𝐇𝐚𝐫𝐫𝐲 𝐏𝐨𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐫: 𝐋𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐎𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐇𝐨𝐠𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐬

Ch 147 - Do not call his Name?!

"Many Witches and Wizards, talented though they are in the area of loud bangs and smells and sudden disappearing, are yet unable to penetrate the veiled mysteries of the future," Trelawney went on, her enormous, gleaming eyes moving from face to nervous face.

"It is a Gift granted to few. You, boy!" She suddenly yelled, looking right at Neville, who almost toppled off his pouffe, "Is your grandmother well?"

"I-I think so," Neville said tremulously.

"I wouldn't be so sure if I were you, dear," Trelawney said, the firelight glinting on her long emerald earrings. Neville gulped audibly, horror sweeping across his round face.

Trelawney continued placidly, "We will be covering the basic methods of Divination this year. The first term will be devoted to reading the tea leaves. Next term we shall progress to palmistry. By the way, my dear," she shot suddenly at Parvati Patil, "beware a red- haired man."

Parvati gave a startled look at their table, which was right behind her, and edged her chair away from it.

"In the summer term," Trelawney went on, "we shall progress to the crystal ball - if we have finished with fire-omens, that is. Unfortunately, classes will be disrupted in February by a nasty bout of flu. I myself will lose my voice. And around Easter, one of our numbers will leave us forever."

A very tense silence followed this pronouncement, but Professor Trelawney seemed to be entirely unaware of it.

"I wonder, dear," she said to Lavender Brown, who was nearest and shrank back into her chair, "If you could pass me the largest silver teapot?"

Lavender, looking relieved, stood up, took an enormous teapot from the shelf and put it down on the table in front of Trelawney.

"Thank you, my dear. Incidentally, that thing you are dreading - it will happen on Friday the Sixteenth of October," Trelawney said to her. Lavender trembled as she sat back down.

"Now, I want you all to divide into pairs. Collect a teacup from the shelf, come to me, and I will fill it. Then sit down and drink; drink until only the dregs remain. Swill these around the cup three times with the left-hand then turn the cun upside down on its saucer; wait for the last of the tea to drain away, then give your cup to your partner to read. You will interpret the patterns using pages five and six of Unfogging the Future. I shall move among you, helping and instructing. Oh and dear-" she caught Neville by the arm as he made to stand up, "- after you've broken your first tea cup, would you be so kind as to select one of the blue patterned ones? I'm rather attached to the pink."

Sure enough, Neville had no sooner reached the shelf of teacups than there was a shattering sound of breaking China.

Professor Trelawney swept over to him, holding a dustpan and brush, asking him to gather a blue patterned teacup.

Lucifer and Hermione had their teacups filled and sat down across from Harry and Ron.

Hermione took a swig of tea, and found it to be scalding hot. She choked it down and began to cough a bit.

"Are you alright?" Lucifer asked her, concerned.

"Fine... just peachy," she smiled crookedly and took another, larger swig, prepared for it this time.

When they finally both had their tea gone, they did exactly as Trelawney said, swilling around the dregs and turning them upside down until the remnants of tea were gone.

They gave the now emptied cup, except for the dregs, to each other and began to decipher the patterns.

"Okay... it looks like... you have something in here that looks like... the Sun... which indicates Great Happiness....but then you've also got a skull, meaning... danger is in your path... but there's something else...Haha! Of course! A book, great wisdom lies ahead.” Lucifer said, the last one with a small chuckle.