That night, the party in the Hufflepuff common room continued until the early hours of the morning.
Thanks to the championship, several Hufflepuff students made surprising progress at the end-of-month Patronus Charm Club.
Kanna even managed to summon a full Patronus before the club session ended. Unsurprisingly, her Patronus was a butterfly. It was stunning; as it flapped its wings, it scattered silver light across the Great Hall, dazzling and bright like a starry sky.
Professor McGonagall looked at the shimring butterfly above the Hall and felt genuine happiness for Kanna. She thought this was the perfect Patronus for her. McGonagall still rembered Kanna as she'd been when she first arrived: timid, quiet, and almost always alone, never initiating interactions.
Now, Kanna was not only cheerful and confident but had also found true friends. She had blossod, little by little, like a butterfly erging from its chrysalis.
It's a pity that such a good child isn't in Gryffindor, McGonagall thought wistfully, feeling a twinge of envy for Professor Sprout.
Perhaps inspired by Kanna's success, just minutes later, the silver mist in front of Cedric began to take shape. In the next mont, a wild goose appeared, soaring above the Great Hall. Cedric clutched his wand, shouting and jumping with excitent.
"Well done!" Professor Lupin said with a smile. "You've truly surprised . I always thought no one under sixth year would achieve this before year's end, but it seems I underestimated you."
"As a reward, Hufflepuff will earn 50 points... 50 points each!"
With Professor Lupin's 100-point addition and the bonus for the Quidditch championship, Hufflepuff shot into first place, now over 80 points ahead of second-place Slytherin. With only a month left in the school year, the House Cup was firmly within reach, and Hufflepuff's spirits soared. Even the weather seed to join in their celebration.
As June approached, the days grew clear and hot. The perfect weather for relaxing by the Black Lake with a few pints of chilled pumpkin juice, chatting, fishing, or playing Exploding Snap. But with exams looming, students couldn't be allowed outside to play. Instead, they were confined to the castle, forcing themselves to morize the contents of their books.
Even Fred and George, usually the life of the party, buckled down, spending every spare mont in the library. They had their O.W.L.s (Ordinary Wizarding Level exams) to face, and their future freedom to develop Weasley joke products depended on doing well.
Kyle wasn't having it easy either. His stress didn't co from the exams but from waiting on the results of a Transfiguration essay he'd submitted to Transfiguration Today over the holidays. The delay had him convinced it might be rejected.
But after one Transfiguration class, Professor McGonagall revealed that his assessnt would be on the day of the exam. If he passed, his paper would be published in the latest issue of Transfiguration Today. With this news, Kyle threw himself into Transfiguration studies, reading everything he could find on the subject.
In this tense atmosphere, the month flew by.
During exam week, the castle was unusually quiet. At lunch, many students grumbled that the exams were impossibly hard—especially the Transfiguration test, where Professor McGonagall had asked them to turn a turtle into a rabbit...
"The rabbit I conjured couldn't even run—it was that awful..."
"Yours was still decent. Mine still had its shell on, so I'm definitely getting a deduction."
After lunch, everyone headed back upstairs for the Charms exam. But as Kyle reached the second floor, he was stopped by Professor McGonagall, who seed a bit agitated.
"The professors have agreed that you don't need to take the exams for Charms and Herbology," Professor McGonagall inford him. "Co with . You have more important things to do now."
"Is it the people from Transfiguration Today?" Kyle asked as they walked.
"That's right," Professor McGonagall replied. "The exams for the fifth and seventh years don't start until three o'clock, so they have ti now." She glanced at him. "So, are you nervous?"
Kyle shook his head. He'd been preparing for a month; as long as they didn't make things overly difficult, he felt he had nothing to worry about.
"That's good," Professor McGonagall said, quickening her pace. "As long as you perform normally, you'll do just fine."
She led Kyle to a classroom adjacent to the library on the second floor and pushed open the door. Inside, three people were chatting and laughing: two middle-aged witches in their fifties and, between them, an elderly witch with a slightly stooped figure.
The older witch looked quite aged, her face lined with wrinkles, but her eyes sparkled with lively energy. As the door opened, she glanced at Professor McGonagall and then quickly shifted her gaze to Kyle.
"Minerva, this must be Kyle, correct?"
"You're absolutely right, Professor Marchbanks," Professor McGonagall said, introducing her. "Kyle, this is Professor Griselda Marchbanks from the Wizarding Examinations Authority..."
"Wrong, Minerva, wrong!" Marchbanks interjected with a smile. "I'm not here in that capacity. For the next hour, I'm simply the editor-in-chief of Transfiguration Today."
She looked at Kyle with a warm expression. "I assu Minerva has already explained why you've been called here?"
"Yes," Kyle replied. "The Transfiguration Today Most Promising Newcor Award assessnt."
"Exactly," Professor Marchbanks said. "No need to be nervous. If you genuinely wrote that paper, this assessnt will be straightforward and should take no more than ten minutes." She paused, then added, "But before we begin, I should clarify sothing. We've been occupied with other pressing matters over the past few months, so the assessnt that was initially scheduled for Christmas had to be postponed until now."
Kyle nodded, understanding the delay.
And if they had co over the Christmas holidays, they wouldn't have found him anyway; he'd been at Nicolas's house, far from Hogwarts, and nearly impossible to track down.
...
Professor Marchbanks didn't waste any ti with small talk. After a brief introduction, she got straight to the point, pulling a thick stack of parchnts from the suitcase on the table.
"First, I'd like you to summarize the core thesis of your paper."
"The difference between partial deformation and multiple deformation at the transitional stage..." Kyle began, quickly laying out his main argunt.
After a few minutes, Professor Marchbanks nodded in approval. She pointed to a teacup on the table. "Now, please transform this teacup three tis... This is to verify that you're truly capable of performing the experintal transformations you described."
"No problem," Kyle said confidently, drawing his wand and pointing it at the teacup.
The teacup transford first into a goblet, then into a slipper... then a teapot, a quill, and finally, a piece of parchnt. In total, he completed five transformations, two more than Professor Marchbanks had requested. Although the final piece of parchnt was slightly misshapen and resembled a slab of hardboard more than parchnt, it was enough to astonish the onlookers.
The two middle-aged wizards exchanged glances, then leaned forward in surprise.
"Are you really only a fourth-year student?" one of them asked, astonished.
"I can vouch for that, Audley," Professor McGonagall confird, stepping forward.
"That's remarkable," the other wizard said in amazent. "I daresay even most Outstanding graduates wouldn't manage five transformations."
As they spoke, Professor Marchbanks tucked the parchnt back into her suitcase.
"Congratulations, young man, you've passed the assessnt," she said with a smile. "Now go on and take your exam—you should still have ti."
Kyle was slightly surprised. Less than ten minutes had passed, and it was already over? Still, relieved at having passed, he simply thanked her and headed toward the door.
Marchbanks watched Kyle leave, then seed to rember sothing. "Wait..." she called.
Kyle, who had reached the door, turned back around.
"You'll be a fifth-year next term, won't you?" Professor Marchbanks asked. "Could you tell which month your birthday is?"
"End of July," Kyle answered.
Professor Marchbanks nodded and didn't ask anything further.
After Kyle left, she turned in the other direction and asked, "Audley, what age did they set for the Age Line? Seventeen?"
"No decision has been made yet." Audley paused, considering. "Most are leaning toward sixteen, but last week soone proposed fifteen as an option, and it received so support. Now they're reconsidering."
"Oh, it's changed again? Who proposed that?"
"Chris," Audley replied. "He's the deputy director of the Departnt for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures."
Reviews
All reviews (0)