Dark Defense

Seers and Politics.

Two days after the sacking of Professor Trelawney found Harry, Ron and Hermione sitting at the Gryffindor table, having breakfast before their first lesson of the day with Firenze.

Needless to say, the female Divination students were quite in a tizzy over the new professor, something Hermione, and Harry, found both highly annoying, and degrading. After all, so what if Firenze was rather good looking? It didn't change the fact he had the body of a horse from the waist down, something which was all to obvious as, instead of heading up to Trelawney's tower room, the class found themselves marching towards Classroom eleven, a ground floor classroom that wasn't that far from the great hall.

Now Harry was used to seeing a lot of things, some of them beautiful, some of them terrifying, all of them unusual, but when he walked into the classroom, which last he'd known had been neglected and unused, and found himself standing in the middle of a forest clearing, he actually found himself momentarily stunned.

"Harry Potter." Firenze greeted, the centaur standing in the center of the clearing, where there were no trees, holding out a hand to the Boy Who Lived, who shook it accordingly "It was foretold that we would meet again."

Harry, who after spending more time with Trelawney than he'd care to recall, and thus didn't put much stock by prophecy, merely nodded his head and turned to join the rest of the class, who were eyeing him with something akin to wonderment at his familiarity with the, admittedly wild, looking centaur.

"Professor Dumbledore has kindly arranged this classroom for us." Firenze explained to his students, gesturing to the clearing for emphasis "I would have preferred to teach you in the Forbidden Forest, which until Monday, was my home…but that is no longer possible."

"Please-er-sir…" Pravati Patil asked, the Gryffindor raising a hand breathlessly as she eyed the Centaur shyly "Why not? We've been in there with Hagrid, we're not frightened!"

"It is not a question of your bravery." Firenze assured the young woman solemnly "But of my position. I cannot return to the forest. My herd has banished me."

Harry flinched, wondering if the hoof marks that adorned Firenze's chest belonged to Bane, a darker haired Centaur that had denounced Firenze as a 'common mule' for allowing Harry to ride on his back in his first year.

"Let us begin." Firenze instructed, ordering the teens to lie on their backs, the lights of the room dimming, as if the sun were setting, revealing a starry night sky that earned a series of 'ooh' and 'aah' from the class, and in Ron's case an audible 'Cor, Blimey!'

"Observe the heavens." Firenze instructed, his tone calm "Here it is written, for those who can see, the future of our races…"

Harry's POV...

Harry only half listened at first, as truth be told he didn't really think much of Divination, mainly a result of overexposure to Trelawney, but gradually he began to listen in, particularly as Firenze denounced Trelawney, and most other mortal seers, as if not charlatans, then self-gratifying attention seekers, before going on to explain how Centaurs, who'd been mapping the heavens before human's evolved the ability to look up, went about things.

He didn't particularly like the idea that the current peace, if you could call it that, was simply the calm between two separate wars. For one thing, it sounded right on the money, and eerily portent.

However, the thing that most perplexed the Boy-Who-Lived was the warning that Firenze had bestowed upon him, 'Tread Lightly Where Devils Fear', a cryptic wording that was at the same time more ominous than anything he'd heard before.

Though the message that Firenze asked for Harry to pass on to Hagrid, that 'his efforts were in vain' or something to that order, was by no means less perplexing. If anything, it made Harry all the more nervous, as whenever Hagrid started a project, it usually involved fangs teeth and grievous bodily harm for everyone involved.