Coup de Foudre [Fred Weasley] [4]

⚡️ Chapter 16 ⚡️

Once everyone had settled into their seats, Vega looked up and around the Great Hall – her grey eyes training on the High Table to see who was there. She could see all the old faces from last year there, aside from Professor Lupin. Hagrid was, at the moment, away and most likely fighting his way across the lake with the first years, and Professor McGonagall must be supervising the drying of the entrance hall floor. She glanced over at the seat the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher took.

"There's no one sitting in that chair," Vega said as she turned to look at her friends, a frown adorning her lips. "Shouldn't the teacher be in their chair by now? It's only Hagrid and Professor McGonagall who are busy before the Sorting Ceremony... look, even Professor Trelawney is around, and you know that she rarely ever shows up, even when it's the first day back to school..."

They had never yet had a Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher who had lasted more than three terms. And Professor Lupin had been Vega's most favourite Professor at Hogwarts, especially of Defence Against the Dark Arts.

"Maybe they couldn't get anyone!" Hermione said, looking rather anxious, but Vega shook her head no as she turned back to glance at the High Table once more.

Tiny little Professor Flitwick, the Charms teacher, was sitting on a large pile of cushions beside Professor Sprout, the Herbology teacher, whose hat was askew over her flyaway grey hair, and she was talking to Professor Sinistra of the Astronomy department. And on her other side was –

Snape, the sallow-face, hook-nosed, greasy-haired Potions' Master – Vega's least favourite person at Hogwarts. She especially disliked him after his behaviour last year, and because he loathed them and Harry, the Gryffindors and even traumatised Neville to the point that his Boggart turned into him.

On Snape's other side was an empty seat – Professor McGonagall's. And next to it, in the very centre of the table, sat Professor Dumbledore, the headmaster, his sweeping silver hair and beard shining in the candlelight, his magnificent deep green robes embroidered with many stars and moons.

The tips of Dumbledore's long, thin fingers were together and he was resting his chin upon them, staring up at the ceiling through his half-moon spectacles as though lost in some deep thoughts.

When Vega traced his gaze up to the ceiling, she noticed that it was stormy like never ever before.

Black and purple clouds were swirling across it, and as another thunderclap sounded outside, a fork of lightning flashed across it. It had become even worse than the storms they had last year around.

"Oh, hurry up," Ron moaned from beside Harry. "I could eat a hippogriff,"

The words were no sooner out of his mouth when the doors of the Great Hall were opened and silence fell. Professor McGonagall was leading a long line of first years up to the top of the Hall.

If Vega, Harry, Ron, and Hermione were wet, it was nothing to how these first years looked.

They appeared to have swum across the lake rather than sailed on little boats, as each and every single one of them were shivering with a combination of cold and nerves as they filed along the staff table and came to a halt in a line facing the rest of the school.

"Oh my, they're all so tiny," Vega said, genuinely surprised.

"You're just too tall," Hermione replied, who only came up to Vega's shoulders.

"I guess..." Vega trailed off, but she smiled slightly at the students. "I feel bad for them – it's really cold, and I bet they're all really scared. Look at them shivering like leaves,"

Suddenly, a last student came by to join the children, and Vega noted that he was the smallest of the lot, with mousy hair and he wrapped up in what Vega recognised to be Hagrid's moleskin coat.