With no small amount of pride she strolled down the school's halls, her charges making a path for her as she made her way to her new office, some of them even going as far as to politely greet her, which caused her heart to warm up, leading her to return the greetings without ruining the stern image she was well known for.
Surprisingly, it was Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw house that had smoothly accepted her as the new headmistress with minimal trouble, with Gryffindor and Slytherin causing the most resistance amongst the student body.
The resistance coming from Slytherin house was to be expected, since she was the former Gryffindor head of house, and by default marked as an 'enemy' by the older students. She had also been responsible for restraining their Head of House's biased and inappropriate behaviour towards the rest of the school. And secondly, she had brutally cracked down on the Slytherin's unacceptable social behaviour that they had long gotten away with, such as bullying and verbal abuse. That had won her a lot of support from Hufflepuff and the muggleborn students, both of which were the Slytherins' primary victims.
Naturally, Hufflepuff had no issue with the new emphasis on hard work and good grades, since it was the cornerstone of their house's values, whilst Ravenclaw had always been a grade driven house.
Her former house of Gryffindor, on the other hand, had really surprised her, and not in a good way, which was rather disappointing. She had expected her former house to be the most well behaved and supportive of her new appointment to the role of Headmistress. The reality was exactly the opposite, with most now rebelling in their own way, testing her at every turn, the vast majority buying wholesale into the idea that the former Headmaster had been unjustly removed from his position. The most vocal group opposing her leadership was lead by none other than Neville Longbottom, which somewhat surprised her, since she always assumed she was one his favourite staff members.
The boy's popularity had returned in recent weeks, mainly due to the Chamber of Secrets being largely forgotten about by his peers and the recent scandal involving Lord Malfoy. He was supported by Molly's boy, Ron, who was busy grumbling about the injustice of his detentions for poor grades and lack of good effort in class.
She wasn't going to punish them for their words and opposition, since she had known for a long time that Dumbledore had paid very close attention to young Neville. The Weasleys were no surprise either, being long standing and extremely loyal allies of the old wizard, so naturally, they were inclined to side with the former Headmaster who had been their patron for so many years.
Then again, her recent actions hadn't won her any favours with Gryffindor house, in particular the fact that she was now actually enforcing the rules on school uniform. This was falling the heaviest on her former messy house, with Severus using that rule on a rather frequent basis to deduct a small amount of points.
This was something she couldn't even challenge, because for once he was actually enforcing the rules. Furthermore, her new rules on minimum homework and grade standards resulted in several of her former lions suffering a series of detentions and the removal of the Weasley twins from their positions as beaters on the house's quidditch team, on account of their failing grades in multiple subjects.
Oliver Wood had been given a similar warning about getting his grades up; otherwise he would suffer the same fate as the twins. It was always dangerous to get between a wizard and his quidditch; there were numerous stories of World Cup quidditch referees going missing after a match for making the wrong call, just to reappear months later in middle of the Sahara desert. She gave a small disapproving shake of her head at such disorder over a simple game, no matter how much she liked it personally.
She knew the action of removing the troublesome twins was overly harsh on her former house and her former prized quidditch team, especially as she had previously ignored their failing grades for years until now. But things had changed with her ascendance to the role of headmistress of Hogwarts; she had to be scrupulously fair with her rulings to ensure that the staff and the whole population of the school saw her as a fair judge, and knew that the rules, while maybe not well liked right now, were being applied evenly to everyone.
She had always known that this would be painful in the short-term, but firmly believed that it would bear fruit in the long-term. Her students would eventually see how it improved the learning environment and the overall education they received at Hogwarts, along with their parents. Her students receiving better grades would mean her changes would be supported, as they got results. However, if the grades went down, well, then she would be in trouble.
The bottom line was that she would not play favourites like Albus did; she would be unbiased in all her rulings. She also had to prove she was the better head teacher to Britain, if she wanted to remain in power. She also silently hoped by forcing the mischievous twins to focus more of their energy on their grades and studies, it would also reduce the free time they had to cause trouble with their numerous pranks. However there was also the chance that all this extra studying would make the pranks far more impressive and creative, which could help the twins make their dream of owning a joke shop one day, a reality.
Nonetheless, this difficult situation was being made worse by Slytherin, who were now actually starting to use some of that collective cunning to bait and goad their hot headed Gryffindor classmates into starting fights, which naturally resulted in her former lions being punished more heavily for throwing the first spell.
In short, most of Gryffindor house liked the old system better, where they could easily get away with their lazy, carefree attitude towards education and grades due mostly to the former headmaster's own laid back attitude to their schooling and discipline. Some of it was due to his faulty belief that 'kids will be kids' and that it just some 'harmless' fun. Though most didn't realize it also had a lot to do with the fact that Dumbledore was one man supposedly doing three full time jobs and didn't have time for much else.
Of course, there was one Gryffindor who heartily approved of all the changes, Miss Granger, who for a while openly argued in favour of the changes, before eventually falling silent rather than continue to be isolated in her own house. She did not blame the second year at all for keeping quiet with such pressure on her, not after the events of her first year and the fear of losing her new friends.
"New Regime," she said to the stone gargoyle guarding the entrance to her office, before the lumbering monster moved to one side for her, granting her access to the moving stairwell to her office.
Her new office had once belonged to her former friend and mentor, 'former' because he was currently quite busy trying to get himself reinstated as headmaster and get her fired. This task was turning out to be a rather big problem for her former boss and a minor one for herself.
Ironically, even with his fall from grace and the loss of all his memories, Lord Malfoy was still being a thorn in Albus' side, quite the stubborn thorn too, and was actually indirectly the reason for the former Headmaster's current woes. The reason for this was funny in a way; the Headmaster or Headmistress of Hogwarts could only be removed from their position by the collective might of the Hogwarts Board of Governors.
And for such a meeting to 'officially occur' and for their decision to have the power to remove her, all eleven school governors had to be present for the 'removal' vote. Other matters could be decided without every member present, but the removal of the current head had to be with the full Board. A rather convenient rule in this case.
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A/N : if we get 400 power stones by the end of the week, I will release an extra chapter ;)
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