Bella and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Chapter Ten

We climbed the last few steps and walked onto a tiny landing, where most of the class were already assembled. There were no doors off this landing so where the hell do we go?

"Sybill Trelawney, Divination teacher," Harry read, looking up. "How're we supposed to get up there?"

I looked up towards the ceiling, where there was a circular trap door with a brass plaque on it. As though in answer to his question, the trap door suddenly opened and a silvery ladder descended right at Harry's feet. Everyone went quiet. 

"After you," I said grinning, so Harry climbed the ladder first. 

I followed after and emerged into the strangest-looking classroom I had ever seen. In fact, it didn't look like a classroom at all; more like a cross between someone's attic and an old-fashioned teashop. There were at least twenty small, circular tables crammed inside, all surrounded by chintz armchairs and fat little pouffes. Everything was lit with a dim, crimson light; the curtains at the windows were all closed, and the many lamps were draped with dark red scarves. It was really warm, and the fire which was burning under the crowded mantelpiece was giving off a heavy, sickly sort of perfume as it heated a large copper kettle. The shelves running around the circular walls were crammed with dusty-looking feathers, stubs of candles, many packs of tattered playing cards, countless silvery crystal balls and a huge array of teacups.

Ron appeared at Harry's shoulder as the class assembled around us, all talking in whispers. 

"Where is she?" Ron asked.

A voice came suddenly out of the shadows, a soft, misty, sort of voice. 

"Welcome," it said. "How nice to see you in the physical world at last"

Why does she look like a large, glittering insect? Professor Trelawney moved into the firelight and we saw that she was very thin; her large glasses magnified her eyes to several times their natural size, and she was draped in a gauzy spangled shawl. Innumerable chains and beads hung around her spindly neck, and her arms and hands were encrusted with bangles and rings.

"Sit, my children, sit," she said, and we all climbed awkwardly into the armchairs or sank onto the pouffes. Me, Harry, Ron, and Hermione sat ourselves around the same, round table.

"Welcome to Divination," Professor Trelawney said, who had seated herself in a winged armchair in front of the fire. "My name is Professor Trelawney. You may not have seen me before. I find that descending too often into the hustle and bustle of the main school clouds my Inner Eye"

Nobody, not a soul, said anything in answer to this pronouncement. Professor Trelawney delicately rearranged her shawl and continued, "So you have chosen to study Divination, the most difficult of all magical arts. I must warn you at the outset that if you do not have the Sight, there is very little I will be able to teach you. Books can take you only so far in this field..."

At these words, the three of us glanced, grinning, at Hermione, who looked startled at the news that books wouldn't be much help in the subject. I can see her panicking already.

"Many witches and wizards, talented though they are in the area of loud bangs and smells and sudden disappearings, are yet unable to penetrate the veiled mysteries of the future," Professor Trelawney went on, her huge, gleaming eyes moving from fact to nervous face. "It is a Gift granted to few. You, boy," she said suddenly to Neville, who almost toppled off his pouffe, "if your grandmother well?"

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

"I wouldn't be so sure if I were you, dear," Professor Trelawney said. 

"Poor Neville," I whispered in Harry's ear, looking at Neville's shocked face. "How dare she make him worry like that! I'm sure his grandmother is just fine! And why does she feel the need to use the term 'penetrate'?"