The WizaGod Tournament

Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Harry

                I have to admit. Nico is pretty good with his acting. When I see how he acts with Malfoy and his cronies, I can imagine him as a pureblood. He acts like a pompous and cunning Slytherin. Not much different from how Malfoy acts. It’s like he was there the whole time.

                Ron and I entered the defense classroom and we sat near the front of the classroom.

                “I can’t believe that Dumbledore managed to convince Moody to teach Defense”

                “Who is Moody anyway?”

                “He is an Auror” Ron said “He’s a well known Auror, half the people in Azkaban are there because of him.”

                “I’m personally excited.” Hermione said “We have double Defense today.”

                “You can put those away,” he growled, stumping over to his desk and sitting down, “those books. You won’t need them.”

We all returned the books to their bags, Ron looking excited. Moody took out a register, shook his long mane of grizzled gray hair out of his twisted and scarred face, and began to call out names, his normal eye moving steadily down the list while his magical eye swiveled around, fixing upon each student as he or she answered.

“Right then,” he said, when the last person had declared themselves present, “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?”

“But you’re behind - very behind - on dealing with curses,” said Moody then smirking in Nico’s direction. Who just shrugged. “So I’m here to bring you up to scratch on what wizards can do to each other. I’ve got one year to teach you how to deal with Dark –“

“What, aren’t you staying?” Ron blurted out. Moody’s magical eye spun around to stare at Ron; Ron looked extremely apprehensive, but after a moment Moody smiled .The effect was to make his heavily scarred face look more twisted and contorted than ever, but it was nevertheless good to know that he ever did anything as friendly as smile. Ron looked deeply relieved.

“You’ll be Arthur Weasley’s son, eh?” Moody said. “Your father got me out of a very tight corner a few days ago. ... Yeah, I’m staying just the one year. Special favor to Dumbledore. One year, and then back to my quiet retirement.” He gave a harsh laugh, and then clapped his gnarled hands together.

“So - straight into it. Curses. They come in many strengths and forms. Now, according to the Ministry of Magic, I’m supposed to teach you counter curses and leave it at that. I’m not supposed to show you what illegal Dark curses look like until you’re in the sixth year. You’re not supposed to be old enough to deal with it till then. But Professor Dumbledore’s got a higher opinion of your nerves, he reckons you can cope, and I say, the sooner you know what you’re up against, the better. 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.”

Lavender jumped and blushed. She had been showing Parvati something under the desk. Apparently Moody’s magical eye could see through solid wood, as well as out of the back of his head.