~ Mathilda POV ~
"Guys, wake up! We overslept, school starts in 15 minutes!" I suddenly heard Britt shout, jumping around in the dorm room and my eyes shot open. Fuck, we forgot to set an alarm last night, being too occupied with talking and then we just fell asleep.
We all quickly got up, rushed around in the dorm room, then into the bathroom, got dressed, ditched breakfast and sprinted to the DADA classroom. Great, first day and a new teacher and we are late.
We only were 2 minutes late so we did not expect the worst when we bursted into the classroom, stress and too little sleep probably quite obvious on our faces, and no idea how wrong we were about it being no problem.
"So sorry professor, we know it is the first day but we forgot to set an alarm and overslept. We are truly sorry!" I said, completely out of breath while walking towards an empty table.
"I must admit that that is not only completely immature but also quite stupid at your age, girls. You soon will be grown up women, mistakes like this should simply not happen. You will get away with detention this afternoon. If it happens again the punishment will not be so nice," Mrs Stringer said with a sweet and high-pitched voice, turning towards us, pushing a strand of hair over her shoulder and flashing us a fake smile.
What the bloody hell? I knew that something was up with her, but that is next level rude.
"What? It is the bloody first day of school, that can happen!" Julie blurted out.
"Watch you mouth, young lady! Things like this can happen, but won't happen in my class! Your names?"
"Bell, Mathilda Bell!"
"Emma Deeks!"
"Davies, Britt Davies!"
"Juliette Smith!" Julie growled, clenching her jaw and giving her dead pan.
We then wanted to sit down before she turned towards us, shaking her head, taking a piece of parchment out of her pocket and speaking again.
"I do not like the order you sit in. I made my own plan for how you should sit! Starting here," she pointed to the table in front of her.
"Ian Tanner and Bertram Aubrey." Both Ian and Bertram looked shocked, glaring at each other.
"Evan Rosier and Britt Davies." What the hell was going on here? Britt shook her head in disbelief a sad look on her face.
"Jesper Fuller and Mason Baker." Oh thank god, at least on of us was lucky. Mason was a kind, pretty tall and handsome Ravenclaw guy with ash-blond hair. He was always really calm and hid his head in his books. He reminded me a bit of Remus, they were really quite similar. When he sat down he gave Jesper a small smile which Jesper returned.
Mrs Stringer then reached the last row on the window side and said, "Regulus Black and Mathilda Bell!"
Uh, great, it could be worse though. At least I now could keep an eye on him, as I promised Sirius.
He did not seem too happy either while we both made our way towards the last row.
Julie got placed next to Oliver McKinnon, but poor Emma had to sit next to Alecto Carrow.
I really did not understand what the whole plan or idea behind that was. Did she just want to make our lives worse or what was the deal with her?
"In this class there will be no foolish wand waving or silly incantations. In the lessons from now on we will focus on the exact and perfect preparation for your N.E.W.T.s. You can put your wands away, you won't be needing them. If you study hard enough you will be rewarded, if you don't do it you will face severe consequences!"
She then made a movement with her wand so that stacks of books started to fly and three books were placed in front of every pupil.
What the hell? What about practicing spells and preparing us for having to fight against Death Eaters and other things? No, she just wants to focus on the N.E.W.T.s.
"I was really disappointed when I found out how you were taught the past years, so a drastic change was necessary! Otherwise I really fear that you might not pass your exams," she said, fake-smiling into the classroom. She wore a bright red lipstick which looked pretty weird on her extremely thin lips.
"There is literally nothing in these books about using defensive spells. How should be prepare ourselves to fight against what is out there?" Julie exclaimed loudly while slightly lifting herself up from her chair.
"Against what is out there? Against what is out there, some immature and weak teenagers won't anyways be helpful!" Mrs Stringer laughed out, shaking her head at Julie.
"Obviously if we don't learn how to protect ourselves and fight against Death Eaters!" Julie shouted, now anger obvious in her voice.
"That is enough, detention for the whole week Ms Smith," Mrs Stringer said, now glaring at her and pressing her lips together.
"And what do we do if Voldemort attacks us and tries to murder our families. Should we just sit there and look at him and tell our families, ‚oh I am so sorry I only learned about the theory behind spells I can actually not use them, your bad'!" she now shouted, standing up and giving our professor a death glare.
"ENOUGH! I said it was enough but you stupid girl wouldn't listen. Come to my office at 7pm. And do not even dare not show up!" the professor spat.
"And how dare you use his name, obviously you must be muggle born. Otherwise you wouldn't be behave like that! Such immature and stupid behavior."
"You can't say something like that. You are a professor. We have a right to learn how to protect ourselves. And her saying his name in times like this is not wrong. We are in a war. Fear of his name only increases the fear of the person himself," I sternly said, now also getting up.
She just laughed out while putting her hands on her desk and slightly leaning forward.
"Ah Ms Bell, the same big mouth as your mother and also the same bratty attitude as her. You will also have a week of detention. And now, I don't want to hear any other word from the two of you while I continue with my lesson, or the punishment will be severe," she warned, picking up a piece of chalk and turning towards the board.
Regulus next to me looked quite concerned, looking me up and down while Julie and I exchanged sympathetic smiles and rolled our eyes.
What the hell was wrong with this woman? How could someone in times like this act like that?
She talked about things that she took right out of the book and we had to read for a while until she gave us our homework, which was a super long essay about werewolves. Werewolves were not even part of the curriculum in year seven. Regulus and I did not make conversation, he seemed quite shocked by how she was and I was just 100% angry at her.
◇ ◇ ◇
After the lesson I was still incredibly frustrated and angry and actually just wanted to lie down in my bed and cry or cuddle Sirius, but I couldn't. Next we had Potions and thank god at least Slughorn stayed true to himself. He was as usual, a bit confused but quite happy in his doing.
The rest of the day was just gloomy, detention was useless and utterly boring.
-later in the dorm room-
We were all currently waiting for Julie to return until suddenly the door flung open and Julie stood there.
Tears running down her cheeks and empty eyes darting into the middle of the room.
"This woman is the most cruel thing that I have ever come across," she said, walking over to my bed as it was the closest to the door and falling down. We were all completely shocked, voices stuck in our throats when she put her hands forward.
The were bloody scratches on them and the were burning red.
"What the hell has she done?!" I stammered, quickly wrapping my arms around her and pulling her close to me.
"You can't tell anyone. She threatened if I tell anyone she would make sure my father loses his job in the ministry," she bubbled. "This awful bitch turned her wand into a small whip and I had to put my hands on the table. She then whipped me."
We all were completely shocked and I pulled her closer to me as she sobbed into my chest. We tried to convince her that she should tell Dumbledore, but we of course understood that she wanted to protect her father. Since they anyways did not have a lot of money, this job was vital for him.
We decided that Julie would sleep in my bed tonight and I pulled her close to me when she continued sobbing into the pillow, slightly stroking her hair.
This was our last year and I was actually looking forward to it and then that. Why did it have to be so terrible? I was really happy that the Marauders as well as Lily and the other girls already graduated and did not have to endure this.
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I know I know, quite similar to Umbridge's behaviour but that was the plan.
Aaaand I uploaded that now because another one will be up later (since the two are shorter chapters) :)