Chapter 23
Seren frowned as he read the notice pinned in the Ravenclaw common room, their flying lessons would begin on Thursday with Hufflepuff. He’d been looking forward to learning to fly, but was exasperated when he’d learnt that they were learning on brooms of all things. Could witches and wizards get any more clichéd? He was interested in learning how to play their sport called Quiddich as practically everyone from wizarding families talked about it constantly. The wizard-raised students seemed to come up with more and more outrageous stories about broom flying along with narrow escapes from different muggle things. While a lot of the students were looking forward to the flying lessons, not everyone were happy about it. Neville had never been on a broomstick in his life because his grandmother had never let him near one while Hermione was nervous about learning something that she couldn’t learn by heart with books. For the next few days the two of them did their best to study tips on flying from QuiddichThroughtheAges, although Hermione was doing most of the reading with Neville hanging on her every word. Everyone was getting a bit annoyed by her impromptu lectures on flying by the time Thursday finally came around, but she was thankfully interrupted by the arrival of their mail.
Neville was brought a small package from his grandmother and opened it excitedly, revealing a glass marble-sized ball full of white smoke.
“It’s a Remembrall! Gran knows I forget things and this tells you if there’s something you’ve forgotten to do. Look, you hold it tight like this and if it turns red… oh…” Neville broke off his explanation as the Remembrall suddenly began to glow scarlet.
They watched as Neville’s face fell and he hesitantly continued his explanation, “… you’ve forgotten something…”
Hermione tried to comfort Neville as she tried to help him with what he’d forgotten. Seren turned his attention to Ron as he began reading his recent letter from home. Ron had finally managed to gather enough courage to send a letter to his family and his parents had been rather supportive about his house placement. Despite their written support, Ron was still a bit afraid that they wouldn’t be so supportive once he went home for the summer and they tried assuring him that if he ever felt uncomfortable at home that they would love for him to come to their own homes during the summer. Hermione, Neville, and Ron had all noticed that Seren never received any letter from home which they thought was strange. However, when they asked why he never got letters from home, he’d let them know that it was fine and that he texted or called his family every day. He showed his friends his hellphone and Hermione had tried to tell him that he wouldn’t be able to use muggle technology at Hogwarts because of all the ambient magic saturating the air around them. Seren explained that his phone had actually been modified by his father to work inside Hogwarts and was actually charged by the magic around them. Hermione had fired off question after question as she gushed over what his father had done. Seren had managed to stop any further questions when he promised to introduce her to his father over the summer break.
Later that afternoon, the Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs hurried outside to attend their first flying lesson.
Their teacher, Madam Hooch, came outside shortly after them to show them to where they would begin their class. She had short gray hair and yellow hawk-like eyes that stared at them intensely. The students noticed no more than twenty broomsticks lying in neat lines on the ground that looked like they’d seen better days. Seren frowned as he remembered older students complain about how the brooms tended to fly slightly to the left or would vibrate if you flew too high. Seren hoped that nothing bad happened during their first lesson, but he honestly doubted it.
“Well, what are you all waiting for? Everyone stand by a broomstick. Come one, hurry up.” She told them.
Seren glanced down at the old broomstick on the ground next to him, looking at how some of the twigs stuck out at odd angles and felt the probability of nothing bad happening shrink even more. Vortex stood behind him, prepared to intervene if anything happened.
“Stick out your right hand over your broom and say up!”
“Up!” Everyone shouted.
Seren’s broom jumped into his hand at once, but it was one of the few that did. Hermione’s simply rolled over on the ground and Neville’s hadn’t moved at all. Seren thought that it might have been because of the hesitance and fear that tinged their command to their brooms and wouldn’t be surprised if the broomsticks were somehow semi-sentient. Hooch showed them how to mount their brooms without sliding off the end, walking up and down the rows correcting their grips.
“Now when I blow my whistle, you kick off from the ground hard. Keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet and then come straight back down by leaning forward slightly. On my whistle: three, two—”
Before Hooch could finish counting off and blow her whistle, Neville accidentally pushed hard off the ground fearfully.
“Grab him!” Seren told Vortex who rushed to stop Neville from getting too high off the ground.
“Come back, boy!” Hooch shouted as Neville rose straight up quite quickly.
Thankfully, Vortex managed to grab Neville before he got hurt and cradled Neville in his arms carefully. Neville trembled as he clutched Vortex tightly, his face drained of color, as Hooch made her way towards them.
“You can’t just take off before everyone else, boy. No matter how excited you are—” Hooch began before Seren interrupted.
“What is wrong with you?!” Seren told her angrily as he stalked towards them, “Does he look excited to you? Not only did you not move a muscle to help him, you’re now lecturing him on something he did accidentally when he panicked! These brooms are obviously way too old, yet you keep using them! It’s a safety hazard and it was only a matter a time for something dangerous to happen, especially since this class is only taken by first years with some of them only learning how to ride a broom for the first time! We’re leaving and won’t return until you replace these broomsticks with ones that will actually function properly!”
Seren motioned for Vortex to follow him as he began walking back to the castle, Hermione and Ron following them without any hesitation. A few moments later, the rest of their classmates followed them despite Hooch’s protests. Right before they stepped back into the castle, McGonagall stormed towards them with a furious expression painted across her face.
“SERENGOETIA!” She yelled, “How dare you leave class and lead your fellow classmates to follow your dreadful behavior! NeverinallmytimeatHogwarts—”
“You don’t understand, Professor—” Hermione interjected, trying to explain what was going on to her.
“Be quiet, Ms. Granger.”
“But—” Hermione tried to argue, her opinion of the professor that had introduced her to the wizarding world dropping faster by the second.
“That’s enough, Ms. Granger! You have no idea how disappointed I am with your behavior. Goetia, follow me, now.”
“No.” Seren told her, glaring at McGonagall with barely contained rage.
“Excuseme—!” McGonagall began, outraged at being denied by a student.
She’d known he’d bring nothing, but trouble.