Brave { Neville Longbottom}

Chapter One Hundred Twenty Nine

While the other students shuddered at the mere sight of the odd man, some flinching with every clunking sound of his wooden foot hitting the floor, Kefira just wanted to sit with Professor Moody and ask him a million different questions. He somewhat reminded her of her Uncle Bandile and she wondered if Bandile had known Neville's parents as Aurors, if he knew Moody. She would have to send him a letter and ask at some point. But in that moment, she gave the professor, her full attention.

He had a gruffness to his voice, his unique eye of blue scanning about the room, landing on a student here and there and studying them for a moment as he called attendance.  She liked him even more as he instructed all the students to put their books away.

"Oh thank goodness." She said under her breath with a smile. Unlike some of her classmates, Kefira had definitely not engaged in any form of summer reading.

"Right then," he addressed the class, "I've had a letter from Professor Lupin about this class. Seems you've had a pretty thorough grounding in tackling Dark creatures - you've covered boggarts, Red Caps, hinkypunks, grindylows, Kappas, and werewolves, is that right?"

"Ah, I'll never get over the magic world and their ability to name things." Kefira whispered to Neville in amusement. "Hinkypunks is one of my favorite words."

"But not one of your favorite creatures I hope." Neville whispered back to her with a slight cringe as he thought of what he had learned about the one legged creature the year prior.

"Oh come on, Nevs, they weren't even scary looking."

"No, but they are capable of doing is pretty scary if you ask me." Neville told her.

"Fair enough, but you could easily avoid them if you have a proper map or if you don't go wandering off the designated path. I mean, that's just common sense isn't it?"

Neville only smiled at her before the two turned their attention back to what Professor Moody was discussing with the class. Apparently, he believed they were behind in learning about curses and he was going to be the one to teach them for the year before going back to his retirement.

"...How are you supposed to defend yourself against something you've never seen? A wizard who's about to put an illegal curse on you isn't going to tell you what he's about to do. He's not going to do it nice and polite to your face. You need to be prepared. You need to be alert and watchful. You need to put that away, Miss Brown, when I'm talking."

The class turned to see Lavender turn a bright red as she trying to show Parvati something under the table they were sitting at.

"That's it." Kefira said placing her hands at the table they sat at. "I'm inviting him over for Christmas, could you imagine how much fun that would be? He would scare my sisters so bad. Oh.. I need this."

While Kefira seemed to be in a good mood for the beginning of the class, things would take an extremely dark turn, leaving her completely unprepared to what would unfold.

Professor Moody brought up the discussion of the Three Unforgivable Curses, Kefira hardly knew anything about them, with the exception of what she had learned from Neville due to his parents' condition. The Cruciatus Curse was the only one that she knew a little about but Professor Moody started the lesson with the Imperius Curse first.

She watched as the man pulled out three spiders, seeing Ron shuddered and move away as much as he could. She remembered his fear from the Boggart lesson the previous year and felt sorry for the boy, because even the Riddikulus spell couldn't help him in that moment.

Professor Moody placed the spider under the curse, and turned it into a circus performer before the class's eyes. They watched the spider cartwheel and flip about under Professor Moody's control. The class roared with laughter until Moody spoke again.

"Think it's funny, do you?" he growled. "You'd like it, would you, if I did it to you?

Kefira had never heard a classroom full of students become so quiet, not even under the control of Professor Snape. But as Moody began to explain how the curse was used on witches and wizards under Voldermort and how it had caused a mess for the Ministry as they had to figure out who was under it or who was working in their own free will.

She had been hardly listening to the man as she watched the spider, when she jumped at Professor Moody yelling.

"CONSTANT VIGILANCE!" 

Kefira was confused as to where the class was going, but she suddenly realized she didn't like it as Professor Moody asked for the next curse.

To her shock, she witnessed Neville raise his hand. He seemed surprised by his own actions as well, but kept it up.

"Nevs," She didn't think it would be a wise decision for the boy to talk about any of the curses, she could see his fingers trembling. She wanted to climb on the table and push his hand back down, but it was too late as Neville was called upon.

"There's one... the Cruciatus Curse." He said.

The girl couldn't understand what had possessed Neville to bring it up, knowing the story behind the curse that had affected his life so terribly.

"Your name's Longbottom?" Moody questioned, bringing Neville to nod, filled with nerves.

No longer wanting the lesson to continue, Kefira watched in silent horror as the second spider was removed and enlarged by Moody, so that they were to get the full view of it.

"Crucio!"

Instantly, feeling sick to her stomach, Kefira was forced to watch the poor spider, writhe about in pain, she didn't understand before what had fully happened to Neville's parents, but seeing the spider in that much, she couldn't imagine what his parents had gone through.

She turned to Neville to see him clenching his fists tightly about the table, his eyes were wide and he looked completely traumatized. She looked forward to tell Moody to stop but Hermione beat her to it.

"Stop it!" Hermione's voice was loud and shrill as she looked to the professor.

Professor Moody muttered something under his breath before ceasing the spider's pain. Kefira placed her own shaking hand on Neville's shoulder, but he didn't respond to her touch. The entire class was staring blankly, others shaking, and all was quiet as Moody asked for the third curse.

"No more." Kefira said under her breath. "No more please."

However, it was Hermione again who spoke giving the third curse. 

The Killing Curse.

Nothing would ever prepare Kefira for Moody's next course of action. The child had never experienced death, not that even of a pet or anything of the sort.

"Avada Kedavra!"

A green spurt of light struck the spider once it left Moody's wand. As soon as the spider was hit, it rolled onto it's back and remained still.

Completely dead.

With no apparent regard for the life he had just taken, Moody swept the spider off the desk onto the floor.

Kefira stared at the spider, as her stomach turned completely.

Before the Professor could continue, the class came to a pause as Kefira just vomited.