Skyl's Defence Against the Dark Arts class had been running for a week, and it had caused a huge stir throughout Hogwarts.
Most of the students absolutely loved the spectacular spell displays in his lessons, and they started calling the transfer student de Lin "a wizard among wizards."
Of course, no one is liked by everyone. There were students who disliked Skyl as well, and that had a lot to do with his teaching style. To demonstrate how dark wizards actually fought, he never hesitated to "bully" the kids. Whether it was a first-year or a seventh-year, as long as they dared to raise their hand and volunteer, they would definitely experience the iron fist of reality.
This was the first lesson Skyl taught them: when you run into an opponent who is ruthless and cannot be beaten head-on, what kind of actions should you take?
Skyl didn't design an unbeatable enemy; he treated the enemy like a puzzle-type boss. If you wanted to defeat it, you had to use your head. You had to piece together the hints Skyl gave in advance, make use of the tools he provided, exploit your opponent's weaknesses, and either win against the odds or escape with your life.
Among the students of the four Houses, Ravenclaw did the best. Those little eagles stood out with their calm, composed thinking. Hufflepuff came in second overall; they were quiet and patient, never acting rashly before they were sure of themselves. The Slytherin snakes and Gryffindor lions were about even. Their individual strength wasn't a problem at all, but one side was overconfident and the other too reckless, which dragged their results down.
Skyl's good roommate Percy was the first unlucky victim. He didn't manage to defeat his opponent, but he did use strategy to get himself out of danger. The Weasley brothers, all in all, performed quite well; Ron, unsurprisingly, was the worst of them. He did show astonishing courage, though—facing the "mad alchemist" Skyl was playing, he refused to give in even if it meant dying. That counted as a glorious sacrifice, and the Gryffindors all clapped him on the shoulder, praising him for being a true Gryffindor.
Draco Malfoy was another one who went through Skyl's test. The blond pretty boy was all show and no substance. He thought he was being terribly clever by pretending to surrender to Skyl, intending to backstab him later, but before he could even start his betrayal, Skyl calmly pointed out his fatal mistake: the role Skyl was playing was a hired assassin carrying out an order—someone who didn't accept surrenders.
The Slytherins burst out laughing. Draco became the clown of the class, and only a girl named Pansy spoke up in his defence. When Draco got back to his room, he wrote to his father, old Malfoy, complaining through tears about the bullying he'd suffered at the hands of the transfer student.
At dinner, Draco marched over to Skyl with his two cronies and that girl Pansy in tow, raising his chin and announcing that Dumbledore's act of privately appointing a student as a substitute teacher would definitely earn him a reprimand from the Board of Governors—and that de Lin would also have to pay the price for his behaviour.
Skyl found this amusing, so he smiled and asked, "Kid, what kind of punishment do you think is going to fall on me?"
"At the very least, you'll be expelled!" Draco blustered, waving his hand with a show of bravado. He puffed out his scrawny chest, looking like a dried fowl hanging from the eaves, and even his pale cheeks flushed with excitement. His grey eyes shone. Perhaps he felt that still wasn't enough to scare Skyl, because he quickly stammered on, "And they'll probably fine you as well. You've harmed the mental health of so many students, so you'll have to pay compensation! At least… er… four hundred Galleons."
Harry and his friends all glared at Malfoy, but that only made Draco more pleased with himself. The two pudgy cronies behind him looked like their souls were off wandering somewhere, dazed and blank-faced. Pansy, on the other hand, bared her teeth at Harry and the others like a little yappy lapdog.
Skyl couldn't help laughing.
"What are you laughing at?"
He only laughed and didn't answer. Draco stared at the transfer student for a moment and suddenly felt his hands and feet turn cold. Very quickly, Draco retreated, slinking back to the Slytherin table, where the snakes around him were also laughing the moment they saw him.
It wasn't funny. Not funny at all. Draco's face turned chalk-white. Later that night, he had a fierce quarrel with Pansy, and then went back to the dormitory and took it out on his follower Goyle for no reason. That night felt endlessly long to him as he curled up under the covers, tossing and turning, secretly sobbing into his pillow.
Skyl tossed Draco's threats to the back of his mind. Old Malfoy never got the chance to cause trouble for the transfer student; Dumbledore blocked him first. Lucius Malfoy lost his temper at Dumbledore in the headmaster's office, while the old wizard merely smiled pleasantly the whole time.
When he walked into the office, Lucius was seething with anger, but he still immediately noticed the wolfhound lying beside the desk. In his chilly, reserved way, he even offered a compliment. "A very fine dog."
Afu lifted his head and glanced at Lucius, grumbled a few times in his throat, and then lay back down.
Lucius accused Dumbledore of negligence, of turning a blind eye to upper-year students bullying the younger ones.
All throughout this tirade, Dumbledore looked as though he were dozing off. No matter what kind of accusations were hurled at him, he simply smiled and said nothing. It wasn't until Lucius was about to leave that he finally seemed to "wake up" and spoke in a clear, ringing voice:
"Don't go bothering de Lin, Lucius. Don't do that. For your own sake, for your child and your family, and for the future of our world."
"Have you grown senile, old man?"
"No, Lucius. You don't understand what it means that de Lin has appeared in this era. That child is special."
"How special? What is he, an Obscurial?"
That word stirred some sorrowful memories in Dumbledore. His expression dimmed for a moment, then he smiled again.
"No. That child is not some gloomy, cold, unloved and pitiful creature. He is the god of magic, the sun, the Lion King, and Beowulf. Don't try to threaten him. Don't try to control him. Don't try to make him your enemy. De Lin is very kind and merciful, but he will not give you a chance to regret your choices."
Face dark as a thundercloud, Lucius walked towards the door. Before he left, Dumbledore gave him one last warning.
"Lucius, go home."
Old Malfoy waited in place for a while, but when nothing else followed, he finally left Hogwarts. His beloved son cried in the dormitory for three whole days, never seeing his father come to his rescue. Instead, he received a Howler from his mother, ordering him to behave himself at school. The Great Hall was filled inside and out with a wonderfully cheerful air that day, and the Gryffindors laughed the loudest.
Today was the day Quirinus Quirrell was discharged from the hospital wing. At noon, he appeared at the staff table, looking like a completely new man.
His robes were crisp and perfectly straight, and a blue scarf was wrapped neatly around his neck. Before leaving the hospital wing, he had begged Madam Pomfrey for a cup of Hair-Growing Potion, which had given him a fine head of black hair. Apart from one stubborn little cowlick, the rest of it looked rather handsome.
He once again looked every inch the brilliant Ravenclaw graduate he had been.
Professor McGonagall tapped her table knife against her glass, waiting until everyone's eyes were on them. Quirrell rose to his feet and apologised to the students for delaying the course, promising that he would do his best to make up for it in the days ahead. The first-years had never seen this stammering professor speak so fluently, never seen him look so refined and elegant, and for a while they were all astonished.
Harry stared at Professor Quirrell's hair for a long time, then frowned and asked his friends if they thought their professor seemed… to be missing something.
Ron and the others all shook their heads, deciding Harry must be remembering it wrong.
Quirrell's return meant that Skyl's days as a substitute were over, and many children felt very down about it. Some of the Gryffindors even suggested petitioning Dumbledore to send Professor Quirrell back to the hospital wing for another two weeks, but that terrible idea naturally went nowhere.
Skyl's final lesson ended just in time for lunch. When he entered the Great Hall, every student stood up to applaud him. The young witches and wizards drew their wands and fired off fireworks and confetti into the air. Up at the staff table, Headmaster Dumbledore was smiling like a kindly roly-poly toy, Professor McGonagall was tapping her wrist lightly in a genteel sort of applause, Professor Quirrell rose to raise his glass to Skyl, and even Snape gave him the slightest of nods before retreating back into his drink.
Bathed in cheers and applause, the transfer student swept his hat off in a jaunty bow to the four Houses, and before he knew it, his face was lit with a broad smile.
TN: For those who didn't read the clarification about the names, I'll repeat it: "To clarify when they call him "de Lin": they are not addressing him by his first name but by his surname. "de" is sometimes used in surnames in Spanish, Catalan, or Occitan as a connector (like Ana de Armas), similar to "van" in Dutch".
Thanks for the stones! :D, much appreciated.
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