October: DADA

Ben sat in the third-floor classroom looking at the board. He had an uneasy feeling, for reasons he couldn’t explain, every time he came to this class. It was as if some dark secret was slowly being chiseled away in his mind. As if the room was trying to tell him something he didn’t know. 

“Ben? You alright?” Chris, the Slytherin kid, asked. 

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Ben lied. “Let’s just get to work. What are the Dark Arts?” He asked, reading the first question. 

“Well, it’s important to point out that they’re not necessarily evil,” Chris observed from the textbook. “It’s about causing injury or destruction, sure, but it’s more about having control over something or someone. Sometimes that’s needed to protect somebody.” 

“I’d never thought of it that way,” Ben replied. “I guess that’s why it’s important to learn about the Dark Arts. In case we have to protect ourselves pr others from things like curses, jinxes or dark creatures.” 

“Yeah, I agree,” Chris nodded. “You know what dark object has always fascinated me? The Black Quill. It’s been used as a painful punishment ever since Delores Umbridge invented it in 1995.” 

“Oh yeah. It made the writer feel intense pain whenever they wrote with it,” Ben cringed. “That’s why it’s considered dark... it basically controls the writer’s hand by making them hurt. It looks like it’s just a normal black quill, like all the other quills, but it’s hardly normal.” 

“Dark creatures ate interesting too,” Chris mused. “The Lethifold especially. They’re meat-eaters, and people think they’re dark because they can be super scary and dangerous. Only the Patronus Charm can save you from them.” 

“I think that answers all our questions. Let’s go hand this in,” Ben said, and the boys headed to the front with their work.”