The Purest Kind of Magic

- forty eight -

"Must I remind you that I am, in fact, the Prefect? I can dock house points, you know," Draco huffed as he crossed his arms.

I couldn't help but stifle a laugh at Draco's exasperated expression. "Yes, you're the Prefect, and yes, you can dock house points," I said, trying to sound serious, "but do you really want to dock points from our own house?"

Draco scowled, clearly torn between his duty as a Prefect and his loyalty to Slytherin. "Well, no, but... it's the principle of the matter!" he huffed.

Blaise, who had been watching the exchange with amusement, chimed in, "Come on, Draco, you can't be that strict with us. We're your friends."

Theo added with a grin, "Besides, we're the best-behaved Slytherins you know."

Elmia chuckled, "Well, that's certainly debatable."

"You guys are forgetting the fact that Daphne's a Prefect too," I reminded everyone as I pushed open the DADA classroom's door.

"That's exactly right, go bug Daphne, not me," Draco quickly stated.

Daphne raised an eyebrow, looking amused. "Oh, so now you're trying to shift the responsibility onto me?" she said with a playful smirk. "Nice try, Draco."

"He's just a wittle princess, don't go so hard on him," I laughed.

Draco scoffed, "I prefer prince, Y/n."

I shrugged, "Alright, prince charming, let's go and sit down, hm?"

Draco rolled his eyes playfully, but he couldn't hide the small smile that tugged at the corner of his lips. "Lead the way, darling," he said, gesturing for me to go first.

I laughed and sat down in a seat with him sitting besides me. I glanced up front and saw that Umbridge was in the same pink cardigan as last night and scoffed.

"Almost forgot about who we have to deal with today," I mumbled.

The classroom was close to silent as everyone sat down and faced Umbridge.

"Well, good afternoon!" she said. A few mumbled 'Good afternoon' back.

She looked visibly annoyed, "Tut, tut. That won't do, now, will it? Ishould like you, please, to reply 'Good afternoon, Professor Umbridge.' One more time, please. Good afternoon, class!"

Almost everyone, as in not me or any of my friends, did as she said.

"There, now," said Professor Umbridge sweetly. "That wasn't toodifficult, was it? Wands away and quills out, please."

I raised my eyebrows. Wands away? This is Defense Against the Dark Arts, not Potions.

Umbridge opened her handbag, extractedher own wand, which was an unusually short one. I just shortness runs in her blood, even her wand is short. She then tapped theblackboard sharply with her short wand; words appeared on the board at once:

Defense Against the Dark Arts
A Return to Basic Principles.

"Well now, your teaching in this subject has been rather disruptedand fragmented, hasn't it?" stated Professor Umbridge, turning to face us with her hands clasped neatly in front of her.

"The constantchanging of teachers, many of whom do not seem to have followedany Ministry-approved curriculum, has unfortunately resulted inyour being far below the standard we would expect to see in yourO.W.L. year.

"You will be pleased to know, however, that these problems are nowto be rectified. We will be following a carefully structured, theory-centered, Ministry-approved course of defensive magic this year.Copy down the following, please."