Howling Professor

The Beginning Of A New Year

While entering the great hall my gaze stayed on the new first years, who nervously waited for the sorting hat to put them into their right houses.. I could barely remember how nervous I've been back on my first day.

The great hall was as beautiful and as colored as last year and dozens of candles were floating above the four house tables. The banners of the four houses shined brightly under the blue, almost black, sky, which was already filled with glowing little white dots. It was a beautiful evening, no cloud was seen on the sky and everyone in the hall seemed to be happy, many people chatted with their friends about their holidays, laughed about bad jokes or gazed longingly at the table, waiting for the food to magically arrive. I was one of the last people to enter the room, nearly everyone was already seated, so I made my way through the hall towards the Hufflepuff table. While my gaze still wandered around the room, I recognized two redheads making grimaces at the Gryffindor table. They immediately waved in my direction, I winked back. The Weasley Twins. They were famous for their brilliant pranks and even though their not in the same house as I am, I still like them very much.

The Weasley's are good people, even if especially pureblood families tend to dislike them because they're 'blood traders'. I never believed in such things as blood status. Wizard is wizard and witch is witch, no matter where you're roots are. I, for myself, am a pureblood and sometimes I'm even ashamed of it because of the prejudices many pureblood families have towards halfbloods and muggleborns, or how they call them: 'mudbloods', it's also rare that a pureblood gets sorted into Hufflepuff. I know that not every pureblood family is 'bad and evil', but I can't overcome myself to fully accept that.

Many seats have already been taken, when I've reached the table, so I sat next to a boy that was in my year and also one of my few friends. Cedric Diggory. Many people kind of liked him because of his looks and his Quidditch qualities; I liked him because of his loyalty and his down-to-earth-ness. The small crowd of young girls that were lingering around Cedric slowly disappeared when I came closer.

"Oh Alisha! I didn't see you coming through the door! Why weren't you in the Hogwarts express this morning?", asked Cedric while his eyes wandered my face with worry. He directly hit a sore point.

"Oh..you know. My parents don't live very far from here, so it would've been pointless to come to King's Cross. Still hope you had a good ride though.", I answered with a faked smile, while I was nervously trying to straighten my robe.

Cedric still had his eyes on me, but when I began to worry that he might've caught me lying, he'd already nodded and looked away to talk with a younger boy. The truth is that my parents don't want me to go to King's Cross because it's a muggle station and because everything muggle is 'so bad', they don't even live near Hogwarts, by Merlin's beard the thought alone is horrible. I know it's sad that my parents are this strict, but you learn to live with it.

My whole family consists of purebloods and if someone decides to marry a halfblood or even worse a muggle, they're abruptly disowned and never mentioned. Many things are unspoken. Too many.

When I looked up I saw that the sorting hat had finished putting the first years into their new houses and Dumbledore was already standing in front of the teacher's table, ready to hold a long speech. He wore a long dark blue gown, covered with dozens of stars and his beard was silver as always. I sniggered, not just that he looked like a typical wizard in muggle tales, he also matched the sky today. He greeted us with the same kind words, which he uses every year, but then he suddenly looked sad and dull, unbelievable dull. He stayed silent for a few moments, then he began to speak in a voice that trembled in fear and .. agony?

"Most of you probably know that the dangerous ... mass murderer Sirius Black escaped from Azkaban, so it's our duty to watch out for our student's safety. Many dementors will be stationed at every entrance to the grounds. Now whilst I've been assured that their presence will not disrupt our day-to-day activities ... a word of caution. Dementors are vicious creatures. They will not distinguish between the one they hunt and the one who gets in their way. Therefore, I must warn each and every one of you to give them no reason to harm you. It is not in the nature of a dementor to be forgiving. But you know, happiness can be found even in the darkest of times if one only remembers to turn on the light."

The old man sighed and I could see that his hands were shacking. There was a stifling atmosphere in the hall and many students looked afraid at Dumbledore, not believing a word he'd said. It was depressive to watch. However Dumbledore began to raise his voice again, but this time he sounded happy and even smiled a bit.

"Nonetheless we still have some happier things to talk about. Let me introduce you to your new Defence against the dark arts Professor Remus J. Lupin!"

For the first time today I looked at the teacher's table and really! Next to Professor Snape, who looked pretty grim and still had the same greasy hair as last year, stood a tall man in a brown suit. Even though he seemed very young, he already had gray stains in his blonde-brown hair, which particularly fell in front of his eyes. In his face I could see a small mustache and a big smile and even if I didn't see his face very well because of the distance, I still knew that his smile looked like the  kindest in the world next to Snape's bitter face.

Shortly after, the hall was filled with joyfulness and every student and nearly all teachers, except Snape, clapped because of the new teacher. Lupin sat down really quick and talked with Professor Sprout, my house teacher, he seemed to be embarrassed.
I wondered if it was because of something Sprout said, I knew that she could be weird sometimes, everyone thought that she smokes some of her plants every now and then, or if it was because of all the attention he got. I had to smile, poor Professor.