Emily Potter - Book 5 - Order of the Phoenix

Chapter 26 - Hog's Head

Emily made no mention of how she was going to try and fix her problems, primarily because she had no clue how to do so. She recently had detention with Umbridge because of her outburst during McGonagall's class; she finished all of her course work within three days, she's even managed to vanish a hamster in Transfiguration; and trained nonstop for Quidditch to take her mind off of things.

It was during a wild gusty evening at the end of September, when she, Harry, Ron, and Hermione were sitting in the library, looking up potion ingredients for Snape. "I was wondering," Hermione said suddenly, "Whether you'd thought any more about Defence Against the Dark Arts, Harry."

Emily looked up from her Herbology book, "What about DADA?" She asked. Harry shot a look at Hermione, "Of course I have," said Harry grumpily. "Can't forget it, can we, with that hag teaching us —"

"I meant the idea Ron and I had" — Ron cast her an alarmed, threatening kind of look; she frowned at him — "Oh, all right, the idea I had, then — about you teaching us."

"Are you lot seriously going to ignore me?" Emily said, closing her textbook, "Why would Harry be teaching?" Hermione was about to let her in on it, but then a glimmer of hope shown in her eyes. Harry noticed this and argued with her, "No, Hermione. We are not getting her involved – "

"if you're not going to do it, it might as well be Emily!" She reasoned. Hermione appeared to go a bit red in the face, "Of course, I'd be lying if I hadn't thought she'd be a perfect teacher for this. I was looking for the right moment to tell her."

Harry did not answer at once. He pretended to be perusing a page of Asiatic Anti-Venoms, because he did not want to say what was in his mind. The fact was that he had given the matter a great deal of thought over the past fortnight. Sometimes it seemed an insane idea, just as it had on the night Hermione had proposed it, but at others, he had found himself thinking about the spells that had served him best in his various encounters with Dark creatures and Death Eaters — found himself, in fact, subconsciously planning lessons. . . .

"Well," he said slowly, when he could not pretend to find Asiatic anti-venoms interesting much longer, "Yeah, I — I've thought about it a bit."

"And?" said Hermione eagerly. "I don't know," said Harry. He looked up at Ron. "I thought it was a good idea from the start," said Ron, who seemed keen to join in this conversation now that he was sure that Harry was not going to start shouting again. Harry shifted uncomfortably in his chair. "You did listen to what I said about a load of it being luck, didn't you?"

"Yes, Harry," said Hermione gently, "But all the same, there's no point pretending that you're not good at Defence Against the Dark Arts, because you are and so is Emily. You two were the only people last year who could throw off the Imperius Curse completely, you can produce a Patronus, you can do all sorts of stuff that full-grown wizards can't."

"Let me get this straight," Emily piped in, clearing her throat, "You lot are asking my brother to teach you about the Dark Arts? You lot are prepared to go against Umbridge, against the Ministry of Magic?" Hermione and Ron exchanged looks, but sure enough they said yes. Emily looked at Harry and smirked, "This'll be interesting." He scoffed, "Obviously I won't be the only one teaching, Em. You know things that most Wizards and Witches don't, you're in this now."

Emily sat up straight in her chair, edging closer to the three of them, "You've got the teachers, but where are the students? I doubt that anyone would want us, the crazy nut jobs, as their mentors." She said. "Well, I think you might be surprised how many people would be interested in hearing what you've got to say," said Hermione seriously. "Look," she leaned toward him; Ron, who was still watching her with a frown on his face, leaned forward to listen too, "You know the first weekend in October's a Hogsmeade weekend? How would it be if we tell anyone who's interested to meet us in the village and we can talk it over?"