit about this all. It was really the person behind them that stopped me in my tracks.

She stepped onto the hallway, her hair thick and as dark as raven feathers trailing down her back and fanning her heart-shaped face. Even from as far as she stood, I could tell that she was tall—almost as much as Sadie—with long-lashed eyes and a pretty, if haughty, looking face.

Her stygian eyes were narrowed in what seemed to be rage as she stalked towards the downed boy and rained down hex after hex on him. And despite his pleas and apologies, she didn't seem to be remotely near done.

… That was until she saw me.

Never in my life had I wanted to be invisible as fiercely as I did at that moment. Now that she was facing me directly, I recognised her almost immediately. Younger? Sure. But there was no way I'd mistakenly identify Bellatrix Lestrange— or more accurately, Black.

Her narrowed eyes widened before she stowed away her wand. "Speak!" she snapped and I blinked myself out of my thoughts. "Who on earth are you?"

"I'm Cy—" I was immediately cut off by the previously downed Slytherin boy shakily standing up to his feet with his wand in hand.

"T-The fuck's wrong with you, you crazy slag!?" he roared, gingerly rubbing his shoulders before wincing afterwards.

Poor bastard. I couldn't imagine that many Stinging Hexes were pleasant— if she was using Stinging Hexes in the first place.

Bellatrix rounded on him, the speed at which she did so whipped her lustrous locks over her shoulders. "Slag?!" she screeched, rending her wand free from her robes and training it on the woozy looking Slytherin.

Then, she began to laugh. The kind of laugh that made most intelligent people turn around and walk away as fast as they could. But of course I, being the idiot I am, didn't do that. I stood still and watched in morbid fascination as the growing fury spread over her face.

Bellatrix furrowed her eyebrows. Her dark eyes could be described as pretty if only they weren't burning with anger. "Oh make no mistake, I'll show you slag! Slugulus Eructo!"

A sickly green light burst forth from her wand and the boy's eyes widened before it engulfed him.

Completely frozen to the spot, I watched as he gagged, retching out a bulbous, oozing slug the size of my fist. It was a washed-out yellow and left trails of viscous slime along the front of his robes as it slid down onto the floor.

The boy retched once more, cupping yet another slug in his hands, before taking off down the corridor, presumably towards the Hospital Wing. That left me and Bellatrix relatively alone, and whilst I usually wouldn't mind being alone with a hot girl, this was somebody who'd go on to torture people into insanity in around a decade from now.

That alone was enough to scare the shit out of me.

She screwed up her face at the slug sliding its way across the hall and turned to me. "Well?! Who are you?"

I scanned the hallway for some help and blanched when I found none. Seeing no other way out of here, I decided to indulge her. "I'm Cyrus."

She looked at me as if expecting more, but if I gave her my last name, there was a pretty significant chance that I'd be the next one on the end of her wand left to vomit out slugs.

Sadly, I didn't really get a choice. "Cyrus what?"

I sighed, flexing my toes in preparation for the very real possibility that I'd have to hightail it out of here. "Azar… Cyrus Azar."

Her posture immediately brightened and she began to grin, an unnerving light dancing within her eyes.

"A mudblood, eh?" she sang as she looked me up and down. "Well then, how about we play a little game."

Not seeing how this could get any worse, I decided to open my mouth and say something that I immediately regretted. "I have a feeling I'm not going to like this game very much."

She cackled and raised her wand. "No, I don't think you will."

I reckoned that whatever colour left on my face had vanished by this point and I rushed down the corridor, dodging as much spellfire as I could— which admittedly wasn't really all that much in the end.

OOOO

So I returned to the common room, wincing from the welts all over my back and barely managed to ask one of the Hufflepuff prefects—Eric I think he was called—to dry me off. Thankfully Bellatrix, the crazy bitch that she was, had only used Stinging Hexes. Fat lot of good that did me, though.

I'd spotted him sitting on the armrest of the couch near the fireplace. He took one look at me and laughed, his grey eyes glinting. "Who the heck did this to you?" he asked after a couple more laughs at my expense.

"Pe—"

"Let me guess, Peeves?" he asked, muttering something I couldn't hear and drying me off with a flick of his wand.

I nodded. "The shithead flew right over me and dunked a bucket of cold water on my head." I shuddered, partly at the cold, but also at the pain from the welts. "Not just that cockwomble but fucking Bellatrix Black."

His eyes goggled. "What did you do to piss her off?!"

I whirled towards him, my eyebrows shooting upwards. "Absolutely nothing! I was minding my own business and happened to stumble across her hexing the fuck out of another Slytherin."

He shook his head. "Well, I know she's got a reputation for being a little unhinged but damn! You must have some rotten luck to run into her during your first week of school."

"Unhinged?" I spat, wincing. "T-That bitch is batshit crazy, is what."

"Well, aren't you a ballsy firstie!" he chuckled. "Cursing Bellatrix Black—or just cursing openly at all—without any fear."

I shrugged, the movement alone sending lances of pain down my back. "W-We have wands and there are words that can kill a man. I think swearing should be the least of anyone's worries."

Truthfully, that wasn't something I'd say on a normal day, but I was cold, sore, and was pretty much through with everything for the day.

He threw his head back and laughed. "I've heard a bunch of outlandish shit during my time here but I don't disagree with this!" his face quickly lost all humour, though. "But on a serious note, you might want to stop cursing her— or the Black family in general. Think of it this way, right? They're pretty much Wizarding Britain's Mob. Dark as hell, and they practically control half the Wizengamot— that is to say the government. If she, or anyone else in her family, ever catches wind of anything disrespectful from you, you're kind of fucked."

A nearby girl walked up to the fireplace and heard the tail end of our conversation, swatting the prefect's arm.

"Eric, language! You're a prefect; act like it." she shook her honey-blonde locks at him and pointed at me. "Actually, why on earth are you telling him stuff like this? That's a child, Eric. He's eleven for Merlin's sake!"

I rolled my eyes. Whilst I could've toned down on the profanity, her comment only made me want to swear even more. "Nah, I don't give a shit."

She whipped around and frowned at me. "Well, young man, that isn't language that you should be using."

I turned to Eric, my smirk strained thanks to my sore neck, back, and… everything. "Do you want to tell her or should I?"

He shook his head with a smile, so I decided to take the pleasure for myself. "Hey, uh, I don't have your name. Mind telling me?"

She smiled. "I'm Eva. Eva Harrison. You?"

"Cyrus Azar." I replied. "Now, Eva. I'm going to call you Eva."

She shared an amused glance with Eric and nodded.

"We have spells that, if needed, could cause pretty serious harm to people, right?"

She nodded, her brow furrowed.

"Hell, we even have the Killing Curse." I continued. "Which, mind you, outright kills people. So I don't really get the whole fuss around swearing."

She blinked, looking more confused than anything else. A moment later, her eyes cleared. "I get where you're coming from," she grudgingly admitted. "But still, it's better to be polite."

"Oh I'm not saying you shouldn't." I hurriedly added. "All I'm saying is that I don't get why there's such a fuss over people swearing."

Eric nudged her shoulder with an amused smile. "I'm telling you, this has to be the most interesting first-year I've ever met."

She quickly lost her frown and began to smile too. "Yes, I'd have to agree."

I inclined my head. "Glad to be of service."

Eric snorted at that and Eva simply shook her lead with a wry smile, her golden curls bouncing.

"Honestly though, Cyrus," she said. "If you're going to curse, please make sure there aren't any professors in earshot. From this conversation alone, the amount of points we'd lose wouldn't be fun, I'll tell you that."

"Eh, I'll be fine." I waved her off. I stood up from the chair with a light groan, muttering a couple of curses underneath my breath. "I have enough sense to watch my tongue around teachers."

Wishing them a good evening, I decided to go take a shower, hobbling my way over to my bedroom. I'd been dried off but I still felt off— no doubt thanks to Bellatrix.

"I really hope I don't end up getting a cold tomorrow." I muttered as I stepped into my room.

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