The British Investigation

The First Lesson

Hermione POV
I woke early the next morning, excited to get back to some kind of normality. There were very few students in 7th or 8th year so McGonagall had decided to compress all the students from both into 1 class for most subjects. This meant that we would be with all 9 the new students as well as old friends (and rivals).
When the others finally got up ("God Hermione, anyone would think you liked school") we made our way down to breakfast.
Percy and Jason were down soon after, dressed in Gryffindor colours as opposed to the neutral robes they were wearing before.
When they got their meal, I noticed them looking around nervously, so I listened in.
"Do you think they'll be mad?" Jason whispered.
"No, I mean, we're on a quest for them and we don't usually when we are."
"We did on the Argo."
"That was different."
They spoke too quietly for me to hear after that but the conversation didn't help clear anything up. If anything it left me with more questions. Who were these people and what were they doing in our school?

Luckily, the first lesson was defence against the dark arts. I found a seat with Ginny, while Ron and Harry sat behind. It felt strange to be sat with Ginny and for Lupin to be teaching us again but it was nice.
The Americans all sat together in a bunch too.
"Today," Lupin introduced, "I'm going to split you into small groups and we are going to recap what you will have learnt in the past. Remember, we have some new students who might have been taught different things to us, so help them where you can.

I was put in a group with Ginny, Percy, Annabeth and some seventh years from Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff who I didn't recognise. Our first section was a boggart. I already knew what my fear was, still the same as it was back in third year but I had learnt to separate the bogart from the reality so I volunteered to demonstrate for my group.
"So, it'll show your worst fear, and to defeat it you must cast- Riddikulus!" I cast the spell and we all laughed at the result.
"Okay," Annabeth said, "I'll go next." I noticed Lupin watching in interest as the cupboard door opened. Out came the boggart, taking the form of a spider. Not a normal spider though, like Ron's was, it was more humanoid, like half woman half spider almost. To give her credit, Annabeth was not much swayed by it. Her breath caught in her throat but she cast the spell and the spider appeared to be in a set of Chinese handcuffs. She smiled and chuckled to herself, the rest of us joining in when it began to roll around on the floor.
Next up was Percy. He looked a bit more nervous than Annabeth, but he stepped forwards. Quite a few people stopped to watch him- it seems he had attracted quite a bit of attention.
The door opened and out tumbled the boggart, taking the shape of... him.
It was Percy- there was no doubt about that- but it was different. There was a look in his face that was actually quite frightening, a sort of deadness behind his usual calm green eyes which were now churning and dark.
This had obviously frightened Percy too, as the colour had drained from his face and he was backing away.
"Sorry, I... I can't." And he turned and fled out of the door.
"Riddikulus!" Lupin cast.
"I should-" Annabeth began but Lupin just nodded and she followed him out of the room. Everyone stood in silence for a moment.
"Right," Lupin said, "let's switch stations."

The rest of the lesson passed by pretty uneventfully. Percy and Annabeth returned, completing the rest of the tasks pretty easily, though they never let go of each other's hands- no one bothered to question it.

Lupin dismissed the class at the end, sitting down at the desk and everyone- including the Americans- cleared out quickly, leaving just me, Harry, Ron and Ginny. When we turned to the door, we were greeted by a familiar face.
Sirius stood, leant against the doorframe, his usual cheeky smirk on his face.
"Padfoot!" Harry ran up and gave him a hug.
"Hey guys," he grinned over us before making his way over to sit on Lupin's desk, meaning he couldn't get any of his work done. Lupin sighed.
"What do you want Pads?"
"You." Sirius winked and Lupin rolled his eyes.

After a bit of catching up with Harry's godfather and his boyfriend, I decided to asked their thoughts, after all, if we could trust anyone it would be them.
"What do you think of the new students?" I asked Lupin.
"Interesting." Lupin replied. "I have never seen anyone have a boggart of themselves before. I can understand why he was upset." I nodded in agreement.
"The Americans?" Sirius asked.
"Yeah, why?"
"That kid with the dark hair and green eyes was out in the corridor earlier with the blonde girl. I couldn't tell what they were saying but he was clearly upset, and then the water pipes just exploded." I raised my eyebrows.
"That's unusual," Lupin said. "Most accidental magic stops when you start learning to do proper spells."
"Well," I said, "whoever these kids are, they must be powerful- to be able to do that without a command or a wand."
"Is that even our kind of magic at all?" Asked Ginny and we all contemplated this for a moment before Lupin shook his head.
"Doesn't sound like it..."