Felix did not go to Charms.
He was excused — Flitwick taught him privately, so there was no reason for him to sit through lessons he had already outgrown.
The same was true of Transfiguration.
McGonagall had excused him from class the day after the first private lesson, and nobody had questioned it.
The other first-years had noticed, of course.
Fred and George had noticed more than anyone.
But they didn’t ask, because Felix didn’t offer, and because whatever was going on with him was clearly being handled by the professors.
So instead of Charms, Felix had a free period.
And instead of Transfiguration, he had another free period.
Two hours of nothing, every day, that he could spend however he wanted.
He spent them in the library, reading Andros’s notes and cross-referencing them against whatever books on dueling theory he could find.
He had filled half a notebook already.
The other half was waiting for him.
But Defense Against the Dark Arts was not optional.
Everyone attended DADA.
And so, on Wednesday morning, Felix walked into the DADA classroom for the first time.
The room looked ordinary.
Desks, chairs, a blackboard at the front.
The only thing unusual about it was the arrangement — instead of rows, the desks had been pushed into a wide circle, so that every student could see every other student, and no one could hide at the back.
A man was sitting in a chair near the front of the circle.
He was tall, grey-haired, dressed in plain black robes.
His face was weathered, and there was a thin white scar running from his left ear down to his jaw.
He was not doing anything.
He was just watching the door.
Felix took a seat.
Fred and George took seats on either side of him.
Jonah sat down across the circle.
The rest of the class filed in, and the man waited until everyone was seated before he spoke.
“My name is Professor Vane,” he said.
His voice was low and rough, the way a voice sounds after years of shouting over wind.
“I am your Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. Before we begin, I have a question.”
He looked around the circle.
“What is a Dark Art?”
Nobody answered.
Vane waited.
He did not repeat the question.
He did not prompt anyone.
He just sat there, patient, watching the class the way a man watches a fire he did not build.
Finally, a girl near the back raised her hand.
“Yes?”
“Something that hurts people.”
Vane nodded slowly.
“All right. What else?”
“Something that’s illegal,” a boy said.
“Also true.” Vane’s eyes moved to the next student.
“What else?”
The answers came more slowly after that.
Something evil.
Something that uses dark magic.
Something that kills.
Vane listened to all of them, and his expression did not change.
He did not correct anyone.
He did not praise anyone.
He simply took in each answer the way a man takes in the shape of a room he is about to walk through.
When the answers stopped, he spoke again.
“All of those are true,” he said.
“None of them are complete. But that’s not the point of the question. The point is that you don’t know what a Dark Art is. Not really. You’ve heard the phrase. You’ve read the books. You’ve been told what to be afraid of. But you don’t know what it looks like when it’s standing in front of you.”
He stood up.
He was taller than he had looked sitting down, and there was something about the way he moved that made the room go quieter than it already was.
“That’s what we’re going to fix this term. Not spells. Not counter-curses. Recognition. By the end of this year, you’ll be able to look at a situation and know whether it’s dangerous. You’ll be able to look at a person and know whether they intend you harm. You’ll be able to look at a spell and know what it is before it lands.”
He walked to the blackboard and picked up a piece of chalk.
“The first thing you need to understand is that the Dark Arts are not a list of spells. They are a way of thinking. And you cannot defend against a way of thinking with a spell.”
He wrote a single word on the board.
Intent.
Vane turned back to the class and set the chalk down.
“Pair up,” he said.
“One of you will cast. The other will defend. It doesn’t matter what spell you use. It doesn’t matter if you hit. What matters is that the defender watches the caster’s wand, not their face.”
The class shuffled into pairs.
Fred paired with George, which Felix suspected was a bad idea for everyone involved.
Felix found himself facing a Hufflepuff girl whose name he did not know, and they stood across from each other in the circle while Vane walked slowly around the outside of the room.
“Begin.”
The Hufflepuff girl raised her wand.
Felix did not look at her face.
He looked at her hand.
Her fingers tightened on the handle.
Her wrist angled.
Her shoulders shifted.
She cast.
He dodged before the spell left her wand.
Vane walked past them without a word.
He did not praise Felix.
He did not correct the girl.
He simply watched and moved on.
Felix and the Hufflepuff girl went again.
She cast, he dodged.
She cast, he dodged.
On the fourth attempt, he saw her shoulders shift and moved — but she had learned, too.
She had adjusted her timing.
The spell clipped his shoulder and he felt a faint sting.
“Better,” Vane said from somewhere behind him.
“She adapted. You didn’t.”
Felix did not answer.
He adjusted his footing and raised his wand again.
They went again.
And again.
And again.
By the end of the exercise, Felix had learned more about reading people than he had learned in three weeks of dueling drills in his father’s hall.
He had learned that Fred always shifted his weight before casting.
He had learned that George’s eyes narrowed just before he moved.
He had learned that Jonah’s hand shook slightly when he was nervous, and that the shake was the tell, not the wand.
He had learned that the Hufflepuff girl tilted her head to the left before she cast, and that if he watched for it, he could dodge every time — until she learned to stop doing it.
Vane called the exercise to a halt.
He walked back to the center of the circle and stood there, hands clasped behind his back, looking at the class the way a man looks at a field he is about to plant.
“You learned something,” he said.
It was not a question.
Nobody answered.
“You learned that a person’s body tells you what they’re about to do before they do it. You learned that a wand hand is more honest than a face. You learned that if you watch the right thing, you can see a spell before it’s cast. That’s the beginning of Defense Against the Dark Arts. Not the shield charm. Not the counter-curse. The ability to see what’s coming.”
He looked around the circle.
“Most of you won’t keep it. You’ll forget by next week. You’ll go back to watching faces and reacting to spells after they’ve already been cast, because watching hands takes effort and reacting is easier. That’s fine. That’s what most people do. But the ones who keep it — the ones who practice it — will be the ones who survive.”
His eyes moved across the circle and landed on Felix.
Just for a moment.
Then they moved on.
“Next lesson, we’ll talk about what to do with that knowledge. Before then, I want each of you to practice. Watch people. In the corridors, in the Great Hall, in your dormitories. Watch their hands. Watch what they do before they do it. You don’t need a wand for that. You just need to pay attention.”
He paused.
“One more thing. If any of you think this class is going to be easy, you’re wrong. I don’t teach easy. I teach useful. If you want easy, go find a different professor.”
Nobody laughed.
Vane didn’t look like he was joking.
“You’re dismissed.”
The class filed out.
Felix gathered his things and walked into the corridor with Fred and George.
Fred was rubbing his shoulder where George had clipped him during the exercise.
“He’s strange,” Fred said.
“He’s demanding,” Felix said.
“Same thing.”
“It’s not.”
Fred looked at him.
“You liked him.”
Felix thought about it.
Vane had not praised him.
Vane had not corrected him.
Vane had simply watched and moved on, the way a man moves on when he is waiting for something more interesting than what he has just seen.
It was not encouragement.
It was not discouragement.
It was assessment.
“I don’t know yet,” Felix said.
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s an answer.”
“Let it go,” George said.
“He’s not going to tell us.”
Fred sighed.
“Fine. But I’m keeping a list.”
Felix did not ask what the list was for.
He went to lunch.
The rest of the day passed quietly.
History of Magic with Binns was the same as always — Jonah stared at the ghost with the quiet horror of someone who had not yet accepted that a dead man was teaching him.
Felix took notes he would never need and thought about intent.
About the way a person’s wand hand betrayed them before their face did.
About what Vane had said.
The ones who keep it will be the ones who survive.
After lunch, he had a free period.
He went to the library and read more of Andros’s notes.
The section he was on was about reading an opponent’s body, and Andros had written something Felix had read three times and was still turning over in his mind.
The face lies.
The mouth lies.
The eyes lie.
But the wand hand never lies.
Watch the hand.
The hand is the truth.
Felix read it a fourth time.
Vane’s lesson and Andros’s notes were saying the same thing, and they were saying it in different ways.
Vane had taught it through exercise.
Andros had written it down.
Both of them had learned it from the same place — experience.
The kind of experience Felix did not have yet.
He needed more practice.
He needed someone to cast at him until dodging was as natural as breathing.
He needed the Room.
He filed the thought away and went to dinner.
At dinner, Fred leaned over and asked him where he had been all afternoon.
“Library,” Felix said, between bites.
“All afternoon?”
“All afternoon.”
Fred looked at George.
George looked at Fred.
Neither of them said anything else.
They had been watching Felix all day, and Felix knew they had been watching, and they knew he knew, and nothing had changed.
Felix finished his dinner, said goodnight, and went up to the dormitory.
He did not sleep.
He lay in bed until the others were asleep, and then he got up, dressed silently, and made his way to the seventh floor.
The Room of Requirement was exactly as he had left it.
The wooden figures were still on the shelves.
The practice objects were still arranged along the walls.
The book on the table still read: Practice what you have read.
When you have mastered it, the room will give you more.
Felix walked to the center of the room and set one of the figures on the floor.
It raised its wand.
He began to move.
He thought about what Vane had taught him.
Watch the hand, not the face.
He thought about what Andros had written.
The hand is the truth.
He watched the figure’s tiny wooden wand, and he watched the way it angled before it cast, and he moved before the spark left the tip.
He dodged the first spark.
He dodged the second.
The third clipped his shoulder, and he adjusted.
He practiced until four in the morning.
When he finally stopped, his arms were shaking and his shirt was damp with sweat, and he had learned something new.
He had learned that the figure did not adapt.
It cast the same way every time.
It was not a partner.
It was a target.
And if he wanted a partner, he would need to ask the Room for something better.
He filed that away too.
Then he went back to Gryffindor Tower and slept.