A Sirius Matter [Harmione]

9. Practicing Magic

The next morning, Harry and Hermione showed up at Sirius' house at exactly eight o'clock. They were a bit surprised to find Ginny there.

"Good morning, Ginny," said Harry. "I guess you're here to practice your hexes until we start dueling at ten."

"Er, actually," said Ginny nervously, "I was kind of hoping you'd let me join your training. I mean, I'm already sworn to secrecy. It wouldn't hurt for me to learn extra skills."

Harry said, "What do you think, Hermione?"

"I don't suppose it'll do any harm, love." Hermione then turned to Ginny. "We're studying something different every day of the week. Here's our list. Today we're studying becoming animagi. It's supposed to take a year to complete that. We'll be continuing with this at Hogwarts. We should get through a few of the other subjects within a month and change to new ones."

"Animagus training?" said Ginny, "That sounds exciting! I've always wanted to be able to become an animal! It's too bad it takes a year, but oh well. How will we begin?"

They sat next to each other (with Hermione in the middle) and together read the first chapter. When they were finished, Harry said, "Wow. Maybe we should call Sirius to see how the Marauders began their training. He'll probably have a few tips."

"Sirius?" said Ginny, looking surprised. "Is he an animagus?"

"Yes, he, along with my dad and Peter Pettigrew, became illegal animagi while still at Hogwarts."

"Wow," said Ginny, clearly impressed.

Harry pulled out his small mirror and said, "Snuffles."

"Hello, Harry," said Sirius when he appeared. "How are you doing?"

"Alright. We just read the first chapter of an animagus book, and were wondering if you had any tips or advice about how to learn to transform."

After Sirius had talked for over an hour, describing the way he had prepared for the first step, which included practicing some meditative techniques to prepare for the magical meditation to learn your form. They hoped to be able to do it in a week, but Sirius said that it would take at least two weeks of practicing daily meditation for an hour before they could achieve the proper state to learn their animal.

When they were finished with that conversation, they all walked to the dueling room. Harry said, "It's everyone for him or herself. The way to win the duel is to either incapacitate or disarm everyone else. Defend yourself. Petrificus Totalus!" Harry aimed that first hex at Ginny, who barely dodged in time.

She got mad from that cheap shot and shouted, "Bates Mocus!" while pointing her wand at Harry.

Harry didn't notice what Ginny was doing, because at the time, he was pointing his wand at Hermione, preparing to curse her. When he was hit by Ginny's hex, he felt the weirdest sensation of his life as his own bogies were pulled out of his nose and turned into little bats that started attacking his head. He heard Hermione's amused voice shout, "Petrificus Totalus," and he soon found himself lying stiff on the ground unable to move while being attacked by mucus bats. The duel continued with the two girls fighting each other furiously, with them each dodging the other's hexes.

Finally Hermione saw an opportunity to use a strategy Harry had previously used on her. Ginny was directly between Hermione and a folding chair. "Accio, chair," Hermione muttered, causing the chair to run into Ginny from behind.

Ginny made herself fall to the ground to avoid the 'stupefy' spell that Hermione sent the moment the chair made contact, but was unable to get up fast enough to escape the 'expelliarmus' curse that immediately followed.