Memory 2
The first thing that triggered Prongs’ senses were the chatter of people all confined in a small room. There were girls giggling, other boys chuckling about things, people all around him talking about something. Prongs felt himself breath deeply through his nose, the musty sent of the room filling him immediately.
“Honestly, did she really have to sit away from us? Just because we’re not in the front row…” a voice trailed off beside him, but Prongs didn’t have time to reply, since there was the bang of a door and the whole classroom went silent. The only thing that sounded was the clunking of a lame or fake leg.
After an awkward silence, a new, gruff voice began speaking, “Alastar Moody. Ex-Auror and your new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. I’m here because Dumbledore asked me to, end of story!”
Well, Prongs didn’t really think that much was necessary, but it kept the whole room silent for sure. Moody continued, “I’ve had a letter from Professor Lupin about this class. Seems you’ve had a pretty thorough grounding in tackling Dark creatures, but you’re very behind on curses.”
All of this sounded very foreign yet strangely familiar to Prongs as he sat there and listened. The teacher continued, “Can anyone tell me how many Unforgivable Curses there are?”
There was a dead silence across the room. But someone from the front row finally answered, “Three, sir. There are three.”
“And they are so named?”
“Because they are unforgivable. The use of any one of them will-“
“Send you straight to Azkaban prison, correct. The Ministry thinks you’re too young to learn of these curses, but I say different. You need to learn what you are up against, you need to be prepared! You need to put that away, Miss Brown, while I’m talking!” Moody ranted, and there was a little titter somewhere near Prongs from the girl he just called out.
“Weasley!”
“Y-Yes?” came the voice of the boy next to him. Prongs had a feeling this boy meant a lot to him somehow.
“Give us a curse.”
“Well,” the boy, Weasley, began uncertainly, “My dad did tell me about one… the Imperius Curse.”
“Ah yes,” Moody agreed, and Prongs heard him clobber away towards the front of the class. After a little bit of shuffling, and a quick spell ‘Engorgio,’ Moody continued, “Your dad would know all about that one.”
“Spiders,” Weasley whispered softly besides him, “Why’s it gotta be spiders?!”
Then Moody said the next spell loud it enough for the entire class to hear. “Imperio!” The class for some reason, erupted into a mixture of laughter and horror, but Prongs didn’t hear himself laughing at all. Weasley besides him was whimpering quite loudly, though.
“Think this is funny?” Moody boomed, and instantly the whole class went silent, “Would you like this if I did it to you?”
No one answered.
“Scores of witches and wizards claimed they only did You-Know-Who’s bidding, only under the influence of the Imperius curse. But… how to sort out the liars?” Moody hypothetically questioned. “Another one?”
Slowly, someone answered. “Um… the Cruciatus Curse…”
“Correct! The torture curse. …Crucio!”
Prongs didn’t need to see in order to know what was happening. The only thing he heard was the screams that the spider was softly making towards the front.
After a few more moments of the torturing of the spider, someone from the front row yelled out, “Stop it! Can’t you see it’s bothering him?!”
Moody must have lifted the spell, because immediately the screaming stopped. There was an awkward silence, save Moody’s slow clobbering. After a moment, he asked, “Perhaps you could give us the final curse, Miss Granger?”
Silence.
“No? …Avada Kedavra!”
The shot of magical energy sounded and then nothing. Prongs heard Weasley take in a sharp breath of air besides him.
“The Killing Curse. Only one person has been known to survive it. And he’s sitting right here in this very room,” Moody explained calmly. And though Prongs couldn’t see, he knew… knew who he was talking about.
Only one person has been able to survive the Killing Curse. And it was…
Avada Kedavra
Avada Kedavra
Avada Kedavra
Avada Kedavra