Monday is a hard day. Once again I note this interesting fact, as well as the fact that people themselves make it hard for themselves. However, I also had a hard time this day.
After DADA classes, where students argued plenty with Professor Umbridge, but still sat and wrote mournful and largely useless paragraphs, I went for my wards in the person of first-years.
"So," I stood in front of them and wanted to push a speech, when Hannah caught up with us. "I would like to show you one important place in this school. Hannah?"
"Don't know what you have in mind, but don't think it's something bad."
"Right. So, everyone follow me."
A short walk along corridors and stairs ended in front of the doors of the Hospital Wing.
"Here, in the Hospital Wing," I began to speak, turning to the first-years, shooting curious but at the same time incredulous glances, "you can get medical help if necessary. Because anything can happen—from an unsuccessful experiment to a mistake in practical classes, and knowing where to run in case of anything—is extremely important. And now can go to the common room, drop things off and go to dinner."
We did exactly as I said, and a few minutes later Hannah and I brought our wards to the Great Hall, mostly already filled with students of all ages and houses. Settling at the table and getting our portions, we, like the rest of the guys, began dinner. The little ones actively discussed their first school day, and the older guys did about the same. Especially those who had Defense Against the Dark Arts today—still Umbridge managed not to please anyone at all both by herself and with her curriculum.
Although, again there is some duality of the curriculum. The fact is that it, albeit replete with various water in the text, conjectures and other nonsense, including bureaucratic and legal, but it albeit a little, sheds light on the vision of magic by local wizards, on sorcery processes, complementing the picture of the world. And this, in turn, slightly facilitates the very process of sorcery. Yes, won't notice the difference right away, but this share of understanding defensive magic is a little, but useful. But there are still more minuses to such a program than pluses, because the school course is mostly focused on developing practical skills, and large volumes of purely theory finish off enthusiasts. In general, bad program.
After dinner, naturally, led first-years to the common room, where they tried, sort of, to find their corner, and they even succeeded in something like that, and some figures even began to get acquainted with other students from the second-third year, but no older—now the age difference seems too significant for them, and for other teenagers too. What did I do? Oh, no, no self-education! Hannah and I began to solve issues with clubs.
However, the story with clubs is quite simple, and in itself completely uninteresting—find the head, he already knows what to do, get lists of active members and activity plan, take it to the Head of House. That's all.
Well, and the last activity for this day was doing homework. The leader in the volume of homework remains Professor Snape for now, but not all classes have passed yet—first day, no matter how you look at it. But here's the bad luck—not everyone knows about the properties of moonstone, and there is not much information about it in the textbook. Actually, as always.
"Hector," Justin looked at me when we with our whole company, in fact, the whole Hufflepuff year, sat down at our permanent table. "I am sure that in your head there is much more on moonstones."
"In principle," I laid out writing utensils in front of me, took a roll of parchment and prepared to write. "The text of the set volume has already formed in my head. Can tell while writing, and there you will add and change as you wish."
"Ok, come on. Because it's empty here," Ernie waved a potions book for the fifth year in front of us. "Okay, not completely, but not dense either. And want to do homework now."
"Yeah," the others nodded, and only Hannah continued the thought. "And not run around libraries later. And we are already used to doing homework immediately."
"So maybe tomorrow go to the library?" Susan expressed a sensible thought. "Well, I mean, to take additional literature for everyone. And won't have to run. And we will make a list from footnotes from textbooks—they are everywhere."
"Sensible thought."
Doing homework ended almost by the very curfew, and if the guys planned to sit a little longer, and then go to sleep, then I still had duty ahead. Until one in the morning—two hours after curfew, which is at eleven. Ideally, Hannah should have been on duty with me, but I convinced her that a "two" would be superfluous, and I will handle everything myself, and let her go sleep, rest.
Getting out of the common room, I caught the moment when curfew began. This is quite frightening if you are a morally unprepared person. In the already gloomy stone corridors of the medieval castle-monastery, which, in fact, Hogwarts is, torches dim, giving almost no light and letting the viscous darkness of the corridors close. The flame in black bowls on chains or on columns goes out—they are located in the largest corridors and rooms of the castle. At such moments I consider corridors with high stained glass windows or galleries around inner courtyards of the castle especially beautiful—they are always illuminated either by direct moonlight, or scattered in clouds, and the stars are gorgeous here, in nature, away from cities and illumination, and even in the mountains, albeit not high.
Concentrating, hid myself with volitional magic, checked connection with spiders and just went for a walk around the castle—nothing for me to do except catch violators. Let those who consider the position of prefect an extremely important stage of their life suffer from such things. I consider such a twist of my being—a friendly dirty trick from Cedric. But he can be understood too—who else could he trust his favorite house to?
During the walk I simultaneously created new spiders, scattering here and there—they do not load brains, central artifact is responsible for this, but "sound the alarm" in case of anything they can. And just monitoring the situation—is a useful thing. Will be necessary, after all, as soon as I become a Healer, cure Moody, because promised, and his knowledge about creating artifacts like his eye—very interesting thing.
Walked, scattered spiders, listened to the situation—nothing. Deaf. Only directly near house common rooms there was some small student activity, but, as I noticed, they were in walking distance from the common room—I don't care about such things.
Here from one of the spiders I received a signal that Professor Flitwick walked past it. It seems he is on duty today. And so, yes, no matter how much I "patrolled", everywhere silence, smoothness, God's grace. Charming.
Going to the observation deck of the Astronomy Tower, I took a deep breath of pleasant fresh air, enjoyed the moment of solitude and began to sum up the patrol coming to an end. Overall—waste of time, but at the same time there is a small chance of preventing some offense, for example, a fight, massacre, some other similar events. But to catch just wandering around the castle, who were not even there today—excuse me.
Returning to the common room, didn't find anyone there at all. Well, what can I say? The first school day came to an end.
. . . . .
Tuesday is just as hard a day as Monday.
To begin with, after physical exercises and training, and, of course, a shower, I waited in the common room for Hannah to wake up, and together we went to hand over the club materials to the Head of House. This process was quick, I would even say, instant. And after that began the standard red tape: make sure the little ones woke up and tidied themselves up, escort them to breakfast, escort them to classes, go to our own classes.
Somewhere during breakfast I exchanged a couple of words with Herbert and Tamsin. They decided who would be captain, and it will be the girl—Herbert has a reputation as a slacker, which does not correspond to such a position. But Tamsin can be both serious, persuasive, and diplomatic—her extensive and aptly applied knowledge of history helps a lot in this matter. In general, I assigned her to deal with team affairs, of which there are not very many, if you think about it. Agree with the administration on training times, set a date for tryouts for roles in the team, supervise the training process. Well, and a little bureaucracy in the form of a couple of papers, but this is needed when a new person is accepted into the team and other similar nuances—she will manage.
After breakfast and escorting the little ones, we went to the Ravenclaw tower, where in a spacious and comfortable classroom in the form of an amphitheater, Professor Flitwick was to give us a lecture against the background of a huge window. His classes always caused slight anticipation, because the little professor managed to interest almost everyone in his subject, and even Daphne, having once promised that she would put more effort and diligence into studying this unloved subject of hers, now shows a little interest, and this is an indicator, whatever anyone says.
"Children," Flitwick smiled, standing on his improvised stand made of books, the scientific or artistic value of which is immeasurably small. "At the end of this year, as you already know, you will have to take very important exams, Ordinary Wizarding Levels. OWLs."
Giving us a couple of seconds for agreeing nods and other manifestations of understanding the topic, Flitwick, becoming serious, continued:
"You must remember that these exams can affect your future for many years! If you haven't yet seriously thought about choosing a profession, now is the time for it. But for now, I'm afraid, we will have to work harder than usual so that you can all show yourselves from the best side!"
"Excuse me, Professor," I raised my hand, attracting Flitwick's attention.
"Yes, yes, Mr. Granger? Do you have questions?"
"To some extent, sir," I got up from the desk, and considering that I sat almost at the very top of the amphitheater so that nothing would fly from behind during practice, everyone could see me, even if it was not very convenient for some to turn around. "Would like to clarify the practical significance of OWLs from you."
"What exactly do you mean?" the tiny professor amusingly tilted his head to one side.
"For example, I wanted to finish training in five years. What do OWLs affect in this case?"
"Hope this is purely hypothetical?"
"Of course, Professor."
"Well... I hope everyone is interested in such a question?" Flitwick surveyed the audience, and many nodded in agreement in response. "In that case, need to say the following. Let's take an average student with equally average capabilities. We will also consider prospects on average, so to speak, available to the majority."
The professor straightened up, put his wand on the lectern in front of him, sighed, and continued the thought.
"So, after five years of study, you can start a career, of course, in any industry. Can go as a hired worker to some farm, production and the like. Can go work in trade, in shops, stores, pharmacies. Can go to the Ministry. This is what is really available to everyone. But should understand that not that to a high, even to an average position you are unlikely to be taken—five years of study is the minimum minimum. Besides this, Mr. Granger, should understand that, for example, as a pharmacist's assistant and even a simple seller they will not take someone who does not have an OWL in potions, or the grade is bad. In many cases they will not take even with a good grade in the profile subject, because the OWL exam is an indicator of basic understanding of the subject, and an employer always and at all times wants a specialist as good as possible, and to pay as little as possible."
"Understood, Professor," I nodded. "Then another question. Will many employers bother to personally check the candidate's knowledge?"
"Personally? Oh, no, Mr. Granger," Flitwick smiled and waved off such a thought. "No one will even think about such a thing, unless they ask a couple of questions at the interview. And in the Ministry for many positions they generally take only with OWLs or NEWTs in the subjects they need with a certain grade, and even if you are Merlin in the flesh, the bureaucratic mechanism will not let you through."
"That's clear..."
I wanted to ask the next question, but Ron decided to ask a question from his seat, banally wedging into the conversation.
"And what is the point of OWLs if we decide to study further?"
Chuckling at such tactlessness, I sat down, preparing to listen.
"Everything is extremely simple here, Mr. Weasley," Flitwick smiled, adjusting his emerald robe. "Depending on what subjects you pass OWLs in and with what grade, will depend on what subjects you can choose in the sixth and seventh year of study at Hogwarts. Accordingly, you can choose what subjects you will take NEWTs in. For example, you cannot take NEWTs in subjects in which you do not have OWLs."
"Generally not at all?"
"Speaking purely hypothetically, you can go to the Ministry, agree on passing or retaking OWLs in the needed subject, and then on passing NEWTs. Only must understand that no one will do this for free, and the first retake of OWLs is available only five years after you graduate from Hogwarts."
"Why such difficulties?" asked Lisa Turpin, a brown-haired girl from Ravenclaw.
"Such questions are no longer for me," Flitwick spread his hands. "Moreover, OWLs and NEWTs affect not only your future career, but... Let's say, if you decide to study further with Masters, then you will have to attach your results to the letter one way or another or demonstrate them at a personal meeting. Let me remind you that OWLs and NEWTs allow seeing the level of your preparation, and, for example, a Potions Master will brush off your letter and candidacy for training like a fly if you have a low score on OWLs or NEWTs in this subject, and especially if you did not take it at all. Of course, during a conversation with a Master, if he is generally interested in you, perhaps he will check your knowledge. But I will tell you, guys, from experience, and knowing many Masters—this rarely happens. There are many reasons for this, but take it as a given."
"That is, no way without OWLs?" Ron became so distressed that I wanted to cheer him up with a plate of baked chicken. Seriously—I haven't seen such despondency on the face of a rational person for a long time.
"Unfortunately, Mr. Weasley," the professor smiled. "Of course we were talking about an average student, an ordinary job and so on. There is always a chance that you will have the opportunity to achieve something more. But I'll tell you this—during my time teaching at Hogwarts, and I've been teaching for over fifty years, I haven't met a single student who achieved anything at all while doing nothing."
The question was exhausted, and the professor, making sure that there would be no new questions, enthusiastically took his wand from the lectern and spoke with a smile:
"Since we have clarified everything we wanted, let's start today's practice. Until the very end of the class we have to practice the Summoning Charm. If anyone suddenly forgot, repeat after me."
Professor Flitwick began demonstratively slowly showing the gesture with his wand, pronounced the verbal formula, Accio, named the object that is the target, and as a result summoned a piece of parchment lying on his lectern to himself.
"Did everyone remember everything? Wonderful. This charm often comes up on the Charms OWL," he said cheerfully, "so you need to practice properly. Proceed."
And we proceeded. I also did not shirk, flattering my pride with my own capabilities, and, like everyone else, soundly and diligently practiced the charm. For my target, I chose a crumpled sheet of paper from a notebook into a ball. I did these charms perfectly, without any problems, and therefore I began attempts to perform them as best and fastest as possible, simultaneously trying to discard, for a start, the name of the object, not to pronounce it aloud, and then trying to make the "drawing" with the wand as small as possible. This should use energy more economically in the event that I do not control the process myself, reduce the time of creating charms due to the fact that the tip of the wand travels a shorter distance in space, but at the same time just as fast, if not faster.
Of course, as in some other cases, such a practical lesson turned into a local breakthrough of Chaos—various objects, specially created by students or obtained elsewhere, constantly flew back and forth around, voices of students or their cries from a pillow flying into their heads came from everywhere. In general, real chaos.
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