Chapter 16

At ten in the morning on the Sunday of the first week of October, I found myself ushered out onto the school's Quidditch Pitch along with all the boys of my year for the Mandatory School Flying Lesson. The Girls had already had theirs yesterday, and Hermione hadn't stopped complaining about how much broom travel had made her queasy during our Cross-House Study Group Session. She'd even gotten into an argument with Ron Weasley over it, as he'd finally showed up to a session after realizing that ducking out was causing him to fall behind. Of course, I broke it up and everyone went back to what they'd been doing, which for me was learning a bit of Herbology from Neville relating to the healing properties of Stinksap and how to concentrate them into Essence of Stinksap, though not before chewing out Ron over his comments to Millie earlier in the year.

Of course, Most of the Purebloods already knew how to fly, Blaise included, but the School had made the first lesson of the year a Mandatory exercise for all first years. It was supposed to show solidarity with those who hadn't been raised in Wizarding Society, which in this case meant Muggleborns. It had been one of Dumbledore's ideas when he'd become headmaster, along with updating the Muggle Studies course to cover the technology and culture of the Muggle World as of the nineteen-twenties, where previously it had only covered up through Victorian Times. Both had been well-intentioned, both had been poorly received and in the case of Muggle Studies, poorly practiced too.

Interestingly, various non-European nations preferred other modes of magical transport. For instance, you'd be hard-pressed to find a North African or Western, Central, or South Asian Wizarding Nation that didn't prefer Flying Carpets to brooms, and most East Asian Wizards preferred mounts to inanimate objects for flight. Even in Southern Europe, Pegasi were preferred to brooms in some places, like Sicily, Calabria, and Apulia in Italy, and large parts of Cyprus, Albania, and Greece. Of course, that never entered the minds of most English Wizards. Hells, the preferences of Scottish, Welsh, and Irish Wizards barely seemed to matter to most English Wizards.

Besides, flying carpets were banned in Wizarding Britain as a protectionist measure. They were a more comfortable ride to broomsticks, and the Wizengamot was worried that if they were imported in commercial numbers, flying carpets would quickly outcompete the native Broomstick Manufacturing. Of course, it helped that due to how wealth tended to be concentrated in Wizarding Britain, that several of the sitting members of the Wizengamot also owned large stakes in the various broomstick companies of Wizarding Britain. A threat to their pocketbooks had to be quashed ruthlessly, after all.

Honestly, the constant and blatant corruption there made the system in Magical Italy look downright capable even to me, and I'd been a victim of the Corruption of the Italian System! At least my aunt had hid she was cutting me out of the line of succession until the decision had been made! Here they practically didn't care. They shouted the decision for everyone to hear over their wireless sets and through their newspapers, the propaganda reasons ringing hollow the moment they were spoken. Salazar Slytherin must be rolling in his grave to see what passes for cunning plots these days.

Regardless, flying lessons were here for all boys whether we cared to learn or already knew how. Madame Hooch was presiding over everything. She was an older witch, though hardly elderly by Wizarding Standards, only being in her late eighties, and had her gray hair pulled up into a series of spiky points. Her eyes were hidden by a pair of dark, smoky-lensed, leather-strapped, goggles like the sort some of the older-school Quidditch Seekers liked to wear to block out the sunlight while looking for the snitch. She gazed out over the assembled First-Year Boys imperiously, pushing her goggles up to reveal yellow, hawk-like, eyes.

There were only three ways she could have gotten those Hawk Eyes, the first was being an Animagus and attaining enough proficiency for a partial transformation. The second was human transfiguration, an extremely high-level skill. Lastly and least likely was that she was a Metamorphagus, but I doubted that. Metamorphagi ran in certain family lines, and Hooch wasn't one of them. Either way, you sliced it, she had some impressive skills off the pitch to get those eyes and I know I wasn't the only one wondering about them, judging by the inquisitive looks that Terry and Anthony were shooting her.

Before any of us could ask, however, a Red-haired, Fifth-year Hufflepuff Prefect made her way over to Madame Hooch with a number of the School Brooms hovering behind her with the Levitation Charm. Just enough for all the First-Year Boys to have one. Madame Hooch turned from staring us all down and nodded at the Prefect who began laying out the brooms on the ground in front of us all.

"Thank you, Miss Appel. You may go now." Nodded Madame Hooch, moving to inspect the brooms.

"What kind of a name is Appel? Sounds muggle to me." Scoffed Draco Malfoy, softly.

"It's Dutch. She must be related to the Heksenveldt Appels. They make Heksenacht Cider, it's good stuff for a chilly autumn day. It has the same effect as a warming charm when drunk." Offered Anthony.

"I've had that. Mum buys it for working in the garden during Winter." Mused Ron.

"How's it taste? Not too much cinnamon, I hope?" Questioned Neville.

"No, just the right amount. Really hits the spot when you've got to de-gnome the garden in December." Answered Ron.

"Why?" Queried Ernie MacMillan.

"Too much cinnamon makes me sneeze." Admitted Neville.

"I have a cousin like that. It's not uncommon." Sympathized Terry.

"Me too, though in her defense, she's allergic. She's from the Muggle half of my family, though, so we can't treat her with charms." Added Justin Finch-Fletchley from Hufflepuff.

"Expected failings of Longbottom and Finch-Fletchley's Muggle Cousin aside, why am I not surprised that your family can't afford to keep a Jarvey to De-Gnome your garden, Weasley?" Sneered Malfoy.

"What's that supposed to mean, Malfoy?" Demanded Ron.

"Must I spell it out for you, Weasley? I would think that horrendous jumper that's a size too large for you would be proof enough of exactly what I mean." Taunted Malfoy.

"Malfoy, lay off him. Weasley may be a bit of a git with a habit of saying things before he thinks them through, but he can hardly be blamed for his family's financial situation. He's the same age as the rest of us. You wouldn't want your father to think you've been claiming credit for your family's success, after all. Imagine how that would go down?" I cut in.

At that, Malfoy blanched, visibly going pale at the implication. I grinned internally at that. The thing about having Lucius Malfoy as your father was that while you grew up in a life of luxury and could lean on family connections, you also had a Death Eater for a father who has all the ego of the aristocracy and all the disciplinary inclinations of someone who willingly served Voldemort. That type of blade cuts both ways, after all.

"No, no I would not want that." Muttered Malfoy.

"Then it stands to reason the same would hold true in reverse, no? Weasley can't be held responsible for his family's financial situation any more than you can be held responsible for yours." I pressed.

"Since when do you care about Weasley?" Asked Malfoy.

"I care about fair play. When it suits me, at least." I shrugged.

"The Sight must have driven you mental. Fine, I retract my statement." Spat Malfoy, then he stomped over toward where Theo Nott was.

"Bloody Hell, I don't think I've ever seen Malfoy back down like that! That was Brilliant!" Beamed Ron.

"Mending fences, Weasley. That's all." I shrugged.

"Sure, but did you have to be an arse about it?" Questioned Ron, suddenly realizing the way I'd gotten Malfoy to back down still meant that I called his family poor. Fortunately, Harry Potter was here to save the day and keep the peace. He elbowed Ron in the ribs before turning toward me.

"He means thank you." Offered Harry.

"I know." I grinned.

"All right, pipe down and focus on me! Today will be the first day of flying lessons and I want no accidents so focus is paramount!" Called out Madame Hooch.

And suddenly all eyes shifted toward the Spiky-Haired Teacher, ready for flying lessons. . .

XXXX

The rest of the flying lesson progressed much in the same way it had in the Books. Madame Hooch gave a short lecture on safety, best practices when flying, and when not to fly. She ended that with the story about being buzzed by a muggle aircraft when she was out flying as a teenager and being forced to land and enact emergency disillusionment to avoid being shot by one of the muggle 'auto-gonnes' the aircraft had or breaking the Statute of Secrecy.

In hindsight, going out flying during the height of a World War that the Muggles were fighting likely also hadn't been the brightest idea, especially since the Necromancers War was being fought on the Wizarding Side of things in France, the Balkans, and North Italy. Teenagers always thought themselves invincible, though, so it was hardly a surprising decision.

"Of course, it's the role of us older Witches and Wizards to make sure you lot don't repeat our mistakes. That's why I've started every first flying lesson for the past forty years with that story and I don't intend to stop now." Insisted Madame Hooch.

I took the words to heart, likely more than any of the other Purebloods in the class. To them, a Muggle 'Auto-Gonne' wasn't anything they couldn't handle. They were idiots who'd grown up either under the assumption that muggles were barbarians who had barely mastered electricity and that such technology would be more likely to explode than be effective against a wizard, or else they'd grown up thinking that muggles were a hapless lot who would constantly ask for magical fixes for the many and varied problems in their society if they knew that Magic was real simply because they couldn't fix the issues themselves. British Pureblood Wizards tended to have very little middle ground in their views depending on what side of the issue they were on.

I doubted that they realized that wars were now fought beyond visual range by muggles, at least for the most part, and that if they were found by a Muggle Fighter Jet, they would have no idea they were under attack until the Missile came striking at them from beyond the horizon, to say nothing of things like nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons. No, there were very good reasons why provoking Muggles by overflying restricted airspace wasn't something that should be done. Most of them wouldn't end well for the Wizard that tried it any more than they would for the Muggle who did something like that.

There were reasons why Grindelwald had started the war he did, after all. At least publically, he'd claimed to have had a vision of a Muggle Weapon of such terrible power that it could wipe an entire city from the map in a single explosion. Apparently, he'd had a flash of the Sight showing him the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and had set out to conquer the world before the Muggles could develop such a weapon and bring it to bear against the Wizards. Supposedly, that was the reason that the Axis Powers had their atomic programs so wildly ineffective, they were his puppets and he had Wizards use Mind Arts to ensure that their atomic scientists couldn't calculate the numbers properly.

Unfortunately, most people in Wizarding Britain didn't care about Grindelwald though. Voldemort had taken his place in the cultural zeitgeist, so nobody ever bothered to look into Grindelwald's War deeply enough to read transcripts of his interrogation by the ICW post-war.

"All right! Now, when I say go, I want you to step over to the broom in front of you, hold out your hands, and say 'up'. That should prime the magic within the broom and allow it to fly into your hand. Most brooms don't require such priming, but the School Budget is what it is, I'm afraid." Intoned Madame Hooch, cutting through my musing on Muggle Capabilities.

I nodded, focused up, and did as I was bid. Fortunately, I had no problems getting the broom to come to my hand. Others weren't so lucky, mostly Muggleborns, but also some of the Half-bloods had to take a couple of tries to get their brooms started. Justin Finch-Fletchley, for instance, took three tries, and even Harry Potter took one and a half tries. I say one and a half because Harry's broom shuddered for a second, then went still, before suddenly leaping into his hand before he could command it to do so again. A problem of visualization owing to his Muggle upbringing maybe?

"Excellent, now once you’ve got hold of your broom, I want you to mount it and grip it tight, you don’t want to slide off the end!" Ordered Madame Hooch.

All of us did so, and I could see some of the others, notably Ron and Malfoy, rolling their eyes at the deliberately slow pace. They were well past this stage but didn't seem to realize that the lesson wasn't about them. For my part, I decided that I was going to just bear with the Mandatory First Lesson and then opt out of the rest of them. That's what someone normal who already knew how to fly would do, if they weren't a prat, anyway.

"Good, now at my whistle, I want each of you to kick off from the ground, hold steady, and hover for a moment, before leaning forward slightly, and touching back down. Do not under any circumstances keep yourself aloft for more than ten seconds, if I see a single broom flying about in the air, the one riding it will find themselves out of Hogwarts faster than you can say Quidditch! The object here is to hover, we'll get to flying properly after!" Commanded Madame Hooch.

Predictably, as she blew her whistle and we all kicked off the ground, Neville did the thing that Neville did in the Books and kicked off the ground far too hard, launching himself up far too high in the air before falling off his broom and crashing to the turf with a cry of pain. He landed on his arm with a loud crunching noise as the rest of us touched down. Some of his housemates moved over to him swiftly, and Madame Hooch had to forcibly part the sea of Gryffindors.

"Out of my way! Back off and give the lad some space!" Demanded Madame Hooch as she made her way over to Neville and helped him to his feet.

"My arm, I think it's broken!" Wailed Neville, tears in his eyes.

Indeed it was. The bones in Neville's forearm had shattered to pieces like a broken length of ceramic pipe, flopping about at the elbow like a fish and poking through the skin in a few places. The sight of how badly his arm was hurt caused Neville to faint and flop to the ground, thankfully not on his arms this time, and forced Madame Hooch to use the Levitation charm on his robes to heft him up off the ground.

"Right, he needs to see Madame Pomfrey. Until I return, you lot are to stay grounded, am I clear?" Insisted Madame Hooch.

A round of nods followed, most sincere, some not. Either way, she left for the Hospital Wing, an unconscious, bloodied, Neville floating behind her. The next part played out just as it had in the Books and in my visions as well. There was a small, smoke-filled, glass sphere lying on the ground, Neville's Rememberall had rolled out of his robe pocket as he'd fainted. It was then snatched up by Malfoy.

"Hey, look at what we have here! It's Longbottom's Rememberall! I wonder if it will activate if he doesn't have it. Maybe I ought to keep it for a few days and teach him to mind his belongings more? Purely for his own good." Smirked Malfoy,

"Clearly, you're a true philanthropist." I snarked, rolling my eyes.

"Give that back, Malfoy. It doesn't belong to you!" Demanded Ron.

"Or what? Are you going to take it from me? I'd like to see you try!" Taunted Malfoy.

"I'll take it if you don't give it back now!" Challenged Harry.

"Playing the hero again, Potter? This isn't one of those ridiculous fairy tales that get put out about your 'adventures'. If you want it, come and get it!" Sneered Malfoy before mounting his broom and flying off. Harry mounted his and flew after him, just as predicted.

What followed was the chase from the Books, playing out exactly as it had, with all the twists and turns that something like that involving the destined protagonist of a novel series and his arch-rival would have. Of course, Harry managed to grab the Rememberall after Malfoy tossed it away as if he were diving for the Golden Snitch. When they both landed, Malfoy growled out the duel challenge I'd been waiting for.

"You think you're so great, Potter? How about a duel? Midnight tomorrow, the Hogwarts Trophy Room. If you even have the stomach for a fight!" Spat Malfoy.

"You're on, Malfoy!" Agreed Harry.

"Goyle will be my second. I suppose you'll be taking Weasley for yours?" Demanded Malfoy.

"I'm with you, Harry, Mate. About time Malfoy got that smile wiped off his bloody face!" Nodded Ron Weasley.

"Then it's settled, don't be late, it's bad form." Huffed Malfoy before walking away.

Just as Malfoy had rejoined the rest of the group, however, Madame Hooch and Professor McGonagall came striding onto the Quidditch Pitch. Both looked absolutely furious, though I was good enough with the Mind Arts now to recognize that Professor McGonagall wasn't nearly as angry as she was pretending to be.

"Mister Potter, Mister Malfoy! My office, now!" Snapped Professor McGonagall.

"And twenty points from both Gryffindor and Slytherin for deliberately disobeying my express commands!" Snarled Madame Hooch.

I winced, that would hurt Gryffindor a lot more than it would hurt us, but it still wasn't going to make Malfoy very popular in our House. At least with the undecided Slytherins, of which, there were fewer than there had been previously, now that Sophie Roper had actively joined my 'faction' after admitting that she was getting a lot out of the Cross-House Study Group. Really, my 'faction' was just people who I was friends with. It was honestly more Daphne's faction since she was more into the leader of our year thing.

As Malfoy and Harry got dragged inside, presumably to get a detention and a position as Gryffindor Seeker respectively, Madame Hooch continued the first flying lesson as planned. She seemed to be unflappable in that regard, which was always a good trait to have in a teacher. I was fairly sure that most of the First-Years learned a lot, even if it wasn't anything the Pureblood section of the class didn't already know. By the time we were released a few hours later, everyone in the First Year was at least capable of flying around slowly.

Everyone except Neville, that is. The poor guy would be laid up in the Hospital Wing for two weeks. Madame Pomfrey had needed to vanish his broken bones and he had to wait two weeks for the Skele-Gro to fully regrow his radius and ulna. It was supposed to be an agonizing wait, but it was the fastest that Madame Pomfrey felt comfortable rushing the Skele-Gro. Supposedly, any faster ran the risk of deformation in the newly grown bones, and nobody wanted that.

I'd visit when I had some spare time not already devoted to training or saving Harry and Ron from the prophesized Ambush, that meant some time next weekend. When I did, I'd bring him a care package, a chocolate assortment from Honeydukes plus a subscription to Herbology Today, a pretty well-respected Herbology magazine. Unfortunately, I would wind up running into Professor Trelawney when I did, and she would assign me detention with Professor Snape for loitering around the Hospital Wing. Snape would have me cleaning Cauldrons by hand for 'Embarrassing Slytherin House'.

Before then, however, I would have to intervene in a duel. It was the only way I could see getting backup to save Millie on Halloween when the trolls came. I needed to be able to call in the favors this would bring to get them on board. I certainly wasn't banking on goodwill with Ron Weasley, not with how our relationship was so schizophrenic, at any rate. Hopefully, it would pan out the way I planned. After all, if it didn't, we'd be screwed and Millie would be dead.

And that was something I refused to countenance. . .

XXXX

AN: All right, so here we get the First Flying Lesson of the Year, along with the Duel Challenge from Malfoy and a bit more World Building.

it turns out, the reason for Flying Carpets being banned in Britain is good old-fashioned trade protectionism. The age-old desire for more money and to avoid their shares in broomstick manufacturers becoming worthless has resulted in the Wizengamot banning flying carpets altogether and forcing people to have licenses to ride Pegasi, Thestrals, and other such flying animals that are popular elsewhere in the world.

Meanwhile, it turns out that most Wizards' understanding of how Muggles fight wars is limited to World War One and the majority haven't heard about things like Fighter Jets, Radar, Nuclear Weapons, and Air-to-Air Missiles. Grindelwald knew about how wars were fought by Muggles Circa the forties and expressly started his conquests to attempt to prevent the Muggles from getting the Atomic Bomb, but most modern British Wizards are too hung up on Voldemort to care about Grindelwald and his reasons.

In a fight between a Wizard and a Modern Professional Soldier, the Soldier tends to win more often than the Wizard does just based on Modern Wizarding Misconceptions about Muggle Technology and capabilities. After all, a modern, depleted uranium, armor-piercing round will actually have enough punch behind it when fired from a modern military-grade weapon, to go through a Shield Charm unless the Wizard is particularly powerful or skilled.

At any rate, the next chapter will cover the fight in the Trophy Room.

Stay tuned. . .