Magic? || Years 1-5

The Unforgivable Curses: Year 4

It was finally time for the Gryffindors to have their Defense Against the Dark Arts lesson with Professor Moody.

Everyone was so excited they had all lined up outside the door right after lunch, chatting excitedly. News had traveled fast through the castle about how interesting Professor Moody's classes were.

Well, everyone except for Hermione, who rushed up to join them just before the bell.

"Been in the -- " She began.

"Library," Harry finished, peering into the classroom. "C'mon, quick, or we won't get decent seats."

They did end up getting good seats, however, all four of them in the front with their copies of The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self Protection in front of them as they waited in a somewhat eerie silence.

Amisty straightened up suddenly, everyone except her friends throwing her confused glances. She could hear the sound of Moody's limping footsteps, and soon enough as the noise slowly grew in volume he pushed open the door.

"You can put those away, those books. You won't need them," He told them as soon as he walked in.

Hermione, though hesitantly, packed her book away carefully in her back.

Professor Moody was checking the register, calling out names as his magical eye swiveled around to look at every student as he called them out.

"Here," Amisty squeaked when her name was called, sinking down into her seat with embarrassment.

Ron looked faintly amused, but he didn't seem to want to comment on anything with Moody there.

"Right then, 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?" Moody asked once he was finished. The class murmured their assent.

"But you're behind -- very behind -- on dealing with curses. 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 -- " He went on.

"What, aren't you staying?" Ron interrupted, his eyes going wide.

Moody's eye swiveled over to look at him, and then... he smiled.

Ron heaved a sigh of relief.

"You'll be Arthur Weasley's son, eh? Your father got me out of a very tight corner a few days ago..." Moody nodded. "Yeah, I'm staying just the one year. Special favor to Dumbledore... One year, and then back to my quiet retirement."

He laughed harshly and clapped his 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, Miss Brown, when I'm talking."

Lavender jumped, going very red in the face. She had been showing Parvati her completed horoscope.